RECLAIMING MAINTENANCE MINISTRY

A friend asked me about the church where he had just been invited to candidate. “I don’t want to get stuck in a maintenance ministry,” he said.

I cringed, as I had when hearing similar remarks on other occasions.

At seminary, I overheard student pastors complain that the churches they served offered nothing but “maintenance ministry.” They meant the congregation was composed primarily of elderly people and showed little potential for numerical growth. Ministry there seemed to mean perpetuating the status quo, marrying and (mostly) burying. Pastors marked time until something better came along.

Later I heard a denominational executive entice pastors to consider church planting by offering them “more than mediocrity and maintenance.” He implied that pastors face two options: significance or maintenance.

Yet maintenance, by definition, is “upkeep, support.” To maintain means “to keep in a certain condition or position, especially of efficiency and good repair.” That sounds good to me.

In most areas of life, we applaud maintenance. I take my car to a mechanic to maintain it; I want it to run well. I maintain my house, performing minor repairs and upkeep to keep it from deteriorating.

We also try to maintain skills we have learned. Anyone who plays a musical instrument, for instance, knows that practice is necessary to maintain your level of expertise. The same is true of the ability to speak a foreign language; you use it or lose it.

I also want to maintain a close relationship with my wife. This requires time and energy. To neglect my wife, ignoring her needs to pursue “more visionary goals” would seriously weaken our relationship.

The same principle applies in the church. To maintain spiritual vitality requires time and energy.

So why has maintenance become an epithet in the church? Why is it equated with merely perpetuating buildings and programs with no vision for evangelism? I don’t know. But I do know that maintenance is essential for pastoral ministry.

I remember the time I rushed to the hospital around midnight. A young girl in our church was about to undergo an emergency appendectomy. I waited there with her parents until the operation was over. I didn’t do anything spectacular, but I’m convinced I was doing what Jesus wanted me to do: showing his love by maintaining a presence.

When I visit shut-ins, I’m doing maintenance ministry, but don’t these often overlooked individuals deserve care?

Caring for those struggling with a problem is also maintenance-providing love and counsel for the parent agonizing over a rebellious son or daughter, providing a listening ear to someone discouraged or depressed. Such love helps maintain the spiritual and emotional health of church members. It rarely shows up in statistics. At times it even depletes the numbers.

One couple I counseled was anxious about the husband’s job. Although he worked long hours, they still couldn’t pay their bills. I encouraged him to train for a new vocation. He did, but he had to move out of our area to get the schooling he needed. Our church statistics suffered, but pastoral care was offered to this couple, and, I trust, the kingdom of God was served.

Keeping a program going without any evaluation of its effectiveness is, of course, an invitation to futility. Then again, there’s something to be said for keeping wheels turning. I’ve never seen a productive ministry if the wheels couldn’t rotate-if someone didn’t practice some form of maintenance.

Keeping the wheels turning is maintenance, also known as administration. In a larger church, this involves delegation and oversight. In a smaller church, it means taking care of details-ordering video tapes, picking up a film projector, setting up chairs, planning worship. Such are the tools of ministry. Somebody must provide these tools and then keep them in good working order. In my view, ultimately this is the pastor’s responsibility.

Two years ago our church decided to establish several small groups designed specifically to deepen our fellowship. People who wanted to be in a group filled out a form indicating whom they preferred to meet with and when they could get together. Guess who had the fun of trying to match forty people’s preferences and schedules?

Was all this a waste of valuable time? At times I wondered. But not at the end of the year when I heard the comments of a man new to our church. He told me he had grown closer to God as well as his wife as a result of being in a fellowship group.

That’s what makes it all worthwhile. Maintenance isn’t futility. Maintenance paves the way for ministry.

-Rick Mavis

Union Baptist Church

Estherville, Iowa