Moral failure in high-profile ministers is exceptionally ruinous to the good they may have previously done in their ministry and can be devastatingly destabilising to the faith of those who had benefited from their work. It underlines how essential it is for ministers to be genuinely holy and actually godly from the heart outwards. Personal holiness is a gospel issue since it affects the conviction with which the gospel is declared and also its credibility if the messenger fails to live up to the message. The souls of many are at stake. The conduct of a negligent minister has eternal consequences (1 Tim. 4:16). Ministers are engaged in the most important, and most holy, work there is. In an essay on the qualifications of a minister, James Durham mentions learning, gifts, and grace. Most of the essay is devoted to grace as a qualification. His definition of grace includes not only saving grace but also godliness. The following extract from Durham’s essay has recently been republished in a book titled, Preventing Ministry Failure. It provides seven ways in which holiness is necessary for ministers.

Holiness in the ministry is necessary by precept, for holiness is a qualification alongside things like ability to “convince gainsayers” in the list in Titus 1:8–9.

Holiness in a minister is also useful and necessary in many respects as a means to an end.

Holiness is necessary for the minister himself

He cannot be confident in his calling, or in a sense of being approved of God in this calling, without being holy. Though he may be called by the church, yet if he is not holy he cannot act as someone who has been called by God, and so he will inevitably be greatly incapacitated.

Holiness is necessary for the work of the ministry

It is in the nature of the ministry that it requires communion with God and standing in His counsel (Jer. 23:18, 22). Without this, it may be accounted a stealing of His Word without acknowledging of Himself (v. 30). Although it is necessary in any calling to have communion with God and stand in His counsel, yet the nature of the ministry makes these things uniquely necessary for this work.

Holiness is necessary for boldness in the work of the ministry

Without holiness, there cannot be boldness in the message, especially where difficulties occur.

Holiness is necessary when it comes to the application of truths, especially to the spiritually weary

It comes more naturally to a holy minister to take up the spiritual cases of others and apply a gracious remedy to them, and sympathize with them, by bringing to others the same consolation with which they have been comforted themselves (2 Cor. 1:4). This is, after all, one of the main ways by which God fits His ministers experimentally for their work. Even Christ, the head of the church, was in some senses qualified in this way. This is why Luther said that these three things are requisite in a minister, not only meditatio and oratio (meditation and prayer) but also tentatio (temptation). Anyone who lacks this holiness is certainly exceeding defective.

Holiness is necessary for genuine fruitfulness

The Lord often blesses holy ministers with great fruit yet gives only little fruit to ministers who may be very gifted but have less personal holiness. We can see from Paul’s example that hearers profit not simply from good preaching but in answer to a minister’s prayers joined with his preaching. But what can the unrenewed minister do here? Can he weep between the porch and the altar and plead with the Lord for His people (Joel 2:17)? Can he strive without ceasing in prayer to God for them? If there is no grace in his heart, he will be incapable of having success in his ministry.

Holiness is necessary if a minister is to have much credibility

It is requisite that a minister is “of good report,” even to those “which are without” (1 Tim. 3:7). Otherwise, his word will not have much weight. But what will gain a good report without holiness? Hypocrisy is usually not very convincing, neither does it continue over time, but holiness adorns the gospel even in people’s ordinary callings, and much more in a minister, who is a city set on a hill and cannot be hid (Matt. 5:14).

Holiness is necessary for the church to seek

Holiness is a qualification that a congregation is right to look for when they choose someone to call as their pastor and when a presbytery is considering whether to ordain someone into the ministry. This is clear:

1. From the many directions that are given to ministers concerning this one thing in the epistles of Paul to Timothy and Titus and the fact that congregations and presbyteries are expressly limited in their proceeding to this, that he be holy (1 Tim. 3:2, etc.; Titus 1:8). This holiness is not only described negatively (he must be “blameless…not given to wine,” etc., vv. 6, 7) but also positively, that he must have a good name, be sober, just, and holy.
2. Even a deacon is to be examined as to these qualifications (1 Tim. 3:10), which presupposes that a minister is much more to be examined. Only then let him use the office, if he be found (that is, after examination) to be blameless. The qualification of holiness is as much to be verified as the others.
3. Novices (that is, those who are only recently brought in to the faith) are excluded from the office of a minister, either because they are not yet able to bear it or because it is not yet well known how they might turn out. Those who should be ordained as ministers should have a well-established profession.
4. The instruction in 1 Timothy 5:22, “Lay hands suddenly on no man,” and so on, confirms that congregations and presbyteries should choose ministers carefully. The risk is not only that the man does not have gifts but that through lack of spiritual sensitivity or maturity he will put his gifts to a bad use. In all the epistles, when Paul is recommending ministers, he always gives some evidence of their sanctification and in this way lets us know how truly weighty this qualification of holiness is when men are to be commended for the ministry and recommended in the ministry.

Since it is such a great trust to be entrusted with the oracles of God and with the souls of people, can someone be thought fit to endeavor to save the souls of others if he makes no conscience of taking heed to his own? This is the apostle’s reasoning, “If a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?” (1 Tim. 3:2–5). This is proposed by way of a question to show the unanswerableness of that reasoning by which he presses observing the former qualifications. And certainly, these two are not put together without weighty reasons: “Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to the flock” and “unto the doctrine” (Acts 20:28; 1 Tim. 4:16). It shows that he who cares not for the one will never natively and naturally care for the other. The words that follow should especially be considered, “for in doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee.” This intimates that carelessness in his own walk may not only mar his own salvation but also the salvation of his hearers, seeing these two ordinarily go together. Can people dispense with this so as to have only a form of ordinances, not caring whether their ministers have fruit amongst them or not? Or not caring that the profit should be to many or few? Much cannot be expected (whatever God may do sovereignly) from a man that does not stand in God’s counsel (Jer. 23:22) and therefore does not turn many from their iniquity. Neither can any expect that the Lord will approve that one should be made a steward in His house and an under-father to His children who cannot with any charitable grounds be accounted a child himself. And what confidence can there be that a man not esteemed to be gracious shall either conduct himself in a Christian way in the outward form of religion or keep soundness in the faith? And will those who endanger so much by giving such great responsibility who are not worthy of any such trust not be an accessory to these evils?

Ministers should therefore be very careful about this. Holiness should be carefully prioritized in the instruments which we hope the Lord will use, in proportion as we expect the Lord to set before them an open door (Rev. 3:8) and grant them success in their ministry.

The book, Preventing Ministry Failure, is published by Reformation Heritage Books. It contains material from both James Durham and James Guthrie. 

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