In Matthew 16:18, Jesus told His disciples the day would come when the church of Christ would be established. On Pentecost it became a reality.
The United States of America has a written constitution. So, also, the Church of our Lord has a written constitution, the New Testament. In it is revealed His will through the inspired writers.
The Lord has instructed us on how to live our lives and He has told us how to conduct our affairs concerning the local assembly. Is their a scriptural pattern for carrying out the functions of the local church? Yes, there is!
One of the great slogans of the American Restoration Movement was “Call Bible Things By Bible Names.” The concept of the Eldership is in harmony with that slogan.
Concerning the importance of the Scriptures , we would like to quote from one of the most important non-inspired documents in the Restoaration Movement. In 1804 Barton W. Stone, in The Last Will and testament of the Springfield Presbytery, wrote these words: “We will, that the people henceforth take the Bible as the only sure guide to heaven; as many are offended by other books, which stand in competition with it, may cast them into the fire if they choose; for it is better to enter into life having one book, than having many to be cast into hell.” By a study of the writings of the pioneers we see a great reverence for the Word of God.
If we are to be true to the New Testament, we ought to be doing all we can to restore the ancient order of things concerning the New Testament Church. In this paper, we are going to strive to do this. We want to write about four aspects of the eldership. They are as follows:
- The Eldership: Its Establishment is Divine
- The Eldership: Its Perpetuity.
- The Eldership: Its Qualifications.
- The Eldership: Its Duties.
We will be breaking this down into 4 more articles.
Note: This article was originally written for a paper in the class The Church, taught by Tom Thurman at Cincinnati Bible College (now Cincinnati Christian University)
