Kerala Pentecostalism is one of the powerful spiritual movement that originated, developed and spread in Kerala. The main line Pentecostal churches are Indian Pentecostal Church, The Pentecostal Mission, Assemblies of God, Church of God and Sharon Fellowship. Though they contributed greatly for the growth of the Kingdom of God, there are many unhealthy trends in Pentecostalism which are really hindering the growth of the Kingdom of God and their organisational purity and strength.
Some are as follows:
1. Transfer System of Pastors
Most of the Kerala Pentecostal churches have a system of transferring the local church pastor every three years usually. This system gives different spiritual challenges:
Some are as follows:
1. Transfer System of Pastors
Most of the Kerala Pentecostal churches have a system of transferring the local church pastor every three years usually. This system gives different spiritual challenges:
- I do not understand the how far this system can keep God's will about a church and its pastor in all this process.
- A pastor takes at least one to two years to get into relationship with people in a new place. Once he builds up relationship and start to share gospel to the people in that place, he gets the transfer system and the work of God is hindered.
- Because of transfer, the local churches do not have any kind of vision for its ministry in the particular location.
- Pastors are increasingly getting into church politics and tend to prefer transferring to a church which is financially stable or rich.
2. No Basic Salary Support for Pastors
Most of the Kerala Pentecostal Churches do not have any kind of centralized system of salary scale for pastors. Local churches take care pastor in their financial capacity. The lack of centralized financial system keeps all pastors in financial insecurity. Pastors are not willing to pastor in a local church which has less members and less financial income. If there is a centralized salary scale for all the pastors under an organization irrespective of the pastor is working in a big local church or small local church and financially rich local church or otherwise will provide a financial security and stability to pastor. If that the case, pastors can go to any church to pastor irrespective of the condition of local church and also it will help to avoid church politics.
3.Preaching in the Church
One of the common trend in the Kerala Pentecostal Churches is that the pastor of the church often does not get an opportunity to preach properly in the Sunday worship because unexpected visiting or guest pastors come to the church. We need to stop this trend. The pastor must prepare and receive God's voice for the congregation and must deliver that to the congregation on every Sunday which is essential for the spiritual growth of the church.
4. Pastor's Education
The Pentecostal Churches need to have certain basic criteria for selecting a pastor for ministry in their organization. One of the ignoring area is that most of the pastors are not trained for a different need in the church such as counselling, leadership, Christian education, discipleship training, music and leading worship, ministry development and so on. Pastors should get continuous training and resources for their continuous ministerial development and growth. It is very much relevant especially doing a ministry in the fast changing world.
5. Lacking Vision
Most of the Pentecostal churches in Kerala engage in fasting prayer and conventions. Those are the major events of the most of the churches And most of the financial resources are investing in these two areas: fasting and conventions. I personally feel that churches should move beyond these two things. We need to reorganize and re-prioritize our events, finance, time, human resource and effort on the basis of the vision of the local church and for the growth of the local church. Mostly, the results from conventions and fasting for a church growth is very less. Churches need to think for other alternative ways to fulfill the vision of the local church. For example, if a local church has a enough finance, then, instead of investing all those finance in a convention or a fasting prayer, let local church send a missionary to a place and pioneer another church. If we ask any local church about their vision statement, they may not have it. It is the time where all the local churches should develop some kind of God given vision and reorganize the entire church according to that vision.
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This is what we left behind when we left the mainstream episcopal churches. What we really need is the guidance of the holy spirit and pure trust in Jesus and acceptance of his Lordship. Instead of scheming our own way!!
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