Die Nederduitse Gereformeerde Kerk leraar as medereisende mistagoog in mistieke eenheid met Christus: ʼn Pastorale studie

Abstract

This research is a pastoral study of the Dutch Reformed Church minister as a fellow travelling mystagogue in mystical unity with Christ. The study seeks to show that the minister can implicitly trust the triune God in the continuing ministry of the living Christ with Whom the teacher lives in mystical unity, and consequently participates in the ministry of the risen, to present Christ in the congregation and the world. The ministry is not something the minister "makes happen". It is participatio Christi, by virtue of the minister's mystical union with Christ, which has already taken place at baptism. The focus of the minister's ministry is that of a fellow journeying mystagogue, to guide the believers, together with Christ, into the mystery of God's presence. The minister is therefore the spiritual director par excellence. In this ministry, Christ is central. To this end, the researcher took a small group of ministers from the Dutch Reformed Church, Presbytery of Clanwilliam, with him on a retreat, which served as an intervention, to discover and appropriate anew the mystical unity with Christ and to place the focus of the ministry on the minister as mystagogue, who journeys with Christ, but also the members he or she ministers to and then with each other as colleagues. The spirituality of the minister and his or her spiritual enrichment are at the heart of this discovery and appropriation. In the deistic milieu in which the minister is to serve, we have found it necessary to return to the reappraisal of Reformed mysticism, as our church father Calvin guides us, with his focus on our mystical union with Christ, through our baptism and affirmation and deepening in holy communion and the Word. This is the Trinitarian act, in which we consciously live and minister anew in Christ and He in us. The ministry that results from this union with Christ is that of mystagogue, and the minister can calmly see ministry as participating in the life and ministry of Christ in the present tense. John 15, Romans 6 and Galatians 2:19-20 form the normative basis for this study, and their mystical reading, using lectio divina and imaginative prayer, in other words, reading with the heart of these passages, has great value for experiencing the minister’s mystical unity with Christ. The pragmatic task of this study is summarised in a retreat that serves as a model for the internalisation of the mystical unity with Christ and the new perspective on the ministry of the minister as a participant in Christ's present ongoing ministry, with the aim of cultivating new energy, enthusiasm, and love for ministry.