Pastoral Vision-Casting and a Correct Interpretation of Proverbs 29:18

From seminary on I have heard and read Christian leaders and teachers state that the pastor is supposed to cast the vision for the church. I’ve never read any biblical justification for this practice and none is ever provided. Mostly this is just assumed to be the case and people proceed with it as God-ordained and a New Testament standard. Of course, just because a particular practice is not known in the New Testament does not mean that the practice is invalid. I will say, however, that the concept of the vision-casting pastor mostly stems from an incorrect view of his or her role. Nevertheless, I would like to tackle one verse that is frequently thrown out there to support the idea that a church needs a vision.

“Where there is no vision the people perish” (Proverbs 29:18).

This is THE verse that people reference when talking about leadership vision-casting. The unspoken addendum to the use of this verse is that it is the pastor/leader that is supposed to provide this vision. But what is this vision that pastors are supposed to provide? Usually this conception of vision is defined in practice as the ability to think about or plan the future with imagination or wisdom, as in “an organization has lost its vision and direction”. This is how church vision-casting is practically understood. But as with many verses for which people search the scriptures in order to artificially support their preconceptions, Proverbs 29:18 does not mean what they want it to mean.

The Hebrew word for “vision” here is chazown and, far from referring to a imaginative plan for the future, means revelation, oracle, or prophecy (2 Chronicles 32:32; Psalm 89:19; Isaiah 1:1; Jeremiah 14:14; Lamentation 2:9; Ezekiel 7:26; Daniel 1:17; Hosea 12:10; Micah 3:6). Furthermore, the word for perish is para` and is best translated “unrestrained”. In this understanding of the verse, if the people do not have a prophetic revelation from God then they are left unrestrained to engage in foolishness and sin. This interpretation is reinforced by the rarely mentioned second half of this verse: “happy is he who keeps the law.” If we put this verse altogether we get “Where there is no prophetic revelation, the people are unrestrained, but happy is he who keeps the law.” This verse is about keeping God’s laws and commandments, not vision-casting. So unless a pastor is spouting out fresh prophetic oracles from God, this verse should be applied not to a pastor’s imaginative wonderings of a future plan for the church, but for his or her biblical role to teach and equip other believers to follow the commands of God.

If a pastor is going to vision-cast, she needs to do so by studying Scripture to understand the mission of the Church and by seeking God’s explicit instruction through prayer. Vision-casting for the church should not be the result of a pastor’s musings, imagination, and personal wants of what she would like to see happen. Otherwise, if we are going to apply “vision” in the way too many Christians do, “They speak a vision of their own imagination, not from the mouth of the LORD” (Jeremiah 23:16).