Paul refers to the "other apostles" as being paid full time. Jesus appeared to be paid full time.

Of course, in our culture "paid" means receiving a paycheck. Their pay may have been at least some in the form of "provision." (Resources)

I can see the strategic value in some contexts (as described in your article) of following different models, but I don't believe it is accurate to say that the Bible emphasizes part time or not getting paid. I would say that it actually very clearly teaches the opposite.

I would have to experiment with "bi vocational" church planters to find out if it would really work better, but I can see the reasoning in this article. We do live in a time where people need to be discipled "from scratch" and modeling "making a living" may be an important part of the church planting process. We also live in a time where popular Christian culture wants everyone to "get in line" with the "pastor's" vision and things become hierarchical . I can see the potential value of a "come along side" type church planter / church leader in this situation – a leader who is "one of us."

First, I would say that chief among the practices of the apostolic church is exactly what I am proposing here – contextualization. The apostles were faithful to Jesus precisely because they refused to do things, "just like they did it in the Bible." The inbreaking of the Kingdom of God in and through Jesus called for a renewed understanding of God's design for his people and the apostles are to be emulated, in some instances for what they did (preaching, teaching, praying, sharing, sacrificing, etc.), but more so for how they did it – by responding to what God was doing in their midst and responding appropriately.

The second thing that I would want to keep in mind is very closely related. It's the idea that God's Holy Spirit is just as fervently at work today, leading, guiding, directing, revealing, as it was in the time of the apostles. I would venture to suggest that if they could speak to us today, the main refrain of the apostles to us would be, "Don't follow us – follow the Spirit!" Or, at least something very close to the actual words of the apostle Paul, "Follow me as I follow Christ" – who if of course our prime example of what it means and looks like to follow the Spirit.

The last thing I would mention is the problem of interpretation. Everybody and their brother tends to think that their way of reading the Bible is the right way, ya know? So you read something and think you have the right view of how to do something and someone else, just as sincere, reads the same thing and interprets/applies it differently. The point here is that communal discernment is needed and the desire to "just do it like they did it in the Bible," as good as it sounds, just doesn't end up getting us as far as we would like it to.

Hope that clarifies what I'm saying a bit. These are the senses in which I would want to focus on following the "apostolic pattern." It's not that I don't think the Bible is authoritative for life and ministry. It's just that I think faithfulness to the kind of authority God means for the Bible to have in our lives entails discernment w/ regard to the leading of the Spirit in the midst of context, culture, and community.

Thanks for replying to my comment! I hope to see more women following God's lead into missionally-shaped ministry too.

I'd venture to say that the "success" of mom's being able to live out a life of bi-vocational ministry will be directly proportional to the willingness of their husbands to structure their lives in such a way that this is actually a possibility. Dad's who have all their identity in their careers won't be able to lend the right kinds of support. For my part, as someone who believes that all ministry should be shared by gifted men and women, I think we need to see way more examples of families and communities allowing the contours of life in God's Kingdom to determine the shape of their lives, which would translate, presumably, into seeing more women encouraged and supported into bi-vocational lives as pastors and Christian leaders.