By Allan McCullough

“If I catch you doing ministry, you’re fired!”

Those kind words are from our beloved Rich Hurst. It is a saying that to someone who is in full-time vocational ministry seems oxymoronic and sacrilegious. Yet over the past two months, these words have made incredible sense to me. I work for The Gathering, the college ministry of McLean Bible Church. The Gathering basically plants fully operating churches supported by McLean Bible Church on each of the five major campuses of Washington DC and I specifically work with George Mason University. When I got the job, I first thought that I would come in, take control of the team, and do a ton of work to operate the Gathering at GMU…

I was wrong. I was confronted with those words…”If I catch you doing ministry, you’re fired!”

See, the Gathering is student lead, volunteer coached, and staff guided. My perception that I was going to operate the Gathering at GMU was wrong because if I did it all on my own, I would be leading a one-man charge. I was fortunate to learn this lesson early in the summer before classes started at Mason. I say this because we had our first service last Wednesday night that resulted in an attendance of 133 students and seven small groups being formed. This is an absolute answer to prayer because the Gathering is starting to make an impact on its campuses that it has never had before. As I began to reflect on that night and thank God for his provision, I realized that none of that was possible without the team of people we had.

I realized by looking back at how the day went on Wednesday…

• Our service starts at 9:00pm.
• At about 4:00pm on Wednesday I became overwhelmed over all of the things that needed to be done in order to put on our service.
• At 5:00pm my stress level rose.
• At 6:45pm it was time to get started setting up and contacting all sorts of people.
• At 7:00pm I had nothing to do.
• At 7:30pm I had nothing to do.
• At 8:00pm I had nothing to do.
• At 8:30pm I was talking to students.
• At 9:00pm I was enjoying our service and it was AMAZING!

I quickly realized that our team of people was built up so well that they put on our service in such a way that was efficient and excellent and I had nothing to do with it. I didn’t need to delegate tasks, I didn’t need to be a drill sergeant, and I had no reason to worry or be stressed. My job that entire night was to encourage our team and just be there for them. That is when this mantra of Rich Hurst made sense to me. My job is not to DO ministry but to EQUIP the people of God to do ministry and that was exactly why Wednesday night went so well. The mark of a great leader is one who can put their own selfish motives aside and empower others to step up and take charge of the task at hand. In the words of Jesus…

“Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” -Matthew 4:19

Just as Jesus empowered the disciples to build the church so are we to empower the people to preach the Gospel.