{"id":1946,"date":"2026-02-03T20:51:14","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T01:51:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/discipleshipink.com\/?p=1946"},"modified":"2026-02-04T11:05:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-04T16:05:12","slug":"are-you-ministering-or-performing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/?p=1946","title":{"rendered":"Are You Ministering or Performing?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>There are ministers and there are performers. And unfortunately, there are some ministers who act more like performers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I hate unpreparedness. Nothing irks me more than when someone, particularly in a church service, gets up to do something without having prepared. I believe in doing everything with excellence, and when leading, I try not to let anything but the best occur under my watch and supervision. Anything less is inexcusable, although some things inevitably slip through the cracks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">But at the same time, there\u2019s a fine line between excellence and perfection, or between preparedness and performance, particularly in church.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>I\u2019ve come to believe that when your goal is perfection, it can easily move from ministry to performance, and those are VERY different things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><address class=\"MsoNormal\">A minister seeks to glorify God, honor the Spirit, and uplift Jesus.<\/address><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><address class=\"MsoNormal\">A performer seeks to glorify, honor, and uplift self.<\/address><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><address class=\"MsoNormal\">A minister lets God do His work to move the people.<\/address><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><address class=\"MsoNormal\">A performer seeks to move people through their talent.<\/address><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><address class=\"MsoNormal\">A minister will get out of the way when God desires to move.<\/address><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><address class=\"MsoNormal\">A performer won\u2019t budge, as they want all eyes on them.<\/address><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><address>A minister is concerned with the ministry.<\/address><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><address>A performer is concerned with the show.<\/address><br><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">I don\u2019t believe I\u2019ve ever been ushered into the presence of God through an overly perfected performance. And at the same time, a minister who is totally unprepared can just as easily squelch the presence of God.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">Ministers are not performers and performers are not ministers. I suppose it all boils down to a mindset\u2014who are you seeking to glorify? God or yourself? In the end, I think that\u2019s the only question that matters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">So the next time you have an opportunity to minister, be prepared and do it with excellence, but make sure you\u2019re not just performing.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/discipleshipink.files.wordpress.com\/2013\/12\/performer-minister.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/discipleshipink.files.wordpress.com\/2013\/12\/performer-minister.jpg\" alt=\"Performer Minister\" class=\"wp-image-1948\"\/><\/a><\/figure>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There are ministers and there are performers. And unfortunately, there are some ministers who act more like performers. I hate unpreparedness. Nothing irks me more than when someone, particularly in a church service, gets up to do something without having prepared. I believe in doing everything with excellence, and when leading, I try not to<\/p>\n<p class=\"more-link\"><a href=\"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/?p=1946\" class=\"themebutton\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2793,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hmmm"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/12\/Performer-Minister.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4mgFO-vo","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1946"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1946\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3745,"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1946\/revisions\/3745"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/darrenschalk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}