Here’s the truth: our prayers are being answered!

There are more people training for ministry in the Fellowship of Independent Evangelical Churches (FIEC) than at any time in the last 30 years. Surprised? So were we, when we did the maths.

And the numbers we crunched need a few caveats: We don’t have absolutely concrete data going back 30 years, so we had to do some asking around. And because we’re independent churches we don’t keep tabs on everyone training for Christian work, so we had to do a little estimation.

But in broad terms, it’s about right. Yes, in the FIEC, there are more people training for ministry today than for a long, long time (something approaching 200 people, probably). It seems counter-intuitive: as other en contributors have pointed out, there seems to be an almost catastrophic decline in those following classic training routes (typically full-time residential training).

What are we to make of all of this?

Lamenting what we’ve lost

The real decline in the traditional journeys into ministry is something to lament. We have lost something significant. Full-time seminary-based education is a gold standard that is almost impossible to replicate in other forms. And the church needs its scholars, and wise, theologically sharp pastor-teachers and workers who will lead the way in the future. My daughter and son-in-law went through such training and are stronger for it.

Moreover – and perhaps more immediately significant – we have completely lost the secondary market for church workers as a result. Most people training are now doing so staying rooted in their local church. This means that there is no longer a pool of people leaving college and looking for that first role. Smaller churches or those without resources are particularly suffering. Again, this is a loss to lament.

Celebrating what we’ve gained

But it is not all bad. In our churches, the average age for training is around or just over 30. This means that candidates often have young families and are rooted in local situations (schools, employment, support networks) that make moving away difficult. Yet, it seems to me, it is not primarily for this reason that in-church training has become more and more popular.

Rather, it is the commitment to a local church – to serve, love, grow and develop in a place where God has already placed them – that is motivating many people to seek more-flexible training options whilst staying put. There is also a broader range of folk training for ministry; and churches willing to invest in them doing so. All good – and worth celebrating. Love your local church? Invest in your local workers? Great!

Flexibility is key here. It’s great that training institutions are waking up to finding ways to serve people in such situations. Our training fund has been supporting those training for ministry for over ten years, and it is noticeable how these trends have been good for the church. And it can be good for all kinds of churches: my own story is that of training in-church in a smaller church setting.

Flexing to what we need

It would be naïve, however, to pretend that we can sit back and rejoice. The context is changing all the time. John Benton (en, October 2023) has a point; and I do think some thought is needed as to how we help certain churches find a new generation of leaders. Karen Soole (en, March 2024) rightly identifies that with a younger generation there are other challenges for us to face in raising leaders. Recent scandals may well have been off-putting.

Yet the changing training decisions also reflect, to an extent, that we can flex relatively well already. It may take time and patience (and collaboration), but if we stop and think about it, we are already adapting well and ensuring that large numbers of men and women across a greater variety of roles are being well-prepared for ministry.

The Lord is raising up workers for the harvest. More please, Lord! Give us wisdom, Lord! But let us not miss the truth: our prayers are already being answered.