Fellow workers or office bearers? Thinking missionally about church structures

Church government, with its talk of elders, deacons, overseers and offices, can be bewildering. But as Steve Cree argues, perhaps that’s because we’ve lost sight of the mission of Christ.

Have you ever noticed the defining factor in most denominational names—Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Congregational, Pente­costal, Inde­pendent? It’s a particular understanding of church government. It’s a bit surprising that this doctrine has won denominational naming rights. It’s even more surprising that denominational representatives often claim exclusive biblical warrant for their particular structure. However, what is truly staggering is how the biblical emphasis is silenced in the debate. Does the New Testament really seek to present a blueprint for church government, or is its emphasis elsewhere?

This article argues that denominations have too often claimed for them­­selves a theology of glory that is not rightly theirs, thus forming a potential roadblock to gospel mission. Discussions of church government have proceeded from a dubious assumption: that church government is an end in itself. But this sidelines the missionary emphasis of the New Testament, and produces a domestic agenda and a passive notion of our task. We are guilty of clinging to our order while forgetting our mission. But in Acts 1:6-8, Jesus transforms such passive domestic agendas into an active mission agenda. The book of Acts presents the church as constituted by Christ for gospel mission.

What is needed is a fresh look at the New Testament data concerning ministry structures. This will open up exciting possibilities for thinking about team ministry generally and church planting in particular, and will even help church planters conceptualize their role biblically within a denominational setting. What I’m going to do is to investigate what the Bible has to say about church government under five headings: offices; elders; elders, overseers and deacons; gifts; and fellow workers.

Offices

Acts 6 is a favourite stop-off point for church government theorists.¹ The passage, so it is thought, is about the institution of offices in the church. However, this approach does violence to the narrative and argues for a different conclusion to that explicitly given by the author. Luke does not conclude, “so the office of deacon was instituted”, or any such thing; rather, he concludes, “And the word of God continued to increase” (Acts 6:7). If you go looking for offices in this passage, you’ll probably come up with them. But that is not the concern of the narrative; its concern is the progress of the mission from Jerusalem to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8).

Simply follow the narrative, and the real significance of Acts 6 emerges: it’s about a threat to the ongoing mission. The focus of the story is ethnicity: the Hellenist (Greek) widows were being neglected. The threat was that the gospel would stall at this point—and it hasn’t even left Jerusalem (6:2). The solution: seven men (all Greeks!) are appointed to look after the problem (6:5). The result is that the gospel continued to spread outwards towards the Gentiles (6:7).

So Acts 6 is not about a new office, and it is certainly not about the institution of the diaconate. Nowhere are the seven men called ‘deacons’, regardless of the overlap their initial task may have with the role of deacons outlined in 1 Timothy 3.

Indeed, it is dubious exegesis to impose 1 Timothy 3 here as an interpretive grid. Even if such an approach were conceded, the ministry of these seven men ends up looking more like the overseers of 1 Timothy 3 than the deacons, for within moments of this episode (narratively speaking), we find members of the seven—Stephen and Philip—engaged in word ministries and doing apostle-like things! So the key is not so much that something new is being done, but that someone new is doing it: Greeks! Who preaches the sermon that provokes a movement of the gospel into Judea? Stephen (7-8:1)! Who first proclaims Christ in Samaria and is described as an evangelist? Philip (8:4ff; cf. 21:8)! Have these men lost their job descriptions? Maybe they’re not deacons after all—at least, how we understand them. But then they don’t really fit any office—unless, that is, we understand ministry structures to be flexible and subservient to the demands of gospel mission.

Elders

It is easy to see the word ‘elder’ in the New Testament and assume we know what is being spoken of. But what does the New Testament mean by presbuteros (‘elder’)? Luke introduces the existence of elders in the early church without explanation in Acts 11:30, but does not provide a definition. He is similarly vague in narrating the appointment of elders at Antioch (14:23) and introducing the elders at Ephesus (20:17). But where did they all come from? What did they do?

The introduction of elders in Acts is, in narrative terms, unremarkable; Luke assumes that his readers understood their role. But where do we locate this assumed background information? We need look no further than Luke’s “first book” (cf. Acts 1:1) where he spoke of the ‘elders’ of Israel (Luke 22:66). Now he speaks of ‘elders’ in the church, without nuance or qualification. Clearly the role of these early church elders is analogous to the Jewish elders who met in the Sanhedrin. ‘Elders’ in Acts, therefore, is best taken in a generic sense—an umbrella term describing those with general oversight of the community.

We need to be wary of the common conclusion represented by Coenen: “By the time of the composition of Acts it is clear that the Pauline churches of Asia-Minor had adopted the ‘presbyterian’ system of government”.² At first glance, this statement appears to claim too much, reading later structures back into the text. But the greater problem with the statement is that it says nothing: asserting that Acts attests to a ‘presbyterian’ form of government is as meaningful as concluding that it presents a ‘leadership form of leadership’ or ‘a government form of government’. We are merely told that there were leaders, and nothing more specific than that.

On the evidence of Acts, we must maintain the broadest of definitions for our understanding of ‘elder’. It appears to be an overarching category, open to a range of functions or subcategories. The search for more rigid definitions arises from neglect of the missionary framework of the book—a framework that demands flexibility.

Elders, overseers and deacons

If parts of the book of Acts provide stop-off points for church government theorists, 1 Timothy is their favourite playground. The focus is Paul’s use of three Greek words: presbuteros (elder), episkopos (overseer) and diakonos (deacon). What is their interrelationship? Theories abound. Surprisingly absent, however, is the possibility we have canvassed from Acts—that ‘elder’ is an overarching category for leadership, open to a range of functions. This is all the more surprising because Paul’s usage of the term in 1 Timothy and elsewhere accords with this understanding.

1 Timothy discusses the role of ‘overseers’ (3:1-7), who must be “able to teach”, and ‘deacons’ (3:8-14), who must “serve”. Note that the term ‘elders’ isn’t used until 5:17, referring to a group—of whom only some teach. Who in this letter has the responsibility for teaching? The ‘overseers’. Therefore, the most integrated reading of this material is that ‘elder’ is an overarching category, incorporating both groups Paul previously discussed: overseers and deacons. Some elders have a teaching function (overseers) and others a serving function (deacons).

This argument is supported by Philippians, which Paul addresses to the “overseers and deacons” (1:1). Has Paul forgotten the elders? If elders were a separate ‘office’, then Paul’s omission would be remarkable. If, however, the overseers and the deacons together make up the eldership (leadership) of the church, it’s easily explained. Those who appeal to a straight interchange of presbuteros and episkopos in Titus 1 and Acts 20 ignore the fact that, in both cases, the first term used is presbuteros, and when the term episkopos is subsequently introduced, there is an accompanying narrowing of focus to the issue of doctrine/teaching (Titus 1:5, 7, 9; Acts 20:17, 28-31). The terms are only interchangeable to the extent that Paul, given the priority he accords ‘word ministries’, seamlessly moves from the broad category of ‘elders’ to those possessing the greatest responsibility among them: that subset of elders who teach and drive the gospel mission forward.

Who are the elders? All the leaders in the local church. Who are the overseers? Those leaders with ‘word ministries’. Who are the deacons? There is no warrant for a more specific definition than those leaders with ‘other ministries’—or even ‘support ministries’. The New Testament language concerning ‘office’ is fluid: ‘elders’ is a broad term meaning ‘leaders’, and there is sometimes a simple division within this group between those who teach and those who serve. This should not, however, be understood as necessitating ‘two offices’ in a strict sense; what is necessary is leadership, and what is most essential to leadership is teaching. So on analogy (but not straight conformity), with the logic of Acts 6, this may necessitate the presence of ‘other ministers’—deacons—leaders who act in a support role to the ‘word ministries’, so ensuring their continuance. Most importantly, the requirement for an overseer to “be well thought of by outsiders” (1 Tim 3:7) again reminds us that mission is the framework of leadership.

Gifts

There is a greater problem we need to acknowledge in the usual discussion of New Testament data about ministry structures. It is not simply that the mission emphasis is often lost in how ‘offices’ are analyzed; worse, the preoccupation with looking at the data only through the ‘office’ window has often blinded commentators regarding another important window: ‘gifts’. Yet this gift language dominates the way Paul talks about ministry in many of his letters. ‘Presbuteros’, the word so central in discussions around the ‘office’ category, is strikingly absent from the majority of Paul’s letters, occurring only in the Pastoral Epistles. This is even more striking given what Luke tells us in Acts 14:23—that as early as their first missionary journey, Paul and Barnabas appointed elders “in every church” they established. Furthermore, Luke speaks of the ‘elders’ of the (Pauline) churches at Ephesus (Acts 20:17), and yet in the book of Ephesians, we do not read of any ‘office’ as such, only certain people who have a particular function in the church.

It is equally erroneous, however, to simply shut the ‘office’ window and gaze through the ‘gift’ window alone. ‘Office’ and ‘gift’, should not be regarded as mutually exclusive categories. On the contrary, they are easily thought into each other. A closer examination of the evidence suggests that this is exactly what Paul has done (see table).

Firstly, this table (with each list presented in text order) demonstrates consistency with our rough division of the ‘office’ of elder into ‘word ministries’ and ‘other ministries’. When Paul employs ‘office’ language, he moves from teaching elders to other/serving elders. Similarly, when using ‘gift’ language, he moves from speaking gifts to other/serving gifts. This observation is further and strikingly corroborated by the shorthand summary of giftedness in 1 Peter 4:11: speaking or serving. Secondly, the priority of ‘word ministries’, observed in Paul’s ‘office’ language, is maintained in the lists (the order being logical, not merely chronological).³

Apparently, as far as Paul is concerned, he has not stopped talking about eldership in these letters. While he does not speak of presbuteros and episkopos in Romans 12, 1 Corinthians 12 and Ephesians 4, he does bring to the foreground the substantial meaning of ‘elder’. This is a more helpful approach than some false Darwinian notion that gifts (in the early ‘missionary’ church) evolve into offices (in some later ‘maintenance’ church). Those referred to as ‘elders’ in Acts and the Pastorals can be described here in terms of their gifts. The two categories—‘office’ and ‘gift’—are not different realities, but different windows for viewing the same reality. The charisma or ‘gift’ tends towards the office, and the office cannot exist without the charisma.⁴

Note especially that such personified gifts (apostles, prophets, evangelists and pastor-teachers) are all word and mission-focused. Similarly, just as Paul has the ‘outsider’ in mind in his requirements for ‘office’ (1 Tim 3:7), ‘the unbeliever’ is kept firmly in view as he discusses the use of gifts in congregational life (1 Cor 14:23-24). The language varies—‘office’ or ‘gift’—but the missionary framework is constant.

Fellow workers

Most discussions of ministry structures terminate there, with offices and/or gifts. But this is inadequate. There is a third window—a crucial window that hardly ever gets a look in. This is a significant category in Paul’s thinking that has been largely ignored, leaving us with a two-dimensional understanding of church. This ‘sin of omission’ has marginalized the missionary thrust of the New Testament data about ministry. The irony is profound: we have already noted the paucity of New Testament evidence regarding the categories of ministry that dominate the pages of our systematic theologies; but, astoundingly, a category that dominates the pages of Paul’s letters is almost completely absent from the theology texts. We have acclaimed Paul as the great ‘missionary to the Gentiles’, but overlooked those who laboured at his side. Paul never overlooked them; they were his fellow workers, missionaries and  brothers.

We observed that Paul’s teaching about both ‘office’ and ‘gift’ is firmly located within a missionary framework. However, it is in this third category that we meet the lifeblood of the early church’s mission. Seen thus far in skeletal form, it is now given flesh and this forces us to think three-dimensionally about church.

Paul is rarely found without companions. His letters, together with the book of Acts, introduce us to over one hundred individuals involved in the Gentile mission—many elevated to the status of colleagues. Their designations (or missionary ‘titles’) reflect that fact. Paul displays a fondness for designations compounded with the prefix sun (with). Such compounds, often used to encapsulate his union with Christ and his fellowship with other Christians, aptly express the nature of his relationship with these fellow missionaries (e.g. Rom 16:3, 9, 21; 1 Cor 3:9; 2 Cor 8:23; Phil 2:25; Col 4:11; Phlm 1).

These are the people often found under uninspiring translator’s subheadings, such as ‘final greetings’ or even ‘loose ends’⁵—they are individuals of ‘the Pauline circle’, such as Apollos, Archip­pus, Aristarchus, Barnabas, Epaphras, Epaphroditus, Fortunatas, Phoebe and Sosthenes, along with others in explicit subordination to him: Erastus, Mark, Timothy, Titus and Tychicus. They are regularly neglected in preaching—the passages in which they appear often unwittingly seen as ‘the theology is over now’ sections (as if the credits are rolling and we can tune out). In fact, these passages are rich mines for the New Testament theology of ministry, and these people are the Pauline circle, whom Paul calls variously brothers, apostles, servants, fellow slaves, partners, workers, fellow soldiers, fellow prisoners and fellow workers.⁶

A further indication of an appointed class of semi-resident missionaries in Paul’s churches is the right of some believers to receive financial support for gospel ministry. Based upon the teaching of Jesus, Paul asserts this as a principle (1 Cor 9:14; Gal 6:6). We must appreciate the significance of Paul’s own boast in 1 Corinthians 9:5ff that he has not exer­cised his rights in this matter. This is evidence for the widespread provision of financial support for workers in the Christian mission, otherwise Paul had no grounds for boasting. The context supports a broad application of the principle, speaking generally of those who sow ‘spiritual seed’, who work, who “proclaim the gospel” and who evangelize (1 Cor 9: 11, 13-14, 16).

A large and growing number of missionary figures appeared very early next to the apostles. Their work involved planting of churches, as well as ongoing pastoral and theological assistance. They were specialists in word ministries—gifted evangelists and teachers. They were a missionary operation working within and alongside local churches. As we seek to integrate this New Testament data, it is striking to note the absence of certain designations for these missionaries. They are never referred to in terms of the ‘offices’ of elder, bishop or deacon. They are not primarily defined in terms of their gifts. While they probably could have all filled the former, and they certainly possessed the latter, the implication appears to be that there is another dimension to Paul’s approach to ministry structures. These people are not described in congregational terms because the gospel mission is largely facilitated by those who both belong to and transcend local congregations. Unlike ‘gift’ terminology, missionary terms such as ‘fellow worker’ are not used of believers in general, but only of these itinerant workers.

The mission imperative

Why has this distinct category been neglected in discussions of church structures? Is there any indication that roles of this kind would cease? Have we decided that the mission no longer requires missionaries? Might not ministry workers—especially church planters—be helpfully thought of in this way?

Leadership is for mission. Paul’s passion to use “all means” to save some includes his approach to ministry structures (1 Cor 9:22). So there are rigid and flexible aspects to the New Testament data—rigid, in that leadership must occur, and is primarily grounded in ‘word ministries’; flexible, in that the structures are not ends in themselves. The key to both the rigidity and the flexibility is the missionary framework, within which ministry structures are formed. What is fixed and immovable is the mission imperative: the gospel mission must continue.

Here are some concluding thoughts regarding what this might look like:

• Denominations may be viewed as a legitimate expression of ‘the Pauline circle’. However, given the tendency of formal structures to atrophy, it may often be relational networks within and beyond the denomination that are more likely to function in this way (e.g. in identifying the right ‘brother’ needed for a particular context, etc.).
• The activity not just of church planters, but of all ministry personnel (and the denominations they work within) may recapture more missionary focus when viewed through this ‘fellow workers’ window.
• Viewing ministry through the ‘fellow workers’ window (rather than just the ‘offices’ one) reminds us that the health of relationships in a ministry team is more vital to their mission than the clarity of their organizational chart.
• The ‘fellow workers’ window may help us place greater value on a ‘home-grown’ approach to the recruitment of staff teams (i.e. recruiting/staffing from within congregations/networks, or extending existing relationships).
• Flexible approaches to theological education need further development to better support this home-gown approach.
• Simply moving theological students around from church to church during college or post-college without regard for relationships and networks may work against the development of this relational view of ministry (promoting instead a more static/structural mindset).
• In a relational (fellow workers) understanding of teams, it will be seen that everyone’s job changes whenever a team member is added, but not the team mission. Developing trust where healthy conflict can be fostered and the clarity of a team ‘win’ (i.e. mission in Christ’s name) will be more important than individual job descriptions.
• Inasmuch as team members do need to have defined roles, the teaching/serving pattern of the ‘offices’ and ‘gifts’ data will remind us of the importance of support roles within staff teams (e.g. administration, etc.).
• This diversity should also be embraced within the word/teaching category—such that word ministry not be reduced to preaching alone. That is, while preaching is crucial, other training roles (e.g. a small group pastor) may also be important for teaching, training and recruitment.

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Whatever the structure of our church, let us not forget the imperative of the gospel, which calls people out of darkness into Christ’s glorious light.

Discussion questions

1. Read Romans 16:1-16 and Philippians 2:19-30. What titles are used to describe Paul’s fellow workers? What characteristics of Paul’s fellow workers are drawn out in these passages?
2. Has your church lost the fellow workers perspective in its ministry? If so, how and where?
3. List three things you can do to develop God’s missionary perspective in your own life and ministry.

Pray

• Ask God to give the elders in your church godliness, wisdom and a love for his mission in the world.Ask God to give churches in your part of the world flexibility and a willingness to change structures in order to help people come to hear about Jesus.
• Ask God to save and have mercy on those you know who don’t know Jesus.