上一篇談到，當我們真的願意把責任交給下一代，最後需要交出去的，可能不只是工作和位置，連「怎樣在他們的時代忠心」這份分辨的責任，也要慢慢交給他們。這一步並不容易，因為它意味著我們需要接受：下一代所建立的教會，未必完全像我們熟悉的教會；他們使用的方法、重視的表達，甚至對一些事情的先後次序，也可能與我們不同。但一路寫到這裡，我也開始覺得，「交棒」這個比喻本身，或許還有一個地方需要再想深一點。
這個系列一直用「接棒」來談教會的傳承。這幅圖畫很容易明白：有人在前面跑了一段路，到了一個時候，把手上的棒交給後面的人，讓他繼續跑下去。它提醒我們，沒有人可以永遠站在同一個位置，每一代都有自己的責任，也需要預備後來的人繼續前行。可是，這個比喻也很容易讓我們產生一個錯覺，好像這一棒原本是在我們手上的，是我們建立了這些事工、牧養了這群人、發展了這間教會，到了某一個時候，再由我們決定把它交給下一代。
但如果再問深一點：
我們真的擁有過這一棒嗎？
服事得愈久，我愈覺得這不是一個容易回答的問題。我們當然知道教會屬於神，這是一個很基本的信仰認知，大概沒有多少教會領袖會反對；但「知道教會屬於神」，和真的在服事裡活出「教會不是我的」，其實可以是兩回事。當你花了很多年建立一個事工，看著它由幾個人慢慢成長；當你陪伴一群弟兄姊妹經歷信仰的高低起跌，參與他們生命裡重要的時刻；當你為一個群體禱告、流淚、承擔衝突，也為它付上很多時間和心力，那份感情一定是真的。甚至有些教會領袖，一生最好的歲月幾乎都放在同一間教會裡，教會今天能夠走到這裡，也的確留下了他們忠心服事的痕跡。
所以，有時候放不下，未必只是因為喜歡權力，也未必只是因為不信任下一代，很多時候恰恰是因為太愛、付出太多，也承擔得太久。我們愈為一件事情付上自己，就愈容易把「受託」慢慢感受成「擁有」。
這種轉變往往很微妙。沒有人會公開說：「這是我的教會。」但我們可能會說：「這個事工是我一手建立的。」「這班人我帶了很多年，我最了解他們。」「以前我們不是這樣做的。」這些說話本身未必有錯，甚至很多時候都是事實。真正需要留意的是，當一件事情與我們的生命連結得愈深，我們便愈難分辨：我現在所守護的，究竟是神交託給我的，還是因為它已經成為了我的一部分，所以我很難想像它有一天不再帶著我的樣子？
保羅寫給哥林多教會的說話，對我來說是一個很重要的提醒。當時哥林多信徒中有人說自己是屬保羅的，有人說自己是屬亞波羅的。這段經文本來處理的，是信徒依附不同領袖所帶來的結黨，保羅並不是在討論今天所說的教會「接班」。但正因如此，他所指出的人與神之間的位置，也反過來提醒所有服事和帶領的人：如果信徒不應把任何領袖放在本來屬於神的位置，領袖自己也不能慢慢把神所託付的群體看成屬於自己的。
面對哥林多人的結黨，保羅問：「亞波羅算甚麼？保羅算甚麼？」然後他說：「我栽種了，亞波羅澆灌了，惟有神使它生長。」（林前3:6）
我很喜歡這節經文的一個地方，就是保羅沒有因為強調神的工作而否定人的工作。
他真的栽種過，亞波羅也真的澆灌過。
保羅不是說：「反正都是神做的，所以我們做甚麼都沒有關係。」人的忠心、付出、恩賜和承擔都是真的，也真的會在神的工作裡留下痕跡。沒有那些願意栽種的人，很多事情不會開始；沒有那些願意澆灌的人，很多生命也不會得到照顧。然而，保羅同時把一條很重要的界線畫得非常清楚：
使它生長的，是神。
再往下讀，保羅說：「因為我們是神的同工；你們是神的田地，神的房屋。」（林前3:9）這裡的區分很重要。保羅和亞波羅是同工，而哥林多教會才是神的田地、神的房屋。也就是說，我們真的參與其中，也真的承擔責任，但我們從來不是主人；我們可以栽種，可以澆灌，可以用很多年建立一些東西，但教會始終是屬神的，生命真正怎樣成長，也始終不是由我們掌握。
如果這是真的，那麼「交棒」最深的功課，可能就不只是學習相信下一代，而是重新學習相信神。如果信任只停在「我終於覺得你夠成熟，所以我可以放心交給你」，那根棒其實仍然好像是我的，只是我終於找到一個我認為合資格的人接手。保羅所說的卻把我們帶到另一個方向：不是我先擁有，然後決定交給誰，而是我們每一個人都只是在神的工作裡，在一段有限的時間中受祂所託。
有人栽種，有人澆灌；有人在一間教會最困難的年代留下來，有人在教會穩定之後慢慢建立制度；有人開拓新的事工，有人整理前人留下來的東西；有人陪伴一代人成長，後來又有人接著陪伴另一代。每一個人的角色都可以很重要，但沒有一個人的角色是永遠的。這也令我想到一個更難面對的問題：如果下一代最後建立出來的教會，不再像我們熟悉的教會，我們仍然能夠為它感恩嗎？
這裡說的當然不是離開福音，也不是不再重視聖經，而只是它不再帶著那麼多我們熟悉的痕跡。它的崇拜可能不同，領導方式可能不同，事工的重心也可能改變；有些我們花很多時間建立的東西，他們可能繼續保留，有些則可能慢慢完成了它在那個時代的任務。到了那個時候，我們心裡真正希望延續的，究竟是神的工作，還是「我的工作」？
我覺得這個問題比「你願不願意放手」更深，因為放手仍然可以只是一個管理上的安排：我退下來，你接上去；我不再負責，你開始負責。但如果我真正承認這是神的工作，我便要接受一件更深的事情：
神可以使用我，也可以在沒有我的情況下繼續工作。
甚至有一天，神所做的事情可能已經不再需要留下很多屬於我的痕跡。
但這個功課其實不只屬於上一代。今天接過責任的人，同樣需要記得：當一個事工、一個群體，甚至整間教會的責任交到我們手上，它也沒有因此變成「我們的」。上一代不是主人，下一代也不是。我們今天可以重新整理前人留下來的東西，可以按著新的處境作出分辨，也可以建立一些上一代從未想過的事工；但如果神給我們足夠的年日，有一天，我們同樣會成為那個需要學習放手的人，而另一代人也會用與我們不同的方式繼續前行。受託者最容易忘記的，也許就是自己仍然只是受託者。
所以，教會的傳承從來不只是兩代人之間的事情。不同世代能夠在同一個故事裡繼續前行，最終不是因為我們擁有一套永遠不變的制度，也不是因為每一代都有一位足以掌握一切的領袖，而是因為神從來沒有停止在祂的教會中工作。聖靈曾經在上一代的處境中呼召人、建立人、賜下恩賜，也仍然會在我們未必熟悉的下一個世代中工作。
這當然不是說，只要是新的方向，就可以輕易稱為聖靈的帶領。教會仍然需要回到聖經，也需要在群體中分辨；上一代所累積的經驗和提醒，也不應因為時代改變便被輕易丟棄。但如果責任感慢慢變成「如果沒有我看著，事情就會出問題」，我們可能已經在不知不覺間承擔了一個從來不屬於我們的位置。傳承需要教導，需要守護，需要分辨，也需要彼此提醒，但最終我們所相信的，不是一套足以保證教會永遠不會犯錯的制度，而是那位仍然在祂的教會中工作的神。
施洗約翰曾經說：「他必須興旺，我必須衰微。」（約3:30）約翰說這句話，原本是指向基督與自己的關係，並不是在談教會的交接，所以我們不需要把它直接變成一套接班原則。但他面對基督時所呈現的姿態，仍然值得每一個服事者學習：當基督被高舉，我便不需要證明自己仍然重要。
我們都希望自己所做的有意義，也希望多年付出的東西不會輕易消失，這並沒有錯。但事奉裡有一種很深的自由，是有一天我們不再需要成為故事的中心。我不需要每一個人都記得這件事是誰開始的，也不需要後來的人用同一種方法繼續，來證明我以前的選擇是對的。即使別人用與我不同的方法，把神交託給教會的使命繼續承擔下去，我仍然可以為此感恩，因為真正重要的從來不是我的名字有沒有留在那裡，而是基督仍然在那裡。
這樣再回頭看「接棒」，也許教會的傳承並不是一群人擁有一根棒，跑完自己的路程，再把它交給下一群人。更準確地說，是一代又一代的人被神邀請，在祂自己的工作裡走其中一段路。在我們以前，已經有人走過，他們禱告過、付出過、犯過錯，也留下很多我們今天仍然享受的恩典；有些人的名字我們知道，有些早已沒有人記得。今天輪到我們走這一段，我們同樣會建立一些東西，也會犯一些錯；有些事情會留下來，有些事情將來會被改變。我們所能做的，是在神交託我們的時間裡盡力忠心，然後在適當的時候，讓另一代人繼續走下去。
到了那一天，我們需要交出去的，也許不只是位置、權力和方法，甚至不只是那根我們一直以為握在手中的棒。最後需要放下的，是「這是我的」這個念頭。
我想，這可能也是傳承裡最深的一種信心。當我知道教會不是我的，我便不需要靠控制它的未來，來證明自己過去的付出有價值；當我知道使它生長的是神，我便可以接受自己可能只是栽種的人，也可能只是其中一個澆灌的人；當我相信神的工作比我的一生更長，也就可以在自己那一段路逐漸完成的時候，看著另一群人繼續向前。
有一天，我們都會離開現在的位置。有人退休，有人搬到另一個地方，有人進入另一個人生階段，也有人只是隨著年月過去，名字慢慢不再被提起。但神的教會仍然會繼續，因為到了最後，我們需要承認一件其實從一開始就是真的事情：
教會從來不是靠我們撐下去的。
我們只是有幸，在神漫長的工作裡，被祂使用，忠心地走過其中一段。
Antony傳道
In the previous article, I reflected on what it means to truly entrust responsibility to the next generation. What we eventually need to hand over may be more than tasks and positions. We may also need to entrust to them the responsibility of discerning what faithfulness should look like in their own time. This is not easy, because it means accepting that the church they build may not look exactly like the church we know. Their methods may be different, the forms of expression they value may differ, and even the priorities they set may not always be the same as ours. But as I have continued writing this series, I have begun to wonder whether the metaphor of “passing the baton” itself needs to be examined a little more deeply.
Throughout this series, I have used the image of a relay to talk about the handing on of what we have received in the church. The picture is easy to understand: someone runs one part of the race, and when the time comes, passes the baton to the person behind so that the race can continue. It reminds us that no one remains in the same place forever. Every generation has its own responsibilities, and every generation needs to prepare those who will continue after them. Yet this metaphor can also create an illusion—that the baton somehow belongs to us in the first place. We built these ministries, shepherded these people, and helped develop this church; then, at some point, we decide to hand what we have built to the next generation.
But if we take the question one step further:
Did we ever really own the baton in the first place?
The longer I serve, the more I realize that this is not an easy question to answer. Of course, we know that the church belongs to God. This is one of the most basic convictions of our faith, and few church leaders would disagree with it. But knowing that the church belongs to God and actually living as though “this church is not mine” can be two very different things. When you have spent years building a ministry and watched it grow from just a few people; when you have walked with brothers and sisters through the highs and lows of faith and shared some of the most important moments of their lives; when you have prayed and wept for a community, carried its conflicts, and invested years of your time and energy in it, that bond is real. Some church leaders have given the best years of their lives to one congregation, and the church as it stands today genuinely bears the marks of their faithful service.
So when people find it difficult to let go, it is not necessarily because they love power, nor simply because they do not trust the next generation. Sometimes it is precisely because they have loved deeply, given so much, and carried the responsibility for so long. The more of ourselves we pour into something, the easier it becomes for what was “entrusted to us” to begin to feel like something we “own.”
The change can be very subtle. Few people would openly say, “This is my church.” But we may say, “I built this ministry from the ground up,” “I have led these people for years; I know them better than anyone,” or “This is not how we used to do things.” None of these statements is necessarily wrong. In many cases, they may simply be true. The deeper question is what happens when something becomes so closely connected to our lives that it becomes difficult to tell the difference between what God has entrusted to us and what has become part of us. Am I protecting what God has entrusted to me, or has it become so much a part of me that I can no longer imagine it one day carrying fewer traces of who I am?
Paul’s words to the church in Corinth offer an important reminder. Some of the Corinthian believers identified themselves with Paul, while others identified themselves with Apollos. The original issue in this passage was the division created by believers attaching themselves to different leaders; Paul was not discussing what we today would call leadership succession. Yet for precisely that reason, the place he gives human leaders in relation to God also speaks back to those of us who serve and lead. If believers must not place any leader in the position that belongs to God, leaders themselves must not slowly come to regard the community God has entrusted to them as their own.
In response to the divisions in Corinth, Paul asks, “What is Apollos? What is Paul?” and then says:
“I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.”
(1 Corinthians 3:6)
What I appreciate about this verse is that Paul does not emphasize God’s work by denying the reality of human work.
Paul really did plant. Apollos really did water.
Paul is not saying, “God does everything, so it does not matter what we do.” Human faithfulness, sacrifice, gifts, and responsibility are real, and they leave real marks within the work of God. Without people willing to plant, many things would never begin. Without people willing to water, many lives would never receive the care they need. Yet Paul also draws a very clear boundary:
It is God who gives the growth.
A few verses later, Paul says, “For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field, God’s building” (1 Corinthians 3:9). The distinction matters. Paul and Apollos are fellow workers; the Corinthian church is God’s field and God’s building. We genuinely participate in God’s work and genuinely carry responsibility, but we are never the owners. We may plant, we may water, and we may spend many years building something, but the church still belongs to God, and the growth of people’s lives is ultimately not ours to control.
If this is true, then perhaps the deepest lesson in passing the baton is not simply learning to trust the next generation. It is learning again to trust God. If trust goes no further than, “I finally think you are mature enough, so I can feel at ease handing this over to you,” then the baton still seems to belong to me; I have simply found someone whom I consider qualified to take it. Paul’s words point us in a different direction. I do not first own something and then decide whom to give it to. Each of us is simply entrusted with a part in God’s work for a limited season.
Some plant and others water. Some remain through the most difficult years of a church, while others build structures after stability has returned. Some begin new ministries, while others organize and strengthen what earlier generations have left behind. Some walk with one generation as it grows, and later others continue that work with the generation that follows. Every one of these roles may matter deeply, but none of them lasts forever. And that leads me to a harder question: If the church built by the next generation no longer looks like the church we know, can we still give thanks for it?
I am, of course, not talking about abandoning the gospel or no longer taking Scripture seriously. I simply mean that the church may no longer carry as many of the marks that are familiar to us. Its worship may look different, its leadership may function differently, and the focus of its ministries may change. Some things we spent years building may remain; others may gradually complete the purpose they served in a particular time. When that happens, what do we really want to see continue—the work of God, or “my work”?
I think this question goes deeper than simply asking whether we are willing to let go, because letting go can still be nothing more than a management arrangement: I step down, you step in; I am no longer responsible, and now you are. But if I truly believe that this is God’s work, then I must also accept something deeper:
God can use me, and God can continue His work without me.
There may even come a day when what God is doing no longer needs to bear many traces of me at all.
But this is not a lesson only for the older generation. Those who receive responsibility today must remember the same thing. When a ministry, a community, or even the responsibility for an entire church is placed in our hands, it does not therefore become “ours.” The older generation is not the owner, and neither is the next generation. Today we may reorganize what earlier generations have left us, discern what faithfulness requires in a new context, and even build ministries they never imagined. But if God gives us enough years, one day we too will become the generation that needs to learn how to let go, while another generation continues in ways different from ours. Perhaps what a steward most easily forgets is that a steward is still only a steward.
So the handing on of what we have received is never simply a matter between two generations. Different generations are able to continue within the same story not because we possess a system that never changes, nor because every generation produces a leader who has everything under control, but because God has never stopped working in His church. The Holy Spirit called, built up, and gifted people in the circumstances of previous generations, and He continues to work in generations whose world may be unfamiliar to us.
This does not mean that every new direction should automatically be called the leading of the Holy Spirit. The church must still return to Scripture and discern together as a community. Nor should the experience and wisdom accumulated by previous generations simply be discarded because times have changed. But when a sense of responsibility gradually becomes, “If I am not here to keep an eye on things, something will go wrong,” we may have begun, without realizing it, to take on a role that was never ours. The handing on of what we have received requires teaching, guarding, discernment, and reminding one another. But in the end, our confidence is not in a system capable of guaranteeing that the church will never make mistakes. Our confidence is in the God who is still at work in His church.
John the Baptist once said, “He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30). In its original context, John was speaking about Christ and his own relationship to Him, not about leadership succession in the church, so we should not turn his words directly into a formula for passing the baton. Yet the posture he displays before Christ is still worth learning for anyone who serves: when Christ is exalted, I do not need to prove that I am still important.
We all want what we do to matter, and we naturally hope that what we have spent years building will not simply disappear. There is nothing wrong with that. But there is a deep freedom in ministry when the day comes that we no longer need to remain at the centre of the story. I do not need everyone to remember who started something, nor do I need those who come after me to use the same methods in order to prove that the choices I made were right. Even when others carry forward the mission God has entrusted to the church in ways different from mine, I can still give thanks, because what matters most is not whether my name remains, but whether Christ is still there.
Seen this way, perhaps passing the baton is not really about one group owning a baton, running its part of the race, and then handing it to another group. A better picture may be that generation after generation is invited by God to walk one part of the way within His continuing work. Others walked before us. They prayed, sacrificed, made mistakes, and left behind many gifts that we still enjoy today. We know some of their names; others have long been forgotten. Now it is our turn to walk this part of the way. We too will build some things and make some mistakes. Some of what we do will remain, while some will eventually change. Our task is to be faithful during the time God has entrusted to us, and then, when the time comes, to allow another generation to continue the journey.
When that day comes, what we need to release may be more than positions, power, and methods. It may even be more than the baton we have always imagined ourselves holding. In the end, what we need to let go of is the thought: “This is mine.”
Perhaps this is one of the deepest expressions of faith in the handing on of what we have received. When I know that the church is not mine, I do not need to control its future in order to prove that my past service mattered. When I know that God is the one who gives the growth, I can accept that I may be only the one who planted, or only one of those who watered. And when I trust that God’s work is longer than my lifetime, I can watch another generation continue forward as my own part of the journey gradually comes to an end.
One day, all of us will leave the places where we now serve. Some will retire, some will move elsewhere, some will enter a different season of life, and some will simply find, as the years pass, that their names are mentioned less and less. Yet God’s church will continue, because in the end we have to acknowledge something that has been true from the very beginning:
The church never depended on us.
We simply have the privilege of being used by God, faithfully walking one part of the way within His much longer work.
Pastor Antony
