Transcript: Officiant Skills in Ministry Duties

Video Transcript: Officiant Skills in Ministry Duties

Hi, my name is Henry Reyenga President of Christian Leaders Institute, president of Christian Leaders Ministry and Network Minister at Christian Leaders Alliance. When I graduated from Seminary in 1987, I was not equipped in officiant ministry skills. I learned them through the School of Hard Knocks, through mentors and other people who shared those skills with me. My journey to ministry was an eight-year college-and-seminary journey where I got a bachelor's degree and then got a Master of Divinity degree. My internship along the way certainly helped but it would have been wonderful if the skills of officiating, the skills of doing a ceremony, the skills of doing certain prayers would have been taught for the cognitive grounding, so that when I went into the field and met with my mentors, I had a base point. It was not done. This class is about giving you these ministries skills, which is perfect if you're just considered to be a volunteer minister, a volunteer officiant, or if you want to be a licensed officiant or a licensed minister. 

Maybe you want to pursue more not only in volunteer ministry, but also maybe grow into part time ministry, and you want to become ordained through our Deacon or Minister ordination program. This is a perfect introductory skill class that will greatly help you in being an ordained Deacon minister, and then moving on to the various roles such as women's minister or youth minister, then move on even further to roles like commissioned minister, even minister of the word. This is a foundational class.

Let's first of all talk about the need of officiant skills in ministry duties. What are some of the duties you will be called upon to participate with God's people through serving and performing ministry duties? What would some of these roles be? There will be the duties of baptisms and dedications, funerals, the Lord's Supper, profession of faith, leading someone to faith, and confession of sin. One of the things that is very important, as a duty of a minister, is to help someone unburden their soul. Visitations like hospital visitations or care facilities, nursing homes, and prayers associated with those visitations. Spiritual Warfare is an issue that licensed ordained ministers come across. 

Maybe you're asked to emcee (be a Master of Ceremonies) events with God invited. Here are some of the duty ceremonies and prayers in which you may be asked to participate. First of all, understand this: God has been sending out armies of ministers. We read in Psalm 134:1, "praise the Lord, all you servants of the Lord, who ministered by night in the house of the Lord, lift up your hands in the sanctuary, and praise the Lord." This is a beautiful passage that is a foundational passage for ministry and the servants of the Lord. We read that angels are ministering spirits sent by God. I even picture that angels do ceremonies, behind the scenes, ceremonies of protection where they're connected directly to God. Servants: that's a key emphasis here at Christian Leaders Ministries, that Διακονοσ (diakonos) means servant, servants of the Lord, ministers of the Lord. here we are and you are, potentially are called to be a minister for the Lord. Let's talk about some of these ministry duties. I find it interesting that even in the book of Timothy you see this emphasis so strongly in 1 Timothy 4:4-8, "for everything God made is good. Nothing is to be rejected if it is to be received with thanksgiving, because it is consecrated by the word of God in prayer. If you point these things out to the brothers, you'd be a good minister of Christ Jesus brought up in the truth of the faith, and of the good teaching you have followed, have nothing to do with godless myths and old wives tales. Rather, train yourself to be godly, for physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come." What I find is, is that word consecrated is fascinating. That's an Old Testament theme for ministry that consecrated duties, the duties of the priest, the duties of ministry, and to be a good minister of Jesus Christ, to be one who does ceremonies and prayers, and on duties associated with bringing people close to the Lord. In the end, that's what these are all about. These are all about activities that connect humans with God in Christ Jesus. much of Christianity we often think about as the message of Christianity, Christ is risen from the dead, Christ paid for all of our sins. Often, we don't think about specific duties that ministers do, though are very important and heighten the connection between God and humans. Ministers are those agents who step into situations and make a visit, do a funeral, pray for someone who is oppressed by spiritual forces, and in that very activity to be a good minister. What we see in this passage in 1 Timothy is to be a good minister, who rejects myths and wives' tales. I think that's interesting because the ministers of the dark side, Satan, also do certain ceremonies. They are to have people minister apart from the knowledge and power of God through the Holy Spirit. As ministers, we want nothing to do with that. Our prayers, our activities and duties, all are in servant understanding that we don't make things up based on our own power. We don't say prayers because we think our prayers do it. No, we do what we do to glorify God. What was fascinating is for us. It's about godliness, not our own power, when we minister to others. I find it interesting to look at that word 'godliness' in the book of 1 Timothy, and on your own just look at that. It's fascinating. Beyond all question, the mystery of godliness was great. He appeared in a body was vindicated by the Spirit was seen by angels preached among the nation was believed down in the world with take it up in glory. That's right, and godliness. To be grounded in Jesus Christ, to not be in your own power, but to be an officiant, a minister, who is representing the God of the universe. When you pray for someone, you are not giving an incantation, or you're not just to some spiritual words that you're bringing to bear. No, we are dependent on God; we are on God's team. 

It is amazing to me the mystery of godliness. When doctors can't find an answer of the mystery of godliness, God changes the situation in Jesus Christ. When somebody is lost in their sin, it's the mystery of godliness that God can rescue them. When someone is not sure about their future, it's the mystery of godliness that he was taken to the glory, and we will be with Him in glory with him. Let's talk now about how the mystery of godliness the presence of God, depending on God fits into the understanding of ritual, ritual habits, our core behaviors in all of our lives. We see this in Deuteronomy 6:7, Impress them on your children, talk about them, when you sit at home. when you walk along the road, when you lie down, and when you get up. the law of God was given to Moses, and the behaviors of living and leaning into the law are things that are done habitually core habits, rituals. Now, ritual is a negative word for many people because they think about how they were raised, and all it was, was ritual. we've talked about that at Christian Leaders Institute, that professors Steve Elzinga uses a glass and he says the glass in some ways is the ritual, the habits, but we all want the water, or in this case, the coffee. But the glass holds the coffee in there. Officiant ministers who do rituals, in prayer, and in those types of things but it is not the ritual itself. It's the prayer through the power of the Holy Spirit, and to the activity of God that changes things. 

Ritual functions in our life, whether it's the habit of a family getting together at the dinner table, the habit, or the ritual, of when the Word of God is opened up. But it is through the power of the Holy Spirit, that the Word opened daily changes hearts, whether it's devotions in your marriage, your family, whether it's a small group or church. In some ways of habit or ritual, you come to church to officiate as ministers of God who then take prayers and opportunities ceremony into situations. These are repeatable rituals, many times repeatable prayers, even things like baptism: there's a baptism form that's followed. But it's not the form itself that changes people's hearts, it's the meaning, the power of the Holy Spirit. There's the ritual of the Lord's Supper, but it's the meaning of the presence of God. in this class, you're going to learn that the duties, the habits, the rituals, and how they impact people's lives. let's talk specifically about these duties, these specific rituals. Now in the Bible, they are present from the book of Genesis all the way through the book of Revelation. Here's an example on Abraham, visit Melchizedek, king of Salem in Genesis 14:18. 

Then Melchizedek king of Salem brought up bread and wine, he was a priest of God most high. That is action packed: the officiant, the Minister, the ritual, he brings out bread and wine. Now, later on, we celebrate communion with bread and wine, bread and juice. Jesus picks us up. Take, eat, remember and believe that my body was given for complete remission of all of your sins. Take drink, remember and believe the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, was shed for complete remission of all of our sins. here is a practice, a ritual, sort of speak, that has been handed down thousands of years now. It is not the ritual itself. It's the presence of God that the ritual will bring to someone as they open up their heart and invite Jesus’ energy as we remember and believe that his blood was shed. we see that in the Old Testament an entire Levitical priesthood, leaders that are raised up first Chronicles 26:13, these divisions of the gatekeepers, through their chief men, had duties for ministry in the temple of the Lord, just as their relatives had. you had this whole line of ministers. The apostle Paul picks this idea up through Romans 15:16. he talks about his full ambition is to preach Christ where he's not known. Then he talks about to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles with the priestly duty, and one of those duties of proclaiming the gospel of God so that the Gentiles might become an acceptable offering to God sanctified by the Holy Spirit. 

What I find fascinating about that, is that one of the duties we're going to talk about in this class is the duty the ceremony of leading people to Jesus Christ. In a sense, when someone leads someone to Christ, that's the work of the officiant, the work of the officiant minister: you are officiating, making official hearts and minds committed to Jesus Christ. we do a lot of things. But when something is made official, it comes out of wishful thinking, it usually becomes a heart-set when you are willing to declare something publicly with someone else there. Like weddings: if you if all he had was like private, little weddings, where a couple got together and saying, “We're married, let's just be married. Yay, we're married!” Really? How many divorces? Would divorce even exist, was it official? There are so many things in life where we say let's make it official, officiate and officiate for an officiant minister. Officiate means you are bringing God to the table in making something official. When public prayers are given, there's an official aspect to it where you receive prayer in official capacity. 

When someone is licensed and ordained to ministry, there's an official piece that is given to them so they can officiate something, which brings God into something that has to be made official. part of what I just love that we just read about from the Apostle Paul is that he was to be a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles with the priestly official duty of proclaiming the gospel of God so that the Gentiles might become an offering acceptable to God, sanctified by the Holy Spirit. 

I want to talk about uniforms next. For much of my ministry, I never really thought too much about this. I had uniforms, often with in the evening official suit and a tie on, it seemed like that was the Protestant minister uniform, and my friends who are more ancient churches, and they had a collar and, you know, in the priest uniform on, and recently, I've come in the last five, six years to see the value of uniforms. Exodus 28:24 says, “These are garments they are to make. A breast piece and ephod, a robe, a woven turban, and sash. They are to make these sacred garments for your brother Aaron and his sons so they may serve me as priests.” In Exodus 35:19, a woven garment worn for ministering in the sanctuary, both the sacred garments for Aaron and the priests, and the garments for his sons as they serve as priests are specified. this is what I've noticed, if I go to a hospital, there's the nurses have uniforms on I know that the nurse and the doctors have a uniform on and if I go get my car serviced they have a uniform on. I began to think about that. The uniform says something about who they represent, who they're for, who they're working for. To me, they're starting to become more and more valuable, as I think about ministry, and I think about licensed or ordained leaders. I know that that is becoming an increasingly important thing, especially in a day and age when people are looking for God. I believe it's increasingly important that a Christian minister, an officiant, or minister, has that uniform. I don't want to get silly about this. some people say, well, if you don't have a uniform on, does that not make you a minister? No. Do I have to wear a uniform if I'm going to be a minister, a licensed ordained minister? No, you don't need to have one. But I actually believe like it was in the Old Testament, it is a tool for impact. People feel comfortable that they got this uniform from a place that is formally endorsing ordaining licensing ministers. They're in a day where there's so many scams, everything that a uniform implies can be helpful. I'd like to say that that is something that can be for the volunteer the part time for the career, because we do see it in the Bible. The apostle Paul was clearly clergy, as well as a tent maker. 

He stayed and worked with them and read about him, and Aquila and Priscilla in Acts 18, but then you also see that priests, Old Testament, priests, ministers who are given first fruits of grain, new wine oil, first heard from both sharing for your sheep. What I find fascinating about this is that in both cases, whether someone is by vocational or part time, or volunteer, part time or career, that designation of ministry, and being a minister applies in all those cases, so as you are here, learning about the skills of being an officiating minister, you are here so that you can represent God in official capacities. In this class, we're not doing the Christian wedding officiant: that's another class. This is some of those other skills in this class, you know, such as visitation, the baptisms, communion and so forth. But these skills whether doing a wedding, in the other class, Christian way in officiant skill class, or this class, they fill you out. But you're confident and competent in your colleagues serve the Lord, whether it's to be licensed or ordained, or maybe just ordained locally as an elder or Deacon in a local church and not through Christian Leaders Alliance. This class will give you tools to be more effective and more confident as you exercise your calling in ministry.