Book excerpt: Lay Pastor Training Manual is the second portion of a two-phase plan for equipping and training leaders within the context of the local church. With today's rapidly growing church, leadership training is critical to the establishment and growth of a healthy local church. The Timothy Training Program (phase one) is designed for equipping potential leaders, and the Lay Pastor Training Manual takes these potential leaders one step further by establishing and training them for a lay pastor role. A lay pastor is one who has the pastoral gift, who is trained and released to do the work of pastoring while still being employed in full-time secular work, and who is not necessarily ordained as an elder The Lay Pastor Training Manual is specifically written with the growing church in mind. Designed to train lay pastors to help alleviate the heavy ministry load of elders and senior pastors, this course teaches lay people how to do the harvesting and pastoring at a relational level within the local church