Biblical Eldership Church Leadership

The Acts of the Apostles

If this assumption is true, then Paul and Barnabas, acting as the only official leaders of the churches, would have guided the whole process of elder appointment, just as the apostles did in Acts 6. Paul and Barnabas would have formally placed the first elders into office, but the congregation would have examined and selected qualified can didates (see chapter 14, page 282).

Word Study on Cheirotone6

The word cheirotoneo‘ is made up of two words, “hand” (cheir), and “to stretch” (teino'), thus “to stretch out the hand,” and that for the purpose of voting. The word could then mean to elect or vote, as in the two examples below: Isocrates, at the end of Areopagiticus (ca. 355 B.C.) says, “but it is for you to weigh all that I have said and cast your votes according to your judgment of what is best for Athens.” Plutarch (A.D. 45-120), in his Life of Phocion, writes, “But Hagnonides read aloud an edict which he had prepared, in accordance with which the people were to vote by show of hands whether they thought the men to be guilty, and the men, if the show of hands was against them, were to be put to death” (34,34). But cheirotoneo‘ was also used more generally to mean “appoint” or “designate” without reference to the manner of choosing. In Luke’s day, Philo, the Jewish philosopher (ca. 20 B.C.-A.D. 50), uses the word without reference to voting: 0 “Nor yet, when he [Joseph] was appointed to be the king’s Viceroy” (0n Joseph 248). 0 “A king appointed not by men but by nature” (0n Dreams 2, 243). 0 “His wish to honor the ruler whom He [God] had appointed” (Moses 1, 198).

The first-century Jewish historian Josephus uses the word in the same way:

0 “Samuel said to Saul, ‘know that thou art king, elected [appointed] of God to combat the Philistines’” (Antiquities 6, 54). 0 “Ask Claudius Caesar to give him [Herod] authority over

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