Biblical Eldership Church Leadership

Servant Leadership

Of course we disagree, argue, get angry, and at times think badly of one another. In our own strength we would destroy our eldership team in short order. But Christ’s principles of patience, forgiveness, humil ity, oneness, and love ultimately govern our attitudes and behavior toward one another. When we fail to act toward one another as Christlike disciples (and we do), we repent, confess, and start anew. Eldership will never work if the elders don’t understand or fall short of a total commitment to Christ’s principles of self-sacrificing love and humble servanthood. To discover how a plurality of elders works together, look and listen to Jesus Christ.

JESUS’ TEACHING ON SERVANT LEADERSHIP

Just as Christianity influenced the Roman empire, the Greco-Ro man world also affected the course of Christianity. Renowned church historian and professor of Christian missions Kenneth Scott Latourette (1884-1968), when citing pagan influences on early Christianity, states that the Roman concepts of power and rule corrupted the organization and life of the early churches. He observes that “the Church was being interpenetrated by ideals which were quite contrary to the Gospel, es pecially the conception and use of power which were in stark contrast to the kind exhibited in the life and teaching of Jesus and in the cross and the resurrection.”l This, Latourette goes on to say, proved to be “the menace which was most nearly disastrous” to Christianity.2 I believe it is more accurate to say that the conceptual and structural changes that occurred during the early centuries of Christianity proved disastrous. Christianity, the humblest of all faiths, degenerated into the most power-hungry and hierarchical religion on the face of the earth. After the emperor Constantine elevated Christianity to the sta tus of a state religion in AD. 312, the once-persecuted faith became a fierce persecutor of all its opposition. An unscriptural clerical and priestly caste that was consumed by the quest for power, position, and authority arose. Even Roman emperors had a guiding hand in the de velopment of Christian churches. The pristine character of the New Testament church community was lost. When we read the Gospels, however, we see that the principles of

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