One of the big wins for many churches is having people accept the call to full-time ministry. I think that this is great. I love to hear about people who have decided to go into church ministry or have become missionaries. As someone who accepted the call to ministry and has since become a professional minister, I loved receiving the encouragement from the church.
But what about everyone else. I started thinking about this when I was talking to one of our incredibly mature students. I realized that I assume that our best students should become full-time ministers. It just makes sense that the smartest, most devoted students would be excellent candidates for the ministry. I have come to realize that my goal cannot be to push someone into full-time ministry.
What if our goal was to make all of our students ministers regardless of what vocation God would lead them into? What if our hopes were that all of our students would be able to make serving God the central part of their lives whether they were a pastor or a teacher or an electrical engineer.
Thinking that our students should be full-time ministers sets us up for two problems. One, it makes it seem like real ministry can only be done by professional ministers. Second, it means that we are choosing the second best for the majority of people who God fully intends to use for His purposes. By lowering the expectations that God has for them, they have a built in excuse to make God only a part of their life. After all, it’s not like they are a minister or anything.
Journey of Faith 