The Spurgeon Fellowship Journal

Book Review
Reconstructing Pastoral Ministry:
A Christological Foundation
by Andrew Purves

Andrew Purves’ Reconstructing Pastoral Ministry: A Christological Foundation (RPM) begins with a simple question: “What makes pastoral ministry Christian?” At first blush, this may sound like an odd question, after all, isn’t all pastoral ministry “Christian” by definition? The trouble with such an assumption, as Purves documents in the book’s introduction, is that since the early 1920’s (beginning with Seward Hiltner’s seminal work Preface to Pastoral Theology) there has been a significant shift in both the study and practice of pastoral theology. What was historically fueled by “the exegesis of Scripture and the central Christian doctrines” has been replaced by a much more psychological, secular and pragmatic vision of doing ministry (xix-xx). This shift has introduced what Purves calls a “huge space” between the “so-called consensus fidelium” (that is, the church’s historic, orthodox statement of faith) and “what is broadly identified as pastoral theology and pastoral care today” (xvii). Pastoral theology has been, to put it succinctly, de-theologized. RPM is written, however, not merely as a condemnation of pastoral theology’s past and recent failings, but as a positive affirmation and explanation of what and how pastoral theology ought to be:

Pastoral theology, I believe, must be developed specifically as Christian pastoral theology, rooted explicitly and actually within, arising out of, and accountable to the doctrinal or dogmatic content of Christian faith. God, as the principle subject matter, is to be apprehended from within the event—past, present, and coming—of Jesus Christ . . . pastoral theology is understood properly first of all as a theology of the care of God for us in, through, and as Jesus Christ; as such it is an expression of the gospel of revelation and reconciliation (xviii).

After a substantial introduction, Purves divides his text in two: Part One – Jesus Christ: The Mission of God, and Part Two – Ministry in Union with Christ. Part One functions as a sort of theological prolegomena, a preliminary discussion defining what distinctly Christian pastoral theology ought to be built upon. Chapter One—“Doctrine and Pastoral Care”—begins with a powerful declaration: “While, loosely speaking, pastoral work is what pastors do, this is true only derivatively. Pastors do what they do because of who God is and what God does. Or more precisely, before it is the church’s ministry all ministry is first of all God’s ministry in, through and as Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit” (p. 3). In other words, the work of pastoral ministry ought to be conceived not in terms of what the pastor does but rather as a continuation by participation in God’s ministry in the gospel. In Part One, Purves walks his reader sequentially through: (1) the nature of doctrine and theology; (2) the distinctly Trinitarian “ministry” of God; (3) the work of Jesus Christ as the “apostle and high priest of our confession;” (4) the believer’s (therefore the pastor’s) spiritual union with Christ; (5) the continuing and heavenly priesthood of Christ; and finally, (6) “eschatology and ministry.”

Again and again, Purves returns to the theological and practical centers of God as Trinity and union with Christ. Focusing on the latter, Purves records, “Through the communion of the Holy Spirit the Christian life is participatio Christi, not imatatio Christi” (p. 40). Whether a pastor conceives of the Christian life as participation in Christ or the imitation of Christ, it works itself out as the difference between authentic Christian ministry and what Purves astutely terms “pastoral Pelagianism”:

Apart from union with Christ, ministry is cast back upon us to achieve. This is a recipe for failure, for we all fall short of the glory of God. The understanding and practice of pastoral work in this case is a burden too heavy to bear and follows a path that denies the gospel. We do not heal the sick, comfort the bereaved, accompany the lonely, forgive sins, raise up hope of eternal life, or bring people to God on the strength of our piety and pastoral skill. To think that these tasks are ours to perform is not only hubris, but also a recipe for exhaustion and depression in ministry (45; cf. xxx and 158-60).

Although RPM is thoroughly confessional, chapter three—“Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of Our Confession”—does deserve a bit of special attention. Purves traces his model of the atonement through four historical figures: Athanasius, John Calvin, John McLeod Campbell and Thomas F. Torrance. It is upon the third and least known members of this theological quartet (John McLeod Campbell), that Purves does some theological sidestepping. While praising much of Calvin’s Christ-centered view of the atonement, ultimately Purves rejects so-called “Federal Calvinism” as a later development of English Puritanism (i.e., the Westminster Confession) noting that “this two-covenant theology [grace verses law] was unknown to Calvin, and is noted only once by Augustine alone of all the church fathers” (64). “Federal Calvinism,” argues Purves, “imposed conditions of faith and obedience that signaled a departure from the Reformational view of grace as unilateral and established instead a bilateral view of God’s promise and human duty” (65). This “bilateral view” undercut the freeness and power of grace and relocated the believers’ sense of assurance from Christ to “an anxious, introspective self-examination in search of the fruits of one’s sanctification” (65). In contrast, Campbell, a reformed Scotsman whose major text on this topic, The Nature of the Atonement, was published in 1856, “insisted on the difference between a legal and a filial standing before God that led him to define atonement not as the penal reconciliation of God to humankind, but as the restoration of living relations, which is the more basic or original meaning of the word” (63). While approving of Campbell’s treatment, Purves never himself rejects the juridical nature of the atonement. Rather, his purpose is to stress the often overlooked reality that, as he explains, “The atonement cannot be limited only to [Christ’s] passive obedience” (74). Although there is plenty of room for critique upon this point, ultimately Purves rejects the limiting and de-personalizing effects such a view of the atonement often creates. He affirms the imputation of both Christ’s “passive and active obedience” (74).

Part Two of RPM grows organically out of Part One as the pastoral fruit of deep, theological roots. Purves’ reformed background shines in his treatment of preaching in chapter seven, “The Ministry of the Word”:

[T]he sermon has personal divine authority. Or, to put it more startlingly: through our union with Christ, whereby we share in the life of Jesus Christ, the sermon becomes a present form of the incarnation, an enfleshment in speech today of the once historical and always eternal and living one Word of God. The sermon is the Word of God . . . [Preaching] is a theological act in the true sense . . . It is God’s personal and actual Word of address to the people gathered through the voice of the minister (157).

Purves directs the pastor at every step to be a mediator and an embodied ambassador of God’s word. This means resisting the temptation and often the demand to “fix” parishioners’ problems and to instead direct people first to the reality of Christ’s objective and decisive victory and then to their own subjective union in that victory with Him: “Everything is the ‘speaking’ of God’s own Word and Truth who is Jesus Christ in his actuality. . . . The pastor’s primary job is to listen for… ‘the entrance ramps’ that lead us from the presenting problem to a discussion of the real truth of the person’s life, which is the person’s union with Christ” (153 and 162).

A member of the PCUSA’s confessional movement, Purves is to the mainline denominations what David Wells has been to evangelical Christianity: a prophet with a clarion call to return to a distinctly Christian way of doing Christian ministry. RPM is first and foremost a theological text, full of half-page footnotes, italicized Latin, and dense, sprawling sentences teeming with phrases like “in, through, and as.” Yet it is also a passionate book that seeks to minister to both the mind and heart of pastors, relentlessly pointing them (and, through them, their congregations) back to the One who alone is both the subject and source of all Christian ministry: Jesus Christ.

Aaron Orendorff, M. Div. student at Western Seminary, serves as Pastoral Intern at New Life Community Church in West Linn, Oregon.


	Book Review Reconstructing Pastoral Ministry: A Christological Foundation by Andrew Purves Andrew Purves’ Reconstructing Pastoral Ministry: A Christological Foundation (RPM) begins with a simple question: “What makes pastoral ministry Christian?” At first blush, this may sound like an odd question, after all, isn’t all pastoral ministry “Christian” by definition? The trouble with such an assumption, as Purves documents in the book’s introduction, is that since the early 1920’s (beginning with Seward Hiltner’s seminal work Preface to Pastoral Theology) there has been a significant shift in both the study and practice of pastoral theology. What was historically fueled by “the exegesis of Scripture and the central Christian doctrines” has been replaced by a much more psychological, secular and pragmatic vision of doing ministry (xix-xx). This shift has introduced what Purves calls a “huge space” between the “so-called consensus fidelium” (that is, the church’s historic, orthodox statement of faith) and “what is broadly identified as pastoral theology and pastoral care today” (xvii). Pastoral theology has been, to put it succinctly, de-theologized. RPM is written, however, not merely as a condemnation of pastoral theology’s past and recent failings, but as a positive affirmation and explanation of what and how pastoral theology ought to be: Pastoral theology, I believe, must be developed specifically as Christian pastoral theology, rooted explicitly and actually within, arising out of, and accountable to the doctrinal or dogmatic content of Christian faith. God, as the principle subject matter, is to be apprehended from within the event—past, present, and coming—of Jesus Christ . . . pastoral theology is understood properly first of all as a theology of the care of God for us in, through, and as Jesus Christ; as such it is an expression of the gospel of revelation and reconciliation (xviii). After a substantial introduction, Purves divides his text in two: Part One – Jesus Christ: The Mission of God, and Part Two – Ministry in Union with Christ. Part One functions as a sort of theological prolegomena, a preliminary discussion defining what distinctly Christian pastoral theology ought to be built upon. Chapter One—“Doctrine and Pastoral Care”—begins with a powerful declaration: “While, loosely speaking, pastoral work is what pastors do, this is true only derivatively. Pastors do what they do because of who God is and what God does. Or more precisely, before it is the church’s ministry all ministry is first of all God’s ministry in, through and as Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit” (p. 3). In other words, the work of pastoral ministry ought to be conceived not in terms of what the pastor does but rather as a continuation by participation in God’s ministry in the gospel. In Part One, Purves walks his reader sequentially through: (1) the nature of doctrine and theology; (2) the distinctly Trinitarian “ministry” of God; (3) the work of Jesus Christ as the “apostle and high priest of our confession;” (4) the believer’s (therefore the pastor’s) spiritual union with Christ; (5) the continuing and heavenly priesthood of Christ; and finally, (6) “eschatology and ministry.” Again and again, Purves returns to the theological and practical centers of God as Trinity and union with Christ. Focusing on the latter, Purves records, “Through the communion of the Holy Spirit the Christian life is participatio Christi, not imatatio Christi” (p. 40). Whether a pastor conceives of the Christian life as participation in Christ or the imitation of Christ, it works itself out as the difference between authentic Christian ministry and what Purves astutely terms “pastoral Pelagianism”: Apart from union with Christ, ministry is cast back upon us to achieve. This is a recipe for failure, for we all fall short of the glory of God. The understanding and practice of pastoral work in this case is a burden too heavy to bear and follows a path that denies the gospel. We do not heal the sick, comfort the bereaved, accompany the lonely, forgive sins, raise up hope of eternal life, or bring people to God on the strength of our piety and pastoral skill. To think that these tasks are ours to perform is not only hubris, but also a recipe for exhaustion and depression in ministry (45; cf. xxx and 158-60). Although RPM is thoroughly confessional, chapter three—“Jesus, the Apostle and High Priest of Our Confession”—does deserve a bit of special attention. Purves traces his model of the atonement through four historical figures: Athanasius, John Calvin, John McLeod Campbell and Thomas F. Torrance. It is upon the third and least known members of this theological quartet (John McLeod Campbell), that Purves does some theological sidestepping. While praising much of Calvin’s Christ-centered view of the atonement, ultimately Purves rejects so-called “Federal Calvinism” as a later development of English Puritanism (i.e., the Westminster Confession) noting that “this two-covenant theology [grace verses law] was unknown to Calvin, and is noted only once by Augustine alone of all the church fathers” (64). “Federal Calvinism,” argues Purves, “imposed conditions of faith and obedience that signaled a departure from the Reformational view of grace as unilateral and established instead a bilateral view of God’s promise and human duty” (65). This “bilateral view” undercut the freeness and power of grace and relocated the believers’ sense of assurance from Christ to “an anxious, introspective self-examination in search of the fruits of one’s sanctification” (65). In contrast, Campbell, a reformed Scotsman whose major text on this topic, The Nature of the Atonement, was published in 1856, “insisted on the difference between a legal and a filial standing before God that led him to define atonement not as the penal reconciliation of God to humankind, but as the restoration of living relations, which is the more basic or original meaning of the word” (63). While approving of Campbell’s treatment, Purves never himself rejects the juridical nature of the atonement. Rather, his purpose is to stress the often overlooked reality that, as he explains, “The atonement cannot be limited only to [Christ’s] passive obedience” (74). Although there is plenty of room for critique upon this point, ultimately Purves rejects the limiting and de-personalizing effects such a view of the atonement often creates. He affirms the imputation of both Christ’s “passive and active obedience” (74). Part Two of RPM grows organically out of Part One as the pastoral fruit of deep, theological roots. Purves’ reformed background shines in his treatment of preaching in chapter seven, “The Ministry of the Word”: [T]he sermon has personal divine authority. Or, to put it more startlingly: through our union with Christ, whereby we share in the life of Jesus Christ, the sermon becomes a present form of the incarnation, an enfleshment in speech today of the once historical and always eternal and living one Word of God. The sermon is the Word of God . . . [Preaching] is a theological act in the true sense . . . It is God’s personal and actual Word of address to the people gathered through the voice of the minister (157). Purves directs the pastor at every step to be a mediator and an embodied ambassador of God’s word. This means resisting the temptation and often the demand to “fix” parishioners’ problems and to instead direct people first to the reality of Christ’s objective and decisive victory and then to their own subjective union in that victory with Him: “Everything is the ‘speaking’ of God’s own Word and Truth who is Jesus Christ in his actuality. . . . The pastor’s primary job is to listen for… ‘the entrance ramps’ that lead us from the presenting problem to a discussion of the real truth of the person’s life, which is the person’s union with Christ” (153 and 162). A member of the PCUSA’s confessional movement, Purves is to the mainline denominations what David Wells has been to evangelical Christianity: a prophet with a clarion call to return to a distinctly Christian way of doing Christian ministry. RPM is first and foremost a theological text, full of half-page footnotes, italicized Latin, and dense, sprawling sentences teeming with phrases like “in, through, and as.” Yet it is also a passionate book that seeks to minister to both the mind and heart of pastors, relentlessly pointing them (and, through them, their congregations) back to the One who alone is both the subject and source of all Christian ministry: Jesus Christ. Aaron Orendorff, M. Div. student at Western Seminary, serves as Pastoral Intern at New Life Community Church in West Linn, Oregon.

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