Biblical Eldership

          Biblical eldership is such an interesting topic isn't it? It is rarely handled the correct way. Why do i say this?- We erect these different church governments in an effort to avoid placing the power of guiding/leading the church in any other persons hands than the men chosen by God to do so. I'm not currently a pastor, but I am on my way (Lord willing). I don't want the power, I don't think anyone that is thinking rationally really does. To seek out complete control in the local church is absolutely absurd! Only a pompous fool would really seek to do so. Godly men on the other hand, will recognize that the Lord has placed a burden on their hearts and others will also feel that way about those godly men.

But i can tell you how frustrating it is when you are a part of a church that tries to do things some other way that what is biblically prescribed because they are fearful of being non-seeker friendly, or because they have been burnt by a similar type of leadership in the past.

          We as Christians are constantly asking those that we witness to, to evaluate the faith that we have, based upon our Savior and not ourselves. We tell them to give Christianity a try despite the way we live it out. We sin and don't want to mar the beauty of Christianity with our sin, so we ask them to look past it and instead focus on the one true and perfect God. So why, when we have a man that is power hungry as a pastor of our church do we evaluate the position given by God and the authority given by God instead of evaluating the position biblically. Why do we say, "Oh thats the wrong way to do things because look what it leads to!" Where would we be (humanly speaking of course) if every time we shared the Gospel with someone we asked them to look to us for the evaluation of whether or not Christianity actually works? What if they knew that we were a sinner still? What would they think of our God if he pointed to us as the perfect example of His finished work?

          You know what they would do? They would laugh in our faces and tell us to take our worthless religion and shove it! So what do we do when it comes time to form our churches and develop a blueprint for leadership? We say, "Lets do things kind of like the Bible says, but not all the way. Lets put a pastor up behind the pulpit to preach but lets take away his God given authority and neuter him so he walks around like kid with a leash on." That is what we have done today.

          We elect our lay elders and put them in places of authority. Men that don't even understand how to properly interpret the Bible. And then we given the group of men nomenclature like "elder board" so they think that they are high and mighty. Please don't misunderstand, i'm not saying that a layman can't be an elder, what i am saying is that he better meet the qualifications! I don't know about you, but I needed Bible college to help me understand some of the deeper truths of Scripture and I needed Bible teachers to spend hours upon hours breaking down Scripture that i might get a handle on how to properly understand and preach it. Would you ask a jack of all trades to work on your Ferrari when it needed a major repair, or would you call in an expert? And how much more valuable is the human spirit than a Ferrari?

I don't know if anyone reads this, but hit me up if you have any thoughts!
Thanks!

V.