I have often been asked by pastors how the Lay Pastors Ministry is related to church growth. I have also asked myself this question many times: How does the church grow through this ministry?It is a natural question for pastors, especially because they are responsible for the spiritual growth and health of their congregations.
Through many years of experience, I have come to understand two important things.
First, the Lay Pastors Ministry contributes to church growth indirectly, not directly. Second, the results take time. Church growth does not normally appear after two or three weeks, or even after a few months. In my experience, it often takes two or three years to see significant results.
I have observed many churches that practiced PACE. Some continued for three or four years, while others stopped after only a few months. From these experiences, I have learned that it is difficult to evaluate the success of PACE within only one year.
If a church faithfully practices this ministry for at least a year, I believe it begins to see important fruit. The first fruit is individual maturity. As individuals mature spiritually and learn to care for others, this maturity begins to influence the congregation. Eventually, it can contribute to church growth.
There is an important order here:
Personal maturity → relational care → change in church culture → church growth.
Time is necessary for this process.
Caring Ministry, Not a Church Growth Program
At this point, we need to understand the original and essential concept of the Lay Pastors Ministry. It is a caring ministry, not a church-growth strategy or program.
If we misunderstand this basic concept, we can easily make church growth the ultimate purpose of the ministry. That would be a mistake.
At the same time, I do not believe that caring itself is the final destination. Caring is the core ministry, but we must also ask, What does caring produce? Where does it lead? What happens when a congregation becomes a caring community?
These are important questions, and as a national director of this ministry, I have felt a responsibility to think deeply about them.
I have found at least three helpful examples.
- Melvin Steinbron’s “Faith Plus”
The first example comes from Dr. Melvin Steinbron. He wrote about what should be added to faith—what he called “FAITH PLUS.”
When we practice Lay Pastors Ministry and PACE, we need to add certain qualities and characteristics to our faith. This idea is closely connected with the teaching of 2 Peter 1:5–8, where believers are encouraged to add virtue to faith, knowledge to virtue, self-control to knowledge, steadfastness to self-control, godliness to steadfastness, brotherly affection to godliness, and love to brotherly affection.
I see this as a kind of spiritual-development strategy.
As these qualities are added to faith, people gradually mature. As individuals mature, their relationships change. As relationships change, the congregation begins to change. Eventually, that personal and relational transformation can lead to organizational change and, ultimately, to church growth.
Dr. Steinbron addressed these ideas particularly in his Letters to the Lay Pastors. His emphasis was not simply on increasing the number of people in the church but on developing the character and quality of believers.
In other words, growth begins inside the person before it becomes visible in the organization.
- Hallelujah Church
The second example is Hallelujah Church.
The church was already large, with approximately 6,000 members. Therefore, it would be difficult to say that PACE itself caused the numerical growth of the church.
However, PACE had a significant indirect influence. Through the ministry, the church’s culture and direction of ministry began to change.
People began to understand that being a Christian also means being a person who cares for others. They began to see that every Christian could become a PACE minister—not simply a person who attends worship services, but a person who takes responsibility for caring for another person.
This eventually influenced the culture of the entire congregation.
That experience taught me something important:
Church growth is not always produced by a program that directly increases numbers. Sometimes growth comes from changing the kind of people and culture that make up the church.
- Rock Church in Downtown Seoul
The third example is Pastor Park of Rock Church in downtown Seoul. Pastor Park has been one of our staff members. He is a gifted preacher and, at the same time, has maintained a strong interest in PACE ministry.
His church has practiced PACE for more than ten years. Even after all these years, he continues to look for new ways to apply PACE to his congregation.
What impressed me was that he discovered that PACE was useful not only for ordinary adult members but in many different settings: Sunday school, teenagers, organizations, companies, and even prisons.
He came to understand that PACE was not simply another church program. It was a way of thinking about Christian life and relationships.
When the congregation begins to understand that caring is part of what it means to be a Christian, the ministry becomes part of the church’s culture. And when the culture changes, the church itself can change.
How Much Have I Grown Through This Ministry?
This question also led me to examine myself:
“How much have I personally grown through the Lay Pastors Ministry?”
I had already received pastoral-care training through Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE), so I had some foundation in pastoral care. CPE certainly helped me mature in my understanding and practice of caring.
CPE and PACE are both concerned with care, but they approach it in different ways. CPE provided me with important training in pastoral-care skills and concepts. PACE, however, became a much larger part of my ministry journey.
I would describe PACE as an extension of caring skills into the life of the ordinary Christian community. It does not limit caring to pastors or professionally trained caregivers. Rather, it seeks to equip ordinary believers to care for ordinary people in everyday life.
That has been one of the most important discoveries of my ministry journey.
I have learned that care is not merely something a pastor does for the congregation. Care is something the congregation learns to do for one another.
And when that happens, something deeper begins to take place.
People mature.
Relationships become stronger.
The culture of the church changes.
And, over time, the church can grow—not simply because it has adopted a church-growth program, but because it has become a healthier and more caring community.
Therefore, I would summarize my understanding this way:
The Lay Pastors Ministry does not begin with church growth. It begins with caring. Caring produces maturity. Maturity changes people. Changed people change the culture of the church. And a changed church can experience genuine growth.
That is why we should not expect immediate numerical results from PACE. The fruit of caring takes time, but when the roots are deep, the fruit can be lasting.