Please note that this article is the final part of a three-part teaching series on Leadership within the Local Church given in Bermondsey Gospel Hall, the audio of which can be found here.
Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God. Consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. Do not be led away by diverse and strange teachings, for it is good for the heart to be strengthened by grace, not by foods, which have not benefited those devoted to them. We have an altar from which those who serve the tent1 have no right to eat. For the bodies of those animals whose blood is brought into the holy places by the high priest as a sacrifice for sin are burned outside the camp. So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood. Therefore let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured. For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come. Through him then let us continually offer up a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that acknowledge his name. Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God. Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they are keeping watch over your souls, as those who will have to give an account. Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you. Hebrews 13:7-17
We have been examining leadership in the local church in order to understand the responsibilities placed on ourselves and our leaders by God’s Word. We started be reminding ourselves about the men of leadership. When studying God’s Word we see that elders are godly men who can teach God’s truth. We then took our first leadership lesson from Acts 20, where we observed the motive of leadership. Leaders are needed to care for God’s church. Our second leadership lesson dealt with the manner of leadership, as set out in 1 Peter 5. Leaders care by shepherding like God’s Son. In this our final leadership lesson will consider the means of leadership. How is it that leaders go about leading? What do they do in order to lead the church? What activities and duties do they actually perform in leading the local church?
In turning to Hebrews 13, at the end of our short series we turn to the end of what was most probably a written sermon by an ultimately unknown author to an ultimately unknown local church at an ultimately unknown point in the first century. However, despite all the uncertainty surrounding the character of the book of Hebrews, there is little uncertainty over its content in these paragraphs. The author is finishing his sermon off by urging his readers to remember and imitate (verse 7) and obey and submit to (verse 17) their leaders. The importance of this passage in identifying the means of leadership, what leaders do to lead in the local church, is presented in the small phrase used by the author to identify the leaders of these Christians. The author says that the leaders in the local church are ‘those who speak to you the word of God’ (verse 7).
How do we know who are leaders are? They are those who speak God’s word to us. That is, the means of leadership is teaching God’s word. If we started our series by looking at the worth of leadership and then by considering the way of leadership, we now turn in the final lesson to consider the weapon of leadership. If leading is shepherding, as we have seen in our previous leadership lessons, then leaders shepherd by teaching God’s word.
Leaders shepherd by teaching
Identifying leaders as those who teach God’s word isn’t just taken from a single comment made by the author of Hebrews. It is the overwhelming testimony of the New Testament. The New Testament passages which refer to the ministry of an elder without explicitly referring to teaching God’s word are few and far between. Indeed, even in those passages the work referred to almost certainly includes teaching God’s people.
Teaching is the activity that the writer to the Hebrews uses here to identify leaders in a local church, not chairing meetings, conducting pastoral visits, writing policies or interviewing new members. While elders may do all these things, it is the activity of teaching that is singled out as the key factor. If you are in any doubt who the leaders are in the church, you should be able to see them among the teachers. Not only is teaching the activity selected by the writer here, but it is the ability selected by Paul when recording the qualifications of an elder (1 Timothy 3:2; Titus 1:6-7). The only extraordinary characteristic of an elder, the only quality that they have that is not expected of all mature and godly Christians is that they are able to teach God’s word. An elder must be ‘able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it.’ (Titus 1:6-7). That’s why we identified the men of leadership, the elders, as godly men who can teach God’s truth.
Paul declares this truth when he uses the term shepherd-teachers in Ephesians 4:11. There is a lot of discussion and debate over the phrase, whether they are separate terms for separate groups or whether they are a single term for a single group of people. The term can be translated as ‘shepherd-teachers’ or paraphrased as ‘teaching shepherds’, but even if your translation doesn’t confine it to one term, most commentators admit that it either points to one single group or at least two groups that have a large degree of overlap. This would fit in with the explanation that while all shepherds are teachers, all teachers are not necessary shepherds.
Paul not only declares this to be the case in Ephesians, but demonstrates this to the Ephesians when speaking to their elders. Paul calls these elders to lead in a way similar to his own leadership, a leadership about which he states in Acts 20:21 that, ‘I did not shrink from declaring to you anything that was profitable, and teaching you in public and from house to house, testifying both to Jews and to Greeks of repentance toward God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.’ Later in the same passage, at verse 27 Paul again stresses that, ‘I did not shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.’ Paul’s leadership, a model of leadership for the Ephesian elders, was one where declaring God’s word was the chief focus.
The truth that teaching is the means by which leaders shepherd is beautifully recorded by Mark in the ministry of Jesus. Mark describes Jesus disembarking from the boat prior to the feeding of the many thousands and records that, ‘When he went shore he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion on them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd. And he began to teach them many things.’ (Mark 6:34). The chief need of the crowd was not miracles, resources or organisation. These shepherdless sheep didn’t need an administrator, a motivator or a deliberator. These sheep needed a teacher. A flock without a shepherd is a flock without a teacher. Sheep need shepherds, and those shepherds will first and foremost be teachers.
The testimony of the New Testament causes us to say that the chief means by which an elder shepherds the sheep is through teaching them God’s word. That is the chief means that they have to protect and provide for the flock under their care. However, while this is the chief means, it has to be admitted that it is not the only means.
To use the analogy of an actual shepherd, we can see that he protects and provides for his flock in numerous different ways. To protect them he can build a wall or fence around them. He can check each one as they enter in. A shepherd can place them close to a town where wolves are less likely. A shepherd could go out and find and kill surrounding wolves or take turns with a colleague to keep watch during the night. Similarly, to provide for the sheep a shepherd can place them in green pastures and beside still waters. Or they can bring food and water to their sheep and fill troughs for them. They must also provide for them in other ways, shearing the sheep to make sure they are not too warm in the summer or keeping near to those sheep that are pregnant and may go into labour. A shepherd uses lots of means to protect and provide for sheep, to shepherd his flock.
What about an elder or overseer in the church? Well it has to be admitted that leaders shepherd by doing things other than standing at the front of a congregation speaking to them. Even those that do this will do it to varying degrees (1 Timothy 5:17). Leaders shepherd us when they take the lead in admitting members, interviewing them and determining whether they are able to partner with us as a member of our fellowship. Leader also shepherd us when they lead the discipline of those who are already members, investigating the allegations and keeping on top of all of the facts. Leaders shepherd when they take decisive steps in laying out the vision of our life and together and the programme that corresponds to that. These are all aspects of leadership in the local church that does not necessarily require standing in front of a congregation and asking them to turn to a text but does result in protection and provision for the flock. In that sense there are many different means which elders use to shepherd the flock. As we have seen, the New Testament seems to put a stress, an emphasis, on teaching as the chief means. However, I want to make sure that we don’t consider all other means divorced or unconnected to teaching. For not only is teaching is the chief means of shepherding, but it is also the core means of shepherding.
It is on the foundation that is laid by their teaching ministry that elders perform all their other duties. If interviewing prospective members, leading us through change, formulating a new programme and providing pastoral counsel are the spokes in the wheel of eldership, the hub at the heart of that wheel from which all these spokes protrude is teaching.
We can see this within our passage. Having identified the leaders, those that teach them, the author calls his readers to consider their lives and imitate their faith (verse 7). He tells them to follow the example in faith and conduct that has been set for them by their leaders. These leaders had clearly followed (even if unknowingly) Peter’s instruction to set an example to the flock (1 Peter 5:3). They had lived a godly life and set an example before the flock. This is surely part of eldership, a means of shepherding the sheep, a part that on its face does not necessarily involve or include an elder explicitly ‘teaching’.
However, when we consider the passage further we see that even this aspect of eldership has teaching at its core. In pressing on to apply this instruction to his readers, you would assume that the author would tell them that, having observed the conduct of their leaders they should conduct themselves in a certain way. And while he does that, he does more than that. He doesn’t just call them to stop doing something. Rather, he calls them to stop following one teaching and return to another. He asks them to recall the teaching of these leaders over and against the false teaching that they are being presented with.
The author says that they should endeavour to imitate their leaders because Jesus Christ, the one who their leaders taught about and believed in, is always the same (verse 8). Because Jesus is always the same, these readers can trust and rely on him in the same way as their leaders He calls them to imitate the leaders who taught them rather than being led away by false teaching (and consequently, false leaders and teachers) (verse 9). As throughout the book of Hebrews, this false teaching was likely a call to return to some of the practices and ceremonies of Judaism, in which food laws and sacrifices play a key role. The author counters this specific false teaching by explaining the significance of the Old Testament sacrifices and their complete fulfilment in Christ (verses 10-12). He declares that we should be happy to identify with Christ (verses 13-14), the full fulfilment of such Old Testament shadows, and offer pleasing sacrifices to God by acknowledging who Christ is and doing good to others (verses 15-16). This true teaching, derived from the word of God, delivered to them by their leaders and demonstrated in their leaders conduct and faith, is set over and against the false teaching now being presented to them.
From this passage we can see that teaching is the chief means of shepherding. These leaders protected their flock from false teaching by teaching them the truth. These leaders also provided for their flock by equipping them to live godly lives by teaching them the truth. However, it also displays to us that the core means of shepherding is also teaching. The example that these leaders set was one founded on the truth that they taught. All of our behaviours stem from our beliefs. Elders are no different in this regard, except that elder’s beliefs are on display for all to see in their body of teaching. Setting an example to the flock by living a godly life as elder requires more than just conducting yourself in a certain way, it requires teaching the doctrine at the core of your godly life so that others may belief it and behave accordingly.
As a commercial lawyer, I see a great illustration of this in my own work. The very core of what a lawyer does is to provide legal advice. In its pure form this involves a client asking a legal question or providing us with the problem facing us. We then write a memorandum of advice, applying the law to their situation and advising them of the outcome and how they should respond. You could say that advising in the chief means of lawyering. However, I complete lots of other tasks that don’t seem to be directly connected to providing legal advice. Indeed, sometimes I wonder why I had to study law in the first place. When I am reviewing a Company’s accounts, drafting a letter, chairing a meeting, organising a conference call, discussing the commercial arrangement between parties or corresponding with the court, I’m not exactly providing legal advice. However, these activities aren’t completely divorced from advising. The reason that we have to have studied law is that everything we do springs out of and takes place in the context of the provision of legal advice. Providing legal advice is not only my chief, but also my core responsibility. It is at the heart of everything I do.
Teaching is the core means of shepherding. When interviewing a prospective candidate for membership, what basis are judgements and assessments made on? It will be on the doctrine that is taught in the local church. When developing a vision of life together as a local church, surely this should be developed upon the foundation of what is taught in God’s word, not on what is commonly done in the world or has historically been done in a certain tradition. When providing pastoral counsel, what else must elders lean on for both instruction and wisdom other than God’s word? Teaching is at the core of everything an elder does. That is why an elder must be a godly man who can teach God’s word. Teaching is both the chief and core means of shepherding.
The fact that teaching is the chief and core means of shepherding puts responsibilities on all of us. For elders, there is a responsibility to take up opportunities to teach within the local church, whatever setting that may be in. Their ministry is chiefly one of teaching God’s word to God’s people. Whether that is from behind a lectern, around a table or over a cup of coffee. For the rest of the assembly, we have a responsibility to ensure that our elders are given the freedom in order to pursue this chief aspect of their ministry. That they have the proper time to study and consider God’s word in order to teach it to us. We must support our elders as they seek to shepherd us by teaching God’s word.
We see these responsibilities played out in Acts 6, where those with responsibility for teaching in the church were not to ‘give up preaching the word of God to serve tables’ (Acts 6:2). Instead of the disciples dealing with the organisational problem which had arisen in the early church, they instructed the rest of the congregation to select others who could take on this responsibility so that they could ‘devote [them]selves to prayer and to the ministry of the word’ (Acts 6:4). Elders are not primarily administrators, curators, caretakers or secretaries. Leaders are primarily teachers, and because they are teachers we must ensure that they are able to teach. In order to do so, some of us may have to take on other responsibilities to allow those we have recognised as godly men who can teach God’s word to actually teach us God’s word.
Leaders shepherd by teaching God’s word
While we have seen that the chief and core means of shepherding is teaching, we have yet to understand why it is so. It is possible to affirm that an elder is a godly man who can teach without understanding why he must be able to teach. Why is it that teaching, rather than administrating, managing or motivating, is the chief and core work of a leader in the local church. When we go into our workplaces, leaders are not automatically teachers. Leaders are often those that can bring together a team, co-ordinate different parts of a project and keep calm under pressure. They are perhaps the individuals that have the most experience, performing all the different roles in the team over a period of time. If the skillset for leadership in the world doesn’t always require an ability to teach, why is it this way in the local church?
I think we find the answer by considering what leaders teach. The writer to the Hebrews says to his readers that they identify their leaders not just as those that teach, but those that teach the word of God. These leader were those that taught God’s word, set over and against ‘diverse and strange teachings’. As it is the word of God that does the work of God in the people of God, this is what lies behind the necessity of teaching in the role of an elder.
God’s word is not only the means that God uses to save his people (James 1:18), it is also the means by which they are sanctified (John 17:17). God’s word not only brings about Christian faith (Romans 10:17), but responding to God’s word is what marks a faithful Christian life (Hebrews 2:1). God’s word is not only what gets us into salvation (1 Peter 1:23), it is what grows us into our salvation (1 Peter 2:2). There is no other means available to us to see sinners become saints and saints become sanctified except the word of God.
How is it that elders can fulfil their responsibility of readying the bride of Christ for her bridegroom, of seeing the local church built up into the body of Christ, attaining the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God and reaching maturity and the stature of the fullness of Christ (Ephesians 4:12-13)? The only means available to them is to wash this bride with the word, seeing her sanctified and purified so that she may be presented to Christ ‘in splendour, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish’ (Ephesians 5:26-27).
Elders must be able to teach because teaching is the way that God’s word is communicated to a group of God’s people. And there is nothing that God’s people require more than God’s word. When all is said and done, the only weapon that an elder can wield to do this work is the word of God. All that an elder has to offer the flock is the Bible. Therefore, he must study it, trust it, obey it and teach it.
At the start we noted that there are two instructions to readers in this passage. At the start, in verse 7, the author calls them to consider and imitate their leaders. At the end, in verse 17, we see that they are also to obey and submit to them. Just as the first command relies on the fact that these leaders taught and trusted in God’s word, so does the example. The writer has already defined leaders as those who teach the word of God, and now he calls the readers to obey and submit themselves to such men. Just as the writer would not expect the example set by these leaders to be followed where it wasn’t in accordance with God’s word, he would not expect the instructions of these leaders to be followed where they are not in accordance with God’s word. When it comes to a conflict between the word of God and the word of man, even if that man is an elder, there should only ever be one winner.
However, we must take care not to see conflicts where only concerns exist. Just as God’s word is the only basis upon which elders can shepherd in the church, God’s word is the only basis upon which members of the flock can refuse to follow their shepherd. And not every decision that is made or direction that is taken that we disagree with will rise to that level.
When a matter falls outside of the clear instructions of the Bible and into the territory of wisdom and discernment, we should trust our leaders to lead us and willingly follow them. That’s exactly what we have said together in our Doctrinal Statement at my local church. We have said that a local church ‘in coming together…are governed by God’s Word…submitting to their leaders in as far as they are not acting in disobedience to it and holding each other accountable under it.’
If you have a concern or complaint about what your elders are leading you towards or into, by all means raise it and talk with them about it. However, even if coming away from that conversation you still don’t understand the reason behind the decision, or even still disagree with it, unless it is contrary to God’s Word, unless you have a chapter and verse as it were, I think you are commanded to obey and submit to your elders. I believe that that is what godly submission to authority in the church looks like.
We should have a disposition of trust and obedience towards those we have recognised as elders, those who we have declared to be godly men who teach God’s word. A stance of being ‘subject to the elders’ (1 Peter 5:5) and ‘respect[ing] those who labour among [us] and are over [us] in the Lord’ (1 Thessalonians 5:12) is what is expected of us in Scripture. Unless God instructs us otherwise in his Word, I think we can assume that he is instructing us through the leadership of those whom he has given to shepherd us. We should obey and submit to them, for they are ‘keeping watch over [our] souls, as those who will have to give an account’ (Hebrews 13:17). Ultimately they will be held accountable by God for the decisions they make and the directions they take, even if they are not held accountable by us. ‘Let them do this with joy and not with groaning, for that would be of no advantage to you’ (Hebrews 13:17). They are not only to shepherd with joy, but like Paul they are not to ‘lord it over your faith, but…work with you for your joy’ (2 Corinthians 1:24). Therefore, let us work with them to see God’s church built up and established, Christ’s bride purified and sanctified and each one of us grow up into the fullness of our Saviour.
We started our series by looking at the worth of leadership, the motive of leadership being that leaders need to care for God’s church. We then considered the way of leadership, the manner of leadership is that leaders care by shepherding like God’s Son. Our final lesson has been considering the weapon of leadership, the means of leadership is that leaders shepherd by teaching God’s word. And if leaders shepherd by teaching God’s word, let us not only support them in that, but also submit to them as they do that.
ALEXANDER ARRELL