The Trellis and the Vine
Author: Colin Marshall & Tony Payne
Written: 2009 (update 2021)
The Vine
“The basic work of any Christian ministry is to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ in the power of God’s spirit, and to see people converted, changed and grow to maturity in that gospel. ”
The Trellis
“Christian Ministries also need some structure and support. it may not be much, but at the very least we need somewhere to meet, some Bibles to read from, and some basic structures of leadership within our group.”
Hello Ordinary Readers,
The Trellis and the Vine has become one of my favorite books on leadership structures in the Church. Ok, maybe my favorite! Just as the two quotes to start off, Colin Marshall and Tony Payne compare church leadership to a trellis and vine. Now if you are like me you may not know much about a trellis and vine and will have to do your own research (as I encourage you to do). Basically you have structures for leadership, trellis work, and you have true gospel growth, vine work. I love this picture and it gives great language to think through the questions, is my leadership structure focused on helping the vine grow?
What I appreciate a lot about this book is that it has practical advice and ways to keep the focus on vine work and not just trellis work. Especially chapter nine: Multiplying gospel growth through training co-workers. This chapter helps pastors and elders focus on how to multiply discipleship. Often we think that the person that doesn’t know Christ needs most of our time as a pastor. But what would it look like if the pastor spends most of his time discipling a solid believer so that that person can disciple the non-believer or young believer? This doesn’t mean the pastor/elder never disciples young believers, but where is the focus?
So who should read this book? I would say primarily, pastors and church leaders. But maybe you're part of a church that has a more trimmed leadership structure and you don’t understand why. Or you are a volunteer and you feel that you are overworked and your church has too many programs and not enough volunteers. This might be a great resource to help see a better way to do the trellis work to see vine growth.
Happy Reading!
“It’s a commission that makes disciple-making the normal agenda and priority of every church and every Christian disciple.”
“Our goal is to grow the vine, not the trellis.”
“We will be arguing that structures don’t grow ministry any more than trellises grow vines, and that most churches need to make a conscious shift-away from erecting and maintaining structures, and towards growing people who are disciple-making disciples of Christ.”
“The danger of having such willing volunteers is that we use them, exploit them and forget to train them. ”
“We must be exporters of trained people instead of hoarders of trained people.”
“The vine is the Spirit-empowered word, spreading and growing throughout the world, drawing people out of the kingdom of darkness into the light-filled kingdom of God’s beloved Son, and then bearing fruit in their lives as they grow in the knowledge and love of God.”
“...all Christians have the privilege, joy and responsibility of being involved in the work of God is doing in our world, the “work of the Lord”.”
“In the New Testament, training is much more about Christian thinking and living than about particular skills or competencies.”
“These programs and packages can provide a very helpful framework for training, so long as the structures and resources provided aren’t seen as a replacement for the real work of personal training and modeling.”
“We are using the word ‘training’ to describe the growth of all Christians in conviction, character and competency, so that in love they might minister to others by prayerfully bringing the word of God to them-whether to non-Chrsitians in outreach, new Christians in follow-up, or all other Christians in daily growth.”
“Our ‘vocation’ (which comes from the Latin word ‘to call’) is to be Christ’s disciple and to obey everything that he commanded-including the commandment to make disciples of all nations.”
“The goal of all Christian ministry, in all its forms, is disciple-making.”