by Jesse Hill
In his book, Life Together, Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes about seven ministries that every follower of Jesus is called to for the sake of Christian community. These seven ministries (plus two of my own additions) are ways in which we can practice welcoming and accepting one another as Christ has accepted us (Romans 15:7).
1. The ministry of holding your tongue
Sometimes, when you are in community with someone who has different ideas from your own, or who is acting in a way you don’t approve of, the most helpful thing you can do is to say nothing. There are endless temptations to gossip about one another, to speak condemning words, to speak foolishly about our own ideas. But, Jesus has not condemned us, and we choose not to speak ill of one another. If you read the letters of the New Testament, or the wisdom books of the Old Testament, you will encounter countless instructions to speak carefully, both for your own sake and for the sake of others. Ephesians 4:29 says, Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. Sometimes our best ministry is to say nothing if we don’t have anything beneficial to say.
2. The ministry of meekness
The ministry of meekness or humility is about not thinking of yourself as being above others. We do not think of ourselves more highly than we ought. We know that the way of arrogance and pride is destructive to both the community and to ourselves. Instead, we seek to emulate the humility of Jesus by choosing to make ourselves lower than others. In Philippians 2, we read the instruction to make our attitudes like Christ Jesus, who made himself a servant and became obedient even to the point of death. We serve one another by considering the needs of others as being more important than our own, and when we do this, we become living representations of Jesus for one another.
Bonhoeffer also points out that the ministry of meekness includes considering our own sins as being more serious than the sins of others. Jesus warned that some people love to point out the sins of others while being ignorant of their own, he said it is like someone pointing out a speck of dust in a brother’s eye, while ignoring the plank in our own eye (Matthew 7:3-5) It’s an absurd image, and one that reminds us not to think of ourselves as being better than others.
3. The ministry of listening
The ministry of listening to one another is a way that we can represent Jesus to one another. After all, the Lord listens to our prayers. When we listen to one another, we become a living picture of what Jesus is like. Bonhoeffer wrote that he found that Christians were bad at listening because we’re all too eager for our turn to speak and tell the other person what we think. That was 80 years ago, and I’m not sure all that much has changed. Let’s resolve to become more like Jesus in listening to one another.
In Mark 5, there is a story of Jesus on his way to heal the daughter of an important Roman official, but then Jesus encounters the woman with the issue of blood who touched the hem of his garment. Jesus stopped in the middle of the crowd and listened to her as she told him the whole truth. I once heard a sermon by Christina Cleveland on this passage, where she asked, How long do you think it took for this woman to tell her whole truth? The woman in the passage was an oppressed minority living for twelve years with a condition that ostracized her from the community. She probably had a lot to say. Yet Jesus thought it was worth his time to listen. Let’s be like that.
What would it change in our community if we could learn to listen to those who are hurting? Or those who are full of doubt? Or those who have been wounded by the church? It’s an incredible privilege to be trusted with another person’s story. What if we could honor that trust by listening like Jesus listens?
4. The ministry of helpfulness
The ministry of helpfulness is pretty straight forward, but some of us (I’m thinking of myself) have difficulty with this. What Bonhoeffer is referring to here is the simple practice of stopping what you’re doing to help out a brother or sister in need. We’re all so busy with our own lives and projects and worries, and the ministry of helpfulness is about stopping to notice the lives and projects and worries of the people around us. It’s about allowing ourselves to be interrupted.
Henri Nouwen wrote about meeting an old priest who told him, I have always been complaining that my work was constantly interrupted; then I realized that the interruptions were my work. Can we notice who God has put in front of us and tend to their needs? Again, Jesus was continually interrupted, and served all who came to him.
Often, doing simple deeds of love and mercy is what actually gives us credibility when we speak about the love and mercy of God. James wrote that it does no good to simply tell someone to go in peace, keep warm and well fed if we don’t first attend to their physical needs (James 2:15-16).
5. The ministry of bearing
The ministry of bearing is about bearing one another’s burdens. This comes from Galatians 6:2, which says, carry each other’s burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the law of Christ. You might remember that old song, “He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother.” We are bound together as brothers and sisters by the grace of God, and this means that your burden is my burden. It means your grief is mine, and I’m going to sit and weep with you. It means I’m going to live as though your struggles and hardships are my own to carry. It even means that your sin is not only your own, but weighs on the whole community. If I see you struggling, I’m going to come alongside you and struggle, too, and you’re going to do the same for me, because ultimately Jesus has already done this for us.
Now, there are caveats to this; we don’t want those who are weak to be jeopardized by trying to help others who suffer the same weakness. You wouldn’t send a person who can’t swim to save someone who has fallen overboard. But together, we consider our burdens, physical, financial, spiritual, and emotional, as belonging to all of us.
6. The ministry of proclaiming
For Bonhoeffer, it is only when these other ministries are functioning somewhat correctly that we really earn the right to then enter into the ministry of proclaiming. This is the ministry of proclaiming God’s word, from one person to another in the midst of daily life. This is not the same thing as a pastor who preaches a sermon; in fact, Bonhoeffer says that it’s much easier for a person to prepare notes to read in the pulpit than it is for us to speak God’s word clearly and boldly to one another in the midst of a conversation. To do this, your thoughts and words have to be saturated with God’s word. You have to be willing to be attentive to the leading of the Holy Spirit and what he wants to say to your brother or sister.
Colossians 4:6 says, let your conversations always be full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. Earlier in the same letter, we read the instruction to let the word of Christ dwell among you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. (Colossians 3:15)
We can proclaim God’s word to one another when we give thanks to the Lord for his blessings, when we encourage someone who is struggling, when we correct someone in sin or error, and when we proclaim God’s forgiveness for that same sin.
7. The ministry of authority
The ministry of authority is Bonhoeffer’s last category, and it has to do with authority in the church. In every church, there are some people who are seen as leaders in some sense. In our church, we elect elders who are charged with spiritual leadership in our community; we also hire staff, appoint growth group leaders and choose people to serve on ministry teams or communities. The crucial thing about any kind of authority in the church is that it is always upside down from how human authority tends to work.
Bonhoeffer writes that people often seek to place authoritative personalities in positions of leadership in the church, but this comes from a “spiritually sick need for the admiration of human beings” because the true spiritual authority of of serving God looks so unimpressive from the the outside.
In the church, though, leaders are called to emulate Jesus by serving others and choosing the lowest place in the community. What we need is not more big personalities and powerful ideas about how to get people in line. What the church desperately needs is humble people who can serve the church by obeying Jesus. The way that we then put this ministry of authority into practice is by seeking to develop, honor, and trust those leaders who are singularly focused on living according to the grace of God and by not elevating some people to a position that is somehow outside of or above our common status as brothers and sisters in Christ.
8. The ministry of vulnerability (my own addition)
When we are free and courageous enough to be vulnerable with each other, we open up a window for someone else in the community to practice any of the ministries above. If I tell you that I’m having a hard time, then you can practice the ministry of listening to me. If I tell you that I’m overwhelmed, you can practice the ministry of bearing my burden with me. If I can be vulnerable enough to tell you that there is an issue of sin in my life, then you can practice the ministry of proclaiming God’s righteous word to me, and proclaiming God’s forgiveness for me if I am willing to confess my sins to him.
Anytime we can be vulnerable enough to show our failures and weaknesses, we are creating an opportunity for the grace and power of God to become more evident in our lives. The Apostle Paul does this all the time in his writings. He says he is the chief of sinners, that his ministry is one of weakness, that he speaks with humility and trembling, because he wants us to see through him to the power and grace of God. The ministry of vulnerability is a way of showing that we are here because of the grace of God. Nothing more, nothing less.
9. The ministry of reconciliation (my own addition)
I didn’t really invent this one, Paul named it, and Jesus did it. Jesus has reconciled us to God and to one another in the cross (Ephesians 2:16). The spiritual reality is that we are already reconciled, and our ministry of reconciliation is about figuring out how to live according to what is already spiritually true about us and about our relationships. When we live out the reconciliation that Jesus has made possible for us, we become living examples of what is offered to the entire world. “We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God.” (2 Corinthians 5:20).
10. ???
Can you think of another way in which we can accept one another in the same way that Christ has accepted us? What would you add to this list?