Pastoral Care Lacking in East African Churches

by Keith Underhill

The pastoral ministry among East African churches is inadequate and misdirected, says this author. He examines the problem and proposes some solutions.

The pastoral ministry among East African churches is inadequate and misdirected, says this author. He examines the problem and proposes some solutions.

This study is concerned with the major Protestant and Independent Churches in East Africa, and examines that aspect of ministry which is the domain of the man called to be pastor/minister (here used interchangeably). While it is concerned with historical and contemporary patterns, the overriding interest is comparison with the pattern which is revealed W the Scriptures.

It has been disturbing to note that many professing Christians have given up "the notion that the Bible outlines one specific pattern of ministry for all times."¹ The effects of this denial can be clearly discerned in the church.

The position of the author is that the Bible is the final authority in all matters of faith and practice, and that God has not left himself without revelation in this all-important matter of ministry. The Bible clearly teaches that the ministry is one founded on Jesus Christ as revealed in the Scriptures (1 Cor. 3:11). So the minister must have a thorough knowledge of the Scriptures to be able to exhort and rebuke (Tit. 1:9), so that God’s people might be edified (Eph. 4:11-14). His main tasks are those of prayer and preaching ( Acts 6:4, and interrelated activities. How do the patterns of ministry present today in East Africa measure up to the biblical standard?

AN INADEQUATE MINISTRY
However the situation is considered, there is a gross lack of ministers in the churches of East Africa. Two examples will illustrate the point. In 1965, the Africa Inland Church comprised about 1,000 congregations, with 30,000 baptized members and an estimated 130,000 in the total Christian community. Technically, each congregation has its own pastor, but in that year there were only 45 ordained men and 66 missionaries, few of the latter serving as pastors. The result is either an unordained or even untrained leadership, or an ordained man trying to faithfully shepherd more than 20 flocks and over 750 members at the same time!

Writing in 1966, Russell notes this situation in Central Uganda: "There are approximately 45,000 Anglican Christians in Ach.oli, divided into 15 parishes, with 16 pastors and about 100 congregations."² Here, the average pastor has six to seven congregations and almost 3,000 Christians to care for. How can he be faithful or effective? The situation is not different in the other churches, including the Independent Churches, so that almost everywhere the flock is too large for tie minister to serve adequately.³

These facts are indisputable; but why does this situation plague the church? For various reasons the minister no longer occupies that privileged place in society to which he was used. It was usually a long time after the gospel was first introduced that African pastors were ordained, as reliance was most heavily on the catechist.⁴ In the early days the minister was usually the most highly educated member of society and his salary the most lucrative. Now this is not so as East Africa has developed, so that the educated elite"…do not feel that the ministry is a work of importance, nor that it is a work that requires education, intelligence and initiative, nor that they are wanted in that kind of work."⁵

For example, Miller noted that in one major denomination in 1969, the average educational level of all ordained men, besides ordination training, was six years in primary school.⁶

The educated have been much in demand elsewhere and, with the very poor pay relative to other jobs, even earnest young men are dissuaded from the ministry. There is the added pressure of financial obligation to clan or family, so that many of those deterred do not opt out for purely selfish reasons. Even most of those who earn less than the gross average domestic product live off the land and are thus selfsufficient. But should the pastor be so personally involved in agricultural pursuits?

What can be done in this situation? The churches must be reminded that the laborer is worthy of his hire (1 Tim. 5:18 ) and give accordingly. Christian young people must be biblically and openly challenged with the needs. Above all, prayer must be earnestly made to him who gives gifts according to his sovereign will, so that his flock might be adequately nurtured.

A MISDIRECTED MINISTRY
Except occasionally in the cities, the minister invariably oversees, not one congregation, but a group of churches. This situation effectively reduces what the minister is able to do. As he is usually the only person qualified to administer the sacraments, it is easy for him to be seen as "a commercial traveller in sacraments"⁷ rather than as pastor.

Added to this is his role as administrator. "The African ordained minister, whether known as pastor or priest, has fallen heir to the missionary’s precedent. He is expected to be an itinerant administrator of both programme and sacraments."⁸

Some ministers spend from between one-third to one-half of their time attending meetings. Miller describes how poorly one man thought he was trained for the tasks he actually found himself doing. "What I was trained for (teaching-preaching the faith), I can never find time to do, and for what I actually must do (administer church business and sacraments), I received no specific training."⁹

Therefore, particularly in areas where there have been mass movements into the church, instead of face-to-face pastoral ministry, the minister has become hub of a big administrative machine.

East African Christians have not adhered to the strong emphasis in Paul’s pastoral letters, that the ordained minister should be a teacher above all else. The apostolic precedent has not been generally followed (Acts 6:1-6,. There is no proper scriptural emphasis on the centrality of preaching, the very means by which the Lord has purposed to save sinners (see Rom. l:16, 10:14-15, Jas. 1:18) and build up his people (Acts 20:32, Rom. 16:25. Where carried out, this task is so often left to the untrained. These existing patterns are actually perpetrated by the theological training presently received,¹⁰ as students are encouraged to keep the church machine well-oiled. The emphasis in training is on high academic standards to the neglect of pastoral problems. A man who has not been confronted with the deep spiritual causes underlying the events in the lives of the people to whom he is ministering, is not one who will seek to alleviate this need by preaching the whole counsel of God (Acts 20:28. Where are the men being trained as Spirit-filled exegetes and preachers of the Word of God, in order to edify God’s people and evangelize the lost?

OTHER PATTERNS OF MINISTRY
Except perhaps in the East African Revival Fellowship movement, few are the local churches where believers have taken upon themselves their own distinctive ministries side-by-side with the pastor. The pastor is too often conceived of as the one at whose feet all the responsibility lies, because all who work for the church have traditionally been paid for their services."¹¹ The revival movement began years ago as a reaction against what was seen as formalism and clericalism in the Anglican Church, but still remains as a church within the church. Its pattern of ministry is pecularly laity centered. Leadership is not automatically the position of participating ministers, but of the group or "team brethren", who are usually the most-respected and long-standing converts.¹²

However, the movement does illustrate the truth that the minister is regarded primarily as an administrator and sacramental dispenser, because he is not unequivocally given the function of teacher and shepherd of souls in their midst (often he is not himself equipped to do so, of course).

In both the revival movement and the Independent Churches, it is not the ordained status of a man, but his gift for building up a fellowship, which is stressed. This more biblical pattern, a consideration of spiritual gifts, is usually founded on some sort of charismatic figure.

EMERGENT PATTERNS OF MINISTRY
What can be done to rectify this situation where the few ministers are overburdened, and where their educational standard is already too low?

One solution on which church leaders in East Africa look most favorably is the utilization of "tent-making" ministries. An ordained man is expected to earn his own living through some profession while carrying a defined responsibility in a congregation or group of churches in his spare time.

This is not a biblical concept of ministry, however, for both the Lord and Paul commanded "that those who proclaim the Gospel should get their living by the Gospel" (1 Cor. 9:14 ).¹³ So the Scriptures expect those who preach the gospel as an office in the church to be supported by those to whom they minister, or by gifts from other churches (cf. Matt. 10: 8-11, 1 Tim. 5:17,18). Paul did not make use of this right because he did not want his motives in preaching to be misunderstood in his unique office as apostle to the Gentles (1 Cor. 9:15-18).

There is also the very practical consideration of the impossibility of any man engaged in a profession also doing all the work that the ministry necessarily involves. This is not to imply that there never are circumstances where a tent-making ministry is not expedient, especially where a congregation is commencing, but this type of ministry must never be aimed at as a goal.

A more acceptable, because biblical, solution, which is also being strongly advocated, is for the minister to be given a new role. Instead of being primarily an administrator, he must increasingly delegate all jobs the people are able to do with their peculiar gifts, including other elders and deacons. Then he can concentrate on that job the Lord has peculiarly given him to do, that is being pastor and equipper,¹⁴ after the pattern of Eph. 4:11-14. The ordained minister, as preacher and teacher, must be used of God to build up the people of God so that they can do the work of witnessing, of visitation, and use all the gifts they have which are indispensible for the body (Rom. 12:3-8, 1 Cor. 12:4-11, Eph.

CONCLUSIONS
The following patterns of ministry should be the goal in order to attain a truly biblical ministry in East Africa.

1. While the need in East Africa for ministers is great, the moral-spiritual standards demanded in the Scriptures (1 Tim. 3:1-7 and Tit. 2:5-9) cannot be relaxed for pragmatic reasons. True men of God, full of the Holy Spirit, are desperately needed; men conscious of God’s call, and acknowledged to have the requisite gifts for ministry by the people of God.

2. Such a minister will recognize his primary task as a teacher and preacher of the Word of God, both in public and private (Acts 20:20). He will relinquish administrative tasks to others where possible and concentrate on the ministry of prayer and preparation for his activities. Avoiding the temptation to do everything himself, he will see his ministry primarily in terms of equipping the people of God for their ministries.

3. In terms of training for the ministry, the emphasis will be on biblical exegesis as applied to the East African milieu. Thus we pray that young men might be able to both accurately and convictingly preach the Word, for there is need of both instruction and exhortation. A handful of men, who like Paul, preach the Gospel"…not only in word, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction" (1 Thess. 1:5) will, by God’s grace, transform the spiritual map of East Africa.

Endnotes
1. In his study Miller points out that this is a very common attitude in East Africa; Equipping For Ministry, pp. 11, 123-4, 195, 199-200.
2. Russell, J. K., Men Without God, p. 69.
3. This is essentially Welch’s conclusion also, Training For The Ministry in East Africa, p. 27. Other figures can be obtained from Coxill, H.W. and Grubb, K., eds., World Christian Handbook (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1968).
4. For historical details of this pattern see: Hastings, James, Church and Mission in Modern Africa, pp. 83ff. (Fordham University Press, 1967; Sundkler, Bengt, The Christian Ministry in Africa, pp. 38ff; and Sundkler’s essay "Historical Factors in the Development of the Various Forms of Ministry in Africa" in, Hoffman, Paul E., ed., Theological Education in Today’s Africa, p. 3 (Geneva: Lutheran World Federation, 1969.
5. Welch, F.G., Towards an African Church, p. 25. There are the beginnings of a reversal of this trend in the last few years with men who have completed 11 years of education.
6. Miller, op. cit., p. 17.
7. The phrase is Sundkler’s, in The Christian Ministry in Africa, p. 166, which is in reference to West Africa. He also gives an example from Tanzania on p. 144.
8. Miller, op cit., p. 16.
9. Ibid.
10. For details to substantiate this position see Miller, op cit, Ch. 6; and MacPherson, The Presbyterian Church in Kenya (Nairobi: P.C.E.A., 1970).
11. In the Ugandan context, Russell notes that there is nothing that can be called a tradition of voluntary service which can be built upon, op cit., p. 65.
12. Studies on the East African Revival Fellowship movement are few. Some of the sources are: Warren, Max, Revival (London: S.C.M., 1954); Welborn, F. B. and Ogot, B.A., A Place to Feel at Home (London: O.U.P. 1966); Taylor, John V. The Growth of the Church in Buganda (London: S.C.M., 1958); Miller, Op. Cit.: Barrett, David B. Schism and Renewal in Africa (Nairobi: O.U.P. 1968).
13. This was also the situation in the Old Testament with the Levites (Lev. 7:31-36, Num. 5:9-10, Deut. 8:1).
14. This same emphasis is the most important contribution that Miller maes in his book. See pp. 207-209 for his summary. With Miller’s book, the other useful and serious study is Welch’s.

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