The Rise of Transvocational Ministry

Part One: The Rise of Transvocational Ministry

Most churches today can no longer afford to compensate full-time salaried ministers, (including the congregations I currently serve as pastor). Many clergy persons have advanced degrees, extensive ordination credentials that take years to acquire, and a track record of faithful service. But churches that can sustain the significant price tag of a salary package, health insurance, and housing allowance or parsonage, are becoming fewer and farther between.

On the other side of this coin, are those who find themselves as “lay persons” in a false and unbiblical clergy/laity, sacred/secular divide. At least three generations of so-called laity have voiced frustration with a Christian faith that has been reduced to going to church at set times throughout the week to consume religious goods and services. “There has to be more to following Jesus” is the oft repeated phrase among the “spiritual but not religious.”

Perhaps this might be an opportunity disguised as a crisis. Might we find ourselves in a moment of reset amid broken institutional church systems? Systems that haven’t really worked for at least decades.

Dominus Iesus Vocat… “Lord Jesus is calling.” Are we listening?

Vocation

Every person is on a journey toward discovering who they truly are. Trappist monk, prolific author, and social critic, Thomas Merton describes this journey as an awakening from the false self, searching for the true self, and finding union with God’s self. It is a lifelong spiritual adventure crossing over into our own belovedness.

One aspect of our identity is grounded in our vocation. The term vocation is drawn from the Latin vocationem (nominative vocatio), which literally means “a calling” and is related to vox (genitive vocis) “voice.” Thus, a vocation is not simply a profession, or what one does to earn a living, it is also definitive of our living being. Vocation connects with the higher orienting purpose of our lives. It is part of who we are, our identity, and personal mission in the world. A key reformation idea is that all work is sacred work, and that every Christian is called to live faithfully within three dimensions of ordinary life: the household, the church, and the state.

We have designated clergy persons as “vocational ministers.” These are often those who have offered their whole lives in service to the church. Yet as long as there have been those called to “full-time ministry” there have been others who have expressed that calling differently.

Bi-vocational, with the prefix “bi-” as twice, double, or dual, literally “two voices” or callings, describes persons who serve a local church and maintain employment at another job. Increasingly we have seen the rise of “co-vocational” ministry with the prefix “co-” as with, or together, literally as “with voice” or a “with-ness” calling. This describes persons who turn their workplace into church, or entrepreneurs who start creative ministries that also pay the bills.

For example, my friend Ryan is a Christian who owns and operates a tattoo shop. He makes a living tattooing, but also sees his shop as a fresh expression of church. His focus is not to get customers to attend a church service, but to be church with them there in that space. Churches that are embracing the blended ecology way, where fresh expressions and inherited congregations live together in symbiotic relationship, are seeing an increase in these co-vocational leaders.

Trans-figuring Vocation

Jesus takes a handful of disciples up on the mountain. There they witness him go through a profound change. Light begins to shine out of him. His clothes become a supernatural glowing white. The voice of the Father from heaven proclaims over him… “beloved.” Standing beside Jesus are Moses (symbolizing the law) and Elijah (symbolizing the prophets) (Mark 9:2-3).

Peter’s first instinct is to commemorate and institutionalize this moment. “Let’s build structures and stay here forever!” A voice from heaven hushes Peter’s impulse and says, “This is my beloved, listen up.” Amid the divine “shush,” the disciple’s reaction is to build a structure and live in that moment. Let’s construct an edifice, stick up a sign, invite people in, and stay right here! Can you blame them? But Jesus immediately leads them back down the mountain where the crowds await, pressing in with their needs. An afflicted child, hungry people, disciples competing for greatness and getting territorial about outsiders casting out demons in Jesus’s name.

As much as we love the mountaintop moments of transfiguration, our discipleship is lived out in the pain and struggle of the valley. We can’t set up shop and live in the seclusion of spiritual ecstasy. While we are in a state of transfiguration, society in general goes on in a narrative of conquest, exceptionalism, violence, and dualistic us-against-them thinking. This is why we must spend a significant period of time every day sitting in silence and adoring the transfigured face of Jesus. It gives us strength to live in the valley.

The word that describes the change in Jesus at this moment is μεταμορφόω (metamorphóō) to transfigure literally or figuratively “metamorphose.” It is as if Jesus peels back his flesh and the light of his true glory shines out. For just a moment they see Jesus in all his fullness. It’s not that Jesus is becoming something else, it’s that what Jesus already is in the core of his being is revealed.

Like a caterpillar becoming a butterfly, molecularly speaking it is the same being but now transfigured. This word transfigure is one that needs to be reclaimed.

Followers of Jesus particularly in the Wesleyan tradition believe in transfiguring grace. We start with the innate goodness of all people—every person is of sacred worth, beloved of God. That original goodness gets wounded, and we need healing. God’s transfiguring grace invites us into a journey of full restoration to the imago Dei (image of God).

So we are not irreparably bad, hopeless, and totally depraved. At the core of who we are, we are beings of light and love. Through our relationship with Jesus, we can all be transfigured from caterpillars into butterflies. We have moments of spiritual awakening in which we pierce the veil and see the new creation bursting forth. But we cannot stay there forever. This is an ongoing journey of grace that must be lived out in the valley, with other people like us, who have struggles, wounds, and needs.

The Latin prefix trans- denotes a meaning that includes “across, beyond, through, on the other side of; go beyond, pass through, overcome” or simply “to cross over.” In terms of vocation, I find this a more appropriate description than “bi” or even “co.” Jesus is not just calling us to dualness, or even withness, but also throughness (okay yes, I made up a series of words there). Our true calling is something both within us and beyond us. We must “cross over” into the fullness of who we truly are in Christ (see Never Alone, for more on this).  

In terms of how we follow Jesus in everyday life, what if we could reclaim the idea of awakening to our original goodness and discovering the oneness we already are? Not trying to become something else, but rather following the voice towards our truest self in Christ? And what if we could live into that identity, no matter what sacred work we do?

Enter Transvocational Ministry

According to the Faith Communities Today survey (2020), only 62% of U.S. churches have a full-time pastor—down from 71% in 2010. For this sample, which included 15,000 responding congregations from 21 denominations, the average congregation has 65 people in weekly attendance in spaces that typically hold 200. This is about a 50% decline from the year 2000. $120,000 is the average annual income of these congregations. 57 years old is the average age of the pastor or leader.[1]

The Barna Study Christians at Work (2019) revealed that more than half of clergy (55%) had another career before going into ministry. Roughly one-quarter of the sample (26%) were bivocational, currently holding some other kind of (paid or unpaid) role in addition to pastoring.[2]

Many clergy across the theological spectrum are navigating bivocational, multivocational, covocational, dual-career, partially funded, or tentmaking ministry.

These pastors are actively serving congregations unable to provide them with a living wage or benefits. In many cases, the pastors’ families are the largest tithers. Less than twenty percent of congregants tithe. And yet, congregations perceive a mark of “success” as the appointment of a “full-time” clergyperson. This is no longer a helpful metric for churches in the twenty-first century. What if truly healthy congregations are those in which part-time clergy and lay empowerment is real vitality? I’m not convinced that there ever should have been full-time religious professionals, but certainly now amid the decline of the church, we have an opportunity to be tentmakers again.

What Could This Look Like?

Consider four examples of transvocational ministry.

First, is the lay person called to serve within the ministry of the priesthood of all believers. Currently their options are antiquated training programs that prepare them to be a good member of an inherited congregation. If they want to “go pro,” they can start a licensing or ordination process that often takes years and will extract them from the very context where they could potentially be most effective. For these folks, we need support, resources, and training, that help them become priests within the daily rhythms, spaces, and practices of everyday life. 

Next, consider your second, third, even fourth career people entering into licensed or ordained ministry. Some have led successful careers in other areas. Some have started businesses or non-profits. Many have significant education in other fields. In order to become professional ministers, we ask them to leave all of that behind to be appointed to churches full time. Churches that often can’t afford to compensate them. Our process treats everyone the same, like a factory assembly line, that takes the raw material and turns each person into the same make and model. We need to rethink support, resources, and training to help them continue in their so-called “ordinary” work while also turning that work into fresh expressions of church or taking on some responsibilities for an inherited congregation.

Third, consider the growing population of people taking early retirement after 25-30 years in the workforce. They perhaps have felt a calling to some kind of ministry, but the demands of family and work kept them from responding. These retirees potentially have decades of healthy life remaining, are financially stable, and looking for a way to more faithfully serve God. Is our only option for them committee level leadership in an inherited congregation? Or serving as a pastor in the inherited system? What if we could release this massive force of ordinary priests to cultivate communal life in Jesus in the everyday spaces and rhythms of life with people who are unlikely to darken the door of a Sunday morning worship event? This group needs support, resourcing, and training to do this work.  

Finally, there are those who have spent significant time, resources, and energy to become ordained ministers. They have been through extensive theological education and ordination processes and now due to the decline of congregations they cannot earn a livable wage. Or if the congregation can compensate them appropriately, in the current social contract, they find themselves a hired hand, a personal spiritual butler to the feisty and fidgety whims of the local congregation. And they feel underwhelmed, unfulfilled, and less than fully who they were created to be. They have left careers, skills, and businesses behind to “answer the call.” Only to find they need to reclaim and recover those skills and experiences to be effective in local ministry. We need support, resources, and training that frees them to explore new forms of ministry for a new world. We need institutional systems that enable them to flourish outside the church, not confine them in what feels like a life-sentence.

In this series, I will explore the Biblical, historical, and interdisciplinary foundations for transvocational ministry. If you find this helpful, please share it with others!

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[1] Faith Communities Today https://faithcommunitiestoday.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Faith-Communities-Today-2020-Summary-Report.pdf

[2] Christians at Work https://www.barna.com/research/sacred-secular-divide/