Whose Sheep Are They Anyway Part 2
Mar 23
I wrote a previous post called “whose sheep are they”. I decided to stay with the name for this post. This post was actually in the think tank; however a dear blogging buddy over at New Leaven posted this about small groups. This actually rekindle my thoughts and motivated this post.
Lets be clear about something. Leaders, have no right to tell Christians how often they can or can’t meet, what they can and can’t discuss and who they should or shouldn’t listen to. Leaders do not own the church. They possess a certain giftedness amongst the church coupled with upstanding moral behavior and good decision making which then causes others to allow them to speak into their lives in order that they may also pursue Christ and mature into Christ who is the Head (Ephesians 4:11-12).
Decision making for each individual Christian belongs to that Christian. That Christian is to be taught how to discern the voice of God on their own behalf, approaching the throne of Grace on their own behalf and being filled with the Spirit on their own behalf. Now this does not take away from the corporateness of the local church. Simultaneous with all I said above we are to lend our ear to the community of faith. We are to be sensitive to the discerning and loving voice of the whole. If a group of loving and biblically aware believers whom I have known and trusted are instructing me, then I am to listen and take heed and ask the Lord for clarification (they could be a bunch of wackos also).
However, decision making does not belong to the leaders, there is no such evidence of this. The church makes decisions guided by the hands of mature men. The biggest problem today is that most men do not come up among the ranks so we have nothing to judge them on. We have no history to judge them off of so with our current church planting techniques what I am currently proposing may seem far off base. When we enter a church relationship with leaders and non-leaders and these very leaders already posses all of the decision making power, then we are already headed down the wrong road at exuberant speeds.
So back to T.C.R’s post. He says that many church leaders do not trust small groups. One of the reasons being that such small group can fall into false teaching and be led astray (he is not saying this is true, he is only observing, he is actually proposing the exact opposite). The problem with that is that large groups often fall into false teaching (this is very kin to the women not being able to teach because of false doctrine which is altogether woeful). Whole denominations have fell hook, line and sinker to the Gay Rights movement. Others have traveled great distances only to engage in mass suicide. Others have split from their denomination because the entire denomination was attempting to snuff the people of God out and make decisions that no such person should make.
Let me be clear here. Each believer has been born from above. They now have the Holy Spirit indwelling them and they belong to Jesus Christ. They don’t belong to a pastor, a church or anyone else. They belong to Jesus and as an expression of their new commitment they are to meet with other believers, let other gifted believers spur them and teach them and admonish them and edify them and they are to do the same in return.
Whenever a leader attempts to usurp the headship of Christ then we have a serious problem on our hands. The problem is this has been going on for so long that we think the opposite is wrong. Elder Ruled, Senior Pastors, Elder Board and the likes are all theological jargon which has no place in scripture that encourages the exact opposite of what scripture really says. Churches make decisions for churches and individual Christians make decisions for themselves. I can’t be any more clearer than that.
To say otherwise is to undermine the work of the Spirit in each believer. It is to block their access to the throne, it is to prevent them from hearing from Christ on their own behalf, also the behalf of others, (that is why prophecy is mocked today), it is to tell Jesus He has done an incomplete work while Peter said “you have been given everything” it is to treat them as infants when the scriptures tell them they should be teachers. You see a Spirit indwelt believer has all he or she needs, though they are incomplete because we need one another and the only person who seems to be noninclusive in this “we” are leaders who seem to be the capstone in the great Christian pyramid.
A local church should do nothing to prevent Christians that meet with them to meet whenever and however they like. They actually have no right to do such a thing. A local church is not to police what is taught from an oversight perspective. If something false does come up, it can be address corporately through centralized teaching. Or a concerned leader or member could ask questions on how such teaching crystallized and attempt to present the more biblically faithfully position.
None the less one thing that can’t happen is that of disallowing Christians to meet together to build one another up. They are Jesus’ sheep and Jesus has given the command and liberty to meet as we please under His headship. This is disheartening and only contributes to the perpetual immaturity of so many believers and their sole dependency on leadership. Churches usually keep Christians at bay by electing small amounts of controllable men called elders who often time function as yes men to the “senior” or now “lead” pastors. Very disheartening I must reiterate.
Anyway those are some thoughts. If you are a Christian you are free to start a home bible study, share your position on scripture (though you may be corrected), you have the right to start community fellowships, back yard bible study, fun groups, life skill classes or anything else for that matter. Please ensure that you are submitted the Jesus Christ and if your church will not allow such freedoms they are usurping Christ’s authority. Again my thoughts. God bless.
Lionel,
Thanks for the link. Ah, but what do we do with leaders who use Hebrew 13:17 to keep their members in line?
But I do believe that leaders have a divine charge to protect their fellowship from doctrinal errors (1 Tim; Titus). But of course, this can be done wisely, while maintaining the liberty of each believer, and at the same time, allowing for healthy, spiritual growth.
Church leadership is no easy task.
T.C.R,
Leaders are to be followed but not “obeyed”. They are to be examples but are not to make decisions. I agree that they can and should protect the flock from false teaching. They do that by teaching, not dictating who can and can’t meet. The problem why this will never be fully addressed is because one to two men dominate all of the teaching, thus no one is ever given the opportunity to discuss differing ideas.
Depends on what you mean by easy task. It isn’t too hard to open your home (hospitality) and life (teaching) to be an example for others. It is hard to maintain and manage the organizational structure labeled the church but the two are not the same.
I wrote an essay several years ago concerning Heb 13:17 et al. My conclusion and I feel a better translation would be:”Consider and be persuaded by those who are leading you.”
We must always be mindful of Jesus’ admonition in Mk 10:42-44 …”You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. But it shall not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.
Lionel,
For a moment when said that leaders are not to be obeyed, I had to stop and think, but I got the drift. I think I agree with you.
Well, it seems like we need to retrain our leaders, getting them to stop think like CEOs and start thinking like shepherds of God’s people. That seems to be the consensus.
TC,
They are to be obeyed when they are faitfully teaching the commands of Christ and because they are leaders they will most likely be the ones doing this, at least more frequently and they will be the ones who have the greatest right to be heard amongst the flock because of their faithfulness in word and deed. So for example when you speak and call the church to something, I would heed to your instruction because you live faithfully being: transparent, intimate, hospitable and a good family man. This would have been proven while you were among us and now we have GIVEN you the right to call the church to faithfulness.
The problem today is that a man out of nowhere comes to a town and starts a church with a few other people and a successful (tongue in cheek) church’s money. Thus this man (lead pastor/senior pastor) and his minions (elders/underlings) come with a vision to do something, yet you never get to know this fella. He actually encourages the idea that the pastorate should be seperate (ever head of that?). He spends no time with the congregation he only concocts nice speeches borrowing from the great speakers before him (Piper, MacArthur, Edwards, Lloyd Jones….) sometimes he is cabled in on you watch him on DVD and we call that guy a leader. I can’t!!!
So I am willing to lend my heart and mind and ear to anyone who has been faitful in serving the Lord regardless of his/her position. Leadership in the bible is about faithfulness today it is about position. The church often times have no say in who is recognized as a leader besides the trivial “do you have anything against this man…” much like we do at a wedding. How many people will actually object. In most churches how many people even really knows the dude anyway?
So to my original point. I am not to obey a leader I am to follow his/her example. They are only given the right to encourage me to follow them as the follow Jesus, they are not given cart blanche to make decisions for people, they are only given the right to follow Jesus and open their lives so others can follow them while teaching the church but formally and informally of what this looks like. But we are to obey every Christian from that perspective. If we are in a relationship with a believer then we have to yield to them as the Spirit speaks through them.
Sorry for the long rant brother.
Amen, Lionel, especially wrt “church” leaders’ usurpation of Jesus’ headship via discouragement / disallowance of Christians’ assembling themselves other than under control of such “leaders” being “disheartening and only contributes to the perpetual immaturity of so many believers and their sole dependency on leadership” (next-to-last paragraph of this “post”).
Amen, also, wrt “now let’s get real honest here. We need to quit playing games. I hear ‘well, I don’t have to go to church with them, but I can still love them.’ HOGWASH!!! The reason you don’t want to meet with them is because you don’t want to love them and if you did want to love them you would meet with them. * * * This is phony bologna and we shouldn’t play pious games like that.” [Truth a Reason to Check Out? (Feb. 19)]
Those quotations of you are indeed related, and they’re pertinent to your Whose Sheep Are They, Really? (March 4) and to Will All Godly People Suffer Persecution: Being Honest With The Text (March 18). I concur with you that it’s inarguable that ostensible persecution in the American “church” is not persecution as experienced by First Century Christians or by Twenty-First Century Christians in many locations. One must not, however, “throw out the baby with the bathwater”.
The churches of Revelation chapters two and three were commended / condemned according to whether they’d compromised their witness of Truth (their “first love”). At that time, witness of Truth meant being disowned by family, being put out of the synagogue (community), and being unable to engage in trade / earn money.
Rev. 12:11 ["for they loved not their lives even unto death" (ESV)] applies to us as it pertained to them. Witness of Truth today in America does not generally result in overt disownment or inability to earn a living (although bona fide witness of Truth invariably detrimentally impacts one’s ability to earn a living). Witness of Truth today in America, however, invariably results in shunning — albeit the ramifications of shunning tend to be minimal as compared to ramifications of shunning twenty centuries ago or today in, eg., a Muslim country.
It’s not only “church” “leaders” who shun those who witness Truth. Witness of Truth is regarded as damning by the religious; consider A.W. Pink: “Abel’s death was … represent[ative] of the death of Christ himself — murdered by the religious world.” (An Exposition of Hebrews, p. 665)
Ultimately, we must each ask and answer Paul’s rhetorical question: “For am I now trying to win the favor of people, or God? Or am I striving to please people? If I were still trying to please people, I would not be a slave [doulos] of Christ.” [Galatians 1:10 (HCSB)]
People-pleasing may lead to comfort in this world; being a witness of Truth ensures otherwise. I believe that such is Paul’s meaning via 2 Timothy 3:12 as well as via Galatians 1:10; “‘A slave is not greater than his master. If they persecuted Me, they will persecute you.” John 15:20
The “phony bologna” “pious games” players indeed persecute witnesses of Truth by shunning them even while claiming to “love” them. Absence of enormity of such shunning neither renders it inconsequential nor as other-than-persecution.
Thanks for the comments Jim! You always bring beneficial perspectives, a couple I will be considering
Lionel,
I certainly appreciated this article.
Jim’s comments as well! His last paragraph certainly touches reality with myself, and some of our brethren, especially one who was unable to bear the pressure.
If interested,
There was actually a RADICAL book on the issue that I highly enjoyed—entitled “Search and Rescue” ( http://www.amazon.com/Search-Rescue-Becoming-Disciple-Difference/dp/0801013097 ), by Neil Cole
If I may say,
Learned of an interesting analogy recently—as seen in one of the ministries I referenced earlier. As said there by one kat in an article you can look up online entitled The Myth of the Institution-less Church
As said best there:
As someone said in response to that:
And as someone else said in response to that:
Hearing that really struck me….for it Reminds me of someone training wounded animals back into health to be released into the wild and for them to be as they were made to be. For many, due to the nature of how things are, the animals are continually kept in captivity and only allowed to move around within limited spaces/oversight—which may make the trainers feel as if the animals are safe when the reality is that those same animals are living at an “artificial” level, good for display and with the attempt to convice them that their environment is “real”…but nowhere near what they were made for, whether with caged tigers or elephants and various other creatures.
Also, animals cannot go into the wild and be free to produce newer variations for differing environments that have never been seen before since the current state of who they are is what’s to be preserved. However, for many, it becomes a matter of destroying the wildlife habittat/range and training grounds as the solution—and that can be just as dangerous for those within that’re are not trained.
Hence, it’s a bit of a Catch 22 where pastors in a traditional church setting feel as if they’re meant to continually protect/thus (whether intentionally or accidentally) hold on so much that there’s no real seeing organisms as they were meant to be…….with no room for “wild” thought or new/”wild” concepts being birthed. For they’re feeling as if there’re so many external dangers that wounded animals are not ready to handle and thus leaving completely would be a death threat.
Additionally, with the Zoo Analogy, though originally applying to the ways the structures behind traditional churches are structured in their ecclesiology, I thought it could also be possibly be extended to include what often occurs when it comes to people feeling “caged” within an environment that will not allow differing concepts/forms of thought to come forth due to other instances where it was allowed and it apparently led to destruction.
I’ve experienced circumstances when it came to certain ideas not being allowed to be discussed in church. At times it was valid, as often the result was that those doing so were acting out of a divisive spirit/factions even when having valid points on discussing areas in church that were off.
Sadly, people reacted to that by shutting down all discussion and it felt very much like “thought police”—which I disagree with since people should be able to discuss concepts/think critically on various ideas rather than isolating themselves in their own worlds and living in a Christian “Bubble”. It has indeed been one of the things that has troubled me for years—hence, why the ZOO analogy spoke strongly to me.
It is the reality of what occurs for many when it seems there’s the desire to be wild/organic and yet the reality that for many who did so, they went extict due to a myriad of factors which the Zoo realized were a threat, hence why it is in existence to protect others. Same with the institutional church/many of the factors in place that hinder growth—and also conversations with other camps thinking differently than others and that could lead to the realization of new ideas that could lead to growth since anything counter to how a group has always done it will always been seen as a “threat”, even when it’s with good intentions.….