Those who receive salaries for being employed as pastors ought to resign immediately because their very existence perpetuates and encourages the idea of a clergy/laity divide. This split is a real danger to the vitality of the church because it sets a small number of people up as a "special minority" within the body. This, in turn, brings about instant inequality.
The only special status within the church belongs to Jesus Christ, our Head.
(This particular reason is not number 1 because it is most important. All twenty-five are important. The numbering in this series holds no significance.)
3 comments:
It seems over-simplified to say "The only special status within the church belongs to Jesus Christ, our Head."
What about the command to appoint elders based on a specific set of selection criteria. Titus 1 seems, to me, to indicate a subset of the church body is chosen specifically to uphold the true faith, and 'Silence' those twisting the gospel message.
Unknown,
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Unknown.-
Actually, if you read Titus1 in full context, you will see it is not about appointing elders at all, but appointing overseers from amongst older members.
Your interpretation of the passage is the usual traditional teaching but it completely ignores the actual words and context.
Undoubtedly verse5 tells Titus to ordain elder, but that is then qualified by verse7 which now calls them bishops or overseers.
This is not as some would make out, that elder and overseer are one in the same, but that only an older mature christian (an elder) can be ordained an overseer of the work of God.
The problem with claiming that you must be appointed in order to become an elder, rather than grow into maturity is that it perpetuates the clergy laity divide. The biblical evidence makes it clear that elder refers to mature people, both male and female, of which there should be many in every church. See 1Tim5v1 for example where male and female elders are defined by the Greek text. See also Titus2v1,2 where the same is evident.
These two scriptures which show an elder can be female, deny it being the same as overseer because an overseer must be the husband of one wife, ie. male!
Imagine a church where every mature member was expected to minister from the Holy Spirit in the meetings. That cannot happen when you appoint one or two special people who are set above the other members. It will always cause the non special members to sit and watch rather than function in their anointing.
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