In Finding Organic Church, I explore how Paul deliberately mentored, coached, and apprenticed his younger coworkers in Ephesus for a period of three years. Essentially, Paul repeated what Jesus did with the Twelve in Galilee in what A. B. Bruce called “the training of the Twelve.”
The main difference is that Paul trained eight people instead of twelve. Interestingly, during the time that Paul trained these eight coworkers to carry on his work, he paid for their needs. Rather than taking money from them – to pay for their training or “internship” – he supported them during those years of spiritual apprenticeship. Paul makes this plain in his discourse to the Ephesian elders:
“I have not coveted anyone’s silver or gold or clothing. You yourselves know that these hands of mine have supplied my own needs and the needs of my companions. In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’” (Acts 20:33-35). Incidentally, that’s the context of the famous text, “It is better to give than to receive.” With that in mind, I received this email from someone this week. A Christian sister in her 30s. The email raises some important, piercing questions. Take a look. Why is it that so many churches and organizations have “internship” programs for young adults, and in almost every single case, the young adult has to raise money for these usually very expensive programs? Oftentimes, if one wants to “really get involved” in the inner workings of a group, or have any opportunities for leadership, one has to cough up anywhere from $5,000 to $10,000 for “leadership training” in a “school” or “internship program” with their organization.
It seems that organizations have found these internship programs both a good way to raise up new leaders, but also a great way to finance the already existing leaders with fees from the new interns, and I don’t see ANYONE out on the blogosphere questioning what’s going on here. Is it right that in the body of Christ, in order to be trained and to come into meaningful chances and opportunities of leadership within any organization, one has to pay thousands of dollars for that training – and go around begging money from their brothers and sisters for that?
I can understand people being asked to raise money when they are SENT somewhere, when the money is necessary to fulfilling the mission they are being sent on, but someone now money has become a prerequisite to being allowed on the inside track of any up and coming ministry, from 24/7 (for instance, to be on the inside track with them one should go to their 5 month training program for roughly $8,000, not counting personal expenses) to YWAM to many large churches to IHOP and on and on.
About The Author
Harrison Okafor
editor
Judith is a believer, a lover of Christ and a Gospel freak person. A passionate gospel blogger and press writer. I work with GospelHitsNaija.net Media, no 1 Gospel music platform.
