Here is a post from Aug 2008. I wrote this post after wrestling with leadership and so forth. This is where my paradigm for leadership really began to sink in and I became more and more convinced that the way leadership functions in Christianity today may not be the way it was intended to. 

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I say this  with all the humility I can muster. We are all submitted to each other but we are only under the authority of Christ alone.  This may be a radical statement to some and a normal practice for others; however, I want to convey this clearly. If we are to take the Priesthood seriously then we must embrace this statement recklessly.

Let me explain. In most church relationships, there is an authority and there are those that submit. However mature the believer might be,  this relationship never becomes reciprocal. The Leader will always lead and the submitter will always submit! We continue in these relationships perpetually and the only way to get out of the perpetual relationship of submission is to become a leader yourself; however that works in your specific assembly. Maybe you tell them you want to be an elder, or a deacon, or you start your own church, you will have to do something and have a status change to come from under someone’s submission and then you now assume the position of a peer to the leaders and an authroity figure to your old peers. Here are the imperatives by Paul again (I believe there is someone smart enough out there to write an entire book on this passage and still not scratch the surface Alan? Kieth? Hutch? Phil Fletcher?)

6 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. 17 And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.

Again if we are to obey these imperatives when we gather, something must functionally change in our local congregations. For the life of me I don’t understand why we just don’t. I talked to a good friend of mine and I asked him about this. I was asking why are we slack in fighting for and pursuing mutuality recklessly. He really couldn’t answer. I am saying we should equip all of the saints to function at a level where on any given Sunday a man could get up and address the assembly. I am not talking house church, lets take for example a nice sized evangelical biblically sound nationally know church. There are at least 2000 members. Are we saying that we don’t have at least 50 gifted individuals who could “preach” thus the church be known by its body not by its “pastor”? Can anybody tell me why we couldn’t function that way?

That’s preaching now lets take to what I am really getting at. In the typical church the leaders drive the church, while the members are passive passengers. All of the exhortation, encouragement, rebuke, edification, admonishment and teaching flows from the top down. I am proposing that we flow from the middle out. Where Christ is the center piece and we all equally stand eye level around Him. Christian leaders should be willing and even encouraging their members toward this type of priestly ministry and function. Women should function within these imperatives above, young children should function in these imperatives, parents to children and children to parents, husbands to wives and wives to husbands and ultimately leadership to congregation and the congregation to the leadership. This is nearly impossible in our celebrity type churches where if you are only lucky will get to meet your pastor in any real way and if you do meet him mutuality will never ever be established.

I say that to say this. When we meet we are to be under the authority of Christ and submitted to one another. Everyone! Everyone is to function this way. We are all priests and though priest have different functions the end goal is mutual edification and mutual submission (Ephesians 5:21 anybody)? Leaders are to take instruction just as much as they give it if the body is equipped properly and the priesthood is functioning as I believe it should (again my premise could be wrong). If I am doing all I can to ensure that those God place in my life is functioning at their best capacity eventually we should sharpen one another. It is funny that when we talk about sharpening it is usually pulpit to pew or pew to pew but never pew to pulpit or very rarely anyway. 

Now most may think I am crazy but as God opens doors for leadership this is my pursuit and goal. I want every priest who was brought into priesthood by Christ and not a school, or some human element to function at the level of their greatest potential. That means that they should be given to opportunity to instruct me, they should be given the opportunity to function freely in their gifts as God has so sovereignly given them by the Spirit and finally they should be given the opportunity to fulfill the imperatives found in Colossians 3. Not pew to pew but pew to pulpit.  I want to teach them everything I know so that eventually I don’t have one up on them but that we are walking hand in hand side by side not four steps behind and two steps to the right.  I will end that maybe I got this thing all wrong and I have a false premise but as I read all of the epistles the only one that has a hint of leader/non-leader submission is Hebrews and Alan Knox has broken this down in every way possible. and specifically here.

I pray that you are encouraged and you enjoy the Labor Day weekend.

As I reflect over my past, I guess I never pondered the question as a Christian of who am I responsible for. It just never crossed my mind. I was always taught to give to my church and let them sort out who gets provided for. I give my 10% and well that’s that. It was up to the professionals to make the decision because as you have probably heard “You do you part and we will do the rest”. Well I want to talk about that a little bit in this post.

Who Is Repsonsible For Caring For Others

You are. Not your church, not your leadership, not some organization, but you. Now that doesn’t mean that the vehicle used to care for others can’t be one of those previously mentioned; however, you are still responsible. We have been miseducated to believe that we are to write checks blindly and trust that others are doing the right things with our resources. Nothing can be further from the truth. We see this in Luke 10:29-36, the parable of the good Samaritan. He took responsibility for his neighbor. In both James 2:14-17 and 1 John 3:17 the apostles James and John lays the responsibility at the feet the individual. Jesus in Matthew 25:31-46,  lays the responsibility at the feet of those individuals also.  Each individual Christian is responsible for meeting others needs and that responsibility can’t be passed on to others.

Who Am I Responsible For

This might sound elementary; however, the answer is whoever Jesus soevereignly brings into my life. Going back to Luke 10, and the parable of the good Samaritan Jesus commends a Samaritan for being more gracious than a pious Jew. The reason why is not because of how much he gave but simply the fact that the Samaritan recognized who his neighbor was. Our neighbor is anyone we come in contact with that has a need, no matter what that need may be (love, a kind word, finanical…). And if God has given us the resources (time, talent or treasure) we are to employ it to love others because ultimately none of those things are ours and even more importantly our lives are not even our own. We belong to the person who redeemed us so all we have is His.

Now, I will admit, this is much easier to write than to practice; none the less, it is true, a truth that we need the grace of God to walk in and pursue. Here is my struggle. Churches today use Acts 4 as a platform to raise resources, yet they don’t finish the story. If we read that narrative, even casually, it would seem that all of the money that was raised was given out. It wasn’t kept for a rainy day. It wasn’t kept to potentially hire a discipleship pastor or build a youth wing, it was collected, laid at the feet of the Apostles and then distributed to ALL who had needs, it doesn’t seem like they kept a little back and denied someone who had a need (much like churches keep reserves today), it seems like it was a huge bucket with a gaping hole in the bottom. And when we do see somebody holding back it did not turn out favorable for them.

Some Last Thoughts

I am not saying it is wrong for churches to hold reserves at any amount, I am saying that those churches need to quit picking and choosing parts of narratives and scripture to raise money. It is a manipulative ploy to do such a thing. Don’t preach that text without following all the way through to the conclusion. Next I am not saying you shouldn’t give to your local congregation, especially if they are generous and meeting the real physical needs of people. I am not saying churches shouldn’t hold anything back, it may not be the most pragmatic thing to do if you have mortgages, contracted salaries, utilities, taxes or whatever else comes with operating the institutional aspect of that church. In these times there have been many churches who have opened their buildings to the homeless and are providing refuge for small children, single women and even men and my hats off to such churches. That is why I am not a “house church” guy, though I believe our buildings can be used for much more than youth dances and bible studies.

What I am saying is that the responsibility to meet the needs of others rests in the hands of the individual christian. Some churches have given up the buildings and have decided to turn the buildings over into full-time homeless shelters, community centers and so forth and have moved to homes and use the buildings for big corporate meetings. I really like this personally, but anyway. Jesus does not let us stick our head in the sands while others have needs and allow us to say “well I have given to my church”. If we know those resources aren’t being used faithfully then we have an obligation to meet needs. I am responsible for everyone God puts in my path and I have the resources to meet such needs. This is Kingdom responsibility.

Richards, Lawrence O. A Theology Of Church Leadership. The Zondervan Corporation, Grand Rapids, MI, 1980. Ppg 399.

Throughout one’s reading collection, there are books that rattle our cage, others strengthen our positions one way or the other, others move you from one position to the other at rapid speeds, others awaken curiosity, while other cause such deep impact that you wonder why no one ever told you such beautiful truths before. Well this work did a few of those things for me. I had already begun to question much of what Christians call leadership especially in the local church. That is because my view of the Church had already moved from organization to organism. I had already begun to view the church for a radically different paradigm than I had during the early and formative years of my Christianity and “Church Leadership” gave me the gentle nudge and encouragement to help solidify such a position.

This book is broken up into four main parts with about 26 sup-points under them. The four main points are: Theological Foundation: The Church and It’s Leadership, Understanding Enterprise, Biblical Principles of Church Leadership: A Description of Allegiance and How Leaders Build Allegiance and finally The Shape of Tomorrow. The first and the third parts are the vast majority of the book and rightfully so, because there is where the meat of church leadership is found. I will write about each part, what I felt  was important in those parts and then sum it up at the end.

Theological Foundation

Mr. Richards gets off on the right foot. He says on page 37:

Scripture teaches that in its essential nature the church is a living organism. We are members of a body, not an institution. Any expression the church takes must be an expression in harmony with its nature, not a stumbling copy of man’s notions for organizing institutions.

If we miss this we miss it all. This is the cornerstone of church leadership. If we treat the church like a common organization then its purpose and plan will be missed and the practical outworking will start off fast in the wrong direction and as we have seen it is nearly impossible to convince it that it is going the wrong way because it has been travelling the road for so long.

This following quote is long but I have to type it all so none of it is missed and the context misapplied. On page 75 he says:

One of the drawbacks to working with the church as though it were an institution is that an institutional approach to Christian life gradually robs us of our awareness of the supernatural.  It is not hard to understand why. Leaders in an organization are always dealing with problems related to maintaining the institution and planning for the achievement of its goals. They must deal with budget and staffing. They must plan new buildings and maintain the old ones. They need to set goals and then set up committees and councils and other organizations to reach them. Even in their counseling and teaching they tend to focus on problems in their relationships with people.  Even with the use of good management techniques, the come to think of the saints in relation to whether they help or frustrate the leaders’ plans and hopes. The exercise of managerial skills being to dominate more and more of their attention and demand more and more of their time. Many who entered the pastorate burdened to minister have left, discouraged by all they are required to do simply to keep the organization functioning and its agencies and activities on track.

Enough said there.  On page 77 he talks about how many leaders have taken on responsibilities that “are not really theirs”. And says “no wonder they feel burdened”. He brings in a principle called release (I wrote about this and must find it) This is the practice of simply “affirming Jesus as the head of His church and giving the burdens that are His back to Him”.

On page 92 he moves into what the responsibility of leaders are. He says:

The responsibility of leaders is not to manage the church. They are not to be God’s voice of authority in the body. The responsibilities of leaders is the care and nurture of believers. The Human leaders in the church use their wisdom and maturity to “guide” the congregation and individual members into growing ways of life so that when Jesus speaks, His body will be healthy and responsive.

He then moves into the identity of leaders which is servanthood. Much has been written on this subject and many sermons preached but I have rarely seen the servanthood of Jesus practiced by leaders today.

Understanding Enterprise

Mr. Richards does a great job distinguishing organization from organism and the goals of each in part two of his work. Here plain in simple he says the goal of an organization is the organization itself, the health, survival of and even the profitability and people are second. In an organism such as the church this can never be and whenever a church begins to operate in the survival of the organization over the growth and development of the people at all cost, you best believe that church is not functioning under the direction of the head. It has adopted enterprise goals and has lost its ability to do what it is called to be. (ppgs 161-173)

Allegiance

This part of the book alone is worth its weight in platinum! There are too many quotes and I have practically highlighted the entire part. But here are two and hopefully if you are a leader or even if not you would meditate on these two quotes, please read this part of the book. On page 22o he says:

Allegiance to one another in the body of Christ is based on love, expressed as love and experienced through love. We cannot live as the church unless we are growing in our personal relationships with each other, and deepening in our devotion to each other.

A little longer quote is found on 226 in relation to leaders developing interaction:

How do we develop a climate of love and openness where impersonal institutional patters may have long been established? Some suggest that the institutional church must be abandoned and a new form adopted. Others opt for starting new congregations, where they fell there will be no need to “fight” established patterns. It’s true that it is difficult to work toward a change of patterns that are deeply ingrained. But since the church is the body of Christ, and Jesus is the Lord of the church, He is powerful and able to work within His people. We would be wrong to quickly or lightly abandon brothers and sisters because we are discouraged about the unbiblical patterns that have become established in the congregation. Instead we need, without criticism, or antagonism, for what the body now is, to work toward the reality described in Scripture as the heritage of a church that is family and that is body.

Some other subpoints that I enjoyed were Body Organization and Ownership, Consensus and Freedom. Both are huge in the way we build allegiance to one another and to Christ.

The Shape of Tomorrow

The final part is the shortest. However, he asks a question that I wanted to quote on page 399 he asks:

Why then would anyone choose the type of leadership suggested here rather than one of the “success” models taken from secular management systems or recommended by “superchurch” promoters? We can think of only one compelling reason: It is biblical. It honors Jesus as the living, capable head of His own body, and we must honor His instructions.

Conclusion

Mr. Richards does a fine job of not promoting in “step” related methodology. He simply promotes and advocates a living, thriving, discerning relationship with the Head of the Church. Why turn to plans we Jesus knows best. Also why turn to secular leadership models or borrow from pseudo-christian leadership networks that are just modified business strategies cloaked in theological jargon? We don’t need them folks! We don’t need them. Success in the church is not defined by success in the world. An organism does not employ the same methods to grow and become successful that an organization does. We need to scratch the way we have turned the church into an enterprise and ask the head what does He want, unless of course we believe we know better! I recommend this work 100 times over please it is worth every penny then more.  Not to mention it was written 30 years ago

I want to approach this post from an apologetic perspective. There is a common misconception held about those who don’t agree with the popular church culture. That misconception is that because some reject the organization commonly known as the “church” that somehow those same individuals don’t love or care for the “church”.

I guess the biggest problem with that is that when the word church is used, different groups see this from two totally distinct and often times contradictory points of views! One group says they want to get back to the 1st century or “apostolic” church also known as the New Testament church while the other group says the same thing while both groups often disagree with each other radically. With that lets get into it.

Loving the Church

Lets first start by saying you can’t love Christ without loving the church the two are not to be separated. There is no church without Christ and the church is the bride and body of Christ, thus to dislike the church is to dislike the head and groom of the church which is God in flesh! Thus if someone says they hate the church then it is likely, though not necessarily apparent, that they also hate Christ. The two are one flesh (Ephesians 5:31). So it is simply impossible to take one with the other. Not to mention if you hate the church, then you hate Christ and if you hate Christ you have also rejected the Father, since they are one, and thus most likely you have not been reconciled to God and may like the benefits or the philosophy of God while not loving Him. It happened with the Pharisees and throughout “church” history and I am pretty sure it is happening throughout the world.

So loving the church is synonymous with loving Christ and loving Christ is synonymous with loving the church; however, we now have to define “church”. We have to be fair and biblical with this. The Church IS the body of Christ. The church is a group of one, much like the trinity is a group of one. God is one in three persons and the church is one in many persons. All who have been born from above is the church. We say we understand that, but we don’t, because if we did there would be no need to keep talking about this. We throw the word “local” into the conversation and then we being to redefine church. Don’t believe me?

The Church In Practical Terms

Our lack of concern and love for one another in groups we disagree with is evidence that we have redefined church. Because we disagree we have decided to separate ourselves into denominational (organizational) trappings that cannibalize our witness and makes us look much like a Target vs Wal-Mart scrapping for scarce resources and in the process slandering one another to get such resources. We put walls up and then expect God to move on our behalf. But Paul asks “is Christ divided”? The answer is no and if we are there may be a good chance that we are not in Him at worst or at least not filled with the Spirit at best! We have erected these walls and because of that we have decided who we will and will not care for because they are not part of “our church”. SEE THAT? Do you see that, we can say all the long that we understand the definition of the church, yet our practice rightly shows us that we have no clue with this is about! That is because our organizational trappings have so blinded our eyes that we couldn’t see the church if it fell on us!

The Trappings

From hierarchical  positions, to massive buildings, to pastoral visions, to biblical authority, to sacraments, to pulpits, to denominations. I am sure someone could add many, many more. However, these things are not part of the Church. They are part of the organization commonly known as church, but they are not the church nor parts of the Church.  And often times when someone comes along (look at the group known as the Anabaptist for more information) that questions such trappings, they are grouped, rounded up and thrown into the lion’s den of “anti-church”. You see how that works? I redefine the church thus giving it a definition not consistent with those who are the cornerstone and foundation of the church and then when someone disagrees with that redefinition I can say “they don’t love the church”. It is the easiest thing to do and it only strengthens my argument and secures my position on the new definition.

There are many men and women who have decided to go a “step past reformed” (the protestant reformation) and have decided to not only question the theology of Rome but also the ecclesiology of Rome. And because some have begun to knock on the door of the enshrined they have been labeled distastefully ( I am very glad that the sword no longer belongs to the church because men like Viola would have been drowned a long time ago ). You see a quick study of church history will show us that though the Reformers did a great job addressing and clarifying Justification and Salvation by Grace, they only turned in the right direction as it related to the priesthood of believers, but they never moved forward really. Yes they did bring the bible into common language, but they kept the same system of not questioning their truths and if you don’t believe me, you need to look no further than a few quotes and few graveyards of those who disagreed with them.

We Do Love The Church

Those who see things differently do love the church and we even love our brothers and sisters who see things differently. Sometimes the disagreements get a bit too serious and sometimes downright ugly but usually that is because of the slanderous positions casted upon us.  We love the church because we love the Groom of the church. We love the church because we look to the head of the church. We love the church because for eternity to here she has always been the plan and purpose of God to express His glory to the world. She is His, redeemed and secured in His blood and she is beautiful and beloved and there is no way we can say anything other than lovely things of her because it is the Master who makes her as lovely as she is. She was is in His side and He is coming back to finish what He started with Her. So sure we love her, we are her, we are one flesh with her, how can we reject who we are? We just don’t care for this organization that part of her has decided to clothe her in! Is she organized? Yes to say the least, especially when she is rightfully responded to her head! She has leadership, and working parts, and moving parts who moves together and build one another up so that she grows more and more into the head, but that leadership and those parts are just that PARTS they are not the head and whenever we see those parts doing things that only the head should be doing then we must ignore those parts and this is what is happening today

So you have to love the church, shoot, you are part of the church you are one flesh; however, you don’t have to like what she is being clothed in. You don’t have to submit to the trappings, regardless of how many hold to that trapping or how popular or enshrined the people who created those trappings may be. We have all been given the freedom to respond directly to the head, with no mediators in between and we are obligated to discern His voice as His sheep. So please don’t get the two confused the trappings/organization is not the organism called the Church no matter who tells you so.