What is a Christian minister?
A "minister" in ordinary speech usually means a man with a title, a training, and a pulpit — but the New Testament word points somewhere else entirely. The commentators press two questions: who makes a person a minister, and what is he actually for?
The word simply means servant
Behind the English word lies a Greek word used of waiting at tables as much as of preaching. One writer traces it through its uses to show how wide the idea is:
C J DavisThe word translated "ministry" is the same word that is elsewhere translated "service" and "waiting"; and the word "minister" comes from a Greek word which means a servant, a doer, a waiter, an officer. So you must not limit it to one particular kind of service.
Christ alone makes one
Every writer here traces ministry back to a gift given by Christ Himself, and refuses to let anything else stand in for it — not learning, not eloquence, not appointment:
C. H. MackintoshWe hold that unless a man has a direct gift from Christ, though he had all the learning of a Newton, all the philosophy of a Bacon, all the eloquence of Demosthenes, he is not a Christian minister. He may be a very gifted and effective minister of religion, so called; but a minister of religion and a minister of Christ are two different things. And further, we believe that where the Lord Christ has given a gift, that gift makes its possessor a Christian minister, whom all true Christians are bound to own and receive, quite apart from all human appointment.
Where a human ceremony is made the gateway instead, the damage runs both directions:
William KellyThe effect is this: it accredits a number of men who are not ministers of Christ, and discredits a number of men who are His ministers, because they have not gone through that particular innovation.
Not the same as being a priest
The Bible speaks of all believers as priests, and that is a different thing from being a minister of the word. Kelly separates the two carefully:
William KellyAll Christians, without exception — men, women, and children — are priests... Priesthood, in a word, gives the soul the title to draw near to God... So while priesthood is universal, and no one can be a Christian without being a priest, it is only a few among the many who are what Scripture calls ministers of the word or public servants of Christ.
Answerable to one Master
If the call comes from Christ, then the account is owed to Christ — which raises an awkward question about being employed by anyone else:
Raymond K. CampbellIf someone is called to be the Lord's servant, how can he hire himself out as the servant of a denomination or a congregation and do what men tell him to do? When a man is hired, he becomes a servant to those who hire him and must please them... Paul wrote to the Galatians, "If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ."
Two lines of service
Paul described himself as made a minister twice over in one chapter, and commentators take the two descriptions as two distinct fields of work held together in one man:
J. N. DarbyNotice these two ministries: the preaching of the gospel in all creation under heaven, and Paul's service as minister of the church. These two ministries are distinct, but we see them combined in the person of Paul. Ministries lower than the apostleship are generally given for one or other of these two branches of service, though God does sometimes use one and the same servant to meet the very varied needs of souls.
The message, and the man behind it
The subject of true ministry is never the minister. Commenting on Paul's refusal to preach himself, Kelly links the two halves of the verse:
William KellyOthers might preach themselves; the apostle preached Christ Jesus as Lord. He was content to be the servant of Christ, and for that very reason the servant of the saints, for Jesus' sake. This alone is true service; anything else is a snare, both to the one who serves and to those served.
When Paul's standing was challenged, the credentials he produced were not qualifications but scars:
Hamilton SmithHe may be speaking foolishly, but he had no hesitation in saying that he was a minister of Christ "above measure" more than these men. To prove his words he brings forward a wonderful summary of his labours and sufferings for Christ's sake... Besides all these outward sufferings, he had to endure in his spirit the burden of all the assemblies.
Summary
- Called — no ceremony, degree, or human appointment can make a minister of Christ; only Christ's own call and gift can.
- Gifted — the gift itself constitutes the man a minister, and other Christians are meant to recognise it as such.
- Serving — the word "minister" means servant; ministry is not one office but a whole range of service, and it never makes the servant the subject of his own message.
- Sent — his work runs along two lines seen together in Paul: the gospel to the world outside, and the building up of the church.
- Accountable — because Christ hired him, Christ alone judges him; a servant who takes his orders from men has changed masters.