Ecclesiology 6 - A New Church - part 4a: The Staff (continued)

     In The Problem of Wineskins, Dr. Snyder does not discuss in any detail what the staffing of the Renewed Church should look like.  Indeed, the reason I began writing these recent posts is in a poor attempt to "flesh out" the ideals set forth in that work.  What follows, then, are my own observations and ideas.  One prays that these ideas are being guided by the Holy Spirit.

    If our churches no long have professional staffs, how will we get anything done?  The same way the first century church did during its most explosive period of growth, before Romans came along and explained how to get organized and church membership started dropping off (until Rome made church membership compulsory, of course).  Nowhere in the New Testament do we have a literal list of job titles and descriptions for the early church.  However, by poring over the epistles - especially those from Paul - we can begin to piece together a reasonably clear picture of what those jobs were, how they were carried out, and by whom, although some confusion will remain as some occupations were afforded multiple job titles, and several job titles are given overlapping responsibilities.

    Christ himself never discussed church organization or hierarchy.  Scouring the epistles, we can get a glimpse of how the first century church organized itself.  The named occupations within the church body are as follows:

Elders (also called overseers or pastors)

Deacons

Preachers

Apostles

Prophets

Evangelists

    Elders are the primary leaders of the local church and they are described as having a variety of duties.  The terms "elder," "overseer," and "pastor" are used interchangeably (Acts 20, Titus 1, 1 Peter 5).  While many epistle writers switch between the terms "elder" and "overseer" often, it is worth note that the term "pastor" is applied only once (Eph. 4:11) and it is used in connection with the term "teacher."  Elders are to assume a number of different roles within the local congregation, which is undoubtedly the reason why elders are always referred to in the plural.  Elders are to lead, shepherd, teach, and equip.  The exact nature of these various tasks are somewhat obscure, but it is obvious that elders are to hold both administrative and conciliatory roles.  Primarily, an elder must lead the church (1 Tim. 3:4–5). Those who lead well are worthy of double honor (1 Tim. 5:17). Second, an elder is called to shepherd Christ’s church (1 Pet. 5:1–2). The elders must be willing to protect the sheep from the false teachers (Acts 20:28–29). Elders are called to visit those who are spiritually and physically sick or weak (Jas. 5:14). They are to care for the souls entrusted to them as “those who will have to give an account” (Heb. 13:17). They must follow the example of Jesus, “the chief Shepherd” (1 Pet. 5:4) who “lays down his life for the sheep” (John 10:11; cf. 15:13). Third, elders are teachers of God’s word (Eph. 4:11; 1 Tim. 3:2; 5:17; Titus 1:9). Finally, elders are to equip others to do the work of the ministry (Eph. 4:11). Just as Paul urged Timothy to entrust what he learned to faithful men who would then teach others (2 Tim. 2:2), so also elders are to raise up the next generation of leaders and disciple-makers in the church.

    The word Deacon comes from the Greek diakonos, and it means "to serve."  The epistles, again, do not have a formal job description for deacons except to say that, unlike elders, deacons are not called upon to preach (1 Tim. 3:2).  Based on the pattern established in Acts 6 for the selection of the Seven, it seems that the deacon's role in the church is to help the elders in whatever capacity is needed, but their primary role is to take upon themselves the physical care of the church's widowed, orphaned and otherwise downtrodden.  The deacons, then, are the hands, feet and backs of the church.

    Preacher is the easiest job to understand as it is the most widespread.  Every Christian is called upon to preach.  This does not mean standing on a street corner or university mall with a bullhorn and weaving long, eloquent sermons that virtually no one will listen to.  It means simply being ready, willing, and able to "give a witness."  This is to say that a preacher simply tells people what Christ has done for them on a personal level whenever the subject comes up.  To the Enlightened Christian - one who has made that connection we've been discussing since last May - this is not only no burden, but a perfectly natural thing to do.  We are always ready to discuss the actions of those to whom we are closest: our parents, our children, our friends.  If we are actually as close to the Holy Spirit as we are called to be, then preaching (i.e. witnessing) will be second nature.

    Beyond the local congregation, we has several more ecumenical positions.  The first of these is that of Apostle.  Initially, the word apostle was applied only to the remaining 11 members of Christ's original group of 12.  However, efforts were made almost immediately following Pentecost to replace the fallen Judas, so it is clear that the word "apostle" was not confined to the idea of  an "eye witness."  The role of the apostles in the early church seems to have been primarily to teach the gospel.  With the passing of John (the last of the first generation of apostles to die) and the development of the written gospels, the office of apostle seems to have faded away.  The concept of the apostle, however, is still relevant; the word "apostle" comes to us from the Greek word apostolos, which has no direct translation, although we can come close if we consider the idea of an ambassador.  An ambassador is a representative of a state or nation in a foreign land.  His/her mission is to be the living reference point to which foreigners can look to see how things work back home.  An ambassador would never express a personal opinion in public (lest it be heard by the media) or in private (lest it be heard by other foreign officials), but only ever express the official position of the state or nation being represented.  To that extent, all Christians are called to be ambassadors or apostles for Christ.  In modern nomenclature, the job of missionary would not be entirely unlike that of an apostle.

    Next, there was the role of Prophet.  It has been noted somewhat sardonically that a prophet's job is to "comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable."  The prophets' actual job was to travel from church to church bringing the Word of God.  Almost from the beginning, the church started having trouble with "false prophets."  There were a number of factors involved here: (1) since prophets were travelers, and traveling was both expensive and time consuming, the local churches were expected to support prophets with room, board, and travel expenses while the prophet was among them; (2) prophets were held in high esteem throughout the ancient world, Christianity not excluded; (3) there were no clear, explicit guidelines or qualifications for being a prophet; (4) prophets were expected to carry letters of introduction from their home churches, but these were easily forged; (5) just as today, there were many in the early church who were simply unable to understand all the ramifications of the selfless life taught by Christ and, instead, tried to make Christianity fit within their preconceived notions (and force these "tidy" beliefs onto others).  As a cumulative result, a cottage industry sprang up among the less scrupulous to go into a city claiming to be a prophet and take advantage of the local congregation, many of whom would be poorly educated along with being just plain poor.  This quickly became a big enough problem that, by the time Paul is writing his last epistles, the church had virtually dispensed with prophets altogether.

    Next, we have the Evangelists.  The word "evangelist" is only used three times in Scripture (Eph. 4:11-13, Acts 21:8 & 2 Tim. 4:5) and Philip and Timothy are the only men named with the title.  Little is known about the work of the evangelists except to say that they were to preach the gospels, and the only known distinction between evangelists and prophets is in the allusion that evangelists were chosen from among the diaconal members of a church rather than the elders.  While prophets fell out of favor early in church history, it would seem that the same fate did not befall the evangelists.

 Somewhat later - but still by mid-century - the church added the office of Bishop, possibly as a replacement for the more dubious prophets and the quickly expiring office of apostle.  While bishops also traveled between churches, their job had two great distinctions from those of apostle and evangelist: (1) their territory was much smaller, usually overseeing the churches within a given city or limited geographic area, and (2) the bishop's job was apparently more administrative than evangelical.  While bishops were known to correct any errors in a local congregation's preached theology, their main focus was to try to codify and unify the various churches' internal functioning, e.g. their mission and outreach programs, their accounting methods, their method of selecting and ordaining congregants for service, etc.  James, the writer of the epistle bearing that name and presumably the younger brother of Jesus, is thought to have served as the first bishop of the church in Jerusalem.

    That is a list of the named jobs in the first century New Testament church along with a best guess as to their occupations.  At a later date, we'll look at how these jobs and job titles might be adapted to the twenty-first century Renewed Church, but, for now, let's get back to Howard Snyder's Wineskins.

Pax