House Church Talk - House church or simply church wherever people are

[jesusislord343 at juno.com]

On Wed, 28 Jul 2004 22:19:16 -0700 Glenn Frank <glennfrank at earthlink.net>
writes:
> > Everywhere in scripture we see that ELDERS (plural) were the leaders
in any given group of believers. Some of them might be gifted as
pastors... Or maybe some other gift. And there might even be people
gifted with the pastoral gift in the non-eldership part of the fellowship
who will never be elders in a church. But the "pastor" was never intended
as an office. The pastor was intended as a gift to the church for the
building up of the body... Eph 4.


Well said, Glenn (and spoken like a member of a certain "eldership
discussion group").  In God's use of the word, "pastors" (note that it is
found in the NT only in the *plural* form, in Eph. 4:11) are but one of
*several* gifts within a body of COMPLEMENTARY members, arranged and
fitted together as sovereignly distributed by the Head of the body.  

We need to recognize that 1) the distribution of the gifts of the Spirit,
and 2) their use in regular corporate assembling as commanded in the word
of God in I Corinthians 14, are both with a view toward the men of the
church growing to maturity and becoming fully qualified for assembly
oversight.  That is, the wonderful and intimate "relational Christianity"
which characterizes Spirit-worked "house church" is not an end in itself,
but is the means rather by which the saints are strengthened in the faith
and men are raised up to oversight as *exemplary servants* to the body.

I Corinthians 11:3 depicts "the men" (I Tim. 2:8) alike submitting to
their Head, that is, in serving one another in fervent brotherly love. 
And through this process of the brothers in grace walking and growing
together over time, the Spirit's work in sanctification and gifting will
produce true "elders" and "overseers" who will be characterized by the
*scriptural standards* of blamelessness as found in I Timothy 3 and Titus
1.  

Let us observe then further that until our assemblies (in the Lord's time
and not man's) have such, blameless men in gentle servant leadership and
oversight, they are indeed "lacking" and are not yet "in order" (Titus
1:5).  Certainly they are worthwhile and legitimate as churches, and may
function perfectly well (as did the first churches of the NT age) without
a plurality of biblically qualified overseers, but are meeting for the
better rather than the worse only as *spiritual progress* is being made.

As we "see the Day approaching," may our sovereign Lord see fit to raise
up more patriarchal, participatory assemblies of saints according to His
abiding word, with men and families growing in the grace and knowledge of
Jesus Christ at the rate at which He desires.

Grace in Christ,
Glenn S.
(central IL)

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