Questions to Ask a Prospective Deacon
Questions to ask a prospective deacon, for the pastor, elders or nominating committee sitting down with a church member who has been put forward for the office. They run in the order the conversation usually takes: faith and willingness to serve, character held against the qualifications in 1 Timothy 3, home and time, how the person serves and handles money and conflict, agreement with what the church believes, and what the office asks in your congregation.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Faith and calling
How did you come to faith in Christ, and what has changed in you since?
Why ask it
People who have sat near this person for years have often never heard the story, so give it room. The answer to trust has a turning point in it and is about Christ more than about attendance. If it stops at a childhood baptism, ask what the last five years have looked like.
In an ordinary week, when do you pray and read Scripture, and what are you reading now?
Why ask it
A time of day and a named book are the believable details. Ask what they do in the weeks the habit slips. Members will come to a deacon asking for prayer, and that is far easier for someone who already prays when nobody has asked.
As far as you know, who put your name forward, and how did you react when you heard?
Why ask it
Surprise and some reluctance are ordinary and usually healthy. Hope to hear that they prayed about it and talked it over at home before agreeing to this meeting. A nominee who asked to be put forward is not ruled out, but ask what they expect the office to let them do.
Why do you want to serve this church as a deacon?
Why ask it
The good answers are about people and needs the nominee has already noticed. "I am not sure I want it, but I could not say no" deserves a follow-up and not a mark against. Be slower with "it is my turn" or anything that sounds like wanting a vote on how things are run.
In your own words, what is a deacon?
Why ask it
Hear their picture before you describe your own church's office. Someone imagining a governing board and someone imagining a servant carrying meals have agreed to two different jobs, and that gap is easier to close today than after the vote.
Have you served as a deacon before, here or in another church, and how did that term end?
Why ask it
Whether an earlier ordination carries over, or the person is examined and set apart again, is handled differently from church to church, so find out your own practice first. Then listen to how the term ended. A quarrel or a quiet resignation is worth hearing about from the nominee and, with their permission, from that church.
When were you baptized, and how long have you been a member of this church?
Why ask it
A ten-second answer that lets you hold the nominee against whatever your bylaws require of an officer, which may include a form of baptism or a minimum time in membership. If they joined recently, ask where they served before and whether someone there would speak for them.
Besides Sunday morning, what are you part of here most weeks?
Why ask it
Sunday attendance you can see for yourselves. A class, a small group, the midweek meeting and the business meetings are harder to see, and they are where a deacon finds out who is out of work or newly widowed. If the answer is nothing, ask what has been in the way.
Who outside this church knows you are a Christian, and how did the subject last come up?
Why ask it
Deacons are not chosen as evangelists, but a faith that no neighbor or coworker has ever heard about is worth a question. One name and one real conversation is plenty. Do not grade how well it went.
Character
We sent you 1 Timothy 3:8-13. Which of those qualifications would the people closest to you say needs the most work?
Why ask it
It only works if the passage went out a week ahead, so that this is a reflection and not a memory test. A specific, slightly uncomfortable answer is a good sign. Be wary of "none, really" and of a weakness picked because it sounds like a virtue.
Who in this church has told you that you were wrong about something, and what did you do with it?
Why ask it
You are waiting for a name and an occasion. A nominee nobody corrects will have more weight behind their words once they hold office and no more accountability than before, so if nothing comes, ask who they would want that person to be.
Would the people you work with or do business with be surprised to hear you were nominated?
Why ask it
This is about reputation outside the building. Watch whether a particular coworker or customer comes to mind and what the nominee thinks that person would say, then ask if you may speak to someone who knows them on a weekday.
Tell us about a time you gave your word on something and it cost you to keep it.
Why ask it
Not being double-tongued is on the list in 1 Timothy 3, and a story tests it better than a yes does. A real one has a price in it: money, a weekend, an awkward conversation. Then ask whether what they say in a meeting matches what they say in the parking lot afterward.
How do you handle alcohol, and is there any other habit that has more hold on you than you would like?
Why ask it
Know your own church's position first: some covenants ask officers to abstain and others ask for moderation. The second half reaches to gambling, spending and screens, and "yes, and here is who knows about it" is an answer you can work with.
Are your own finances in order, or are there debts you are behind on, unpaid taxes or money owed to another member?
Why ask it
In many churches deacons count the offering and decide who receives help, which makes this fair to ask. You do not need figures. You need to know nothing is hidden, and where there is a struggle, a plan and a person helping matter more than the amount.
Do you give to this church regularly, and how do you decide how much?
Why ask it
Before the meeting, find out what your church expects of its officers on giving and whether anyone is permitted to look at the records, then tell the nominee which it is. Listen for a settled habit and a reason behind it. A boast about the amount is no better than a shrug.
Is there a member of this church you are at odds with right now?
Why ask it
In a small congregation the committee often knows the answer already, which is a reason to ask. Hope for a name and an account of what they have done to mend it. Deacons get sent into other people's quarrels, so their own should be settled or well under way before installation.
When were you last angry enough to say something you regretted, and what did you do afterward?
Why ask it
Everyone has an instance, so naming one only shows honesty. Weigh what came after: whether they went back, apologized without a "but", and can say what sets them off.
What do you post and share online, and would any of it embarrass this church if it were read out on a Sunday?
Why ask it
Look before you ask. Arguments in comment threads and sharp political posts are the usual trouble, and people who hold office are read as speaking for the congregation. A nominee who offers to take something down has understood the point.
Is there something you would want us to hear from you now, and not from someone else after the vote?
Why ask it
Say who in the room will keep the answer and who else, if anyone, will be told, then ask it plainly and wait. Something long past and dealt with seldom rules a person out. Whether it does is for the committee to weigh, and a nominee who stays quiet has made that decision for you.
Home and time
Have you and your spouse talked this through, and what did they say?
Why ask it
The meetings and the phone calls at dinner land on the whole household, so decide beforehand whether the spouse joins this meeting or a later one. "We have not really talked about it" means the interview has come too early. If the nominee is not married, ask who they did talk it over with.
How would you describe your marriage at the moment, and is there anything in its history we should understand?
Why ask it
Churches read the "husband of one wife" line differently, especially on divorce and remarriage. Settle your own position before the meeting and tell the nominee the subject will come up, so nobody is ambushed and no rule is invented in the room. A marriage in a hard season is not a no, though it can be a reason to wait a year.
If you have children at home, how are things with them, and what does faith look like in your house during the week?
Why ask it
Leave it out when there are no children at home. The answer worth having is ordinary and concrete: who prays at the table, who drives to youth group, what happens after an argument. How your church applies the household qualification to grown children is for your elders to say, so ask them before the meeting.
How much room is there in your week once work hours, travel and the evenings already taken are counted?
Why ask it
Lay the answer beside the deacons' actual calendar, down to the meeting night and the Sunday rotation. Shift workers and people who travel can serve well, but only if everyone knows in advance which duties they will miss.
What are you doing in the church now that you would have to hand to someone else?
Why ask it
The people who get nominated are usually the ones already doing four jobs. Agree in this meeting what comes off the list and who might pick it up. Adding an office on top of everything is how a good volunteer is worn out by the second year.
Is anything coming in the next couple of years, such as a move, a new baby, a parent who needs care or a job change, that we should plan around?
Why ask it
None of these rules a person out. One of them may turn the answer into "next year", and saying so here gives the nominee an honorable way to wait without it looking like a refusal.
When did you last say no to something this church asked of you?
Why ask it
It sounds like a trap and is the opposite. A person who cannot refuse will take every visit and every work day and resent it quietly. A real refusal with a sensible reason shows they can pace themselves through a full term.
Serving
Where have you served here so far, and how much of it happened where nobody could see?
Why ask it
The committee should be able to answer this before the nominee does. Stacking chairs, driving someone to appointments and cleaning up after a meal are the record that counts. If none of you can name any, slow the process down.
Tell us about a time you noticed someone in need before anybody asked you to help.
Why ask it
This is the instinct the office runs on. A good answer is small and specific: a widow's gutters, a family's groceries, a visitor sitting alone. If nothing comes from church life, ask about a neighbor or a coworker before you draw a conclusion.
A member calls you to say they cannot cover this month's rent. What do you do?
Why ask it
Have your benevolence policy on the table. Strong answers start with listening, bring in a second deacon, follow whatever the policy says, and ask what is behind the shortfall. Promising church money on the spot, or opening with a lecture on budgeting, are the two ways it goes wrong.
How would you respond to someone who comes back for help a third and a fourth time?
Why ask it
Mercy and prudence have to share this answer. Contempt for the person is a bad sign, and so is a plan to keep writing checks without ever asking what would change the situation.
If you helped count the offering and the total did not match the deposit, what would you do?
Why ask it
Tell them your procedure afterward, but hear their instinct first. The answer you want involves the second counter and the treasurer that same day. Quietly making up the difference, or letting it go because the other counter is a friend, are the answers to note.
You will learn things about members' money, health and marriages. What will you tell your spouse?
Why ask it
Many nominees have never considered it, so the pause is fine. Say what your church expects, and say what can never be kept quiet: a concern that a child or a vulnerable adult is being harmed. Who has to be told differs by policy, denomination and local law, so check yours before the meeting.
How comfortable are you visiting someone in a hospital room, a nursing home or a house in mourning?
Why ask it
Plenty of faithful people dread this, and "nervous but willing" is a perfectly good answer. Pair that nominee with an experienced visitor for the first few calls. If deacons in your church mostly look after the building and the budget, say so and ask about that work instead.
Tell us about a disagreement you had with another member or a leader in a church. How did it end?
Why ask it
The detail that matters is who heard about it first: the other person, or everyone else. If the nominee comes out of the story entirely in the right, ask what the other side would say. Find out, too, if they are on speaking terms today.
What would you do if a member stopped you after the service with a complaint about the pastor?
Why ask it
Most deacons meet this sooner than they expect. For an ordinary grievance, the sound answer sends the member to the pastor, with the deacon alongside if that helps, and does not carry an unnamed complaint into the deacons' meeting. An allegation of misconduct is different and goes wherever your policy says it must.
If the deacons voted for something you had argued against, what would you say about it outside the room?
Why ask it
Some form of "the deacons decided" is what a united body sounds like. Someone who would make sure people knew they voted no will split the group the first time a decision is unpopular. Ask about a vote they have already lost and how they carried it.
Beliefs
Have you read our statement of faith all the way through, and is there any line you cannot affirm?
Why ask it
Hand it over a week early, because many members have never read it start to finish. A named reservation is something the elders can weigh. "I agree with all of it" from someone who skimmed it tells you nothing.
In a few sentences, what is the gospel?
Why ask it
You are not after seminary polish. Listen for Christ's death and resurrection and for grace received, and take note if the answer is mostly about being a good person or showing up on Sundays. A clear answer here matters at a bedside as much as in a meeting.
What do you believe about the Bible, and can you name a time it changed your mind or your plans?
Why ask it
The belief usually arrives as a phrase from the statement of faith. The example is the evidence that it works that way in practice: a decision reversed, an apology made, a habit dropped because of something they read.
Is there a teaching or a practice of this church that you would change if it were up to you?
Why ask it
Baptism, the Lord's Supper, the style of worship and who may hold which office are the usual places. A difference is not automatically a problem. The real answer is where they would take it: to the elders, or to the hallway.
Have you read the church covenant, the constitution and the bylaws, and will you work within them?
Why ask it
Dull but necessary, since in many churches members turn to the deacons in a business meeting and ask what the bylaws say. Ask what surprised them in the documents. Someone with nothing to mention has probably not opened them yet, so give them time and ask again.
A grieving member asks you why God let it happen. What do you say?
Why ask it
A deacon is likely to hear this in a hospital corridor with no time to prepare. Good answers are short: staying, praying, admitting what they do not know. A quick explanation delivered to someone in grief is the worrying one.
The office
Where do you think the deacons' work stops and the pastor's or the elders' begins in this church?
Why ask it
Churches arrange this differently, so say how yours does after they answer. A nominee who expects the deacons to supervise the pastor, in a church where they do not, will be frustrated by spring. The reverse mismatch is just as real.
Which part of the deacons' work suits you best, and which would you be glad to leave to someone else?
Why ask it
Name the parts first as your church divides them, which might be benevolence, visiting, the building, the Lord's Supper table or a list of widows and shut-ins. An honest preference helps whoever makes the assignments. A nominee who claims to be good at all of it has not pictured the work.
We have described the meetings, the Sunday duties, the families you would look after and the length of the term. Which part gives you pause?
Why ask it
Do the describing first, in writing if you can, with honest hours. A named concern means they are counting the cost, and most concerns can be planned around. A nominee with none may not have taken the list in, so go back over the heaviest item.
What do you make of the pastor's leadership and the direction this church is heading?
Why ask it
If the pastor is in the room, consider having another member of the committee ask it. Disagreement is workable when it has already been said to the pastor's face. A grievance that surfaces here for the first time would otherwise have come along to every deacons' meeting.
Are you willing to go through whatever background check and child protection training our policy asks of people who serve?
Why ask it
Check beforehand what your policy, your denomination and your insurer ask of officers, since it varies from church to church. Most nominees agree at once. One who bristles at being checked like any nursery volunteer is telling you how they take being under a rule.
Are you willing to be trained, and to work beside an experienced deacon for a while before taking families of your own?
Why ask it
1 Timothy 3:10 asks that deacons be tested first, and churches do that in different ways: a class, a trial period or simply shadowing. Explain yours. Someone who feels thirty years of membership is training enough will be hard to teach anything.
Suppose the vote falls short, or we come back and say not this year. What happens next for you?
Why ask it
Awkward to ask and kinder than leaving it unsaid. The reassuring answer is that nothing changes: the same pew, the same jobs. If the disappointment would send them to another church, the title mattered more than the work.
If your circumstances or your convictions changed partway through the term, would you come to us and step aside?
Why ask it
Tell them how stepping down or taking a leave works under your bylaws. Getting a yes now makes a hard conversation later far easier to begin, for them and for whoever has to raise it.
What do you want to ask us before you give your answer?
Why ask it
Stop early enough that this is not squeezed into the last two minutes. Questions about hours, expectations and what happened to the last deacon who stepped down are good signs. Send the nominee home with a date to reply by and a plain account of what follows, whether that is a vote, training or a service of installation.
Interviewing a nominee for deacon
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Settle what a deacon is in your church
Servants, a board, or both
The word covers different jobs. In some churches deacons carry meals, visit the sick and look after members in need while elders govern. In others the deacons are the board that sets the budget and works with the pastor on decisions, and many congregations sit somewhere between. Put on paper which yours is, with the duties and honest hours, because the nominee is saying yes to that description and not to the word.
Positions to settle before the meeting
Divorce and remarriage, alcohol, what officers are expected to give, whether women serve as deacons and whether a spouse is interviewed are answered differently from one church and denomination to the next. Find out what your own documents and elders say before the interview. A position worked out while the nominee waits becomes a ruling on that one person.
What your bylaws already decide
Length of term, whether deacons rotate off, how long someone must have been a member, who nominates and what share of the vote confirms are usually written down. Read that section before the meeting so that you can answer the nominee's questions and do not promise a process the church does not have.
Where deacons are ordained clergy
In Catholic, Orthodox and Anglican churches, and in some Methodist and Lutheran bodies, a deacon is an ordained minister, and selection and formation are run by the diocese or regional body, usually over several years. The questions here suit an early conversation in the parish, but the formal process belongs to that body. Ask its vocations or ordination office how it works there.
The week before
What to send the nominee
Give the nominee 1 Timothy 3:8-13, Acts 6:1-7 (which many churches read as the start of the office), your statement of faith, the church covenant, the bylaws section on deacons and the written description of the work. A good share of the list assumes these have been read, and a member nominated by someone else may never have seen them.
Keep the table small
Two or three interviewers are enough. A full board facing one member across a table feels like a hearing, and the personal questions get thinner answers. Agree who will ask about marriage and money, and tell the nominee at the start who will hear what they say and who will not.
What you can find out without asking
Membership date, where the nominee has served and whether your screening is up to date can be confirmed beforehand. Whether anyone may look at giving records depends on your church's own rules, so ask your treasurer or elders how it works there. Spend the meeting on what the records cannot show.
Facts on paper, stories in person
If your church uses a written questionnaire, put the factual questions there: baptism, years of membership, earlier service as a deacon, whether the documents have been read. That frees the meeting for the questions that need a story, and it gives a nervous nominee time to think about the harder ones.
One evening with the list
A member, not an applicant
The nominee did not apply. Someone else put their name forward, and whatever you decide they will be in the same pews next Sunday. Thank them for being willing before you ask anything, say that every nominee gets the same questions, and open and close with prayer if that is your custom.
Why the groups come in this order
Faith and calling is first because a person can answer it without defending anything. Character and Home and time are the personal groups and need the ease the first one builds. Serving and Beliefs are where a committee does most of its weighing. The office comes last because there you do half the talking: what the work is here and what happens next.
A dozen for one hour
Nobody should be asked all 52 in a sitting. For an hour, take the story of coming to faith, why they want to serve, what they think a deacon is, the 1 Timothy 3 question, whether they are at odds with any member, what the spouse said, what they would hand off, the rent call, what they will tell their spouse about members' troubles, the statement of faith, the complaint about the pastor, and which part of the work gives them pause. Then leave time for their questions.
When an answer stays general
"I try to be a servant" and "family comes first" sound the same from everyone. Ask when it last happened. A particular Tuesday and a named need are worth more than a statement of intent, and most people relax once they are telling a story.
Yes, not yet and no
Years of watching outweigh an hour of talking
An interview shows how someone talks about serving. The congregation has usually seen how they do it. If the answers were hesitant but the record is long and quiet, weigh the record. If the answers were impressive and nobody can recall the person doing anything unglamorous, weigh that too.
A direction, not a spotless record
No nominee meets every line of 1 Timothy 3 without a flaw, and a committee that waits for one leaves the office empty. Look for the direction of a life over several years. How strictly your church applies each qualification is for your elders and your tradition to say, so ask them where you are unsure.
Reasons to slow down
Take more time when the conversation keeps returning to decisions and authority and seldom to people, when the nominee speaks sharply about the pastor or a fellow member, when a spouse is plainly unhappy about the idea, or when the reading was not done. None of these settles the matter alone. Each is worth a second conversation before a vote.
Saying not yet
Have the pastor or one elder say it in person, soon, with the reason and with what would change the answer. Keep the nominee in the work they were already doing and check on them a month later. A careless no to a faithful volunteer can cost the church that volunteer.
When the answer is yes
Tell the nominee what follows and when: a congregational vote or an appointment, a class or trial period, ordination or installation, the first assignment. These steps differ between churches, so read your bylaws and give dates. If you can, pair a new deacon with an experienced one for the first months.