some thoughts about minister qualities -- RSQUBF discussion forum

[ Show ]

Support VoyForums

[ Shrink ]

VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: 1, 2, 3, [4], 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 13:41:28 12/07/04 Tue
Author: Nick T.
Subject: some thoughts about minister qualities

On the PCUSA website, they have quite a number of different levels of service, in a variety of ministries. They also have a number of qualifications for anyone interested in exploring church service as a missionary or as a minister/pastor.

If anyone would like to review them, they are here at

http://www.pcusa.org/prep4min/qualities.htm

Take some time to read these, they tell alot about how a normal and healthy church can remain normal and healthy.

Of course, I would like to take the opportunity to comapre the PCUSA qualifications to those of the ubf qualifications. The PCUSA has a whole series of qualifiers, from before getting into the minsitry, how to be properly trained and educated, how to properly condict oneself, how to mature, and how to be measured for effectiveness. So it is not about just making a decision to be something, like a missionary, it is about receiving a divine calling and living up to the divine call.

One thing that really jumped out to me was this (and this is just one small but indispensible part):

willingness to be self critical and to self-disclose

exhibits self-confidence, while admitting limits and vulnerabilites

acknowledges mistakes, seeks forgiveness

exhibits a congruence of words and behavior

record of trustworthiness, honesty, and fairness

does not pursue personal advantage, not self-serving

This is just a small part of the qualifications to be a minister in the PCUSA. From all that I have seen, I have not met a ubf leader who can honestly say he/she is qualified to be a minister, just based on this one small part of the entire package of qualifications. I just hope that people can see that ubf, which has the lowest qualifications, has the lowest quality of missionary/pastor/shepherd, whatever.

Don't be fooled. It is incredibly easy to become a ubf missionary. All a person has to do is fog a mirror and put up with alot of garbage from the ubf leadership. That is it.

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]