{"id":994,"date":"2010-02-11T12:47:58","date_gmt":"2010-02-11T12:47:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/bibleandculture\/2010\/02\/neither-clergy-nor-laity--a-nt-vision-of-ministry.html"},"modified":"2010-02-11T12:47:58","modified_gmt":"2010-02-11T12:47:58","slug":"neither-clergy-nor-laity-a-nt-vision-of-ministry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/02\/neither-clergy-nor-laity-a-nt-vision-of-ministry.html","title":{"rendered":"Neither Clergy nor Laity– a NT Vision of Ministry"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ghent_Altarpiece_D_-_Clergy_-_detail.jpg\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

(This is an edited version of the lecture I gave twice in Houston this past week, with good response).
<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

           Almost all forms of ancient
\nreligion were all about priests, temples, and sacrifices.  <\/span>This was as true of Greek religion and Roman
\nreligion, as true of Babylonian religion as Assyrian religion, and it was true
\nof Biblical religion as well— just read the book of Leviticus for
\nexample.  <\/span>In Jesus’ day Jewish religion
\nfocused on Torah, Temple,
\nand territory— the three Ts.   <\/span>But something
\nradical happened in the Christ event, and it was a game changer.  <\/span><\/p>\n

            <\/span>You
\nsee the main reason you need priests and temples is because you are required to
\noffer sacrifices to appease the deity, to atone for sin,  <\/span>to thank God, and so on.  <\/span>But what happens if God in person offers a
\nonce for all perfect sacrifice for the sins of the world, past, present or
\nfuture?   <\/span>What happens if instead of a
\nhereditary or even an appointed priesthood, a priest comes along who not only
\noffers a perfect sacrifice, but he is a forever priest, without successors, without
\ndescendents, without necessity of having another one?   <\/span><\/p>\n

What if there
\ncomes a day when, as Jesus himself said “neither on Mt. Gerizim
\nnor on Mt. Zion shall we worship, but
\nwherever and whenever you find people worshipping in Spirit and in truth…”,
\nwhat if the nature of worship itself has changed due to Jesus the game
\nchanger?   <\/span>What if it is true that on no
\nspot on earth can you find the inner sanctum of God, the Holy of Holies,
\nbecause now it is in heaven, and our high priest is there at this very moment
\ninterceding for us, pleading the blood he sacrificed once for all, once for all
\ntime?   <\/span><\/p>\n

Well friends, if all this is
\ntrue,  <\/span>and it is,  <\/span>then it has to change the whole way we look
\nat ministry and at the people of God, and the writers of the NT understood
\nthis, even though the church in subsequent generations often did all they could
\nto go back to the OT system of doing things. 
\n<\/span>And indeed, that is precisely what you see going on in the Orthodox and
\nCatholic traditions–its all about priests, temples, sacrifices. And of course,
\namong other things,  <\/span>one of the drastic
\nimplications of that hermeneutical approach to Biblical religion is that women
\nneed not apply, for in the OT scheme of things women can’t be priests, though
\nthere were priestesses all over the ancient near east in various non-Biblical
\nforms of religion.   As you will see my main point is this—when worship changes so does ministry. <\/i><\/span>So lets start with
\nsome definitions,  <\/span>some first things. <\/p>\n

            <\/span>The
\nGreek word laos<\/b> <\/b>from which we get the term laity
\nsimply means the people of God. It is used this way over and over again in the
\nNT, sometimes of Israel
\nsometimes of those who are in Christ, but in neither case is it used to refer
\nto a particular kind or class of believing persons who are set apart from the
\n‘clergy’. <\/span>And about that word clergy,
\nit is not a Biblical word at all. 
\n<\/span>Webster’s tells us it comes to us from the Medieval French word clerc
\n(13th<\/sup> century), but in fact ultimately the term comes from the Greek
\n??<\/i>?<\/span>???<\/i> – kl?ros<\/i>,
\n“a lot”, “that which is assigned by lot” (allotment) or
\nmetaphorically, “inheritance”. <\/sup> <\/span>So it partially has a Biblical root, but no
\npersons in the NT are called kleroi <\/b>to
\ndistinguish a class of ministers.    <\/span>And
\nthere is a good reason for this. <\/p>\n

            <\/span>First
\nof all the reason is that Christ and his sacrifice has torn down the wall not
\nonly between God and an alienated and lost humanity, but also the wall between
\nJew and Greek, between slave and free, between male and female, and yes between
\npriests and ordinary folk.  <\/span>There is no
\npriesthood as a class of individual ministers <\/i> in the NT. 
\n<\/span>There are in fact two priesthoods— the unique heavenly high priesthood
\nof Christ, as described in glorious technicolor in Hebrews, and the priesthood
\nof all believers as described in 1 Peter and elsewhere.  <\/span>In other words, no one on earth is or can be
\na priest like Jesus, and on the other hand, every believer is part of the
\n‘kingdom of priests’ foreseen by Moses, and actualized by Jesus.   <\/span><\/p>\n

             And so it is that the author of 1 Peter is
\nnot saying something novel when he throws down the gauntlet and says to his
\nChristian audience “but you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy
\nnation, God’s special possession, so that you may declare the praises of him
\nwho called you out of darkness into his wonderful light” ( 1 Pet. 2.9).   <\/span>This friends is the Magna Carta of Christian
\nidentity and Christian freedom, and among other things it means we are all
\nlaity, and we are all priests.  <\/span>We will
\nunpack the implications of this wonderful verse in a moment, but first we need
\nto answer a question— if what I say is true, what went wrong with Christian
\nreligion, and when did it happen?   <\/span>Why
\ndo we continue to have a clergy club and laity conferences for non-clergy?   <\/span>I’m glad you asked. <\/p>\n

            <\/span>What
\nhappened, already beginning in the 2nd<\/sup> or 3rd<\/sup> century
\nA.D. is the same thing that happened to God’s people as recorded in 1 Samuel—
\nthey wanted to be like other nations, other peoples.  They wanted a king and a
\nkingdom–and of course you remember that God obliged them and gave them Saul,
\nnot exactly what they were hoping for. 
\n<\/span>Be careful what you wish for, as God may let you have it–and then he
\nwill let you have it (in another sense), when you use it <\/span>to distance people from God.   <\/span>Well the church, especially after it became
\na licit religion in the 4th<\/sup> century A.D. thanks to Constantine, the church longed to be like the
\nother religions with priests, temples and sacrifices, and more to the point
\nthey longed to be like God’s OT people with priests, temples, and sacrifices,
\nand they got what they wished for.   <\/span>The
\nOT hermeneutic was applied to NT ministry and so it was that ministers became
\npriests, churches became temples,  <\/span>the
\nLord’s Supper became a sacrifice, Sunday became the Sabbath sacrificial giving became tithing— all in defiance
\nof what Peter says and means in 1 Pet. 2.9. 
\n<\/span>And of course the ultimate irony happened when Peter who wrote 1 Peter
\nwas turned into the first Pope— and he is still surprised about that!! <\/p>\n

            <\/span>But
\nin the NT Sunday is not the Sabbath, it’s the Lord’s Day celebrating the day
\nthat Christ arose.  <\/span>And the Lord’s Supper
\nis not a literal sacrifice of any kind, it is a reminder of Christ’s once for all
\nsacrifice until he comes again.  <\/span>And
\nneither apostles nor prophets nor elders nor deacons nor teachers nor
\nevangelists nor any other sort of special group of ministers in the NT are
\nlabeled some sort of kleros, <\/b><\/span>God’s priestly portion.  <\/span>No indeed, in the wake of the once for all
\nsacrifice, each one of us has become our own priest and so Paul exhorts us
\n“brothers and sisters I beseech you by the mercies of God to present yourselves
\nas living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God for this is your spiritual
\nworship” (Rom. 12.1-2).  <\/span>We are all
\ncalled to offer ourselves up to God in praise and adoration and exaltation and
\njubilation–all of us.  <\/span>And we are not
\ncalled to do the Moses thing when God requires this of us.  <\/span>You remember what happened at the call of
\nMoses— he used call forwarding.  <\/span>He
\nsaid— “Here I am Lord, take my brother!!”<\/p>\n

            <\/span>It
\nis the view of the writers of the NT that Jew and Gentile united in Christ is
\nthe people of God, the royal priesthood, the chosen portion of God, and it is
\nthe job of all of us, all of us, to be a light to the nations, to be winsome so
\nwe might win some for Christ, to be priests offering this world and all that is
\nin it back to God for as the psalmist says— “the earth is the Lord’s and the
\nfullness thereof.   <\/span>With the call to come
\nto Christ comes a call to ministry, and it does not come to just some of us.  <\/span>It comes with the territory.   <\/span>But what, practically speaking, does this
\nmean?  <\/span>Should we all be quitting our day
\njobs and dedicating ourselves to the ministries of Word, order, and
\nsacrament?   <\/span>Well no, as it turns out. <\/p>\n

            <\/span>Paul
\nin 1 Cor. 12 puts it this way— “now you are the body of Christ, and each one
\nof you is a part of it. And God has placed in the church first of all apostles,
\nsecond prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, gifts of
\nhelping, gifts of guidance or administration, and of different kinds of
\ntongues” (vs. 27-30). Too often the discussion of spiritual gifting begins and
\nends with a discussion of the gifts themselves 
\n<\/span>(see vss. 7-11) rather than of the persons given the gifts.  <\/span>This is a mistake, but it is right to
\nemphasize as Paul does that “to each is given some gift, some manifestation of
\nthe Spirit for the common good”.    <\/span>No
\nChristian is giftless, and none are exempt therefore from ministry in some
\nform.  <\/span>And in fact what Paul is telling
\nus that the roles we play in ministry are or should be determined largely by the Holy
\nSpirit, for the Spirit decides who gets what gifts in the body of Christ. It’s
\nnot a matter of our going to the Holy Spirit super-store and picking them
\nout.  <\/span><\/p>\n

            <\/span>Let
\nus concentrate first on the fact that God gave certain persons<\/i> to the church— apostles, prophets, teachers, and so
\non.  <\/span>And no only so, Paul means that
\nthere is something of a hierarchial order of leadership.  <\/span>He says first apostles, second prophets, and
\nso on.  <\/span>Just because we are all called to
\ndo some sort of ministry doesn’t mean that we are all called to do the same
\ntasks, or that we have all been equally gifted to do any and all tasks or that
\nwe are all called to be leaders. This is false.   <\/span>There will always be leaders and followers,
\nbut all of God’s people are gifted and graced to do something.  <\/span><\/p>\n

            <\/span>Now
\nPaul is not talking about natural abilities though certainly God can use our
\ntalents as well.  <\/span>He is talking about
\nSpirit endowed and induced gifts and graces. One of the great problems we do
\nhave in the Church is a failure to help all Christians spiritually discern what
\nGod is calling and gifting them to do. 
\n<\/span>Indeed, the old laity\/clergy distinction has impeded such a
\nprocess.  <\/span>The assumption is that if you
\nhave paid clergy then the laity are off the hook, basically except for the giving
\nof tithes and offerings of course.   <\/span>This
\nis quite false and to some degree this problem has been furthered by the
\nwell-intentioned commitment to professionalism when it comes to ministry. <\/p>\n

            <\/span>Don’t
\nget me wrong.  <\/span>I am all for us being not
\nonly called, and gifted and trained and education to do the best possible job
\nwe can for the Lord.  <\/span>I believe in all of
\nthose things,  <\/span>and I don’t believe we are
\nhelped by a sort of anti-intellectual spirit that is suspicious of Christian
\neducation or thinks that if one has the Bible and the Spirit one is fully
\nequipped to do ministry in our complex world. 
\n<\/span>This is almost without exception false. 
\n<\/span>But that anti-intellectual spirit plagues Protestants, even in the
\nsetting of a seminary.  <\/span>I once had a
\nstudent who came up to me and said “I don’t know why I need to learn all this
\nstuff,  <\/span>I can just get up in the pulpit
\nand Spirit will give me utterance.”  <\/span>My
\nreply was succinct— “Yes, Charlie, you can do that, but you shouldn’t. You
\nneed to give the Spirit more to work with, more mental furniture to use and
\nmove around.” <\/p>\n

            <\/span>What
\nabout the distinction between part-time and full-time ministry with the laity
\ndoing the former and the clergy the latter?  
\n<\/span>There is certainly nothing in the Bible that supports such a notion, and
\npart of the problem is the way one envisions ministry.  <\/span>Raising children in a godly way is a
\nministry.  <\/span>Helping people with their
\nfinances is a ministry.  <\/span>Building homes,
\nmaking clothes, selling groceries is a ministry.   <\/span>Any
\ngood deed, anything that can be done to the glory of God and for the
\nedification of God’s people and the world is a ministry. <\/i> <\/span>Our problem is that we have defined ministry
\ntoo narrowly, and then jealousy fought over who gets to do what.   <\/span><\/p>\n

            <\/span>Frankly
\nI have run into too many ordained clergy who think: 1) it is their job to do
\nmost all the ministry (though they complain bitterly they are over-taxed and
\nunder-appreciated); and 2) instead of “equipping the saints for ministry”  <\/span>they have in fact disabled, discontinued,
\neven destroyed the ministry of those who are not, like them, ordained
\nclergy.  <\/span>What is all too often put in the
\nplace of every member a minister is the pastor-American idol syndrome, the
\npastor super-star model, which feeds on America’s love of the cult of
\npersonality.  <\/span><\/p>\n

This is not a
\ngood, much less a godly approach to ministry and it leads to Humpty-Dumpty
\nsyndrome— ministers who put themselves up on a pedestal and are bound to have
\na great fall.  <\/span>Remember Ted Haggard?   <\/span>Remember Jim Bakker?   <\/span>For everyone one of them, there are hundreds
\nof not well known clergy who fall into the same trap.  <\/span>And of course a lot of this has to do with
\npeople in ministry with: 1) serious ego deficiencies and problems with feelings
\nof low self-worth;  <\/span>2) people in ministry
\nwho are tremendously talented and enormously spiritually and emotionally
\nimmature;  <\/span>3) people in ministry whose
\nfamily life is not stable and whose most intimate relationships are not what
\nthey ought to be. And then of course there are men in ministry who feel threatened by women in ministry, as if women are encroaching on their private domain. But the problem in the church is not strong, gifted, called, ministering women. The problem is weak men who can’t handle strong women. <\/p>\n

What about the
\nissue of ordained ministers?   <\/span>This is
\nindeed Biblical as can be seen from Acts and the Pastoral Epistles and various
\nother portions of the NT.  <\/span>Paul did
\nindeed ordain and commission Timothy and Titus and others to be apostolic
\nco-workers, evangelists, teachers etc.  
\n<\/span>Why do we need an ordination process before doing ministry?  <\/span>Well of course it is not absolutely necessary
\nin every case, but the reason it is a good and healthy thing if you are set
\napart for the ministry of Word and sacrament and ordering of the church’s life is
\nbecause the church needs to help you go through the process of discernment about
\nyour calling and gifts and graces, and the church needs to recognize and
\npronouncement the benediction, the Amen on what you are called and gifted to
\ndo.   <\/span>Why? Because we are all part of the
\nBody of Christ, and the gifts are given “for the common good” not for our own
\npersonal fulfillment or aggrandizement. 
\n<\/span>And then too, individuals can be enthusiastic and dead wrong about being
\ncalled and gifted to do this or that task of ministry, or alternatively they
\ncan be resistant and truculent like Moses, and in fact they have been called to do
\nsignificant ministry work.  <\/span>Ministry is
\nthe work which builds up the body of Christ, not puffs up the individual as
\nPaul so aptly tells us in 1 Corinthians. 
\n<\/span>And frankly, ministry is just hard work. <\/p>\n

Are there any
\nministry tasks that those we today call lay persons should not do, at least
\nfrom time to time?   <\/span>My answer to this
\nquestion is no.  <\/span>We need more preachers,
\nmore teachers, more evangelists, more Stephen’s ministers, more soup kitchen
\nworkers, more doctors, not less.  <\/span>But
\nagain because of the nature of the ministries of Word, order and
\nsacrament,  <\/span>because they are the very
\nlifeblood which keeps the congregation going and on task more training, more
\neducation,  <\/span>more full-time commitment is
\nrequired for these tasks.  <\/span>As the Bible
\nsuggests, to those to whom more is given, more is required, and if you have been
\ngiven the gift of regular performance of the ministries of Word, order, and
\nsacrament, you need to study to find yourself approved, just as a medical
\ndoctor has to commit himself to life long learning to be a good doctor. Sometimes preachers say to me “I’m no expert in the Bible, but I preach each Sunday’. My response to this is— if you are not the expert in the Bible for your people, who is? I mean would you go to a dentist who said “I’m no expert in drilling, but hey, let’s start with you!”  In an increasingly Biblically  illiterate culture we need more, not less experts preaching and teaching God’s Word.<\/p>\n

As I bring this lecture to a close, I want to go back to the glorious vision of Peter
\nand how he conceives us all.  <\/span>Let us dig
\ninto this passage in 1 Peter 2 in a little more depth.   <\/span>John Muir once said we look at life from the
\nbackside of the tapestry and what we see normally and on a daily basis is loose
\nthreads, tangled knots, a large canvas. 
\n<\/span>But occasionally the light penetrates the tapestry and we get a glimpse
\nof the larger design of God as he weaves all things together for good for those
\nwho love him and are called according to purpose (noting that Rom. 8.28 does
\nnot in fact say in the Greek, according to HIS purpose, though that may be
\nimplied and is true anyway). <\/p>\n

In 1 Peter 2.9-10 <\/b>Christians are seen as a chosen race, a holy people
\nfor God’s possession– Exhibit A, revealing the mighty acts of God.  <\/span>Indeed they are chosen for the specific
\npurpose of proclaiming <\/i>God’s mighty
\nacts. What has happened to believers has happened so that these acts might be
\nproclaimed, and thus God be glorified. 
\n<\/span>Redemption is for believer’s succor, but it is also for God’s
\nglory.  <\/span>God is the one who called persons
\nfrom the darkness of sin and spiritual blindness into his marvelous and
\neverlasting light.  <\/span>There is nothing here
\nabout an old Israel
\nthat is being replaced by a new one. To the contrary, Peter’s view is that the
\none people of God has kept going all along, only now the true expression of
\nthem is found in Jew and Gentile united in Christ.  <\/span>This is more of an eschatological
\ncompletionist schema than a replacement schema. 
\n<\/span>But Exod. 19.6 is being appropriated and applied to the community of Christ
\nhere.<\/span><\/p>\n

One phrase
\ncalls for close scrutiny in vs. 9.  <\/span>Is Basileion hierateuma<\/b> an adjective and a
\nnoun or two nouns?   <\/span>Does it mean: 1)
\nroyal priesthood; or 2) house of the King, body of priests; or 3) a priesthood
\nin service of the king; 4) a kingdom of priests; 5) a group of kings, a body of
\npriests?  <\/span>In favor of 4) is the OT background–Ex.
\n19.6 as translated in the LXX. The Hebrew reads “a kingdom of priests” but the
\nLXX translates it as two substantives, two nouns in apposition to one
\nanother–kings and priests   <\/span>It may seem
\nodd to stick two nouns side by side, but if the LXX could do it, so could
\nPeter.  <\/span>Now, if  <\/span>view 4) is the right rendering, it does not
\nimply believers are kings, only priests in service of the king. Against view 5)
\n <\/span>we may argue that there is no precedent
\nfor the word Basileion<\/b> meaning  <\/span>a “group of kings”.  <\/span>Against views 1) and 3) we must argue: a) if Basileion<\/b> was an adjective, it would
\nnormally follow its noun as eklektos <\/b>follows
\ngenos<\/b> and hagios <\/b>follows ethnos<\/b>;
\nb) In the only other use of  <\/span>Basileion <\/b>in the NT  <\/span>(Lk. 7.25), it means palace or King’s house, and
\nis not an adjective, and in parallel Hellenistic literature it is normally a
\nnoun (cf. 2 Macc. 2.17; Philo, de Sobr<\/u>. 66l and de Abra<\/u>. 56);   <\/span>c) What precedes this in vs. 5,  <\/span>a reference to a spiritual house, may suggest
\na parallel here– king’s house.  <\/span>Thus,
\nperhaps we should see this as two nouns in apposition, and if so, view 2)  <\/span>“house of the king, body of priests” will be
\nthe best translation.  <\/span>If the LXX and
\nHebrew background is in view, as the other terms in the list may suggest,
\nperhaps we should translate a kingdom of priests or even a royal priesthood,
\nbecause the other four honorific phrases here involve a noun and a modifier.  <\/span>If the latter it is simply affirming that all
\nbelievers are priests, if the former it stresses believers are both collectively
\nGod’s house, and his priests.  <\/span>Whichever
\ntranslation we go for  <\/span>Howard Marshall is
\nclearly right in stressing “There is no justification here or elsewhere in the
\nNew Testament for labeling certain people in the church ‘priests’.  <\/span>If some Christians are set apart to perform
\nthe functions of ministers in the church, they are not to be regarded as
\npriests different in kind from that of all Christians….The term ‘priest’ should
\nbe dropped as a way of designating ministers of the Gospel.”[1]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>\n<\/p>\n

Notice the contrast in vs. 10 <\/b>“you who were once not a people
\nare now a people”. Here E.J. Selwyn urges: 
\n<\/span>“Peter’s words conveyed to people so placed was that they now once again
\nbelonged to a community which claimed their loyalty; and it was something which
\ncould give all their instincts of patriotism full satisfaction. In short, the
\nterm connotes in Greek, community.  <\/span>In
\nthe mixed society of the Roman Empire, where
\nfreedom of association was suspect and subject to restrictive laws, as in
\nmodern despotic states, this sense of community must have worn very thin, and
\nproduced a widespread feeling of homelessness.”[2]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a>  <\/span>These words from Hosea originally referred to
\nJews, and there is not reason why they can’t refer primarily to Jewish
\nChristians here either.<\/span><\/p>\n

Notice as
\nwell the ‘now’ in this text.  <\/span>Peter
\nemphasizes both what God has now done and what he will yet do.  <\/span>To be a people, a community, means believers
\nhave experienced the mercy of God.  <\/span>Many
\ncommentators think that vs. 10 <\/b>could
\nnot have been spoken of Jews. Peter can only be talking about Gentiles here who
\nare now included in God’s new chosen race. 
\n<\/span>This is forgetting that Peter’s view is that when Jews have rejected
\nChrist they at least temporarily cease to be part of the people of God (cf.
\nRom. 11).  <\/span> <\/span>Peter is here quoting Hos.1.6-7 and probably
\nHos. 2.25b as well and these texts were certainly being applied to Jews there,
\nas they likely are here as well.  <\/span>What we
\nhave seen in this section of the discourse is the very sort of tour de force
\nuse of the OT as a basis for argumentation, loaded with allusions and partial
\nquotes tailored to fit the context here, and as such it rivals what we find in
\nRom. 9-11 and the use of the Scripture there. For Peter it was essential to
\nground his argument in such a way that he could say, as he does in vs. 6 “for
\nit is contained in Scripture that….”. This argument is brought to a close by a
\nreminder to the audience that they have a high calling, they are a temple, and
\nindeed they are a royal priesthood, and as such they are God’s option in their
\nown pagan environment, and so they must live in a fashion that makes them good
\nwitnesses, good neighbors, good people.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

AND SO?<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

You are all
\ncalled to be God’s option in an increasingly pagan culture.   <\/span>That is who we all are, and the clarion call
\nfor all God’s people, who are all both ‘laity’ and a royal priesthood,  <\/span>has gone out that we must fulfill our high
\ncalling to spread abroad the Good News of Jesus Christ, each according to what
\nwe have been called, gifted, graced, blessed, educated, trained to be and
\ndo.  <\/span><\/p>\n

In my view,
\nevery single Christian needs Christian training, and all the more so now as our
\nculture and even our churches become more and more Biblically illiterate.  <\/span>But hear me clearly— we are not called to
\ndumb down the Gospel, we are called to boil up the people.  <\/span>We are not called to put the Gospel cookies
\non the bottom shelf, we are called to tease people’s minds into active thought
\nso that their reach will extend further than their current grasp. 
<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/span>We need a total mobilization of the Body of
\nChrist, God’s salvation army for never in our life times has the need been
\ngreater, the call been clearer, and the commission more obvious— Go, said
\nJesus, and make disciples of all the nations. 
\n<\/span>But if we are to claim the world as our parish, then we will indeed need
\nall hands on deck, every member of Christ, a minister of Christ.    <\/span>Claim your birth rite as part of the royal
\npriesthood of God and do not exchange it for anything— not for anything. AMEN<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/span> <\/span> <\/span> <\/span>   <\/span>  <\/span>    <\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n<\/p>\n
\n

[1]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a> Marshall, 1 Peter<\/u>, p. 75.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

[2]<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a> Selwyn, First Peter<\/u>, p. 101 col.
\n2.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(This is an edited version of the lecture I gave twice in Houston this past week, with good response).            Almost all forms of ancient religion were all about priests, temples, and sacrifices.  This was as true of Greek religion and Roman religion, as true of Babylonian religion as Assyrian religion, and it was true…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nNeither Clergy nor Laity- a NT Vision of Ministry - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/02\/neither-clergy-nor-laity-a-nt-vision-of-ministry.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Neither Clergy nor Laity- a NT Vision of Ministry - 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