Baptists and Elders (plural) in the local church

I never heard that. I also never saw truth judged by effectiveness.</font>[/QUOTE]Truth is not judged by something else. It is the standard by which all others are judged. Truth does work every time or it is not truth.

It would seem to me that 2 Timothy 3:16 indicates that.

 

The New Testament only refers to the office of pastor one time (Ephesians 4:11). It is a functional description of the role of elder stressing the care and feeding of the church as God's flock, just as "bishop/overseer" is a functional description of the role of elder stressing the governing or oversight of the church. We may conclude therefore that "pastor" and "elder" and "bishop/overseer" refer in the New Testament to the same office. This office stands alongside "deacon" in Philippians 1:1 and 1 Timothy 3:1-13 in such a way as to show that the two abiding officers instituted by the New Testament are elder and deacon.

The function of elders may be summed up under two heads: teaching and governing. They are the doctrinal guardians of the flock and the overseers of the life of the church responsible to God for the feeding and care and ministry of the people.

Source: John Piper

 

FWIW, our church is moving toward a plurality of elders to lead our Baptist church. My dissertation research in primary documents for my PhD in Church History at SBTS convinced me of the biblical support for a plurality of elders as well as Southern Baptist approval of the notion until the end of the twentieth century.

Our deacons had been serving in a dual role: governing/teaching of elders and the serving/care of material needs of deacons. Those duties will be divided between our new elders and deacons.

Am I as pastor threatened by this change? I welcome and have pushed for it. It will be wonderful to have some godly men to share the burden of spiritual oversight.

Blessings,
Bill

 

Aren't the primary documents from which "biblical support" would come the Bible? I think it abundantly safe to say that examining primary documents did not convince anyone of the necessity of a plurality of elders, though perhaps the allowability of it.

 

For one to undertsand how words are used in scripture it is always a good idea to see how those words were used at the time in society among different groups of people. Also it is a good idea to trace the word from the beginning of the OT and on past the NT.

I have taken a look at the word presbuteros and some interestring things happen. It is a word that was used in society and in Judaism as well. Episkopos comes later.

I think any church that comes out of a particcular religious group will tend to take on the old ways and give them new meanings over time.

For example just in the US depending on the area many call it the Lord's supper while many others call it communion.

 

The point was not about how words are used but about examining primary sources for the biblical support of plural eldership. By definition, the only primary sources for biblical support of anything is the Bible.

Your argument about words is somewhat flawed in that the Bible quite often assigns a unique theological meaning to a word that secular usage does not. To trace a word from the OT past the NT assumes that the words always mean the same thing. I would not make that assumption, particularly in the area of church leadership.

 

To trace a word from the OT throught to the NT and beytond does not assume anything. It is looking to see if there were changes and if there were to try and pinpoint where the changes occured. If there are no changes then you can assume the word has the same meaning and nothing has changed. For example the words prebuteros and episkopos came in at certain times. There is a time of overlap and when one began. There is a time when the two words are used interchangeably and a time when episkopos began to be used.

Everyone knows that both presbuteros and diaknos came from two different backgrounds but they have similar usages in the NT and OT to their backgrounds.

"...the Bible quite often assigns a unique theological meaning to a word that secular usage does not." You and I would agree on this. Maybe I didn't express it very well though. That is one of the things I look for when I trace the word over a long period of time.

I think you would agree that we cannot pull a meaning out of the hat to suit our thoughts or whims. So we must be careful to do our best to search out all avenues of usage in their context to try and determine the correct meaning. Often I use a concordance for other documents and some other lexicons tied to documents outside of the OT and NT to get a better understanding of the word. Then there are times when I must look at al contexts especially the historical context of the passage.

Another example is Philemon. Philemon does not tell us much about slavery and what Onesimus faced. But reading other documents around that time gives a better picture of what slavery was all about.

 

I must say that after several years of studying what the NT said about this very topic, we as an assembly have decided to move to what we call a blended form of church government. There are clearly decisions to be made by the pastors/elders (one and the same group), and other decisions to be made by the congregation under the direction of the pastors/elders. One person referred to our position as "elder-grational." Our deacons are simply servants, not administrators or rulers of any kind.

 

Aren't the primary documents from which "biblical support" would come the Bible? I think it abundantly safe to say that examining primary documents did not convince anyone of the necessity of a plurality of elders, though perhaps the allowability of it. </font>[/QUOTE]The point of the thread is about the plurality of elders in Baptist history (if I remember correctly). I was pointing to the primary writings by Baptist authors (as opposed to secondary writings about what those authors said) as helping me understand what the Scriptures teach.

Of the use of other writers to help us understand the Scriptures, Spurgeon famously wrote, "In order to be able to expound the Scriptures, and as an aid to your pulpit studies, you will need to be familiar with the commentators: a glorious army, let me tell you, whose acquaintance will be your delight and profit. Of course, you are not such wiseacres as to think or say that you can expound Scripture without assistance from the works of divines and learned men who have laboured before you in the field of exposition. If you are of that opinion, pray remain so, for you are not worth the trouble of conversion, and like a little coterie who think with you, would resent the attempt as an insult to your infallibility. It seems odd, that certain men who talk so much of what the Holy Spirit reveals to themselves, should think so little of what he has revealed to others."

It is never "abundantly safe" to make a universal assumption. For the sake of argument and to avoid nitpicking (as well as twisting others' words, too often practice on this forum), it is abundantly safe to understand that many of us became convinced that, excepting unusual circumstances, a local church led by a plurality of elders is preferable to the single pastor/plurality of deacons because of the biblical witness. A newly planted church, for instance, would not have enough scripturally qualified men to have a plurality of elders. Again, back on the topic of the thread, this scenario appears to be the reason that the practice of plural elder leadership began to vanish during the rapid expansion of Baptist work during the 1700's and 1800's in the US. However, the exception appears to have become the norm by the end of the 19th century. The notion of plural elder leadership is completely foreign to the average Baptist church member and is almost so with the average Baptist pastor. I know---I was one. The primary writings from Baptist history convinced me to rethink church government and convinced me that plural elder leadership was the biblical norm and, historically, Baptist practice.

Blessings,
Bill

 

Broadus,
My studies in church history have found the same basic info as yours. I have also found that the shift from a Calvinism to an Arminian focus follows the same time line. David Wells documents many of these things in "No Place for Truth" and "God in the Wasteland." Iain Murray also shows similar thoughts in "Revival and Revivalism."