New Testament Local Church Government

Writing to one of his team members the apostle Paul instructed, “Appoint elders in every community” (Titus 1:5).  As Paul and Barnabas were returning to the towns where they had planted churches during their first missionary journey we’re told,

And when they had appointed elders for them in every church, with prayer and fasting they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed. (Acts 14:23, ESV)

For Paul, each community, each town or city, had only one church.  There was the church at Rome (a very large community), the church at Corinth, the church at Ephesus, and so on.  Even though, as in Rome, a very populous community might have several home churches where believers met, together all these sub-congregations comprised the one church at Rome.  And for Paul, each church in each locality had elders who were appointed by Paul or his team.

Who were these elders?  What were their responsibilities?  Their qualifications?  What other leaders made up the local church leadership?

Acts 20 provides a great window for us to peer into these matters.  It is Paul’s farewell speech to the elders of the church at Ephesus.  He is heading to Jerusalem to deliver the offering he has collected from all his churches to aid the financially hurting Jewish church in Israel.  In verse 28 he makes a very instructive comment to these elders,

Pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock, in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to care for the church of God, which he obtained with his own blood. (Acts 20:28, ESV)

These elders are part of the flock of God, who themselves need careful attention paid to along with the rest of the flock.  They do not stand outside the flock, but within.  Nevertheless, the Holy Spirit has made them overseers (Greek, episkopoi, from which we get episcopal, and sometimes translated ‘bishops’).  These overseers, these elders, are to care for, or more literally, shepherd (Greek poimainen) or pastor the church of God.  As elders they are those with maturity (who still need looking out for) who are responsible to oversee or watch out for the church and like good shepherds are to pastor the flock.

The apostle Peter uses the same terminology in his directive to the elders of the churches he is writing to in 1 Peter 5:

So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed: shepherd the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion, but willingly, as God would have you; not for shameful gain, but eagerly; not domineering over those in your charge, but being examples to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory. Likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders. Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” (1 Peter 5:1–5, ESV)

Elders, those older in years and in the faith, are to shepherd (poimanate, ‘pastor’) the flock of God among them (again, not ‘under’ them), exercising oversight (episkopountes, overseeing them) willingly but without domineering them, rather, leading by example.  And the younger members are to be subject to these elders/overseers/pastors.

What we are seeing here is that in the early church the terms ‘elder’, ‘pastor’, and ‘overseer’ or ‘bishop, were used of the same person or office in the local church.  We are not told specifically whether in a church like the church at Rome these elders/pastors/overseers were spread out through all the sub-congregations as far as where they met with the body, but we may assume that together they formed leadership for the church of that locality.  In other words, there were no independent sub-congregations in any locality that weren’t under or subject to this leadership body of elders.  There was no pastor of an individual sub-congregation within the community of believers who had singular authority over that sub-congregation.  There was one church per locality and one governing body, the elders (pastors, overseers).

We see the apostles acting in this fashion in Jerusalem when, for example, in chapter 6 we see how a problem among the widows who receive support from the church are dealt with.  The problem is brought to the whole bunch of apostles or leaders and together they make a decision about how to address the problem and give directives to implement that solution.  This is part of their oversight or pastoring of this congregation of all the believers in Jerusalem.

Paul gives Timothy instructions about the qualifications of these elders/pastors/overseers in 1 Timothy 3:

The saying is trustworthy: If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task. Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God’s church? He must not be a recent convert, or he may become puffed up with conceit and fall into the condemnation of the devil. Moreover, he must be well thought of by outsiders, so that he may not fall into disgrace, into a snare of the devil. (1 Timothy 3:1–7, ESV)

Here, once again, the elders are called overseers (the King James translation translates the term as ‘bishops’).  And the voluntary nature of their position is again emphasized.  They were appointed by Paul or his team members but they had to really want to take on this responsibility.  This suggests that the “appointing” was more a recognition of their office, the office to which they aspired.

Their qualifications are mostly character qualifications that demonstrate community respect, self-control and leadership abilities and maturity.  But there is also the ability to teach the core beliefs of the Christian faith because, as Paul told the Ephesian elders, ravenous wolves from within and without the congregation would seek to infiltrate with false doctrine and they must be able to protect the flock.

However, after Paul gives the qualifications for elders he mentions another leadership office:

Deacons likewise must be dignified, not double-tongued, not addicted to much wine, not greedy for dishonest gain. They must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. And let them also be tested first; then let them serve as deacons if they prove themselves blameless. Their wives likewise must be dignified, not slanderers, but sober-minded, faithful in all things. Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well. For those who serve well as deacons gain a good standing for themselves and also great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus. (1 Timothy 3:8–13, ESV)

We have not seen the deacons (literally, ‘servants’) mentioned in Acts, but here Paul considers them an accepted role of leadership in the local community of faith.  Their qualifications are much the same as elders/pastors/overseers but we are not told what their specific responsibilities are.  Paul mentions “the women likewise” who must meet qualifications as well, and we can see that the ESV has translated this “their wives,” seeming to indicate that this is a further qualification for deacons.  But this makes little sense, since Paul does not require anything of elders’ wives.  It is more logical to assume that Paul is talking here about women deacons, not the wives of deacons.  Phoebe, mentioned in Romans 16:1 is likely a woman deacon.  He doesn’t consider the possibility of women elders.

We must guess that the deacons were servants who served in numerous capacities at the guidance of the elders, based on the model we see once again in Acts 6.  Here, when the elders/apostles deal with the problem of widows they instruct the church to select qualified leaders to serve the needs of these widows.  Stephen, Philip and the others are, in essence, the first deacons in the church.  They have other abilities, of course, and these become evident as they serve the body.

Paul mentions these two leadership positions, elders and deacons, in Philippians 1:1, the only other letter that mentions deacons.  Down through the course of church history different approaches have been taken to these leadership roles.  Later in the first century of the church the bishop somehow became a role separate from that of the local church elder/pastor.  The bishop had leadership over several communities or towns with churches in them.  It was felt this was critical to protect the purity of the gospel.  In our more modern church, we have moved toward separating pastors in some way from other elders, in some cases giving them more leadership authority than elders.  Suffice it to say, this was not the original intent of the apostles, but the question may be raised as to whether the new needs of the church and its new cultural settings required some changes of this sort.  There are those who say yes, and those who say no.  Those who say no believe we have in some way compromised the original wisdom of church governance and let culture shape our leadership structure inappropriately.