Why Should/Shouldn’t My Church Embrace Change? Part XXIX
The five fold accountability circle forces each participant to serve one another while receive from one another. Because it can circulate, no one gifting is top dog, but any of the five may arise to lead when needed with the other four in a supportive role. The giving and receiving from one another prevents believers from becoming passive and brings life back into the organism.
But the critics cry, “Who’s in charge? Where does the buck stop?" Being in charge to them means someone being “responsible” at the top of the pyramidal structure of leadership. That is not so with the five fold. In the five fold, trusting the “Spirit of Jesus Christ” is mandatory. The five fold will fail if any of the five doesn’t put their trust in the Holy Spirit, for He is in charge.
“Trusting one another” as peer believers in spite of our diversity is compulsory. Instead of arguing over differences, being defensive, becoming aggressively defiant to other Christian sects, the church needs to extend grace, mercy, trust, and acceptance to one another as peers, equals, needed parts of the Body.
In this circle of faith, if you can’t trust your spiritual brother/sister in Christ to your lift or right or across the table, who can you trust? Being one in Jesus as peers is the only way to create unity.
When it comes to leadership, how does this wheel of service work? Isn’t the apostle to be “at the top” as the “overseer”? No! The being an apostle is not a position, title, or an office; no one is “above” the other. The apostle IS NOT an administrator, a management consultant, a C.E.O., a President, or a Chairman of the Board. He is just a peer to other believers who just so happens to have the passion, vision, and point of view to see the big picture of the Church as a whole and the knowledge of its parts and how they work together. Anyone of the five could “lead” according to how their passion, gifting, or point of view addresses a need or situation that the five together are facing. When another person feels his passion is needed, the wheel can rotate so that they take the lead and the others follow supplementing his work. It doesn’t matter what direction the wheel rotates, so any of the five can rise to lead with the others giving support to meet the current need of the group.