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Biblical Qualifications of Elders

Written by Charlie Brackett

On one of his missionary trips, the apostle Paul stopped in Miletus, and Acts 20:17 tells us that while there "he sent to Ephesus and called for the elders of the church" to come meet him. When they arrived, among other instructions which he gave, he warned them: "take heed to yourselves and to all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood." (Acts 20:28) This text refers to these men as "elders", "overseers" (bishops) and "shepherds" (pastors). Despite the departure of denominational Christianity from the biblical usage of these terms, we are strongly committed to calling biblical things by biblical terms and doing the things of Christ according to the instructions He gave us in the New Testament. It is this underlying belief that we must look for Christ's authority for all that we do in His church that causes us to search the Scriptures for His instructions on who should be the church's leaders, what kind of people they should be and how they should lead the flock of God.

The passage in Acts 20 quoted above says the Holy Spirit made those men of Ephesus the overseers of God's people. How did He do that? It seems clear He determines who will be elders by establishing the qualifications of those appointed to the task of leadership. The Holy Spirit guided the apostle Paul to pen these words in 1 Timothy 3:1-7: "This is a faithful saying: If a man desires the position of a bishop, he desires a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, temperate, sober-minded, of good behavior, hospitable, able to teach; not given to wine, not violent, not greedy for money but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetous; one who rules his own house well, having his children in submission with all reverence (for if a man does not know how to rule his own house, how will he take care of the church of God?); not a novice, lest being puffed up with pride he fall into the same condemnation as the devil. Moreover he must have a good testimony among those who are outside, lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil."

And Paul, by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, wrote these instructions to Titus it Titus 1:5-9: "For this reason I left you in Crete, that you should set in order the things that are lacking, and appoint elders in every city as I commanded you— if a man is blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children not accused of dissipation or insubordination. For a bishop must be blameless, as a steward of God, not self-willed, not quick-tempered, not given to wine, not violent, not greedy for money, but hospitable, a lover of what is good, sober-minded, just, holy, self-controlled, holding fast the faithful word as he has been taught, that he may be able, by sound doctrine, both to exhort and convict those who contradict."

We, the members of the Palm Springs Drive church of Christ, have been careful to choose and appoint only those men that meet these qualifications given by the Holy Spirit. We can do not less. After all, it is the Lord's church. He, and only He, has the right to determine leadership as well as the organization, membership and mission of His church.