Protocol Issue 2: “It’s Not Your Job to Pastor the Church.”

Here is another fairly common issue plaguing modern church culture. Untrained and unlicensed individuals, eager to engage in ministry, are attempting to pastor, prophesy over, pray over, and counsel half the church. Don’t do that!

Be very cautious about this on either side, as we are dealing with people’s lives here, and a lot can go wrong, opening a door for the enemy to use. I’ve seen this far too many times over the years. It’s like playing with fire; it’s only a matter of time before a real major issue arises, and sometimes it can be very bad.

Some people treat ministry almost as if it’s a game. It’s actually a very serious matter as people cling to your every word and make major life decisions based on the counsel they receive. Especially in today’s world, as many are unstable and/or vulnerable due to brokenness, etc., it is unwise to be giving large numbers of people counseling unless you are legally licensed, trained, and protected.

There is a difference between good biblical advice and counseling, and in most cases, counseling needs to be handled by a seasoned professional or someone with a lot of knowledge of how to do this in wisdom and biblical order. Otherwise, there are major liabilities at play. If someone needs a lot of counseling, they should seek a professional. It protects them and all parties involved.

I’m just trying to help here; if you are the person who needs counseling, you need to also be careful about who you are going to, and if you are the person giving advice, you need to be careful as well about who you are speaking with. I’ve seen so much damage over the years in this area. More of this is going on than most acknowledge. This is a major problem throughout the Body.

All advice and mentorship need to be connected with the Bible. The issue is that untrained people often also don’t know the Bible that well themselves, which leads to this open door of bad advice, much confusion, or even worse.

This is hard to police or manage in a church environment. However, a red flag is if one person or the same people are attempting to counsel half the church. It’s one thing to mentor and disciple one or two people at a time, maybe three. But unless the pastor is sending a bunch of people your way, or you are in charge of a women’s/men’s ministry or small group, it’s out of order to try and pastor someone else’s ministry without their permission or consent. If you have set yourself up as a pastor without a church and are trying to pastor someone else’s church, that’s also out of order.

Please know that God appreciates an eager person whose heart is in the right place. In most cases, this is not being done maliciously or with bad intentions. It’s just something that many don’t realize the full ramifications of, and they lack the experience to know how dangerous this is to do when you are still learning yourself.

The proper way to handle this is with the permission of the pastor/senior leadership’s buy-in and approval, and I would suggest you focus on a small group of the same people to mentor and get to know them. They would be someone looking to be mentored, and they feel led by the Lord to be mentored by you. It’s an established situation, and it is known by the pastors/leaders that you are mentoring these people. Then, lead them and teach them the Bible and ways of the Lord, not other hyper-emotional, non-Bible things.

Lastly, be teachable yourself and ask your pastor/elders/leaders and confer with them regularly if you are newer to mentoring someone. I’m sure in most cases they would appreciate this and also help give you biblical guidance on how best to mentor those God has entrusted you with.

As a shepherd, it is grievous for me to watch this happen especially when people get hurt, get bad advice, or are led astray—when it’s a flock that God has entrusted to me. I am sure almost all pastors feel this way as well.

Let’s be wise here and do as the Bible says and in proper order and biblical protocol. Amen.