The Ministry of Presence
By Glenna Marshall
There is no perfect church. Charles Spurgeon famously said, “If I had never joined a church till I had found one that was perfect, I should never have joined one at all. And the moment I did join it, if I had found one, I should have spoiled it, for it would not have been a perfect church after I had become a member of it.”[1] Each local body of believers is made up of imperfect people who are slogging their way toward holiness. It should not surprise us when we hurt one another. Paul’s letters to the early churches overflowed with corrections for fighting and exhortations for them to love one another. Peter’s letters spill over with the same kinds of encouragements and rebukes.
The New Testament epistles are ripe with warnings about factions and infighting and strong with urges for the believers to love one another deeply. The backbones of these letters are reminders to us of our former identity as those who were far from God and our current identity as coheirs who are being built together into one building, one body, one family through the same Spirit who lives in each of us. We must fight for that intense love that covers all the ways we have failed one another.
For the first decade of ministry at the church where my husband has pastored for sixteen years, I followed a formulaic equation for ministry. We, the pastor and family, serve and teach you, the people, how to live. In return, you, the people, serve us by following like good little sheep. We’ll all get along if we follow the formula. But that’s not realistic—and it’s not exactly biblical, either. Ministry is less of a formula and more of a practice of presence. If you’ve experienced difficult ministry that has resulted in a lack of trust and lots of broken relationships, there isn’t a churchy formula that will fix it. I can assure you—proximity is the way forward.
Throughout redemptive history, the Lord has expressed His faithful love to His people through His presence. It follows that the way for His people to maintain an intense love for one another is through the ministry of presence as well.
After years of trying and failing to connect with my church community in a way I thought was most effective, I finally ditched that formula and began practicing proximity. Presence. Though I used to think I’d only be content if our church was growing and succeeding and people weren’t mad at us, I’ve learned to pray for ways to declare God’s sufficiency in my life and reject that contingency plan. If God’s nearness is enough for me (and it is), then I can safely expose myself to risk in my faith community—because my security is bound up in the faithfulness of God, not in the people of my church. They’re off the hook for my contentment.
When I realized that my hope must be in Christ and not other’s opinions of me, I stopped praying for my church to love me back and began praying that they would love Jesus the most. It is unfair to hang our contentment on the people with whom we worship and serve; they were never meant to be the anchor for our hope. Only Christ can shoulder the weight of our souls’ satisfaction. Pinning our hearts’ desires on Him frees the people of God from undue expectations. We can simply be a family who use our gifts to encourage one another rather than depending on one another for complete contentment. I think this is an important message for ministry families to grasp. When we stop expecting our brothers and sisters to answer an ache that only God can answer, we can rightly see them as brothers and sisters, coheirs, living stones, and fellow homes where God is pleased to dwell. Their personal struggles, and even their criticisms, won’t hold the kind of power over our contentment if our contentment is connected to Jesus alone. We can just love, pray, and be present.
It’s taken nearly sixteen years as a pastor’s wife to get this, but I’m learning that what my fellow coheirs need from me is presence. Just presence, full stop. Just knowledge that they’re not alone in whatever dark valley they’re walking through. As the Lord has done for me for years upon years, I need to sit near those who are hurting and extend grace.
I do it sloppily. Practicing presence reveals the selfishness in me, and I swallow a lot of platitudes in moments of awkward silence. Mostly, though, people just want you to be near them when they’re suffering. That is sometimes easy and sometimes hard—and always needful.
What we need from each other isn’t a formula for ministry or a churchy platitude. What we need from each other is presence. We need a coheir, a family member, a fellow living stone to help us find our anchor—to help us remember the words to the song we sing every Sunday, when we gather together as one family and declare to the One who unites us with His presence: “You are enough for us.”
[1] Charles Haddon Spurgeon, “The Best Donation” (sermon, Metropolitan Tabernacle, London, April 5, 1891).
Editors note: This is an adapted excerpt from Glenna’s book, The Promise is His Presence: Why God is Always Enough (P&R Publishing, 2019). Used with permission.
Glenna Marshall is married to her pastor, William, and lives in rural Southeast Missouri where she tries and fails to keep up with her two energetic sons. She is the author of The Promise is His Presence: Why God is Always Enough (P&R) and Everyday Faithfulness: The Beauty of Ordinary Perseverance in a Demanding World (Crossway, June 2020).