John Sampson recently blogged (THANKS RHETT!) 6 reasons why he likes the bi-vocational model - where ministers/staff choose to work a regular job and do a church job on top of that (for free?).

WHY WOULD ANYONE WANT TO DO THIS!!?? What do you think? Here's what John said:

1.Shared Responsibility: All Christians have a job to do.  We can’t leave the ‘ministry” side of life to the paid “sage on the stage.”

2.More Money Goes To Ministry: Less overhead forces/enables people to look at what God is doing around them and see how to serve and bless others.

3.A Good Kind of Messy: Removing the strong “staff vs everyone else” divide flattens the power structure, which may usher in more conflict. But it’s conflict that would be there in any model–It’s just hidden in others.  Here, people are forced to deal with problems instead of ignoring them.

4.It’s Sustainable: If you’re planting a church, it’s tempting to grow quickly to become self-supporting.  But often that leads to shortcuts that transfer Christians rather than reach out to engage people outside of the church.

For the other two, go to our buddy's blog: RhettSmith.com

What do you think?