Dennis Tuuri

We come full cycle this morning. This passage that we’ve just read was the passage we began this series of studies in the government of the church with. I don’t know how many months ago now—several months ago. You remember at that time we prepared a list of qualifications based upon these verses in 1 Timothy 3 and also in Titus 1. It looked like this. If you have those, dig them out, please. I’ll make more copies and bring more copies next week along with the questionnaire, sort of fleshing these out a little bit, making them a little more practical for people. But anyway, we started with this series of verses here in 1 Timothy 3 and the qualifications for eldership.

And we wanted to have those in front of us as we looked at all the other offices in the scriptures. Now, we spent a lot of time doing this because we believe that Jesus Christ has come to reign in this world. He is, as we said last week, the Savior King, and his reign is over all the created order. And so we recognize that he wants to reign in the church as well, and he’s given us a government. The scriptures say if the government is upon his shoulders and the increase of it there shall be no end. We must understand his government and walk in obedience to it. And so when we look to how we’re going to organize churches or how we’re going to organize our families, how we’re going to organize society, we don’t want to go to our own ideas or to some management school with their own ideas. We want to go to the scriptures and have them help us to direct our thoughts in terms of correct organizational structure. You don’t want to be like our legislators today.

I saw this in the Oregonian several weeks ago. I meant to mention it several weeks running now, but it fits in well with what I’m saying now. This was a story from the Oregonian saying, “Legislators turn to scripture for insight.” And that’s what we’re trying to do—turn to scripture for insight in terms of civil government and also the government of the church. Well, hopefully we’ll do better than what the legislators are doing in this prayer meeting that’s talked about in this Bible study.

This particular Bible study held in Washington DC, which has a lot of various senators and representatives going to it, is led by a lady who is a Washington psychotherapist and a student of the Old Testament. She conducts a number of similar groups in her home. The final paragraph of this story tells us how they go about doing that. This psychotherapist who’s leading them through it—a woman, of course—which right away tells you that there are some problems here.

Anyway, the woman says, “The Old Testament is written in such a way that it is open to infinite interpretations. That’s why it is so vital and so valid today. It deals with human nature, and there is enough ambiguity there that thousands of years later, when we have evolved into a different animal, it is still applicable.” Is there any wonder why we have such terrible laws? Well, hopefully we don’t have that kind of attitude.

We don’t. We said we’re going to go to the scriptures for insight, but we don’t want to go to the scriptures with our own preconceived ideas of what correct government is and try somehow to see the ambiguities in scripture as meeting our own preconceived notions. We’re going here to see what the scriptures say about organizational structure and government in the covenant community. And so I’m going to take a few minutes here just to remind you of everything we’ve talked about so far as we come full cycle today and end up with again an emphasis upon the office of the bishop or overseer.

We’ll review for a few minutes first and then we’ll talk about some specific applications of the verses in front of us. Remember, we began long ago in Joshua 7. Joshua 7 gives us the family structure of the old covenant government in the wilderness. And remember there were three different groups there. There were tribes, clans, and households. And of course there were 12 tribes. There was a number of clans, which are groups underneath the tribes, and then there were individual households.

But remember, we said that households then didn’t mean like today a nuclear family. There were extended families. Okay? And everybody would be in close proximity. And so you had an extended family, which was a household, and those are the three divisions of the family structure of Old Testament offices. Then we look at Joshua 23. And you might want to jot down these references if you don’t have them memorized yet—just these basic references. If you remember these specific chapters of scripture, it’ll help you step through a view of office and covenantal structure and covenant communities throughout the scriptures. Joshua 7 shows you the family structure.

And what’s going on in Joshua 7 is they’re trying to find the man who created the sin that caused the defeat at Ai. And they go through this family structure. In Joshua 23:2 and Joshua 24:1, we found four groups of men there representing the nation of Israel to Joshua as he gives them his final charge. Those four groups first of all were elders. And we talked about the office of elder in the old covenant. The term elder, of course, begins with a family term and it means a representative of the family in terms of the covenant community. The elders were the pool of men through which all the other officers came out of. And so the elders are an important part of the structure of God’s household.

And I think we said there that we think the Hebrew word for elder meant “a bearded one,” indicating again a man who would come to maturity and self-govern, running under the covenant God of Israel. That’s one of the four offices talked about in Joshua 23 and 24. Another office is that of judges. And in terms of the judges, we talked about Exodus 18. In Exodus 18, Moses is told by Jethro to appoint heads over tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands. And specifically, the context there is talking about judicial authorities hearing cases or hearing disputes among men. And so Exodus 18 tells us that there’s an office of judges. We talked about the officers as well, or the sharim. And remember in Numbers 11, when Moses is having trouble administering the people of God—the people of the covenant community rather—and they have problems specifically oriented to food, again, he calls Moses to appoint 70 as heads over the people in terms of administration. And we said that those were officers because one of the qualifications for that office had to be that they were officers in the land of Egypt when they were still in the covenant community in the midst of an oppressed land. So Numbers 11 talks about officers. Exodus 18 talks about judges. We believe that both those two chapters of scripture are brought together then in the account of Deuteronomy 1, where we have a recounting of how the covenant community was organized, talking about tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands. And he says that I took and I appointed you judges and officers. And then in Deuteronomy 16, we have specific instructions that in every town when they go into the land, in every town they’re to appoint judges and officers. And so we saw some correlation between Deuteronomy 1, Deuteronomy 16, and Numbers 11 and Exodus 18.

So we saw then also by the structure involved: tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands. And we pointed out over the last couple of months that structure didn’t just apply to the judicial authorities. The military was organized along those same lines of tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands. The groups of priests were organized along the same lines. And so that principle of heads over tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands is a basic principle of structuring the covenant community that God has, in his providence, provided to the people of God.

And so that then becomes a pattern for management or a pattern for rule. And I would suggest that if it’s a pattern for rule in judicial authority, in terms of the military, in terms of the ecclesiastical authorities, that we’d also want you to see that as the basic pattern for organizational structure in all areas in which we have management to be administered. In the midst of what I’m saying is, if you have a company, for instance, I would suggest that you also take the same principle of management—heads over tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands—and apply that in your business as well. It’s a pattern that God has given us for our edification. And remember, the tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands being talked about there are households. They’re not clans, not tribes—they’re households. And so, again, those are extended families. Now, today in this church, we don’t really have extended families in existence in this country anymore, unfortunately. In some cases, we do, but more often than not, we’re living in these little nuclear families of a father, a mother, and then some children. There’s nothing wrong with that, but in terms of organizational structure, then it means that there will be some differences as we apply this in our particular societal structure today.

We also talked about the fact that the judges or the officers rather ended up in a group of 70 of them. We talked about the number 70 being key to the clans and the tribes. You got heads over tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands in terms of households. Then you also have these 70 officers at the top of all the rest of the officers who were heads over 70 different groups. At the time of the census in the wilderness, there were 70 clans and tribes put together—70 large groups of people, a thousand families if you want to look at it that way. And remember, we talked about that as an indication of God’s blessing. They came into Egypt, 70 individuals. They left Egypt, 70 clans or tribes—big groups of people. And so it’s a blessing of God. And there’s structure to that blessing as well. So we talked about elders, judges, and officers in Joshua 23 and Joshua 24. And then we also talked about rulers. That’s the fourth group talked about in Joshua 23 and 24. And talking about rulers, we went back to Numbers 10. And in Numbers 10, remember, God gives instructions to make two trumpets for the blowing to gather the representatives of the people.

And so we saw from that study that we did through that there were two representative groups, as it were, representing all the covenant people—very similar to our House of Representatives and our Senate in terms of civil authority. And so there again the elders participate in this process of being rulers through representing various individuals in their households. And then the households themselves are represented by representatives and senators—the two different groups that were brought together when the two horns were blown.

So we had elders, judges, officers, and rulers. Then we took three weeks off and we talked about three other offices in the scriptures: the offices of prophet, priest, and king. Remember, we talked about the prophet from Deuteronomy 18. The prophet is a corrective to the sin of the people. And it reminded us that even though we have a good organizational structure following exactly what God may dictate in terms of management of the covenant community, that’s no guarantee of the prosperity of the community. Rather, we have the prophet who is brought up by God, according to Deuteronomy 18, to speak for God in a corrective fashion both to the ecclesiastical rulers and also to the civil rulers, as well as to the individual heads of households. So the prophet is an important part of the structure of God’s community in terms of corrective action.

We talked about the office of priest and about how we had to remember there that even in the old covenant, the nation of Israel was to be a priestly nation. The priesthood of all believers is not about a New Testament doctrine exclusively. It’s an Old Testament doctrine as well. But what we saw in terms of that priestly office then was a series of concentric circles. You have the high priest. Around the high priest, you had the Aaronic priesthood. In a larger sense, you had the Levitical priesthood. And then you had the whole nation of Israel, which really prayed to God.

The priest does a couple of things. According to Deuteronomy 33, the tribe of Levi were to be guardians in that they were to teach the law of God to the rest of the covenant community. And they were to lead the covenant community in terms of the worship services, offering incense and providing the offerings as well. And so the priests do those two sorts of things. They consecrate areas. They consecrate the covenant community and all that it stands for to God. And then they guard that covenant community as well. And remember, we talked about the fact that our households, for instance, if you’re the priest of your household, that means that you understand that household is consecrated to God. And you’re trying to enlarge the scope, as it were, of that consecrated ground to God at the same time as you’re guarding that consecrated ground from intrusion from ungodly sources.

And remember, the best way to think of all that, of course, is Adam in the garden—to guard the garden and then also to expand, as it were, the influence of God’s reign over the entire world as well, since he was given dominion over the entire created order. So the office of priest is an important office for both teaching the word of God in a normal, day-in-day-out sort of function, offering incense—in other words, indicating they’re leading in terms of worship—and also guarding the people.

Then we talked about the office of king, and you remember the office of king from Deuteronomy 17. And God gave them specific instructions for what sort of king they could place over them. And remember, the king was the leading judicial authority in the land. And so, for instance, we read about Solomon’s construction of his throne room. It was a place where he rendered decisions as a chief judge—as the last court of appeal before a person could appeal to God himself. So the king in Deuteronomy 17 is given specific instructions as well.

The king was—remember, we talked about the fact—they weren’t to have kings like the nations around them. They weren’t to have gentile rulers rule over them. They had to have a king who would rule according to God’s prescribed manners of rule. And those manners were to study the law of God. And then he gives him specific instructions in Deuteronomy 17 to honor God with all his heart in all of his office. And then also not to see himself as lifted up above the people in the nation as well. And we talked about that in terms of the two tablets of the law. The king was given these two instructions in terms of what he had to do, to remind him that he was to act in obedience to the two tablets of the law—in relationship to God, in relationship to the members of the covenant community as well.

All these offices, of course, point to the coming of Jesus Christ, the covenant keeper. He is the true King of Kings. He is our great High Priest. He is the true Prophet of God. All these things point to him. In the same way, then, the other officers—elders, officers, judges—all point to Jesus Christ too, as the final fulfillment of all those offices.

Then, having established a background of old covenant offices and the structure of the covenant community, we came into the new covenant and the descriptions of the offices there. We started with the office of apostle in Acts 1, and remember, we talked there about the central point of continuity between the new covenant church and the old covenant church. We have 12 apostles representing, as it were, Jesus Christ in terms of the covenant community—the same way that we had Israel in the old covenant giving birth to 12 tribes, and then the 12 tribes becoming clans, households—the whole large covenant community.

In the same way, Jesus Christ is the new—is the true Israel. He is the fulfillment of what Israel was, the head of the covenant people, the progenitor, as it were, of a new race of people who are created not by physical generation, but through regeneration through the gift of the Holy Spirit. Jesus Christ is the true Israel. And as the true Israel, he then had 12 apostles representing him and establishing the reign of his new covenant reign over the entire created order again.

And so we have a link there. And of course, the book of Revelation links the apostles with the 12 tribes, the patriarchs, as being the foundation for the dwelling place or sanctuary of God. There are 24 elders also talked about in the book of Revelation, representing the 12 patriarchs, the 12 tribes of Israel, and then also the 12 apostles. In Acts 6, then we went to a discussion of the selection of the seven. And we said there that office we believe are deacons. They are ones who serve tables, as opposed to serving the word. The apostles didn’t want to be distracted from their primary function, which was to teach the word of God, to devote themselves to the word of God and to prayer. They didn’t want to be distracted from that as the covenant community grew. In the same way that Moses didn’t want to be distracted with the administration of the old covenant community, and so God instructed him to appoint officers over them in terms of administration, so now the apostles appoint seven deacons, selected by the people, again. And that’s been a consistent pattern throughout as well.

And by the way, in Acts 6, we also talk about the fact that the apostles then are seen as the new covenant continuation of the old covenant office of the Levites. Remember, the Levites were supported at the time of Hezekiah. The tithe was reinstituted for what purpose? That the Levites could devote themselves to the study of God’s word and to prayer, to doing what they were supposed to do. And so now the apostles also devote themselves to the study of God’s word and to prayer. The same way that the tribe of Levi in Deuteronomy 33 was said to teach the word of God to the people and to offer incense, to offer the sacrifices and the offerings for God. In the same way, the apostles now are seen as teaching the people, devoting themselves to the word, devoting themselves to prayer. And so we have continuity between the Levitical office of the old covenant and the apostles.

So we see it in the apostles as the heads of these various tribes in terms of inheriting the office of the elders over the tribes, the princes, as it were, and also inheriting the office of the Levites and the priests. And then we have a selection of the deacons to administer the service of tables specifically there.

We then went to Acts 15: Acts 1, the apostles. Acts 6, the deacons. Acts 15, the council of Jerusalem—very important element to consider also in the government of the new covenant church. And also we see a great deal of continuity with the old covenant as well. And now we see that continuity that has been established from the offices of the old covenant into the office of apostle. Now we see the office of apostle giving way, as it were, to the office of the elders. The council of Jerusalem is primarily a council of elders, and there’s then a transition, as it were, from rule by those 12 heads of the 12 tribes, to the people that were appointed to succeed them—the elders in the various churches. And so that’s an important transition to keep in mind.

The council of Jerusalem met in the same fashion as a tribal council would meet in the old covenant, to consider things that were difficult to sort out and come up with authoritative judgments, as it were, for the whole covenant community. So we see the same process going on in Acts 15 at the council of Jerusalem. They produced a binding decision in what was in some matters a hard case.

Then in Acts 20, we turned a couple of weeks ago to the office of elders—Paul’s farewell address to the elders from Ephesus. And there we see specifically then the transfer, as it were, from an apostle of Jesus Christ, an emissary of his, as it were—his transition of authority then to the elders or overseers in Ephesus. And that’s very important also for this transitionary aspect from apostles to the authority of the elders of the churches.

And we talked in Acts 20 about how the elders of the churches there, the overseers, had the obligation to be watchmen, to be priests, as it were again, guarding the flock the way the priest would guard the old covenant community, to teach the word of God to the flock as well—the same way that the prophet and the priest would teach the old covenant community as well. And so we have then the elders inheriting, as it were, many of these offices of the old covenant in terms of the ecclesiastical authority.

If the apostle then is seen, from Acts 1, as being the inheritor of the Levitical role, then the elders from Acts 20, being the inheritor of the authority and function of the apostles, are also seen as the inheritor of the Levitical structure given in the old covenant community.

So now, instead of an inherited priesthood, instead of an inherited system of teaching God’s word, we have selection of elders who then represent that. And there’s a transition there from inheritance to one of being appointed by the people that they’re to rule over.

And then last week we talked about 1 Timothy 1, which again is a transition. Remember, Timothy had been left at Ephesus to keep things in order there. And so we transition from the general charge to all the elders of Ephesus, now to a specific pastoral epistle written to a man who was an overseer over the church of Ephesus, and then to guide the elders there in their fulfillment of their duties. And last week we stressed the fact that the elder Timothy himself was to guard the truth. And so the elder is not just to guard the flock, he’s to guard the truth specifically. That means he must have knowledge of the truth. He must have an understanding of the scriptures and what they teach in order to guard them from false teachings.

So today, that brings us up to where we’re at today. And today we want to look and tie together some loose ends, as it were, that we could have addressed several times as we’ve gone through this study. We’re going to wrap up now. And then next week we’ll talk about deacons. And next week we’ll also hand out this new list of qualifications—the same list with some questionnaires as well.

The point is, if we believe this structure that we’ve been looking at, then we’re headed toward more elders. We’re headed toward deacons in this church. If we’re going to do that, we have to understand the function of them, how they are in continuity with the function of many of the offices of the old covenant. We have to look at God’s qualifications and the seriousness with which we’re to measure men on the basis of those qualifications.

This morning, we want to talk about three things basically. First, from this passage, we want to look at the office of overseer. Is there a difference between an overseer or a bishop and an elder? Secondly, after we’ve talked about that, we want to talk about the authority of the elder in the church—the ruling aspect of that. And third, we want to talk about the importance then of abiding by these qualifications and carefully considering men that we’re going to put into this office of elder.

First of all, then, overseer. You’ll notice we read this morning out of the King James version that although we handed out sheets several months ago talking about the qualifications for eldership, yet it doesn’t say elder here, does it? It says in 1 Timothy 3:1, “If a man desired the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. A bishop must be blameless, the husband of one wife.” Doesn’t say elder. And there are some people who believe that the office of bishop is separate and distinct from the office of elder. I don’t believe that’s really correct.

Now, first of all, let’s talk about the two words used here. When you see the word translated elder in the new covenant—in the New Testament rather—what you’re normally seeing there is the word presbyteros. Okay? And that comes from a term used in the synagogues at the time. It comes from a familial term as well—the elder or head of the family, the oldest person there. And so there’s a family and a synagogue background to the term presbyteros. That’s important for us to recognize. However, in this particular case, that word isn’t used. A different word is used, called episcopos. And of course, you’ll recognize right away that presbyteros—that’s the origin, of course, of the term Presbyterian today. And the Presbyterian Church is one that is stressed rule by presbyters or elders in the sense of that specific word. Episcopos, of course, is the root word for the Episcopal Church today. And they believe in rule by bishops. But we believe in rule by episcopos as well, if we believe the scriptures.

What we’re trying to talk about now is: is it a separate office? That’s what we’re going to be discussing. Now the word episcopos is a Greek term. Although it is found in the Septuagint and various translations of words from the old covenant, yet it’s primarily a Greek term and had Greek usage at the time of the writing of the new covenant. It was specifically a word used in Athens to designate Athenian overseers of subject cities. In other words, they would conquer a city, have a subject city. The Athenians would put people in that subject city to guard, to guide the affairs of the city, to oversee it. And that word episcopos was specifically the word that was used there. It had a secular use then in terms of oversight or administration of a city.

Additionally, apparently construction crews had an overseer, an episcopos, over them to oversee the work, to keep the men equipped with what they had to do and make sure the work got done. And that’s the secular use of the word episcopos. And so from that we see then that in the really proper sense the word would be one of overseer. And in Acts 20, when we talked about the overseers that God had made them over the church, that’s the word that’s being used—episcopos.

Now it’s interesting, and some people point out, that Timothy was half Greek. And so to a Greek person who wasn’t schooled in the synagogue system and in the Jewish family system, and hence maybe wouldn’t be familiar with the office of elder, they had this different term being used—episcopos—because that was a familiar term in terms of management or oversight of a specific project. And there’s probably some truth to that. But what we want to talk about here for a minute is: is a separate office?

Well, first of all, in 1 Timothy 3, verse 15, we see what the purpose of this whole epistle is. In verse 15, it says, “But if I carry along, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth.” Paul says to Timothy that if I don’t get back to you, I’m writing in this letter so that you’ll see how the church of God is to be conducted, how the affairs of the church are to be ordered. And so it is a pastoral epistle, and he’s telling him specific things for use in the church of God.

And in 1 Timothy 1, we saw the importance of the preservation of the truth in the church, the purity of God’s word. In 1 Timothy 2, although we’re not going to really spend any time on it, we have the exhortation for men to have prayers for those in authority. We see women adorning themselves with good works and learning in silence with all subjection in verse 11 of 1 Timothy 2. And we think that most commentators would say, and I think it’s correct, that 1 Timothy 2 talks specifically not to private prayers, but to public prayers—the conduct of the men in terms of the church services themselves in the household of God. And certainly that’s true of the women learning in subjection with all authority and not being teachers. That’s talking about the affairs of the household of God being the church.

So what we have here is an epistle written to instruct people in affairs of the church. And so in 1 Timothy 3, he gives them directions for the officers of the church. In the first seven verses which we read, the office of bishop. The next few verses, the office of deacon. Now it would be extremely strange if Paul in writing these instructions for the care and guidance of the church left out instructions for the qualifications of the eldership.

If the bishop is a separate office, then how come the bishops aren’t given their own set of qualifications and then another set of qualifications for the eldership? So, first of all, we don’t think bishop is a separate office from elder because there’s no qualifications given in these epistles for the office of elder distinct from the bishop. You understand what I’m saying? He’s giving instructions for an overseer. He doesn’t give instructions for an elder. And so we can assume they’re the same office. This is a good assumption.

As we saw in Acts 20, and we just briefly went over this, but let’s turn back to it for a minute now. We went over this a couple weeks ago, but in Acts 20, verse 17, we see that Paul from Miletus sent to Ephesus and called the elders of the church—presbyteros, presbyters. Okay? And then in Acts 20, verse 28 of that same passage, he tells these presbyters, “Take heed therefore unto yourselves and all the flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, episcopos—okay, bishops.

So in this passage, it seems to indicate he calls elders to him, and in the instruction of those elders, he calls them bishops or overseers. He says, “You mean overseers or bishops by God over specific church.” Again, a strong evidence that there are not two separate offices being considered here.

Now, some people would say that what really is going on here is Paul turns to a select group of the elders in this passage. In other words, some people explain this away by saying that he called all the elders there—maybe there’s 20, 30, 40 elders—and then there’s four or five bishops. And at some point here in verse 28, he turns from talking to the elders to talk to the bishops. Well, you know, there’s no indication of that here at all. That’s really reading into the scriptures again our own presuppositions in terms of the separateness of the office. And that becomes dangerously close to what those legislators are doing with the scriptures. We don’t want to take our preconceived notions here. We want to say what do the scriptures say and go on the basis of that. There’s no indication here that there’s a separate group being addressed. So we assume the continuity of the address to one group who were elders and who are also bishops or overseers.

Now the same thing is true in Titus chapter 1. Turn to that for a minute, please. Titus 1, verse 5. Paul says, “For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things that are wanting and ordain elders, presbyters, in every city, as I had appointed thee.” So he tells him he’s to appoint elders or presbyters. Then he goes on to talk about the qualifications in verse 6. “If any be blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children, not accused of riot or unruly, for a bishop must be blameless as the steward of God.”

He goes here saying, “I want you to appoint elders. Here are the qualifications for elders.” And this qualification—because the bishop, over here, must be blameless. And so there seems to be the two terms being used interchangeably, almost.

Now, again, these verses have been looked at by those who hold to a three-office position. This position—that there are bishops, elders, and deacons as separate offices—is known as the three-office position. People who advocate that position say what’s going on here is that the bishops are chosen by the elders. And so the elders have to be this way because if one of them is going to be chosen as bishop, he’ll have to be that way too. Well, you know, again, that’s reading into the text what is not clearly there. And it seems if we’re going to take the pure, clear teaching of God’s word here, the terms are used interchangeably. They’re not two offices being considered.

So on the basis of all three of these evidences: first, there’s no qualifications for elder given apart from bishop in 1 Timothy 3. Secondly, the elders at Ephesus are called elders as well as overseers. And third, the qualifications in Titus indicate that the elder is an overseer or a bishop. There are three good, strong indications that we don’t have three separate offices in the scriptures. We have two offices: elders, presbyters, or bishops, and deacons. And that bishop and presbyter are the same man or office.

Now there are two words used, and there’s some reasons for that. Some of the reasons would have to do with the fact that we’re talking about one of the functions of the office. Remember that we’ve talked about all these multiplicity of offices in the old covenant. We’ve talked about how a lot of them correlate then to the office of elder. And so we then see the elder performing a variety of functions in terms of these offices. And the function of overseer is a somewhat different function than that of elder. The idea of elder is a familial term, being a fatherly guidance and direction to the household. The idea of overseer has more the idea of somebody in charge, administrating, being in control and authority. And so there is a difference in function that’s probably pointed out there. But there’s no difference in office.

Now the question is, though, if we believe—and I think the scriptures are real clear—that there’s only two offices, elder-bishop and deacon, does that mean an elimination of the concept of hierarchy? Remember the three-office position believes there’s deacons and elders, and then the elders report to a bishop. So there’s a hierarchal system in place, and of course there are many instances of scripture that seem to support that, and that’s one reason why the third office has come up. But I don’t think we’re forced into that. I think if we remember first of all the whole-Bible approach that we’re trying to use in this entire study—that we assume basic continuity between the old and new covenants except where God shows us discontinuity—if we keep that in mind, we’re not forced into new offices to justify hierarchial systems.

What am I saying? Remember what we said about the judges—heads of tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands. There was a hierarchy to the judges, wasn’t there? Did that make it a different office? No, it didn’t. Same office, different function in terms of how what cases of appeal you hear in terms of a judge. Same thing’s true in the military. You had various officers. They were still all the one office though. Okay, elders, representatives of the people, the rulers of the people. There’s not a different term really used for some of those things, because we have a hierarchy in terms of not different offices, but in terms of the structure that God places over his covenant community. Okay?

So, if we keep this whole-Bible approach, if we let God’s management structure of tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands guide us, we don’t then have to worry about verses that seem to indicate hierarchy in the new covenant. Okay, that doesn’t talk about a separate office. It doesn’t talk about more authority in the sense of rule. It simply means a difference in function. The hierarchal system is not eliminated if we only say two offices. And remember, we talked before, and we’ll talk about it again next week, the office of deacon is not subservient, as it were, to the elder. That’s not a difference of authority. It’s a difference of function.

But what we’re saying here is that in terms of elders or presbyters or bishops in the church, there probably will, if we see the same management structure in place in the new covenant, be a hierarchial system of elders or courts of appeal. And that’s of course one of the distinctives of Presbyterian government—courts of appeal.

Now, I think that James B. Jordan, in writing in the sociology of the church, talks about how the scriptures have a family form of government, and the new, the early church had that same form—a family form of government. That form was replaced by an imperial or monarchical form. And I think he’s correct in that. What we saw with the imposition of the three-office view was the bishop not acting as another level, as it were, in terms of appeal or guidance—as another elder—but now acting in a ruling, monarchical, dictatorial fashion that began to develop in the church in the Middle Ages, a monarchical system as opposed to a family system.

And so we have the imperial form of government, which was wrong. And we still see that today. And of course, in churches that tend to stress the three-office position, they seem to gravitate toward this idea of authority coming from on high and eliminate then the self-governing nature of the local churches. But when the Reformation came along, there was a reaction against that, of course, and a good, healthy set of teaching about church government.

But he thinks—and I think he’s correct—that to some degree what’s happened since that time in many of the reformed churches is the imperial form has been rejected, but we haven’t seen a return back to this family structure the scriptures seem to indicate. Rather, we’ve seen a structure of bureaucracy. Okay? Because they try to eliminate the idea of hierarchy, but as a result we end up with bureaucracy.

Now the scriptures plainly teach the self-governing nature of the local church. That’s obvious as we said from when we talked about the Jerusalem Council. But those self-governing churches are linked together in unity. First of all, there’s an organic unity in the Holy Spirit. And second, as we saw from the Council of Jerusalem, there’s a growing institutional unity. That doesn’t, however, obviate or get rid of the self-governing nature of the local church.

We have a loose-knit confederation of churches as indicated in Acts 15, the Jerusalem Council, that nonetheless see themselves unified to each other in terms of being one large covenant community. And if we just keep in mind the households, clans, and tribes of the old covenant, it will help us greatly to see how this is to work itself out in the new covenant.

Now, this was certainly true in the old covenant except talked about judges. Tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands ending up with the chief judge overall. Officers, it was the same thing. There were 70 at the top. And yes, the scripture said they had to appoint judges, or officers rather, in every town. Had the same office being fulfilled in various levels, as it were, in terms of how many people were given oversight over other people. The span of control, I guess, is what we’re talking about here.

Well, that basic principle then we believe that we also saw in the elder. And the elders in the military in the old covenant we think should hold through to the new covenant as well. And because of that then we don’t want to deny hierarchy. If we take this whole-Bible approach, if the Bible dictates the forms it’s going to take in terms of this hierarchal structure of ruling elders, then we’re going to see that well—and there’s use of the term here. Bishop much is made by people who believe in a three-office position, much is made of the fact that when Timothy and here in 1 Timothy 3 we talk about the office of a bishop, it’s used in the singular, and we see presbyter, it’s usually used in the plural. And so they say there’s a difference in office here. Well, if we keep in mind that we have heads of tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands in terms of the elder structure as well, that tends to disappear, doesn’t it? It doesn’t mean that elders always act collegiately. It means they can. If they’re given oversight over a group of ten, be a single overseer of that group of ten households. If they’re given oversight over 50, they oversee then those 50 households by means of overseeing the work and function of the five elders that would report to them, as it were.

Now remember, we’re not talking about authority coming down from the top down here exclusively. We’re talking about local self-governing families who would, when need arose, turn to the next higher level of authority for advice and counsel in a difficult matter. That was the primary reason for the tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands. If a case is too hard, then you turn it over to the head of the 50. If it’s too hard for him, turn over to the head of the hundred, thousands, and then finally up to Moses. It wasn’t a matter that these groups of heads of thousands, for instance, would be always convening to decide what everybody else would do. That’s the monarchical form, and it can be the bureaucratic form as well. No, what we’re talking about here is an assistance level to the local congregations that is available through a system of graded or hierarchal structure of courts of elders.

So the use of the singular usage of the term overseer-bishop is no proof of the three-office position. But it does spell danger for the bureaucratic position that would tend to say that elders always have to rule collegiately. Okay, they do not have to. It’s clear from the examples of the New Testament church that the elders that were appointed—Titus, Timothy, for instance—who are then to appoint other elders in the churches, were primarily governing or fulfilling their function individually and not collegiately.

Now remember, we’ve got Jesus Christ. His authority is administered and his word is sent out through apostles. The apostles then transition into the eldership of the church. Paul is an apostle, and he gave over instructions in terms of the Ephesian church to elders. And Paul here is instructing Timothy in terms of guarding and overseeing the work of that church at Ephesus as well. Timothy is an individual. Titus is an individual. They’re not apostles, are they? And so we can’t get around it that way. But it’s also wrong to think that they’re a whole different office known as bishop. They were elders fulfilling a function of oversight over a specific span of control that God had put them in.

And so, from the whole-Bible approach, from the single use of the term, and also from the examples of the New Testament church that we have before us, we see then that hierarchy is not eliminated by a two-office position, but that the two-office position will yield itself to a hierarchal structure if we follow the management dictates of the whole scripture, including the concept of tens, 50s, hundreds, and thousands.

Now, one of the reasons why people tend to not like that is that remember, we said that the eldership has to guard the church. If you’re going to guard the church, you’ve got to know the external threats to the church. You’ve got to know the internal threats to the church. Well, in our day and age, one of the great threats to the church in terms of pure doctrine is the idea of egalitarianism—big word. What it means is the idea that everybody’s equal and that there’s no differentiation in terms of function or abilities or anything else.

Whenever I think of this, I always think of the example of—and I’m not even sure where I read about this—but it was a prediction of or was a novel about the future. And when you have ballet dancers, you go to see the ballet, they always have various lead weights tied to their shoes of varying magnitudes. The better dancers would have to have heavier weights, see? Because what they’re trying to do is make everybody dance the same. You don’t want anybody to be able to excel in dancing.

Another example to keep in your mind of what egalitarianism is: when the radical Anabaptists took over Münster, apparently they were on the verge of actually leveling all buildings to a common height. They didn’t want any building to be preeminent or taller than another building. Everything was leveled. Well, that’s what’s going on in our society today. Slowly but surely, all people are being leveled to the lowest common denominator. And so that is a threat to the church. It’s a threat to our minds as we perceive what God wants to do in our households, for instance.

How many times have you heard your children say that isn’t fair, that they get this and I get that, or they’ll feel bad because one child is taller than another child, or one child’s smarter than another. And so often we contemn, we fall into sin, and we attempt to say, “Well, it’s okay. We’ll level all that out somehow.” We’re not all level. We’re not all created equal in the sense of our gifts and abilities and functions. God has differing functions for differing people.

And so, in 1 Timothy 5:17, what do we read about the elders? We read, “Let the elders that rule well be counted worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in the word and in doctrine. For the scripture says, Thou shalt not muzzle the ox when he is treading out the corn, and the laborer is worthy of his reward.”

Now, we know this verse has been used many times to talk about the recompense due to elders. And that’s proper. But think about what he’s saying here. He’s saying, “Let some elders be counted worthy of double honor.” And many people would say one application of that is double pay. And he bases that upon the oxen treading out the corn. See, he’s not making a case here for pay specifically. He’s making a case here for differences in pay in terms of abilities and functions of the elder.

And if you can understand that correctly, think about oxen. Oxen don’t all come in a uniform size, do they? Some oxen are bigger, some oxen are stronger, some oxen are smaller. They may work in different parts of the field or maybe get more or less food to eat. The oxen feed will differ depending on his ability and the function where he’s working. And so what Paul is saying here, I think—and the same is true of the laborer. Laborers are different. The laborer is worthy of his hire. Well, he’s hired to do a different job in some cases.

Some elders have differences both in ability and in function. And that will occur in the course of a church and certainly in the course of the larger covenant community—the church in Portland, for instance. And it’s wrong to think that all elders should have the same functions necessarily, that all elders have the same capabilities necessarily, or that all elders should receive the same pay necessarily. Paul is saying just the reverse. The difference in function, difference in ability.

Egalitarianism—the great leveling that we’re subject to in our minds today—is not a biblical concept. It’s based upon a truth, of course. We’re all equal in the sight of God. We’re all equal in that sense. But we don’t all have—we are not equal in terms of our abilities or functions. And that’s very important.