Being before Doing: Reciprocity and the Need to be Known
Galatians 6:2—Bear one another’s burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ
There’s a deep fear that lives in me— a fear not just of failure, but of being truly known. In our training, our culture, and even in our church systems, pastors often allow themselves into asymmetrical relationships: you know them, but they don’t know you. You carry the burdens of others, but keep your true self quietly tucked away. You preach the gospel of grace while hiding the very places in your life that need it most. And over time, it hollows you out.
I should add, having spent years in student ministry, it is inappropriate to have a fully transparent relationship with every person you minister to. But we should always have a few with whom we can be transparent, and we should be willing to be honest, not hiding ourselves with everyone.
The danger of this is not just burnout — though that’s real. The deeper danger is vocational confusion. You begin to live a job rather than a calling. Ministry becomes performance. Preaching becomes delivery. Leadership becomes strategy. And pastoring becomes something you do at people instead of with them. You lose reciprocity. And with it, you lose something essential to your vocation.
The False Safety of One-Way Love
When I started in ministry I reveled in the thought that I was needed. I gave myself to others and they responded with thanks and encouragement. I felt deeply fulfilled — but was also dangerously deceived. My identity has been tied up in doing ministry but then I was let go from my position. I was working at Highland Park Presbyterian church and was halfway through seminary. The church decided to restructure the student ministry and my position was terminated. I was even asked not to volunteer, so the students could adjust to the new structure quickly. Almost overnight I lost the ministry that was giving my life. I fell into bitterness and frustration because I didn’t understand how much my worth was tied up in my ministry. Because I finally realized how broken I was, and how much I needed the love of the people I ministered to as much as they needed me. In the year that followed a few families love me so deeply. They invited me into their homes, fed me, paid me(!) to tutor their students. I did more pastoring in that year loving those families and BEING LOVED by them, than in the year before when I had an official position.
But here’s the irony: if you can’t need others, you can’t experience gospel reciprocity. Reciprocity is being able to receive love as well as give it. And if you can’t experience gospel reciprocity, then you’re not really living out the full vocation of a pastor. You’re doing the job — and probably doing it well — but the life of Christ isn’t flowing in both directions.
Just as dangerous a lack of reciprocity turns people into projects. Instead of having relationships allowing for depth you are working on people. Reciprocity says, every person is made in the image of God and has something to teach you about knowing and following Jesus—even if they don’t know or follow Jesus. Without being willing to exchange people turn into objects. When that happens we can become deeply frustrated when people don’t obey our instructions, when progress is not seen or people backslide. We come to lack grace and love for the people we are claiming to love in the name of Jesus’ grace.
A Community, Not a Stage
One of the greatest gifts of my time at Calvary was the bookclub. We had a small number of students who really knew me. It wasn’t just a teaching environment; it was a community. A place where we laughed, confessed, played, prayed, wept, and grew together. And slowly, I learned something I had long resisted: pastoral vocation is not possible without reciprocity.
In a group or relationship built around reciprocity there is still leadership. But the leader must be affected by their people, not just the other way around. The pastor must be vulnerability, must be open to rejection, and must allow the possibility of real hurt. It’s the only way to embody Christ in community.
Galatians 6 calls us to bear one another’s burdens. This is a command issued to the entire church. Paul does not say “elders take care of the congregation.” The entire congregation is to share and carry one another’s burdens, including the leaders. Leaders who separate their burdens and struggles do not allow the congregation to use their gifts. When we do this we cease to be humans following Jesus together and become objects, idols.
This might be the largest gap between job and vocation. Job’s involve objects, subjects, and tasks. In a job I can be removed from the thing that I produce. The last time you put on clothes, drove your car, drank a cup of coffee, walked across your house did you think about the countless people who went into creating those products? I didn't. I thought about whether my shirt and shorts matched, the weird spot on my windshield, the flavor of the coffee, the squeak in my floor boards.
Vocation is necessarily inseparable from the person. When I experience someone’s calling they are loving me in a profound way that connects me to that person. When my church lives our their vocation, I come to love them more dearly as they encourage me, embrace me, pray for me, sing with me, preach to me, and give Christ to me. You cannot be separated from your vocation, but you can be distanced from the work you produce.
Being Christ and Receiving Christ
The most powerful truth I’ve come to understand in recent years is that I cannot be Christ to others unless I am also willing to receive Christ from them. It’s mutual. The pastor isn’t a standalone image of Jesus. We are, together, the body of Christ — and that means my growth is incomplete without theirs, and theirs is incomplete without mine.
Even Jesus didn’t only teach and heal. He wept with Mary. He received care from the women who traveled with him. He invited Peter, James, and John into his most intimate moments. Most importantly He has a real relationship with his heaven father who he sought throughout his ministry and especially in his death. Perhaps this is the greatest danger for a pastor who does not have two way ministry. If we cannot trust ourselves to the flesh and blood people who are just as broken as we are who don’t know our deepest thoughts and desires, can we honestly think that we will trust ourselves to the holy God who sees and knows all about us?
This kind of mutuality doesn’t flatten leadership, but it does sanctify it. It roots it in shared humanity, shared weakness, shared transformation. It says: We are both in process. Christ is alive in me — for you. Christ is alive in you — for me. I love the way we do communion at Table of Life. Each time another member breaks bread or pours out wine and reminds me “Christ for you.” It gives space for each member of the church to be Jesus to one another as a reminder that this is our calling to be Christ in our world.
A Vocation Is Shared
In the end, reciprocity reminds us that vocation is not something I possess — it’s something I participate in. And it’s something we participate in together. This means that every person in my church matters, not as a recipient of my ministry, but as a co-minister. Every one of them has something of Christ to give me. Maybe this is what Paul has in mind as he writes, “that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together.” (1 Cor 12:25-26).
And if I’m humble enough to receive it, I just might become a better pastor. You might just find your vocation.
Take Peace With You,
Zach
