Church in the Trench: Commissioned Officers

God has given us 3 primary realms of government and God appoints leaders in each of these 3 realms. This is in Family, in Civil/state government and Church. In each there are real leaders with real authority.

God expects us to submit ourselves to the leadership of the family (within their zone of authority), and for them to use their power in a godly way.

God expects us to submit ourselves to the leadership of the state (within their zone of authority), and for them to use their power in a godly way.

God expects us to submit ourselves to the leadership of the church (within their zone of authority), and for them to use their power in a godly way.

Over the past year and a bit, every so often I have preached on the nature of the Church. And I have called it the “Church in the Trench” because we understand that the church here on earth is in the midst of spiritual war. The trench is a refuge and defensive position (like the Church), and we also expect to advance on enemy positions.

We also looked at how each person in the church has a role to play that contributes to the mission of the whole. God equips his spiritual soldiers for the task ahead and gives them different jobs to do. Today, we’re really honing in on subset of those God has equipped for His service, the leadership.

So lets return to the trench metaphor for a moment. In times of war and battle we want capable ranking officers in the trench. Officers who will lead well.

Officers who will:

care for the troops’ well being

prepare the troops well with the right training & equipment

give out good orders and instructions

Make strategic decisions that minimize casualties while gaining victory.

You imagine for a moment that you didn’t have raking officers on the front line in war. You’ve got the Generals somewhere else, making the big picture calls about the battle, when to attack, when to retreat etc. But then you’ve got all the enlisted soldiers on the front line. They’re there, hearing the orders come down the line, but they’re not sure about how those orders should be specifically carried out in their context.

One guy thinks that when the general says to take out the enemy position that they should wait till night and attack in the dark, so he stays still an doesn't do anything.

One guy reckons that they should try a stealth attack and sneak up from the rear, so he chuffs off to give it a go.

One guys reckons that that they should launch a full frontal assault with as many explosives that they can get their hands on. His mate likes that idea too, so they head off to do it together.

Before you know it the whole platoon is off doing their own thing with completely different approaches - with friendly fire because they’re approaching the same objective from different angles.

It’s chaos.

Everyone has a battle plan that is right in their own eyes. It’s an uncoordinated mess, and unsurprisingly, it all ends in a shameful defeat.

The troops in the trenches need commissioned officers who

care for the troops’ well being

prepare the troops well with the right training & equipment

give out good orders and instructions

Make strategic decisions that minimize casualties while gaining victory.

Unsurprisingly, we need the same thing. We Christians are the Church in the trench, this is an outpost of heaven, on on the front lines of God’s expanding kingdom.

We need commissioned officers who will

care for our’ well being

prepare the us well with the right training & equipment

give out good orders and instructions

Make strategic decisions that minimize loss while gaining victory.

And you know what? Jesus thinks we need those things too! So he set up the structure of the church to work that way with commissioned officers.

Now if you’re in the air force or one of the other arms of the defense force, you’ll find a whole bunch of different ranks like wing commanders and Commodores and lieutenants and so on. But you won’t find that in the church. The church is not an earthly militarized organisation with a rank for everybody and a continual struggle to rise up the ranks.

Jesus gave three formal officers in the church under himself.

Head - Jesus

Apostles

Elders

Deacons

We’re mainly going to focus in on two of them today, Elders & Deacons, but let’s start at the top, and work our way down.

And these aren’t ranked per-se. It’s not like defence where if you serve for a certain period of time and tick some boxes then you can step up to the next rank. It’s not a hierarchy of “Christianness”, you don’t climb the ladder to get closer to Jesus. Instead, these are especially commissioned officers. They are singled out with a commission to do their job. To use some old language, we would say they are “ordained” to their job.

Now, being comissioned means that there is a specific job window. Like the “Royal Commission into aged care” has a specific job to do - to investigate aged care, and not whether or not big companies are paying taxes, whether international policy is successful, or anything outside their purview. So too the commissioned officers in the church are given a job to do, and to do it well.

Sure there is a ranking of honour, Jesus gets all the glory, and the Apostles get more honour than Elders. But it’s not a ladder to be climbed. And it’s not as though you or I are less of a Christian because because we don’t have the job that somebody else has. As Paul reminds us:

1 Corinthians 12:14–15 NIV

Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many. Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body.

We all have our different gifting and role to play and some will be commissioned to the specific office of Elder or Deacon.

Speaking of the way that we all have different roles, God has designed men for the role of church leadership. We don’t understand fully why this is the case, and this has nothing to do with devaluing women. You can’t say that a hammer is less valuable than a screwdriver because they have different jobs to do. In a pinch a hammer can drive in a screw, or a screwdriver a nail, but you make a big mess. It’s just best to let each be used to it it’s full, natural designed potential. In the church, God appointed the leadership for men (and only some men at that), and we don’t need to be apologetic about God’s good order. Even so, I know this is weird for some people, and we have been taught by the anti-God world to think this is somehow a problem, so if you want to work though this gender issue with Laura and I, we’d love to catch up over a coffee and tease out what God says in the scriptures about this - we won’t think any less of you if you struggle on this point.

So lets have a look at the details around church leadership. We know we need good leaders, and we know God has given them to the Church, but who are they and what are they like?

In every case of talking about leadership in the church, we need to start at the top, with Jesus.

1. Jesus: the Head

Jesus is the head of the Church. He’s the general, Chief Marshal, he’s the guy who calls the shots. He’s the one with ultimate authority over absolutely everything.

Ephesians 1:22–23 NIV

And God placed all things under his feet and appointed him to be head over everything for the church, which is his body, the fullness of him who fills everything in every way.

He says "jump”, and we hay “how high”. Now he isn’t some gruff old man worn out by too much war, he’s our loving savoir and captain of our souls. He’s a gentle King who loves his people so much he died for them.

But even though Jesus comes near to us as the gentle and lowly saviour, He’s also the guy who dealt with sin, crushed death, disarmed Satan and now sits at the Father’s right hand in heaven. He’s the guy who fought in the trenches, walking the walk and talking the talk, but now he is exalted! He reigns. He rules on high while his enemies are made a footstool for his feet.

He won the crucial battle, and now we’re chasing the enemy out of the occupied territory, announcing the good news that there’s a Good King on the throne.

He is head over all things.

So Jesus is top dog. He is the head of the Church. He’s the source of it’s life and vitality.

2. Apostles: Jesus’ Delegates

Why aren’t there any more Apostles?

And he established his church through the guys who are the next rank down: Apostles.

The Apostles are the guys that God used to found the Church. Jesus is the cornerstone, the key foundation, and then the apostles laid the foundation of the church based on him.

The Apostles were 12 (or 13, depending on how you count it) men who were witnesses of Jesus. Most of them saw his life, his death and his resurrection. And Jesus sent them out into the world as witnesses who could testify to his Resurrection from the dead and the salvation he brought to humanity.

They preached the message, and planted churches. By God’s providence they also wrote the New Testament, a collection of letters and stories, that provide for us all that we need to know about Jesus and the Church he is building.

Unlike the two other types of commissioned officers in the church, there are no more apostles. Only 12+1. Why 13? Not sure, but a safe bet is that there’s one each to represent the tribes of Israel coming out of exile in Jesus Christ, and Paul, the odd one out, as the representative of the gentile nations. But that’s just a guess.

Capital “A” apostles are those who have met and been taught by the resurrected Jesus, and then commissioned by Him. That means there are no more Apostles, though in a literal sense we’re all sent messengers of Jesus. You should be very cautious of any person who tries to set themselves up as an “Apostle” and take authority over God’s church.

The apostles have done their job , founding the church through the proclamation of the Gospel and delivered us these words in the scriptures, they are ministering to us even now via these words.

So we’ve Got Jesus at the top, then we have Apostles as his “lieutenants” per-se. His personal delegates.

So who are the leaders of the local platoon? Who are the commissioned officers in the trench with the church right now?

3. Elders: Jesus’ Overseers & Shepherds

So we come to the next type of leaders in the church - Elders.

In the New Testament church the apostles would set up Elders to take care of the running of the church. Paul had a habit of doing it as he went around visiting the churches he planted in Acts.

And Paul specifically asked Titus & Timothy out to set up Elders in the churches they visited.

For example:

Titus 1:5 NIV

The reason I left you in Crete was that you might put in order what was left unfinished and appoint elders in every town, as I directed you.

Elders were needed wherever the church was established through the preaching of the Gospel. So who are these elders, what is their job?

Elder (presbyter) = overseer (bishop) = pastor (shepherd)

Well for starters, we get a hint or two in Acts 20:28, where Paul, knowing that he’s on his way to jail, gets the Elders from Ephesus to come away for a pastoral conference. He stops off outside Ephesus a gets the Elders to meet him there, and he reminds them about what their job is:

Acts 20:28 NIV

Keep watch over yourselves and all the flock of which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers. Be shepherds of the church of God, which he bought with his own blood.

SO what do we see here? We see that the Elders are meant to

watch their own life, that is to not be hypocrites, have good character, and then to

Watch over the flock - like shepherds

Oversee & care for the church

That they’re appointed by the operation of the Holy Spirit.

Before we go any further notice the language that is used to describe these men - These Elders are overseers. The Elders are shepherds.

There’s not three separate jobs here, Elder, Overseer & Shepherd.

The Elders are the overseers, the bishops.

The Elders are the shepherds, the pastors.

The one group of people do all these things. So in our churches, we shouldn’t have different classes of these spiritual leaders.

Often you will find in churches that there is a hierarchy of Christian leaders who separate out these jobs into different groups

They have Elders - also called Presbyters who are unpaid leaders.

Then you get Pastors - the shepherds - usually these are the guys who get paid to do the job of ministry

And in some churches you even get the Bishops - overseers, who look after a whole bunch of churches in one area.

Now don’t get me wrong, we need men doing all these jobs, but is unhelpful to call them these names as separate from each other. It has created in church history a poor understanding of church leadership.

We have one group the Elders, who do pastor-ing, and bishop-ing.

“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.”

Now that we’ve got that straight, we do realize that within a team of elders there are going to be different levels of ability, different spiritual gifts, different personalities, different experience.

Some will be specifically set aside and paid to minister for us full time, so that they only have to worry about looking after the church and not about holding down a day job. Most often, these people are also the ones who do the bulk of the teaching in the church, because they have the time to get deep into the scriptures and prepare a heavenly meal of God’s word for us on a week to week basis. That’s why I’m a full time “employee” of the church.

Some elders will be wise and godly men, but they’re equipped differently, perhaps in pastoral oversight or wise leadership. They still have equality in the Leadership team for the overseeing of the church, but they’re not necessarily going to be paid, or up the front all the time. They may not be preaching all the time, but they are is overseeing and caring for the flock.

Qualifications for Elders

So, if it was the practice of the Early church to appoint Elders in every church, and the pattern given in scripture, shouldn’t we do the same?

Yes!

Ok, so how do we go about picking the right blokes?

What are we looking for?

Well we read it earlier in Timothy:

1 Timothy 3:2–7 NIV

Now the overseer is to be above reproach, faithful to his wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage his own family well and see that his children obey him, and he must do so in a manner worthy of full respect. (If anyone does not know how to manage his own family, how can he take care of God’s church?) He must not be a recent convert, or he may become conceited and fall under the same judgment as the devil. He must also have a good reputation with outsiders, so that he will not fall into disgrace and into the devil’s trap.

Above reproach - no one can say something like “well what about his bad temper” or “what about his shady business deals,” not that he’s perfect, but he has a clean sheet in the eyes of others.

Monogamist - one wife in life and in mind

Sober minded - not take to flights of fancy and erratic judgment

Respectable

Hospitable - will share their lives and their belongings with others in need

Able to teach - like the preaching we’ve seen in recent weeks.

Not a binge drinker or alcoholic

Gentle

Not argumentative

Not greedy for money

Manages your own household well - in good order spiritually and morally. Not expecting silent children and subservient wife (if they have one) - but that he is the leader of his home and under his good Godly leadership there is a godly order to the home. Paul eve goes so far to say in Titus: “his children are believers and not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination.” Tt 1:6.

Not a new believer - who is both weak in faith and hasn’t had it tested yet.

Good reputation outside too.

As you can see, for the most part this list of qualifications is just how Godly men are expected to live. Ideally, every man in the church should be eldership material on the character front.

The only ability qualification is that of teaching ability, because these men are tasked with the responsibility of caring for the flock in Jesus name, and if they don’t know the truth about Jesus in the Bible, and they can’t communicate it clearly, then how are they going to be able to lead the flock closer to Jesus?

Titus 1:9 NIV

He must hold firmly to the trustworthy message as it has been taught, so that he can encourage others by sound doctrine and refute those who oppose it.

Elders defend the faith and instruct the church. There may be other teachers in the church, but the leadership responsibility sits with the elders.

You’ll notice here that there is no talk about degrees or seminary or that kind of thing. Bible College does not make pastors, Churches do.

Bible College does not make pastors, Churches do. There is certainly wisdom in using higher education like bible college to assist in training qualified elders, but it should never be considered the method or a qualifier for elders.

Jesus is the Great Shepherd

Ok, so we’ve got the qualifications for an Elder, and we’ve discussed briefly their nature as overseers and shepherds. But what does that look like?

For starters, it looks like Jesus. Jesus is the picture of the shepherd, He is the Great Shepherd!

He is the Good Shepherd!

John 10:11 NIV

“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep.

Gospel!

Jesus Laid down his life for the sheep.

His own people, the church, the flock, were defenseless without him.

They were used and abuse by bad shepherds, and they were attacked by wolves and theives

We were these sheep - before Jesus we are lost and helpless - we are at the mercy of sin, death and Satan. Outside faith in Jesus, we are outside the protection of Jesus. Like sheep wandering in the scrub while wild dogs prowl in the night for a feed.

Jesus came, the good shepherd who fought to protect His sheep. He laid down his own life as a sacrifice for the sheep. Although the sheep deserved to be lost to the consequences of sin and death, Jesus paid for us with his own life.

And then having laid down his life in the place of the sheep, he then took his life back up again, rising from the dead!

Now he calls all his sheep to himself. He calls them to hear his voice, to come into his flock and receive the protection and care of the loving shepherd.

John 10:14–16 NIV

“I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me—just as the Father knows me and I know the Father—and I lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd.

Jesus know you, his sheep. Come to his loving embrace. You can come too, if you come by faith in Jesus.

Pastors are Under-Shepherds

Now we Elders, we Shepherds, continue in Jesus’ footsteps. He has won the sheep, he has purchased the flock with his own blood, but he commissions officers who’s job it is to care for the local flock.

Elders are caring for Jesus’ flock, not their own, so they need to be extra careful, knowing that they need to give the flock back in better condition that they got it. They want to see the flock flourish and grow in Jesus Christ, to be spiritually fruitful and multiply.

They stand as Christ’s representatives to the church, proclaiming the Good News of Jesus, discipling the spiritual community.

They lead the charge in completing the great comission, “[making] disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that [Jesus] [has] commanded [us].” Mt 28:19–20.

They are caring for the flock, but they are also defending the flock in the way that they gaurd sound teaching, good doctrine, so that the sheep aren’t led astray.

They also lead the process of Church discipline for kicking out wolves among the sheep.

So as reps of Jesus, who cares for us, and protects us, the Elders are Jesus tool to care for us and protect us.

They’re not more spiritual than everyone else. They’re regular Christians, but they have been set aside, commissioned to take up the honorable task of oversight.

Here’s Peters words to the Under-shepherds:

1 Peter 5:1–4 NIV

To the elders among you, I appeal as a fellow elder and a witness of Christ’s sufferings who also will share in the glory to be revealed: Be shepherds of God’s flock that is under your care, watching over them—not because you must, but because you are willing, as God wants you to be; not pursuing dishonest gain, but eager to serve; not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. And when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that will never fade away.

4. Deacons: Jesus’ Servants

Jesus is the Great Servant

Lastly we come to Deacons. Deacons is a Greek work “diakonos” which means “servant.

Deacons are servants of the church. Like Elders, they take their ques from Jesus himself who showed us what it meant to be a faithful servant. To serve even to death to save people!

Jesus spoke about this in Matthew:

Matthew 20:25–28 NIV

Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave—just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

Gospel!

Jesus was God himself, incarnate.

He put off glory.

He was a humble servant, even washing feet, though he deserves to be enthroned in heaven basking in the glorious praises of the angels.

He came to save his people, serving them by using his own life as a ransom. To save his people from the wrath of God which will be revealed against the unreighteous, and rescue them from the effects of sin & death.

He was the ultimate servant.

He asks his people to become servants like him - exuding Christ’s character in their own sacrificial service.

Proto-deacons

Deacons are servants. There are leading servants. They’re not given spiritual authority, but they are still commissioned to an office in the church where they lead through service. They are ministers, servants.

We see the first picture of this kind servants in Acts 6 -

Acts 6:2–4 NIV

So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together and said, “It would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables. Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.”

These early deacons had a practical ministry, leading the loving practical care element of the church to free the other leaders to prayer & Word ministry.

Qualifications for Deacons

What is different about the qualifications for deacons?

SO what are the qualifications for deacons?

1 Timothy 3:8–13 NIV

In the same way, deacons are to be worthy of respect, sincere, not indulging in much wine, and not pursuing dishonest gain. They must keep hold of the deep truths of the faith with a clear conscience. They must first be tested; and then if there is nothing against them, let them serve as deacons. In the same way, the women are to be worthy of respect, not malicious talkers but temperate and trustworthy in everything. A deacon must be faithful to his wife and must manage his children and his household well. Those who have served well gain an excellent standing and great assurance in their faith in Christ Jesus.

If you were listening to the Elder qualifications, you would have herd that the list between Deacons and Elders is pretty similar, but the main thing missing is that they don’t need to be able to teach. Theirs is not a spiritual leading office.

They absolutely need to be spiritually healthy and leading holy lives, like the qualification note, but their spiritual leadership is more an demonstration of what faithful servant-hood looks like.

Conclusion

Church in the trenches needs good leaders!

Jesus is the Head

Apostles are the founders edition leaders - who mimic Jesus the sent messenger.

Elders are the under-shepherds with you in the trench - who mimic Jesus the Shepherd

Deacons are the servants supporting the work. - who mimic Jesus the Servant

We’re revising our church leadership structures to appoint elders. This is what we’re going to do:

Think and pray about who you would nominate to become an elder. Talk to them about it.

Consider joining in Leadership Training next year, with a specific intention to filter Elder candidates.