How Does the Eternal Govern Through Humans?

The Eternal (God) created men and women. He gave instructions on how we should live. They are in the Bible! So why are there so many hostilities, even wars, between “Christian” nations and between “Christian” churches?

Why is human history essentially the story of men fighting over questions such as “What is the right form of civil government?” “What is the right form of church government?” “Who should be in charge of such governments?”

We have had theocracies, where the church government is the state government; communism, where the state eliminated or controlled church governments and secular states with separation of “church and state” governments. Both civil and church governments have tried one-person rule, everyone rules (democracy), and every combination in between.

In regard to the issue of:	One-man rule governments		Democracies or republics
In regard to the issue of:	tend to be:	but sometimes are:	tend to be:	but sometimes are:
Internal efficiency—doing necessary work with the available resources	wasteful as the ruler sees he has no accountability to the people and pursues his own goals rather than the good of the country.	efficient as there is usually only one (the ruler’s) idea of how things should be done, and it is carried out.	inefficient as many people have different ideas of how to do things and agreement on any one method is often difficult.	better than most other governments if most people have the good of the whole at heart and individual innovation produces better ways to do things.
Individual rights and liberties	repressive as the ruler maintains his power by squelching all opposition.	protective of individuals when the ruler is committed to protecting individual liberty and thought.	founded on the concept of individual rights and liberties.	repressive toward minority groups as the majority may support measures that persecute a minority group.

We can find historical examples where each kind of government was good for those governed; we can find more examples where each kind of government was bad. Each type of government has certain tendencies, but there are always exceptions (see the chart, below).

All types of governments are susceptible to evil influence and corruption. State or church governments may “officially” be run by monarchs or dictators, but in reality controlled by other, little-known individuals. There are also examples of democracies where individuals paid so little attention to their own government that they either voted away their own proper role or passively allowed their rightful control to be taken away.

There is no single form of human government described in the Bible. Rather, there are many government principles and specific commands for certain aspects of government to be accomplished in a certain manner. This writer believes that the single most important principle of government is this:

When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but when a wicked man rules, the people groan (Prv 29:2).

This principle is amplified in the basic instructions for all human governments:

You shall appoint judges and officers in all your gates, which the Lord your God gives you, according to your tribes, and they shall judge the people with just judgment. You shall not pervert justice; you shall not show partiality, nor take a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and twists the words of the righteous. You shall follow what is altogether just, that you may live and inherit the land which the Lord your God is giving you (Deut 16:18-20)

Judges and officers are chosen by “you”—all the people who give offerings (see verse 17). They are appointed both locally (“your gates” refers to cities) and then at the national or state level (“according to your tribes”). There is no importance placed on any specific form, but rather on being just, not accepting bribes, being impartial, etc. The table at the bottom of this page shows that it is usually not the form of a government that determines whether it is good or bad, it is the righteousness or lack of righteousness of those in control that makes the difference. “Those in control” may be one man, a council, or an entire group of people.

Throughout history, people have placed far too much emphasis on being a citizen of the right nation or a member of the right church, rather than being concerned with whether or not they are acting righteously as individuals. Unfortunately, both leaders and followers often encourage this thinking. The leaders want their followers to think they have “the correct biblical form” of national or church government and that “God is on their side”. If followers believe that opposing their leaders is the same as “opposing God”, then they will not question them and the leaders are much freer to do what they want. Also, it is much easier for a follower to believe that he is “right with the Eternal” simply by being a member of the right nation or church, rather than actually having to live according to the righteousness described in the Bible. The process of yielding oneself to the Eternal on a day-by-day basis can be physically much more difficult than putting up with the requirements of being a member of a nation or church organization.

Because of this innate desire of both leaders and followers to build nations and church organizations, the Bible teaching about how the Eternal governs through humans has been greatly obscured.

If you have not yet studied this subject in the Bible, you will probably be amazed to see what it says—and what it does not say! There are so many commonly held concepts that people believe are in the Bible which actually are not. There are other plain statements in the Bible that almost no one seems to practice.

The Eternal Has Worked In Different Ways Throughout History

Before studying the Scriptures on how the Eternal governs, it is essential to realize the diversity of ways that the Eternal worked with people throughout the Bible. While the Eternal does not change (Mal 3:6), the way He works with His people does change. In 2 Corinthians 3:6-8 we see a “ministry of death” and a “ministry of the spirit.” In 1 Corinthians 12:5 “There are differences of ministries, but the same Lord.” Hebrews 1:1-2 summarizes the issue: “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by His Son.…”

There is no single “divine government” or “government of God” described in the Bible. It is an over-simplification to say that the Bible describes two governments, an Old Testament “Jewish” national government and a New Testament “Church” government. There are at least 10 kinds of governments described. While principles used in one government may apply to those used in other governments, we must be careful not to apply specific commands given to certain people in one situation to our situation today—especially when the Eternal has given us a different command.

1. Government in Heaven. The Eternal governs a large “host in heaven”: angels, archangels, cherubim, seraphim, the 24 elders, etc. The first three chapters of Genesis, Job 1:6-12, 1 Kings 22:19-22, Ezekiel 10, Isaiah 6 and many chapters of the book of Revelation give us some understanding of how it works. The different beings appear to have different functions and probably different ranks and authority. However, we find no command for humans to imitate the Eternal’s heavenly government—it is for perfect spirit beings, not humans.

2. Pre-flood Government. The first six chapters of Genesis give a very brief account of the world before Noah’s flood. A few other Scriptures refer to this time, such as: “Now Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied about these men also, saying, ‘Behold, the Lord comes with ten thousands of His saints, to execute judgment on all, to convict all who are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have committed in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against Him’” (Jude 14-15). There is little said about government or laws at this time, but a clear statement that most people did evil rather than good. We can be sure that they were not using the exact same laws given to Moses because Cain and Lamech were not put to death for murdering (Gen 4:11-12,23-24), as was later commanded to Israel (Gen 9:5-6; Ex 21:12-14).

Genesis 1:26 does show that man was given dominion over the entire earth, but does not show that he was given dominion over his fellow man. Another very important concept about all biblical government is found in this chapter. “Then God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night” (Gen 1:16). The original language Hebrew here really means “rule”. The Eternal could have chosen a Hebrew word that means “shine” or “light up”, but instead this is the first time we find a word for “rule” in the Bible. This is a good lesson for any rulers: The Sun and Moon provide a service to man; they are powerful; they let no man take away their position. Yet, they do not interfere in matters not part of their job.

3. Government of the Patriarchs. We find Abraham being commended for keeping the Eternal’s Laws (Gen 26:5), and some of the Israelites being condemned for not keeping them before the Eternal spoke from Mount Sinai (Ex 16:28). Exactly which laws they understood and kept is not certain. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob could not possibly have kept the many laws given to Moses regarding the Levitical priesthood—no such priests had been born yet! Instead, they offered animal sacrifices directly to the Eternal. Abraham did not receive land from the Eternal, nor did he divide what he had fairly among all his sons (Acts 7:2,5; Gen 21:14; 25:6; Deut 21:15-17). When Abraham and Lot had their dispute over grazing land (Gen 13), they settled the problem themselves. There was no mention of judges or officials of any kind.

4. The Government Given to Ancient Israel. We have much information on this government in the books of Exodus through 1 Samuel. It was designed to be as fair as possible, with checks and balances included, realizing that humans would be running the government. For example, the priests and Levites were not given a land inheritance and were forbidden to acquire one—the Eternal knew there would be too much temptation for these leaders to use their power to amass empires for themselves. The Israelites were given a system of judges who only had authority when people went to them (Ex 18:16; Deut 17:8-9; 25:1). There was no ruler with power to tax people, to draft them into the military, or to tell them how to run their farm or business. The tithe given to the Levites for their services was a fixed amount that they could not try to increase. The Eternal was their King, not a man (Isa 43:15). If they were obeying the Eternal, no standing army was necessary for “five of you shall chase a hundred, and a hundred of you shall put ten thousand to flight; your enemies shall fall by the sword before you” (Lev 26:8). Unfortunately, the people largely abused this freedom. The concluding verse of the book of Judges states: “In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (Jdgs 21:25).

5. The Government of the Kings of Israel. This was the government that the Eternal allowed men to have because they wanted it; He said it would be oppressive (1Sam 8), but that it would still work if they obeyed the Eternal (1Sam 12). The few times when there were good kings, it went well for the people. But most of the time the government was bad for its citizens, leaders and neighbors. After King Solomon died, the people split into two nations, Judah in the south and Israel in the North. They fought each other for many years. Eventually, Israel was taken captive by Assyria and Judah was taken captive by Babylon.

6. Other Human Civil governments used by the Eternal. Daniel 4 demonstrates that the Eternal controls this world’s governments, even though He does not condone many of their actions (note especially verse 17). Jesus echoed the same principles to Pilate: “Jesus answered, ‘You could have no power at all against Me unless it had been given you from above’” (John 19:11). There are times when the Eternal uses one nation to punish another nation (Isa 10:5-7). The land of Israel was under the control of the Roman government when Christ came. Just because the Eternal uses these governments to accomplish His will, does not mean He agrees with all or even most of their actions. Human civil governments are often described as “beasts” in prophecy.

7. The Future “Kingdom of God”. Many passages from the prophets, and many parables of our Savior, describe a coming “Kingdom of God” or Millennium (Rev 20:4). David (Ezk 27:34), the Apostles (Matt 19:29), and others will be kings on thrones on earth. This government seems to be both civil and spiritual, combining some aspects of nearly all the above governments. The main difference is that this government is not staffed by fallible humans, but by Spirit-born children of the Eternal. Today, the Eternal has no throne on the earth, his throne is in Heaven (1Pet 3:22; Rev 3:21). We should not apply scriptures written about these perfect rulers to imperfect human leaders today.

8. Human Family Government. This government is limited in scope, but has more “authority” than any other human government. The death penalty was prescribed for those who cursed the Eternal or cursed their parents (Lev 24:16; Ex 21:17), but not for cursing their rulers (Ex 22:28). Parents are given nearly complete authority over their children. (In ancient Israel, an incorrigibly rebellious son could be put to death upon the testimony of his parents—Deut 21:18-21. Also, a man was allowed to nullify a solemn promise that his wife or unmarried daughter made to the Eternal—Num 30:5,12). Nevertheless, wives and children cannot use “Dad said to do it” as an excuse to disobey the Eternal. Abigail was rewarded for following the Eternal, but disobeying her husband (1Sam 25) when he refused to feed those in genuine need (Deut 15:7-8). Furthermore, Paul taught: “Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right” (Eph 6:1). Some church groups have claimed that they have a “family government”, and want to give their church leader all of the authority that a husband has in the family. This is a mistake, as the Bible teaches that Christ is the husband and head of the Church (Eph 5:23), not a human leader.

9. Government of Satan. Satan clearly has a kingdom on earth (Job 1:7; Matt 12:26; John 12:31; 2Cor 4:4). His followers are demons—angels that sinned (Luke 11:18, 2Pet 2:4). These demons vary in power (Mark 9:17-29). Satan’s demons sometimes act as “princes” over various countries of this world, and sometimes oppose angelic messengers (Dan 10:12-13). Satan has often tried to make his government look like the true Church (2Cor 11:13). This began very early with Simon the Sorcerer (Acts 8:9-24), and will culminate in a great false church and state system symbolized by the “beast” and “false prophet” (Rev 13-20). This makes it necessary for brethren to weigh the fruits of those who claim to be leaders. “And you have tested those who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars” (Rev 2:2). Two characteristics of these false governments are leaders who like to be “preeminent” over other men, and who “put people out of a church” simply for associating with certain other brethren (3Jn 9-10). These verses in 3 John, as well as the letters to churches in Revelation 2 and 3, show the Church frequently has false teachers and doctrines mixed in it. We should not point to the many church organizations and call some of them “God’s churches” and the rest “Satan’s churches”. Rather, we should realize that Satan will try to corrupt all of them to whatever degree he can—even our own group!

10. Government of the Church (the Assembly of Believers). This government is the main subject of the rest of this paper. We will cover it in great detail. It is the one government where our readers have the most personal choice: you can probably choose which religious government you will follow, but it may be difficult or impossible to choose a different national government. Since the Holy Spirit is available to the people in this government, it could be capable of reflecting the very love of the Eternal in its dealings. Unfortunately, even sincere believers are not yet perfect, and there are “tares among the wheat” (Matt 13:24-30)—false brethren and false teachers. The purpose of this government is not to replace national governments, but to promote peace and growth among the brethren and to train them to be kings and priests (Rev 1:6; 1Pet 2:9).

What Many People Believe vs. What the Bible Actually Says

The following table shows the many differences between what people commonly believe and what the Bible actually states. Some of these things may surprise you, but we doubt very much that you can find any scripture to support any of the statements made in the left-hand column. We doubt that any leader in a church organization can do it either. But if you honestly finish reading this paper, you will see scriptures that prove the statements made in the right-hand column.

It is hard to overcome mistakes that have been with us for hundreds of years. This paper will also show you how even Bible translators were misled by “traditional Christian doctrine”, and sometimes put words into our English Bibles to support common church teaching, even though they realized that they were changing the message of the original languages. (You do not need to be a Greek or Hebrew scholar to understand these problems, you can see them yourself with English-language Bible helps.)

What Many People Believe:	What the Bible Actually Says:
“The Church” consists of one or more church organizations, and the members who belong to them.	The Church consists of people who are led by Jesus Christ and have the Holy Spirit, no matter where they worship. The Bible nowhere encourages the formation of church organizations.
Christ is the head of the Church and He set up a human government in the Church so that all doctrinal questions and conflicts can be resolved and unity can be achieved.	Christ is the Head of the Church, but he taught that unity will be achieved by brethren who love and respect each other in spite of differences. There are examples of church leaders and brethren disagreeing without separating or declaring each other to be “unbelievers”.
Deacons take care of the physical aspects of a congregation and ministers take care of the spiritual.	The New Testament Greek uses the identical word for “minister” and “deacon”. The two different words were added in English translations. The Greek word simply means “servant”. The people who read Paul’s original writing could not possibly have understood separate “physical servants” and “spiritual servants”.
The New Testament ministers are a kind of replacement for the Levitical (Old Testament) priests.	The New Testament ministry and Levitical priests existed together for about 40 years. Some Levitical priests became believers. All believers are part of the New Testament priesthood.
Ordained ministers are needed to baptize people into the Church (often as infants).	It matters little who baptizes a person—the Scripture does not specifically say who must do it. A person becomes part of the Church only if he truly repents (infants are too young to baptize).
Ordained ministers are needed to marry people.	Wedding celebrations are mentioned, but there is no example of a priest or minister “marrying” anyone. Marriages were made by agreements between the families involved. (Secular history teaches us that the practice of minister-performed marriages did not begin until about 1400 years after Christ.)
Ordained ministers are needed to preach funerals.	When people die, the living mourn, but there is never a mention of anyone preaching a funeral message.
Ordained ministers are needed to anoint the sick.	Believers can be anointed by elders—which are not necessarily “ordained ministers.” Healing also occurs via prayers of other believers—even if they are not elders.
Ordained ministers are needed to preach sermons in services.	The word “sermon” never appears in the Bible. A variety of brethren prayed, sang, taught, exhorted, and preached and used other spiritual gifts in each service.
Each Church should have a Pastor to preach, teach, counsel, visit the sick, warn those who are sinning, organize activities, and perform the other “ministerial” functions listed above.	Spiritual gifts are distributed directly by Christ among all believers. Believers are responsible for recognizing and using their gifts, rather than simply paying a “church pastor” to act as if he had all of the gifts. There is a gift of being a “pastor”, but it involves overall guidance of a congregation, not doing all of the items mentioned at left. Everyone is given one or more gifts!
Disobeying your church group’s leaders is like disobeying the Eternal. If a leader seems to depart from truth, members should wait for the Eternal’s correction.	Members should obey and cooperate with recognized leaders in the Church. However, they are also responsible to judge them by their fruits and by their teaching, and leave them if they depart from biblical standards. Each person is ultimately responsible for obeying the Eternal—even if leaders “go bad”.
A person becomes a minister when he is ordained by a previously ordained minister. Some believe there is an unbroken chain of ordinations all the way back to the apostles. Ordination comes about by a ceremony usually involving the laying on of hands, and is for life unless revoked by the group that ordained the minister.	There is no Greek New Testament word that means “ordain” as defined at left. Major English translations vary wildly as to where they include the word “ordain” in the New Testament—the New English Bible does not use it at all. The New Testament emphasizes divine spiritual gifts to perform certain services. Brethren accepted into leadership positions are expected to meet higher standards of personal behavior. Some men are given the gift of leadership. Some church leaders are appointed by other recognized church leaders, others are chosen by the brethren. The act of laying-on-of-hands is sometimes involved in this process, but laying on of hands is used more often for other things (healing, filling with the Holy Spirit, blessing of children, etc).
Church organizations and congregations have “church offices” that must be filled (pastor, minister, evangelist, bishop, apostle, missionary, treasurer, youth director, etc.). When offices become vacant due to death or departure, a new person must be selected to fill the office.	Apostleship might be considered a New Testament “church office”, but after Matthias replaced Judas, there is no record of “apostolic succession.” The New Testament records several leaders dying or preparing for their death, but none of them ever spoke about a successor. Rather, the entire focus of New Testament leaders is on those whom the Eternal chose to lead—usually confirmed by miracles or by appointment from the apostles (who did miracles). Today, we do not have recognized apostles like Peter and Paul to appoint local leaders, so we should look to those who have some fruit in their lives, rather than look to those who are “filling an office”.
Church organizations are necessary to produce a statement of beliefs so that everyone in the group can know what is necessary to believe for salvation.	The Bible contains no list of exactly what a person must believe or do to be saved. Each person must give their entire life to Christ. This may involve different things for different people. (In practice, doctrinal statements often discourage Bible study. Lazy people see little reason to learn things outside of the “required beliefs”, and studious people may fear being “kicked out” of their church organization if their Bible study reveals an error in their organization’s statement of beliefs.)
Church organizations are necessary to build church buildings, hold services, take care of the poor, spread the Gospel etc.	The New Testament Church met in houses, synagogues, or in one case, a school. There is no mention of a “church building”. Believers were taught to individually take care of the poor. Collections were sometimes taken for poor people in specific other areas, but there is no example of an organization that collected money in a “poor fund”.

If the above statements appear unreasonable or impossible, please keep reading this paper! We readily admit that many good works have been done by people who were operating under the false assumptions of some of the doctrines mentioned in the left-hand column. This writer and nearly every believer he knows learned much Bible Truth from Bible teachers who had made some of these mistakes. But if we really want to obey and understand the close relationship that Christ promises to have with every member of His Church, then we need to read and learn what the Bible actually says.

The Foundation of Church Government from the Bible

We begin our study of church government by quoting Scriptures that are clearly about government. This makes much more sense than assuming our own ideas of government and then trying to justify them in Scripture. This writer encourages you to read every one of these verses even if you are already familiar with them. There are many good points here that most people have overlooked.

When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but when a wicked man rules, the people groan (Prv 29:2).

But Peter and the other apostles answered and said: “We ought to obey God rather than men (Acts 5:29).

But I want you to know that the head of every man is Christ, the head of the woman is man, and the head of Christ is God (1Cor 11:3)

...Submitting to one another in the fear of God. Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is head of the wife, as also Christ is head of the church; and He is the Savior of the body. Therefore, just as the church is subject to Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for it, that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word, that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish. So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church (Eph 5:21-29).

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right (Eph 6:1).

Likewise you younger people, submit yourselves to your elders. Yes, all of you be submissive to one another, and be clothed with humility, for “God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble” (1Pet 5:5).

You are My friends if you do whatever I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I heard from My father I have made known to you. You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain, that whatever you ask the Father in My name He may give you. These things I command you, that you love one another (John 15:14-17).

…But there was also rivalry among them [the apostles], as to which of them should be considered the greatest. And He said to them, “The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them, and those who exercise authority over them are called ‘benefactors.’ But not so among you; on the contrary; he who is greatest among you, let him be as the younger, and he who governs as he who serves” (Luke 22:23-26).

So the Lord said to Moses: “Gather to Me seventy men of the elders of Israel, whom you know to be the elders of the people and officers over them; bring them to the tabernacle of meeting, that they may stand there with you. “Then I will come down and talk with you there. I will take of the Spirit that is upon you and will put the same upon them; and they shall bear the burden of the people with you, that you may not bear it yourself alone (Num 11:16-17).

Therefore, brethren, seek out from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business (Acts 6:3).

Then He called His twelve disciples together and gave them power and authority over all demons, and to cure diseases. He sent them to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick. (Luke 9:1).

After these things the Lord appointed seventy others also, and sent them two by two before His face into every city and place where He Himself was about to go….Heal the sick there, and say to them, “The kingdom of God has come near to you” (Luke 10:1,9).

¹Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I do not want you to be ignorant.… ⁴There are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. ⁵There are differences of ministries, but the same Lord. ⁶And there are diversities of activities, but it is the same God who works all in all. ⁷But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to each one for the profit of all:… ¹²For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ. ¹³For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and have all been made to drink into one Spirit. ¹⁸But now God has set the members, each one of them, in the body just as He pleased…. ²¹And the eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you”; nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” ²²No, much rather, those members of the body which seem to be weaker are necessary…. ²⁵that there should be no schism in the body, but that the members should have the same care for one another (1Cor 12:1,4-7,12-13,18,21-22,25).

To Him who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us [everyone with the Holy Spirit, not just the “leaders”] kings and priests to His God and Father, to Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen (Rev 1:6).

Not that we [church leaders] have dominion over your faith, but are fellow workers for your joy; for by faith you stand (2Cor 1:24).

But you are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you. Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His (Rom 8:9).

By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another (John 13:35).

Principles From the Above Scriptures

1. It is good to have the righteous in authority, whether they are spirit beings, fathers, dictators, elected officials, congregational leaders, employers, military generals or any other position. The form of government matters far less than the righteousness of those who govern.

2. The strongest biblical line of authority is from the Father, to the Son, to a man, to his wife, to his children. Other governments are given almost no rights to interfere here.

3. Husbands and wives have much stronger authority over their families than the religious leaders have over the brethren. Just as our Savior only directs His People to do that which is good for His Church, a husband is responsible to direct his wife and family only in ways that benefit his wife and family.

4. All authority is to be used to serve others, not to elevate oneself. All the saints are to submit to each other as the need arises. Christ, who was far superior to His apostles, treated them as friends, telling them everything. How much more should righteous human leaders treat members as friends? All must be done in love.

5. We are all in training to exercise authority over others so we can help people who need it. All those who “endure until the end” will become kings and priests. The Eternal is not training one group (“ministers”) to exercise authority, and another group (“laymen”) to be only obedient followers.

6. The Eternal sometime chooses people directly, sometimes has men appoint people, and sometimes asks the group to pick people who are already exhibiting the fruit.

7. The Eternal gives spiritual gifts and power to people to do what needs to be done.

8. People are not considered members of the Church based on recognition by a church leader, but based on the Holy Spirit in them and the outward manifestation of love shown.

There are other scriptures and principles that could be mentioned. But the above points seem to be the foundation—repeated many times, and shown by many other examples in Scripture.

How Did it All Go Wrong?

Satan has deceived the whole world, including, to the extent possible, “even the elect”—those with whom the Eternal is working (Rev 12:9; Matt 24:24). Many of the epistles written late in the New Testament period show that many false teachers had already entered the various church congregations:

For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work… (2Thes 2:7).

…even now many antichrists have come… (1Jn 2:18).

For certain men have crept in unnoticed, who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men, who turn the grace of our God into lewdness and deny the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ (Jude 4).

And you have tested those who say they are apostles and are not, and have found them liars (Rev 2:2).

Even secular church history records that as the first and second centuries passed, more and more church leaders claimed authority through their position and who “ordained” them, less and less claimed authority because of miracles or prophetic utterances directly from the Eternal (see Encyclopedia Britannica, 11^th ed., article Prophet: 91.1911encyclopedia.org/P/PR/PROPHET.htm).

Finding the truth of church history during the first few centuries after Christ’s death is often difficult. The last letter of John shows us that false leaders were often casting the true brethren out of the church (3Jn 9-10). Persecutions caused many of the early groups and their writings to be destroyed. Gradually, many church members began to look more and more to the “bishops” in various cities for leadership, and eventually the “bishops” began to look to the bishop in Rome and/or Constantinople for leadership. When the Roman emperor Constantine made Christianity the state religion (313 A.D.), persecution of Christians was greatly reduced, but all hope was lost for the “organized church” to get back to a Christ-governed group of spirit-filled people. This officially recognized church maintained its outward form of religious services and preaching of righteousness, but internally operated like another political institution. The New Testament canon was finalized about this time. There certainly still were some brethren who were trying to live by its words and some who had verbally maintained the traditions of the first century church. But as time went on, these “Bible believers” began to be persecuted, both by governments and by the big organized churches.

Many more pages would be required to even begin to cover the doctrinal changes and other unbiblical practices that became incorporated into mainstream Christianity from this time onward. Since this is a paper on government, we will summarize what happened to the government.

Since New Testament teaching is based on the Old Testament, let us consider a few broad principles there. The government given to the Israelites through Moses was primarily a “rule of law”. The laws were written for everyone to see (Deut 27:6-8), and everyone, including the top leaders, were expected to follow them. When situations arose which the laws did not cover, or when there was a question of how the law was to be applied, then judges would render a decision. These decisions were either remembered or written down, and used again when similar situations occurred. As long as just judgments were made, this built up a very useful body of “case law” upholding the laws that the Eternal gave. Unfortunately, when unjust judgments are mixed into the system, the result is a complex mess of laws, which lawyers and their clients could cunningly use to “get around” the intent of the original law. This is the problem for which Christ chastised the leaders of his day (Matt 15:6)—a problem that plagues most Western democracies of our day.

Christ made it clear that He did not come to do away with the righteous law given by the Father (“Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets”—Matt 5:17). He came to die for our sins and to give us the power to live a way of righteousness that exceeds the commandments written in stone. “For I say to you, that unless your righteousness exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt 5:20). “For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life” (2Cor 3:6). Christ showed that a person attempting to obey the law on his own could not save himself (Rom 3:20). It was not because the law was bad, but because sinful human beings simply cannot obey it under their own strength (Heb 8:7-8; Matt 11:27-30). Christ went on to give new spiritual principles for governing in His Church (Matt 18:15-20). He allowed his followers to make judgments apart from the existing Jewish legal system of the day. Christ offered a “new covenant”—a chance to start anew!

But as the Old Testament teaching was perverted by those who taught it, so was the New Testament teaching. The New Testament emphasis on leaders with spiritual gifts was replaced by ordination—appointment by some other human church leader. The New Testament emphasis on following the spirit, rather than the letter of the law, was perverted to do away with the law. This perverted teaching required members to obey the commands of church leaders (supposedly church leaders were more spiritual than anyone else), rather than Scripture. Even though the Scriptures forbid it, church leaders began to take on lofty titles, such as “father”, “teacher”, “master”, even “vicar of Christ”—which means “in place of Christ” (Matt 23:8-10).

After the fourth century A.D., most people who called themselves Christian were governed by a hierarchy or a hierarchical government. A hierarchy is a multi-layer government where the lowest level people are responsible to the first level of leadership, who are then responsible to the next level of leadership, who are then responsible to the top leader. The above describes a 4-level hierarchy, but hierarchies can have as few as three levels, or as many levels as one cares to imagine. Military governments typically have numerous levels. Hierarchies are the best form of government to make people do things that they do not want to do. People in hierarchies are usually commanded to exclusively follow the leader immediately over them, and not to obey or even talk to others in other parts of the hierarchy. Each leader has absolute authority over those underneath him: if they do not follow him, he can punish and get rid of them (in the military, execute them; in the church, cast them out). People are taught to follow without questioning or even knowing why they are carrying out their particular assignment. While it is the job of higher level leaders to make sure that lower level leaders are not misusing their authority, they are often unconcerned as long as the lower-level leaders are getting their job done. Before modern transportation and communication, it could take months to appeal from one level of government to the next higher level; the potential for abuse was high! When the top leader of a hierarchical government is both evil and clever, it is very difficult for anyone to change the situation: he often continues in his evil until he dies.

The mainstream Christian church hierarchy essentially consisted of members, who were sometimes governed by “deacons”. These deacons reported to a congregation pastor, who usually reported to a bishop (local overseer). The bishop may have reported to an arch-bishop (regional overseer), who reported to the head bishop (usually the Bishop of Rome). There were other bishops who fought for and sometimes achieved dominance over certain parts of the Christian world. As the years went by the “bottom line” for nearly all congregations was to “obey the dictates of Rome” or risk excommunication. For about twelve hundred years (c 300-1500) A.D., the strength of this central “Roman Catholic Church” continued, and most members became further and further removed from the Bible. Worship services consisted of man-made liturgy. Messages often consisted mostly of “be good, work hard, and support your church and king”. What little Scripture that was read in the common service was usually in Latin—a language not understood by most people. Massive church buildings were built—often by forced or coerced labor (“you will go to heaven sooner if you work on this building for 20 years”). In the minds of the people, “the church” often was the building, and secondarily, the people who were in charge of it.

Once people are deceived into thinking that the Eternal requires them to follow certain leaders or a church organization, they become entrapped. The leaders demand obedience to themselves, and members feel like they are being righteous and pleasing the Eternal when they please their human leaders. (If you are the politically-cooperative type, it is often much easier to please a human leader, than it is to please the Eternal.) These people rely on their organization to learn “new truth,” so it becomes very difficult for them to learn anything outside of their organization’s teachings.

During the 1400s the Roman Catholic Church was the supreme religious hierarchy in Europe. They began asserting more and more control over individual’s lives. Up to this time in history, most marriages were handled as a contract between the people marrying—or a contract between their parents. You can find marriage celebrations in the Bible—even a “master of the feast”—the person in charge of giving it (John 2:8-9). But you will look in vain to find a priest or minister officiating at any wedding. As might be expected of human nature, many people failed to live up to their marriage contracts. So “the church” offered their services and began to serve as a witness of the marriage contract, and to “give their blessing”. Not much later, they began to “perform” the ceremony. These practices continued through the Protestant reformation, and were assimilated by the Jews. Today, Rabbis officiate at weddings in a way that they would not have five hundred years ago years ago. Similarly, the Catholic custom of administering “last rites” to the dead evolved into the modern custom of preaching a funeral service.

As Catholic control of members increased, so did corruption within the church. Anyone who disagreed with the leaders in even small points was branded a heretic. Heretics were hunted down by well-financed armies and sometimes given a chance to recant, but more often tortured or eliminated. Much money was extracted from the populace by a variety of unbiblical means. “Forgiveness from sins” was for sale in the form of written documents (“indulgences”) produced by local church officials. “Forgiveness” for very big sins was available from the Pope—for a higher fee. The people were often poor while the church was wealthy. In many areas the Catholic Church owned one fourth of all available land. Church offices were bought and sold. “Celibate” priests and monks had a steady stream of concubines or affairs with parishioners. The people doubted that this life-style was supported by the Scriptures, but Scriptures were read only in Latin, a language not understood by most people. Priests often interpreted Scripture to suit the needs of the moment.

The 1500’s was the century of the Protestant Reformation. Leaders such as Martin Luther, John Calvin, Ulrich Zwingli and Jacques Lefevre originally sought reforms for these many abuses, but they found a Catholic Church that was in the habit of excommunicating anyone who challenged its authority. Advances in printing technology allowed the reformers to reach enough people tired of the church abuse. Many new independent denominations formed. Although many died for their beliefs, reform ideas found support even among a significant number of the nobility, providing havens for those persecuted in other districts.

During these times, over a dozen translations of the Bible were produced in European languages. Most were set in type and printed on the presses of the day. Most were banned; copies were burned; and over half of the translators involved were executed for their “crimes”. (Today, we would not view the job of “Bible translator” as a high-risk profession.) Some were killed by old church rulers. Some were killed by “Reformists” who wanted only “a little bit” of reform.

The following few pages of this article are slightly technical, but the information is essential to understand what has happened to the Bible, and the Bible-believing churches of our day. This writer is convinced that the time you spend with this will be well worth it.

Translation in Troubled Times

In general, the King James Version (KJV) is a very good translation. As much as practical, it tries to maintain a word for word correspondence between the English text and the original language manuscripts. Yet in verses about government, the New Testament KJV contains many mistranslated words. These KJV errors became further entrenched as other translators copied them and as church administrators and other theologians wrote their doctrinal statements based on them. We are not talking about errors that only a Greek expert can detect, but many that you can easily verify from a concordance or Greek-English dictionary.

In England, Henry VIII was king from 1509 to 1547. He began as a staunch defender of Catholicism, but backed away as the Pope refused to grant him a divorce from his wife, Catherine, aunt of the powerful emperor Charles the Fifth. Henry felt he must have a male heir, which Catherine did not seem able to provide. In 1532 he declared himself head of the Church of England and outlawed any payments to the Pope in Rome. He continued to plunder the wealth of the monasteries, while at the same time executing heretics who denied the doctrines of his church. These doctrines were essentially the same as the Catholic Church—only the leader was different. Henry was not a theological reformer, but an astute politician who used the popular anti-Catholic ideas of the day to further his political goals. Those Europeans loyal to the Pope were too busy dealing with their own Protestant Reformation problems to mount a crusade to bring Henry VIII back into submission to the Catholic Church.

After Henry’s death, a council governed England from 1547 to 1553 while Henry’s son, Edward VI, was still too young to rule. Some religious reforms took place during this time, as well as persecution of Catholics. When Edward VI died young, Mary I, Henry’s oldest daughter returned to England and became Queen. She was married to the King of Spain, and was a devout Catholic. In a short time, she reestablished ties with Rome and began persecuting Protestants with a vengeance that earned her the title “Bloody Mary”. Reformers and English-language Bible translators were some of her chief targets. Mary died after five years, bringing Elizabeth I to power (1558-1603). Elizabeth favored the Church of England but allowed Catholics, as well as those wanting much more religious reform, to peacefully exist with only minor fines and restrictions. Most of this toleration continued even after she was “excommunicated” by the Pope. Several new translations of the Bible appeared during her reign. Puritans and other fundamentalist groups fed on their newly found knowledge of the Scriptures. Some of these groups were officially persecuted and the “heretical translations” were blamed.

With this background, King James came to the throne and the King James Version was produced. On January 6, 1604, only a few months after he began to reign, King James called a conference at Hampton Court Palace to settle some differences among the clergy. While little else was accomplished at the conference, most agreed that a single Bible translation was needed. Up to this point, nearly all of the historical information presented can be found in any standard encyclopedia under the articles “church”, “reformation”, and “Bible”. To find out exactly what happened at the conference, is a little more difficult. The following information came from the Encyclopedia Britannica, 11^th edition. (Later editions covered this information less thoroughly.) Original sources for the information are cited in the encyclopedias. (This history is not an essential part of proving what happened to the King James Bible—this is evident from the Hebrew and Greek reference works covered later. This history explains how and why it happened).

Dr. John Reynolds, president of Corpus Christi College, actually proposed the new translation. King James agreed and wrote that he “wished... for one uniform translation... and this to be done by the best learned in both universities; after them to be reviewed by the bishops and the chief learned of the Church; from them to be presented to the privy council; and lastly to be ratified by his royal authority; and so the whole church to be bound unto it and none other”. Forty-six men were assigned to the project, broken down into six groups that worked on sections of the Bible (Gen-2Kngs; 1Chr-Eccl; Isa-Mal; Apocrypha; Matt-Acts, Rev & Rom-Jude). The men were chosen without regard to party—they really were the best men. Fifteen rules were given to the translators, of which we will reprint some:

1) The ordinary Bible read in the Church, commonly called “the Bishops’ Bible,” to be followed, and as little altered as the truth of the original will permit.

3) The old ecclesiastical words to be kept, viz. The word Church not to be translated Congregation, etc.

4) When a word hath divers significations, that to be kept which hath been most commonly used by the most of the ancient fathers, being agreeable to the propriety of the place and the analogy of the faith.

6) No marginal notes at all to be affixed, but only for the explanation of the Hebrew or Greek words which cannot, without some circumlocution, so briefly and fitly be expressed in the text.

8) Every particular man of each company to take the same chapter or chapters; and having translated or amended them severally by himself where he thinketh good, all to meet together, confer what they have done, and agree for their parts what shall stand.

9) As any one company hath dispatched any one book in this manner, they shall send it to the rest to be considered of seriously and judiciously, for his majesty is very careful in this point.

10) If any company, upon the review of the book so sent, doubt or differ upon any place, to send them word thereof, not the place, and withal send the reasons; to which if they consent not, the difference to be compounded at the general meeting, which is to be of the chief persons of each company at the end of the work.

11) When any place of special obscurity is doubted of, letters to be directed by authority to send to any learned man in the land for his judgment of such a place.

12) Letters to be sent from every bishop to the rest of his clergy, admonishing them to his translation in hand, and to more and charge as many as being skillful in the tongues and having taken pains in that kind, to send his particular observations to the company either at Westminster, Cambridge or Oxford [the three places where the work was being done].

Rules 8 to 12 show the great effort made to really arrive at a very good translation. Essentially, the project began with seven to nine men translating each verse themselves. This prevented a dominant personality from swaying all of the others. Anyone’s good idea would be considered. Differences were then worked out in meetings, first among the group and then among the group leaders. Any knowledgeable person in the country could be consulted for help. As a result, the basic translation was very good. Unfortunately, the church hierarchy and King James still had the ultimate say. Because of rule 6 (no marginal notes), the KJV Bible reader had little way of knowing which words of the Bible were the best possible translation, and which were the command of the King. Rule 3 shows that there were places where the King’s wishes overrode what would otherwise be linguistically correct. The King ordered that the Greek ekklesia be translated “church”, to support his religious organization even though “congregation” or “assembly” would be a better translation. We can know that ekklesia did not exclusively mean a Christian religious organization or building in first century Greek because the word is used three times to refer to an assembly of unbelievers in Ephesus (Acts 19:32,39,41). Rule 4 confirms that decisions were made in favor of church tradition (“commonly used by the most of the ancient fathers”) and to support church doctrine (“the analogy of the faith”).

King James spent much of his time with ecclesiastical matters. He saw himself as head of the Church of England and did not want other sects basing their doctrines on disputed knowledge of the Scriptures. He gave the translators time and provision to complete their task. The translators gave him what he wanted. They were certainly aware of the past hundred-year history of death-sentences for those who opposed the state-chosen religion (whatever it was). Many of them probably did not feel bad about the King’s and clergy’s changes of a word or two here and there. To many, the King was the head of “The Eternal’s government on earth”.

When a generous portion of error is mixed with truth, some of the error obviously sticks out and is quickly noticed. When a tiny bit of error is mixed with a vast amount of truth, it can go unnoticed for a long time. Such is the case with the KJV Bible. Only a tiny fraction of the KJV words were deliberately changed by the King and his religious advisers, but those few words had a great effect on church organizations for hundreds of years. To the Bible reader, the King’s doctrinal alterations were indistinguishable from the rest of the translation. So King James’ understanding of doctrine took on all the force and authority of an otherwise good translation of the Hebrew and Greek Scriptures. This paper will show the major errors that relate to church government. Some of these errors have been corrected by later translations, others still influence Bible translation today.

The Practice of “Ordination”

You have probably never heard a sermon or read an article that explained the doctrine of “ordination” from the Bible. (If you have, this writer would very much like a copy of it.) To know what “ordain” or “ordination” means, we must go to a dictionary—or the literature of a church organization. Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (Tenth Edition) states:

1: To invest officially (as by the laying on of hands) with ministerial or priestly authority. 2 a: to establish or order by appointment, decree, or law, enact. b: destine, foreordain: to issue an order.

The second definition is usually used for the Eternal or those in high office. (e.g.: “The Eternal ordained that the Earth should orbit the Sun”; “Ford management ordained new safety regulations to be adopted by all factories.”) This second definition does not find too much controversy in day-to-day religious practice. Few people will argue about whether the Eternal “ordained” that the Earth orbit the Sun, decreed that it would, or simply did it. It is only a matter of semantics.

Definition one, however, is often very important to Church government. It is such a vital part of most church organizations, that most people take it for granted and feel no need to try to establish the doctrine from the Bible. In the minds of many people, “ordination” includes even more than the definition above. Most people believe (and most churches teach) that an ordained person is qualified to do things that an un-ordained person is not—such as perform marriages, baptisms, counseling, and other ordinations. They believe that this ordination is retained for life, unless the same church organization revokes it. Also, many have the idea that there is an unbroken line of ordinations from the apostles to the founder of their church organization to the minister in their local congregation. Many people would say that “ordination” is a spiritual event recognizing those who are chosen in Heaven, and men just carry out the ceremony here on Earth. The combination of the two definitions for ordination make it a very powerful concept: If the Eternal “ordains” the sky to be blue and “ordains” a man to lead your congregation, how can anyone possibly speak against either one?

But is it really the Eternal who actually performs “ordinations” or is it merely human church organizations?

We will cover the Scriptures on this in the next few pages, but first, it is important to see the contradictory manner in which organizations actually treat “ordained people”. While church organizations “ordain” men as “ministers of Christ”, in reality they are largely ministers in that organization. Why? The following reasons show why “ordination” is an organizational practice, not a strictly biblical one:

1) Organizations usually “ordain” men after some training or because of a need for an “ordained” person in a certain position. They rarely ever “ordain” people based on recognition of spiritual gifts mentioned in Scripture.

2) Organizations, in general, will not accept a minister from another group to serve in their own organization—even though they believe that members in other organizations are part of the “true Church”. They will accept members from other groups—along with their baptisms and weddings—even though ministers of another group performed them. However, organizations will not accept ministers from other groups without some kind of additional training, approval, or even “re-ordination”.

3) Most organizations have no official process for ensuring that the scriptural qualifications for leaders in the congregation are met (1Tim 3; Titus 1). If an organization needs ministers, they will “ordain” young, unmarried men right out of college, or they will ordain long-time men in the congregation without asking people who know them whether they live as described in these chapters.

4) Organizations sometimes revoke “ordinations” of ministers who leave a group to start their own congregation. Yet, if people are baptized or married by that “minister who has left”, and then decide to join the original organization—the organization will usually accept that baptism and marriage—even though it was done by someone from whom they “revoked” their ordination. In other words, they still recognize his work in the Church, but they remove his “ordination” because he no longer works for their group.

5) Organizations that do recognize ministers in other groups still often have internal rules that allow them to hire only ministers ordained by their own group. Some groups even pay their ministers (or lay them off when necessary) based on how long they have been “ordained”, their type of “ordination” or both. Indeed, some have multiple levels of “ordinations” through which aspiring ministers can hope to advance their career—like positions in the corporate ladder or government civil-service jobs. The bearing of spiritual fruit or works often has little part in such decisions. Yes, “ordination” is more often a job placement than it is an appointment from the Eternal.

The actual implementation of “ordination” varies among church organizations, but nearly all of them rely upon some form of “ordination” for their organizational structure. If “ordinations” really were from the Eternal, one would think that people would want to know if there were any miracles or signs that accompanied them. If “ordinations” were from the Eternal”, it seems that all organizations would recognize other groups’ “ordinations”, just as they recognize other group’s members—as long as the people were actually bearing spiritual fruit. But this is not the way it is. “Ordinations” are most often a tool of organizations used to control their ministry and membership.

Organizations that claim to be the one and only “true Church” do not have some of the above logical inconsistencies because they claim that their “ordained ministers” are the only true ministers in the world, and all other “ordinations” are false. However, they have an even bigger problem with which to deal: If they believe they are the “one Church” because all of their doctrines are correct, ask them to historically document the group that held their same doctrines for the last 1000 years. If they believe they are the “one Church” because their leader was ordained in a succession of ordinations since the early apostles, ask them if they have a historical list of these hierarchical leaders. This writer has never seen any group (except the Roman Catholic Church) attempt to answer either one of the above questions. They can neither prove that their current leadership nor their list of doctrines are the ones that have been “in Christ’s church” for hundreds of years. In essence, you must simply take the word of the group that they are the “one true church”.

Yes, there are leaders in the Bible. There are biblical leaders who appoint other leaders. We can recognize these leaders by their fruits (Matt 7:15-20), not by their ordination certificate. What does the Bible says about ordination? If you have not studied this before, you will probably be surprised!

“Ordination” Forced Into The King James Version of the Bible

Is there a word in the original Hebrew and Greek languages that has the modern concept of “ordain”? This writer knows of no other concept that has suffered so much in the process of Bible translation. The King James Bible contains the word “ordain” and variants 23 times in the Old Testament and 20 in the New. The New International Version (NIV) uses it 28 times in the old and only once in the New Testament. If we compare the KJV and the NIV, they almost never agree on where “ordain” should be used! The only verse where both translations contain “ordain” is Psalm 8:2. Young’s Literal Translation, uses “ordain” only 3 times. The New English Bible (NEB) does not use “ordain” at all! A new translation due in 1999, The Original Bible (intended to convey the meaning of the original Bible) will not contain the word “ordain” either.

Explanation of Tables: We have included the extensive tables on pages 17 and 18 so that you may see the “shotgun” approach to the use of “ordain” in seven significant translations. The first five translations are some of the most widely used translations today. Young’s and Green’s literal translations were included because their translation philosophy placed a greater emphasis on correct word-for-word renderings rather than on easy-to-read English phrases.

These tables contain all uses of the words “ordain”, “ordained”, and “ordination” in all seven translations. The tables are grouped by the Hebrew and Greek words so that their definition did not need to be repeated. The word definitions were summarized to fit the available space from Strong’s Concordance as a general guide to meaning. Consult a Hebrew or Greek lexicon for a better definition. The Hebrew and Greek words appear in the order of the first scripture that uses them in the table. This provides a general sense of going through the Bible.

These tables do not show cases where these same Hebrew and Greek words are not translated as “ordain”. If they did, the tables would be larger than this entire paper. Nearly every Hebrew and Greek word in these tables is used in dozens or hundreds of verses where it is not translated “ordain”. You can use The Englishman’s Hebrew Concordance and The Englishman’s Greek Concordance, or a computer Bible program to find those thousands of occurrences. Simply look up the Strong’s number of each word in the concordance or computer Bible.

The only places where any translations exhibit any degree of consistency is with the Hebrew millu (Strong’s 4393). It occurs 15 times in the Old Testament, and is rendered “ordination” 11 times by the NIV, NRSV and NASB translations (see table). These usages are all related to installing or consecrating the high priest. The other four times, millu is rendered “mounting”, “set,” or “inlaid” because it refers to stones being installed in something (Ex 25:7; 35:9,27; 1Chr 29:2). A high priest was “installed” in his position much like a stone might be “installed” in its setting. This is the only case where any single Hebrew or Greek word was translated “ordain” more than half the time. This Old Testament usage gives no credence to the common understanding of “Church ordination”. The high priest of Israel was an inherited office chosen by the Eternal. There are no scriptures that say that the Old Testament priests were replaced by the New Testament ministry or leadership—the Bible teaches that all believers are priests (1Pet 2:5,9).

There are two Greek words which are translated “ordain” half the time. The Greek diatage (Strong’s #1296) appears twice in the New Testament. In Acts 7:53 it refers to the law given by “angels”, so the NRSV and NASB use “ordain”. But the same word is also used in Romans 13:2 where it refers to the Eternal’s choosing of secular rulers. Most Bible-believers agree that the Eternal determines our world leaders, but they would certainly not say he “ordains” them. Hence, diatage (Strong’s #1296) cannot be a Greek word representing the modern concept of ordination.

All Old Testament Occurrences of “Ordain” (and all variants) in 7 Significant Translations (See above for an explanation of this table. He boxes in black should say “ordain[ed]”, but may not always work.)
Hebrew Word with Strong’s Number and Brief Definition			Verses Where Rendered “Ordain”	King James Version (KJV)	New King James Version (NKJV)	New International Version (NIV)	New Revised Standard (NRSV)	New American Standard (NASB)	Young’s Literal Transltn. (YLT)	Green’s Literal Transltn. (GLT)
Ma-le’ #4390- to fill, be full		Ex 28:41; 29:9,29, 33,35; Lev 8:33		consecrate	consecrate	ordain & ordination	ordain	ordain & ordination	consecrate	consecrate & filling
			Ex 32:29	consecrate	consecrate	set apart	ordained	dedicate	consecrate	fill your hand
Lev 16:32; 21:10				consecrate	consecrated	ordained	consecrated	ordain	consecrate	consecrate
			Lev 21:10	consecrated	consecrated	ordained	consecrated	consecrated	consecrated	consecrated
			Num 3:3	consecrated	consecrated	ordained	ordained	ordained	consecrated	consecrated
			1Kng 13:33	consecrated	consecrated	consecrated	consecrated	ordained	consecrateth	consecrated
millu #4394 - installation	Ex 29:22,26,27,31,34; Lev 7:37;8:22,28,29, 31,33			consecration	consecration	ordination	ordination	ordination	consecration	consecration
asah #6213 - to do, make			Num 28:6	ordained	ordained	instituted	ordained	ordained	made	offered
			1Kng 12:32	ordained	ordained	instituted	appointed	instituted	maketh	made
			1Kng 12:33	ordained	ordained	instituted	appointed	instituted	maketh	made
			2Kng 19:25	done	made	ordained	determined	did	made	made
			Isa 37:26	done	made	ordained	determined	did	did	made
tsavah #6680 - to com-			2Sam 17:14	purposed	appointed	determined	ordained	ordained	willed	ordained
mand, charge, give orders,			Pslm 111:9	commanded	commanded	ordained	commanded	ordained	appointed	commanded
lay charge, give charge			Pslm 119:4	commanded	commanded	laid down	commanded	ordained	commanded	commanded
to, order			Pslm 133:3	commanded	commanded	bestows	ordained	commanded	commanded	commanded
			Isa 45:12	commanded	commanded	marshaled	commanded	ordained	commanded	set in order
			Isa 48:5	commanded	commanded	ordained	commanded	commanded	command	commanded
Lam 2:17; 3:37				commanded	commanded	decreed	ordained	commanded	commanded	commanded
amar #0559 - to say			1Kng 1:36	say	say	declare	ordain	say	say	says
nathan #5414 - to give,			2Kngs 23:5	ordained	ordained	appointed	ordained	appointed	appointed	appointed
put, set			Jer 1:5	ordained	ordained	appointed	appointed	appointed	separated	appointed
			Ezk 28:14	have set	established	ordained	placed	placed	have set	had put
yasad #3245- to found, fix,			1Chr 9:22	ordain	appointed	assigned	established	appointed	appointed	appointed
establish, lay a foundation			Pslm 8:2	ordained	ordained	ordained	founded	established	founded	ordained
suwm #7760 - to put,			1Chr 17:9	ordain	appoint	provide	appoint	appoint	prepared	prepare
place, set, appoint, make			Pslm 81:5	ordained	established	established	made	established	hath placed	ordained
			Hab 1:12	ordained	appointed	appointed	marked	appointed	appointed	appointed
olam #5769- long duration, antiquity, futurity, for ever			2Chr 2:4	ordinance for ever	ordinance for ever	lasting ordinance	ordained forever	required forever	to the age this is	shall be forever
amad #5975- to stand, remain, take one’s stand			2Chr 11:15	ordained	appointed	appointed	appointed	set up	establisheth	made stand
min #4480 - from, out of, an account of, off,			2Chr 22:7	was of	was [God]’s	brought about by	ordained by	was from	from [God] hath been	was from
on the side of			Prv 20:24	of	of	directed by	ordered by	ordained by	from	from
yad #3027 - hand, strength, power			2Chr 23:18	ordained by	established by	had ordered	according to the order of	according to the order of	by the hands of	by the hands of
			2Chr 29:27	ordained by	of	accompanied by	accompanied by	accompanied by	by the hands of	by the hand of
quwm #6965 - to rise, stand			Esth 9:27	ordained	established	to establish	established	established	established	rose up
paal #6466 - to do, make			Pslm 7:13	ordaineth	makes	makes	making	makes	maketh	make ready
kuwn #3559 - to be firm, be			Pslm 8:3	ordained	ordained	set in place	established	ordain	establish	fixed
stable, be established			Pslm 65:9	provided for	prepared	ordained	prepared	prepare	prepare	prepared
arak - #6186 to arrange,			Pslm 132:17	ordained	prepare	set up	prepared	prepared	arranged	prepared
set or put or lay in order, prepare			Isa 30:33	ordained	established	been prepared	been prepared	been ready	arranged	ordained
yatsar #3335- to form, fashion			Pslm 139:16	fashioned	fashioned	ordained	formed	ordained	formed	formed
charats #2782 - to cut, sharpen, decree, determine			Isa 10:23	determined	determined	decreed	decreed	decreed	determined	ordained
shaphath #8239 -to set, put			Isa 26:12	ordain	establish	establish	ordain	establish	appointest	ordain
m@na’ #4483 - to number			Dan 2:24	ordained	appointed	appointed	appointed	appointed	appointed	chosen

All New Testament Occurrences of “Ordain” (& all variants) in 7 Significant Translations (See above for an explanation of this table. He boxes in black should say “ordain[ed]”, but may not always work.)
Greek Word with Strong’s Number and Brief Definition	Verses Where Rendered “Ordain”	King James Version (KJV)	New King James Version (NKJV)	New International Version (NIV)	New Revised Standard (NRSV)	New American Standard (NASB)	Young’s Literal Transltn. (YLT)	Green’s Literal Transltn. (GLT)
Katartizo #2675 - to render sound, complete	Matt 21:16 (O.T. quote)	perfected	perfected	ordained	prepared	prepared	didst prepare	perfected
poieo #4160 - to do, make	Mark 3:14	ordained	appointed	appointed	appointed	appointed	appointed	made
tithemi #5087 - to set, put,	John 15:16	ordained	appointed	appointed	appointed	appointed	did appoint	planted
place	1Tim 2:7	ordained	appointed	appointed	appointed	appointed	was set	appointed
ginomai #1096 - to become, to begin to be	Acts 1:22	be ordained	become	become	become	become	become	become
diatage #1296 - a disposition, arrangement, ordinance	Acts 7:53	by the disposition of	by the direction of	through	as ordained by	as ordained by	by arrangement of	by the disposition of
horizo #3724 - to define,	Acts 10:42	ordained	ordained	appointed	ordained	appointed	ordained	marked out
to determine	Acts 17:26	determined	determined	determined	allotted	determined	ordained	ordaining
	Acts 17:31	ordained	ordained	appointed	appointed	appointed	ordain	appointed
tasso #5021 - to put in	Acts 13:48	ordained	appointed	appointed	destined	appointed	appointed	appointed
order, to station	Rom 13:1	ordained	appointed	established	instituted	established	appointed	ordained
Cheirotoneo #5500 - to vote by stretching out the hand, to create, to appoint	Acts 14:23	ordained	appointed	appointed	appointed	appointed	appointed	handpicked
krino #2919 - to separate, to prefer, to deem, to determine, to judge	Acts 16:4	ordained	determined	reached	reached	decided upon	judged	determined
eis #1519 - into, unto, to, towards, for, among	Rom 7:10	ordained to	to bring	to bring	that promised	to result in	is for	was to
proorizo #4309 - to predetermine, decide beforehand	1Cor 2:7	ordained	ordained	destined	decreed	predestined	foreordained	predetermined
diatasso #1299 - to arrange, appoint, ordain, prescribe,	1Cor 7:17	ordain	ordain	rule [I] lay down	is [my] rule	direct	direct	command
Give order	1Cor 9:14	ordained	commanded	commanded	commanded	directed	direct	ordained
	Gal 3:19	ordained	appointed	put into effect	ordained	ordained	set in order	ordained
Protoimadzo #4282 - to make ready beforehand	Eph 2:10	before ordained	prepared beforehand	prepared in advance	prepared beforehand	prepared beforehand	did before prepare	before prepared
kathistemi #2525 - to set,	Tit 1:5	ordain	appoint	appoint	appoint	appoint	set down	appoint
place, put	Heb 5:1	ordained	appointed	appointed	put in charge	appointed	set	appointed
	Heb 8:3	ordained	appointed	appointed	appointed	appointed	appointed	set in place
cheir #5495 epitithemi #2007 - lay hands on	1Tim 5:22	lay hands…on	lay hands on	laying on of hands	ordain	lay hands upon	laying hands…on	lay hands…on
kataskeuazo #2680 - to furnish, equip, prepare	Heb 9:6	ordained	prepared	arranged	preparations made	prepared	prepared	prepared
entellomai #1781 - to order, command to do, enjoin	Heb 9:20	enjoined	commanded	commanded	ordained	commanded	enjoined	enjoined
prographo #4270 - to write before (of time)	Jude 4	ordained	marked out	written about	designated	long beforehand marked out	written beforehand	of old marked out

Another Greek word, cheirotoneo (Strong’s 5500) is also used twice in the New Testament. The KJV translates it “ordain” in Acts 14:23 where elders are being chosen for the various congregations. The Greek grammar indicates that Paul and Barnabas are doing the choosing, but it is unclear whether they were picking people by their own understanding or if they were conducting an election (more about that later). Nevertheless, cheirotoneo is also used in 2 Corinthians 8:19 when a congregation chose a person to accompany a donation to see that it was used properly. The fact that a group chose the person and that it was a temporary job is very much different than today’s concept of ordination.

Young’s Literal Translation deserves some credit for consistency: the word “ordain” only appears three times in the whole version, each occurrence being translated from the Greek horizo (#3724). However, horizo also appears in five other places where it is translated “define”, “determine”, or “declare”. Apparently, the translators simply decided to write “ordain” in some verses where the Eternal was the One doing the “determining”.

With the exception of the cases noted in the above paragraphs, nearly every other use of the word “ordain” in nearly every translation is a decision made based on the translators’ perception of Christian doctrine. If the Eternal was doing something important, or if church responsibilities were being handed out, they sometimes wrote the word “ordain” instead of the more normal meaning of the Hebrew or Greek. This writer could not find any lexicon or commentary that claimed that any rendering of the word “ordain” came about due to idiom (combination of words with a special meaning) or other linguistic reason. There is no combination of words or particular tense or case of Greek or Hebrew words that are uniformly rendered “ordain”.

The translators felt a need to use it because it was such a big part of “Christian doctrine”—they fit it in the best that they could. The KJV is by far the worst example of forcing this word into the text. The translators used 12 different Hebrew words and 14 different Greek words to translate into “ordain”—the majority of those words are translated “ordain” only once in Scripture. Other translations have followed the King James practice, but to a much more limited degree. You can easily see this by looking at the number of black boxes on the charts. There is not one verse where all seven of these translations agree. In fact, there are only four verses where a majority (4 out of 7) of the translations agree to use “ordain” (Num 28:6; Psalm 8:2; Acts 10:42; Gal 3:19).

This complete disagreement among translators about when to use the word does not make sense for a doctrine that is so specific. This writer once attended a conference of a church group that was re-forming after having departed from a larger church group. They asked every “minister” there if and exactly when he was “ordained”. They were not interested in people who had been “chosen”, “appointed”, “asked”, “determined”, “called”, or even “inspired” to lead a congregation in the past. They wanted to know when they had been “ordained” and who “did it”. They did not necessarily accept “ordinations” from people who were not closely related to their former group. One shudders to think how the questions and answers during this part of the conference could have progressed if the English language had a dozen words, all of which could sometimes mean “ordain”, but usually did not.

From all of this, we must conclude that the modern concept of ordination is not taught in the Bible. There are no Hebrew or Greek words used in the Bible that express the concept understood by today’s meaning of “ordain”. The Bible mentions people who receive the laying on of hands, who serve as leaders of congregations, and who command and teach others. But this common idea in many people’s minds is simply not in the Bible: “There is a class of ordained men who are the only ones authorized for certain spiritual functions and that they are the only ones allowed to approve others for positions of service in the congregation.”

Look over the two tables (pages 17 and 18). If you could speak Greek or Hebrew, were transported back to the first century, and decided to tell the apostles about the people who were “ordained” in our century, what Hebrew or Greek word would you use? Would you have to use a word that is not in the Bible? If you were going to use a biblical word, could you use any from the two tables without being ambiguous? You could use the Hebrew millu which was used for the consecration of the High Priest, but neither it nor a Greek equivalent is ever used for “ordaining” New Testament leaders. The Greek hagiazo translates “to set apart for a holy purpose” and sounds closer to the modern concept of “ordination”. But this word is usually translated “sanctify” and is often used to apply to all who are believers. It is not the Greek equivalent of today’s meaning of “ordain”. However, this writer knows of no other biblical Greek word, phrase or idiom, that is closer in meaning. If there is no way to talk to a first century believer about the “doctrine of ordination” by using biblical languages, can anyone believe that this doctrine existed when the Bible was written?

The Bible certainly mentions spiritual gifts of leadership given to some brethren, and public recognition of authority. But we must realize that the concept of “ordination” as generally understood today is not in the Bible. There simply is no word or group of words with this meaning. When we see the rules given the King James Bible translators, it seems evident that the sporadic inclusions of “ordain” in the translation was part of Rule 3, to retain the “old ecclesiastical words”—whether or not they were a good translation of the Hebrew and Greek! Today, if you were to study church government using the New English Bible, you could not explain “ordination” to anyone. The word is not there, nor will you find any similar word with that concept. (This Bible was not produced by some radical anti-organization group, but by many church groups of the United Kingdom. Its translators just happened to be honest in this particular area.) You would fair little better trying to explain “ordination” from the NIV New Testament—it appears only once—simply stating that the Eternal has “ordained” young people to praise Him (Matt 21:16).

In a later section, this paper will examine most of the scriptures that discuss the various leadership positions within the Church—the spiritual body of believers. This paper will cite translations that attempt to accurately translate the meaning of the original Greek, rather than insert “old ecclesiastical words”. Hopefully, the reader will try to drop the “old ecclesiastical ideas” for this study and take a fresh look at what the Scriptures actually say.

Is “Laying on of Hands” the same as Ordination?

The laying on of hands was used simply as a manner of blessing (Matt 19:13-15, Rev 1:17), to request granting of the Holy Spirit at baptism (Acts 8:17-19; 9:17; 19:6; Heb 6:2), for healing (Matt 9:18; Mark 5:23; 6:5; 7:32; 8:23,25; 16:18; Luke 4:40; 13:13; Acts 9:12,17; 28:8) and to request the imparting of spiritual gifts (1Tim 4:14; 2Tim 1:6). While the subject is not specifically mentioned in James 5:14-16, these verses on healing say that elders should anoint the sick, a process that requires placing one’s hands on another’s head.

Also, the laying on of hands was used to pray for people being given a special function in the church—a public recognition of their responsibilities. In Acts 6:6, seven men, who were already full of the Holy Spirit, were chosen to serve tables, and the apostles laid their hands on them. But in the next two chapters, two of the seven (Stephen and Philip) were preaching on a massive scale. Hands were laid on Barnabas and Paul for a preaching mission in Acts 13:2-3, but that was not their “ordination into the ministry”—they had both preached extensively in previous chapters. There is no indication that it was any kind of new “title” or “rising” in “ministerial rank”. Finally, Paul cautioned Timothy to “not lay hands on anyone hastily” (1Tim 5:22). While the reason is not specifically given, the context is dealing with leaders and problems in the congregation.

Note on Greek Expressions for “Laying on of Hands”: All of the Greek expressions used in the verses discussed here are very similar, except for four places (Acts 8:18, 1Tim 4:14, 2Tim 1:6 and Heb 6:2). In these four verses, the Greek epithesis is used, the only four places it appears in the New Testament. Some Greek dictionaries have a note that this is equivalent to the Hebrew term for the practice of “receiving a special commission or blessing from the Eternal”. It is interesting to note that of the four verses that receive this “special treatment”, two are in regard to baptism, and two are in regard to spiritual gifts—none are specifically about “appointing leaders”. However, this Greek word cannot have too much of a different meaning than the more commonly used epitithemi (“to lay or put”) because the two are used interchangeably in Acts 8:17,18 and 19.

The KJV sometimes uses the expression “put hands on” instead of “laid hands on”, even though the Greek words are the same. It seems the KJV translators (maybe even King James) wrote “put” when a “less important” person was blessed or healed—they may not have wanted to mix their “church office” terminology with that used for “commoners”. The NKJV follows the KJV in this, but the NRSV, NASB and others do a much more consistent job of using “laying on of hands”.

It is interesting to see that the KJV translators invented the above distinction (“lay” vs. “put”) when there was no distinction in the Greek, but failed to differentiate between the Greek words that mean “laid” and those that mean “seized”. The KJV uses the exact same expression “laid hands on” for someone being blessed as for someone being apprehended for prison (Acts 4:3). But since there are no major doctrines based on these “seizing” verses, we will not mention them further.

The first two paragraphs in this section contain all of the references to the laying on of hands that are in the New Testament (except as noted in the box). There are references to the “laying on of hands” in the Old Testament, but most of them are about placing one’s hands on a sacrifice to confess sin (Lev 1:4; 4:15; etc.). There is at least one example of conferring a blessing (Gen 48:13-20) and commissioning a person with a new responsibility (Num 27:23). Kings and prophets were frequently commissioned by a command from the Eternal to anoint: a sort of “oily laying on of hands”. However, it is important to realize that there was no organizational system in the Old Testament where leadership was passed from one man to the next by a continual line of laying on hands or anointing. Unless the Eternal specifically interfered:

1) Kings were succeeded by their sons or the person who killed them.

2) Priests were succeeded by their sons.

3) Judges and Officers were appointed by the people in each city—the same people who gave offerings (Deut 16:16-18).

4) Prophets were chosen directly by the Eternal.

There is no mention of church leaders being succeeded by their sons anywhere in the New Testament. So if we want to assume that any methods of choosing leaders were borrowed from the Old, it would be method #3 or #4, above. We can probably learn much more by looking at the New Testament scriptures:

The exhaustive list of New Testament scriptures, at the beginning of this section, shows that the greatest mention of “laying on of hands” is for healing. Receiving the Holy Spirit is second and recognition of responsibilities in the congregation is third. Let us notice some things that the Scriptures do not say about the “laying on of hands”:

1) That it is a part of “ordination”.

2) That it imparts a permanent position or gift. (Are healings or blessings permanent? John 5:14).

3) That it separates the “ministry” from the “laity”.

4) That it is required for a person to be any kind of church leader.

It is interesting to note that the Scripture says little about who should lay hands on others. While most of the scriptures show that Christ, the Apostles, and Timothy laid hands on others, there are exceptions. James 5:14-16 indicates that “elders” did it. Prophets did it in Acts 13:1-3. A “disciple” named Ananias laid hands on Paul in Acts 9:10-17. Finally, Mark 16:17-18 indicates that it is one of the things that “believers” will do. Some theologians teach that Philip baptized, but was not a “high enough rank” to lay on hands, therefore the apostles had to come and do it for him (Acts 8:12-23). However, this Scripture does not say that Philip could not do it or anything about why he did not, but simply that “the Holy Spirit had not yet come upon any of them” (v 16). It is this writer’s opinion that the Eternal wanted a face to face meeting of Simon the Sorcerer and Peter. Also, if we read the rest of Chapter 8, we see that Philip baptized the Ethiopian eunuch, and preached in all of the cities of 70 miles of coastline (v 40). It makes little sense that Philip would be used to preach to all these people, perform great miracles and signs (v 13), but not be able to lay hands on people to receive the Holy Spirit. If Philip could not lay hands on people to receive the Holy Spirit, does that mean that only apostles can perform that function? This possibility is disproved when Ananias was chosen by the Eternal to lay hands on Paul, after which he was healed and received the Holy Spirit (Acts 9:10-17). It does not say that Ananias was an apostle or some other “high rank”, nor that he was “over Paul”.

Lacking a clear command from the Scriptures, how can anyone set up rules to limit who can lay hands on whom? If the Eternal gave some kind of rules where only apostles or other “high-ranking” leaders could lay hands on others, why would He have bypassed these rules and taken a message directly to Ananias? The explanation is: “All these [spiritual gifts] are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses” (1Cor 12:11).

If we see the laying on of hands as a means of power and control, then it is indeed important to try to restrict who can do it. But if we see it as a means of confirming our desire for the Eternal’s blessing on a person—knowing that the laying on of hands means nothing unless the Eternal actually does bless, then the question, “who can lay on hands?” does not really matter much. The biblical practice of laying on hands is a physical event which sometimes accompanies the spiritual activity of prayer.

If anyone can lay on hands, what will stop people from laying hands on each other for unscriptural or silly reasons? What stops people from praying for unscriptural or silly reasons? Nothing! Both prayer and the laying on of hands are only meaningful when the Eternal takes action. Neither should be done insincerely or contrary to scripture. But this writer can see no scripture restricting any believer from laying hands on another individual to request a special blessing, a healing, or the imparting of the Holy Spirit after baptism. After all James 5:15 states “And the prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up.” If the person has true faith, the Eternal will do what He has promised.

Ministers and Deacons Not Different

When the word “minister” appears in the KJV, it is usually translated from the Greek diakonos (noun meaning “servant” or “minister”) or the diakoneo (verb meaning “to serve” or “to minister”). All occurrences of “deacon” and “deaconess” are translated from these same Greek words. There are no associated adjectives or other linguistic elements to signify a “spiritual” diakonos (minister) or a “physical” diakonos (deacon). The word is also used to describe servants who do physical work.

Separate “offices” of “deacon and “minister” could not possibly have existed in minds of the New Testament writers if they used an identical word for both of them! Can you imagine Paul “raising someone in rank” from a diakonos to a diakonos? The concept of church organizations separately “ordaining” people for spiritual service (ministers) or physical service (deacons) is nowhere in the New Testament.

Even though many Bibles contain both the word “deacon” and “minister”, you can see yourself from a concordance and a Greek Interlinear that they are writing something into the Bible that was not originally there. First, let us find out exactly what diakonos (and related words) really mean. In some cases, it is “a real working servant” and is so translated many times. One example: “but the servants who had drawn the water knew” (John 2:9). Most New Testament Historians agree that the Gospels were written later in the first century, probably after most of Paul’s letters. If diakonos had come to be an important religious title, the Gospel writers would not have used it so much for describing working people—they would have used doulos or some other Greek word for “servant”. Also realize that diakonos is also used to describe women. Martha “served” Jesus (John 12:2) and Phebe was a “servant of the Church” (Rom 16:1).

All Uses of 3 New Testament Greek Words

diakonos #1249, should be “servant”

diakonia #1248 should be “service”

diakoneo #1247 should be “serve”

Matt 4:11; 8:15; 20:26,28; 22:13; 23:11; 25:44; 27:55; Mark 1:13,31; 9:35; 10:43,45; 15:41; Luke 4:39; 8:3; 10:40; 12:37; 17:8; 22:26,27; John 2:5,9; 12:2,26; Acts 1:17,25; 6:1,2,4; 11:29; 12:25; 19:22; 20:24; 21:19; Rom 11:13; 12:7; 13:4; 15:8,25,31; 16:1,27; 1Cor 3:5; 12:5; 16:15; 2Cor 3:3,6,7,8,9; 4:1; 5:18; 6:3,4; 8:4,19,20; 9:1,12,13; 11:8,15,23; Gal 2:17; Eph 3:7; 4:12; 6:21; Phi 1:1; Col 1:7,23,25; 4:7,17; 1Thess 3:2; 1Tim 1:12; 3:8,10,12,13; 2Tim 1:18; 4:5,11; Phm 1:13; Heb 1:14; 6:10; 1Pet 1:12; 4:10,11; Rev 2:19.

This writer believes that the Bibles would be much better understood if the three Greek words in the box, above, were consistently translated as “servant”, “service”, and “serve”. If you have any doubt, please read them all and see. While the actual usage of these three Greek words do vary a little, it would still be better understood in English if we had to determine the meaning by the usage, rather than by allowing Bible translators to make the decision for us—choosing different English words for the same Greek word and losing the underlying connection. All of the above verses make sense if “servant/service/serve” are used, provided that we understand service can be spiritual as well as physical.

Sometimes, using “servant” will shed new light on a scripture. For example, 2 Corinthians 3:6,8,9 (KJV) speaks of “ministers of the new covenant”, and the “ministration of the spirit” being more glorious than the “ministration of condemnation”. Because Paul is showing his leadership in the first three verses of the chapter, some have taken this chapter to be an explanation of the glory of being a “minister” (usually an “ordained minister”) of the New Covenant. However, if we compare these verses to Romans 6:16 which uses the Greek doulos for “servant”, the meaning is clear: “Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?” The verses in 2 Corinthians 3 are talking about everyone serving (or being servants of) a “covenant of the Spirit”, rather than being servants under the Old Covenant. Verse 18 confirms that this section is about all believers, not just Paul and Timothy or “the ministry”: “But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord.”

There are some verses where the word diakonos (“servant”) clearly represents people who were specially designated as having a service function within the Church. Paul greets the “saints”, the “overseers” (“bishops”), and the “servants” (diakonos) (Phil 1:1). Also, 1 Timothy 3 gives qualifications for a “servant”. If there were never any kind of recognition of a person as a diakonos (“servant”), then what need would there be for qualifications? But the position is not one of authority or spiritual capability as most church organizations use it. It is one of service to others (possibly a paid position in some cases, but there is no biblical example or proof of it.) The main emphasis of the word is “doing work for the brethren”. Paul calls himself a diakonos and backs it up with evidence (2Cor 6:4-10; 11:22-28). His evidence is not an “ordination”, the “laying on of hands”, the number of people “under him”, or any such thing. His evidence is the number of things he suffered serving the brethren and preaching the Gospel. Indeed, there is no scripture—even a mistranslation—that ever shows where anyone was “ordained” or had hands laid on them to become a diakonos (minister/deacon/servant).

The Eternal could have inspired the New Testament church to choose or make any word that He wanted to for this function. He could have chosen: “ruler”, “boss”, “captain”, “sergeant”, “know-it-all”, “Christ’s representative”, “holy person”, etc. But, He inspired “servant”. The “offices” used in modern church organizations are indeed much closer to Catholic practice than they are to biblical directives.

How many church organizations today would be interested in dropping their titles of “minister” and “deacon” and calling these men “servants”? The word may sound too demeaning for the position—which probably indicates our concept of the position is different than that found in the Scripture. We will discuss more about the type of leadership the Bible describes in a later section.

Other King James Translation Errors

Self-appointed “Minister” (Servant): “...ye know the house of Stephanas, that it is the firstfruits of Achaia, and that they have addicted [appointed] themselves to the ministry [service] of the saints” (1Cor 16:15, KJV). The Greek tasso everywhere else in the New Testament is translated as “appointed”, “determined” or some other decision-making word that fits its Greek meaning. This writer checked numerous translations and nearly every one had a different English word in this verse. Apparently, the translators knew what tasso meant, but did not want to write something against the doctrines of so many churches—so they had to “come up with something”. Green’s Literal Translation has it right: “and they appointed themselves to ministry to the saints.” If Christ really governs his Church, is it unreasonable that He either allowed or inspired the household of Stephanas to serve the brethren? What is important, that men approve Stephanas’ service, or that the Eternal approve it?

Obviously, many “servants” of the Church were selected by the recommendation of the brethren and/or the appointing by already established leaders. But that was not an excuse for translators to obscure this clear case of self-appointing. There are other cases where important functions in the church were initiated by an individual deciding to do it. Apollos began teaching on his own, but was later accepted by Paul and the brethren (Acts 18:24-28; 1Cor 3:6). Also, notice that Paul tells Timothy: “This is a faithful saying: If a man desires the position of a bishop [overseer], he desires a good work” (1Tim 3:1).

Selective Translation Bolsters “Bishop”: The various spiritual gifts listed in the Bible were usually described by plain, everyday words in Greek. The KJV translators should have used plain, everyday English words to translate them. But because King James instructed them to use old church terminology, they inserted the old Catholic words for church offices. This practice leaves the English reader to believe that the Scriptures actually support church offices rather than the various spiritual gifts mentioned.

The Greek episkopos is translated “bishop” in four places in the KJV (Phil 1:1, 1Tim 3:2, Tit 1:7, 1Pet 2:25), where it apparently applies to only a few men—matching the authoritarian Catholic Church concept of a “boss over many congregations.” It is translated “overseer” (its true meaning) in Acts 20:28 where Paul was addressing many elders of Ephesus (vv. 17-18). The KJV translators would have a hard time if they wrote “bishop” here, because the Catholic concept of “bishop” usually involved only one per city. (The American Standard Version, produced much later, is at least consistent and contains “bishop” here). However, “overseer” would be a much better translation for episkopos if we understand it as “someone who looks out for the welfare of others”, not “someone who bosses others”. (See the latter section on “Elders, Overseers, Pastors”).

Other Religious “Titles” Enhanced: The Greek poimen is translated “shepherd” 16 out of 17 times in the KJV. In Ephesians 4:11, it is translated “Pastor” where there is a list of spiritual gifts that Christ gives to His body. That is the only verse where “pastor” (or any variant) occurs in any major Bible translation. The YLT and Darby say “shepherd” here. There are no other modifying words or other linguistic features that indicate that this is some kind of title or church office. Even when the word is used to refer to Christ (John 10:2,11,12,14,16; Heb 13:20; 1Pet 2:25), it is always translated “shepherd” by nearly every translation. Why? Probably because poimen (“shepherd”) is mentioned with “sheep” in the immediately adjoining verses in nearly every case but Ephesians 4:11. Since there is no church office corresponding to “sheep”, the translators had to keep the obvious meaning and write “shepherd”. Certainly, there is a spiritual gift of “shepherd”—one who leads and guides brethren as a shepherd guides sheep. This is the task of “overseers” or “elders”. But we should not take a modern day definition of “pastor” from a dictionary or church doctrine book and read it back into the Bible. Much of what people expect of a pastor in a typical church organization should be accomplished through spiritual gifts shared among many brethren.

Some church organizations use the term “evangelist” as an ecclesiastic “rank” or title. The Greek word is euaggelistes and appears three times in the New Testament (Acts 21:8; Eph 4:11; 2Tim 4:5). But unless you use some kind of Greek Bible help, most translations do not clearly show that euaggelistes is from euaggelion which is almost always translated “Gospel”. The word euaggelistes should be translated “Gospel-preacher”—clearly connecting the relationship between the two words. In two out of three places, the YLT accurately has “proclaimer of good news”.

The KJV translators did well by not including the terms “layman” or “lay member” and “clergy” into the Bible. Of course, there are no words in the Greek texts that have the meaning of those English words. However, they have crept into modern translations in one or two places.

Creative Insertion of the Word “Office”: In their efforts to bolster “church offices”, the King James translators inserted the word “office” into a few verses for no apparent linguistic reason. In Romans 11:13, “office” was used for the Greek diakonia, elsewhere translated “service” or “ministry”. In Romans 12:4, “office” is inserted for the Greek praxis, instead of “function, deed or work”. The phrase “use the office of deacon” appears in 1 Timothy 3:10,13 where “be servants” (same as “ministers” or “deacons”) would be better. These errors were so blatant and obvious that nearly every modern translation has corrected them: the word “office” does not appear in these passages.

“All Authority” Inserted into Titus 2:15: The KJV reads: “These things speak, and exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise thee”. In English, it sounds like Paul is telling Titus that he has “all authority” over the brethren—as a king or dictator might. The Greek words for “all authority” are pas and epitage. The latter word is used five other times in the New Testament (Rom 16:26; 1Cor 7:6,24; 2Cor 8:8, 1Tim 1:1, Tit 1:3) In all of these cases epitage is translated “commandment” and refers to a commandment of the Eternal. The incorrect use of “authority” makes it sound like Titus was the rebuking authority, not the Eternal’s commandments. Also, the Greek pas is translated “every” 117 out of 1243 times. When pas is used with a word that represents a “class of items”, pas refers to “every item in the class.” This verse would be much more consistently translated if it said “rebuke with every commandment”. Titus was to correct the brethren using every commandment of the Father and Christ.

Matthew 16:18-19 Mistranslated: The first part of this translation error is known to many. “And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter [petros—small stone], and upon this rock [petra—large massive rock] will I build my church.” The Greek shows the Church is not built on Peter but on Christ. The KJV, with no distinction between the size of rocks, leads us to believe that the Church was built upon Peter and, by deduction, his successors. (Most top “church leaders” in big organizations claim to have Peter’s authority in some way.)

Verse 19 is also mistranslated. The Greek here is difficult, but any interlinear will show that there are words in the Greek text which do not appear in most English versions. The KJV says “whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” This sounds as though the Eternal will bind whatever Peter says to bind—whether it agrees with the Eternal’s word or not. However, Young’s literal translation is more clear: “whatever thou mayest bind upon the earth shall be, having been bound in the heavens, and whatever thou mayest loose upon the earth shall be, having been loosed in the heavens.” This version gives Peter permission to bind and loose things on Earth, as long as they are bound or loosed in heaven. This exact same wording is given in Matthew 18:18 where the same power is given to all of the disciples (many more people than the 12 apostles).

Probable Voting References Suppressed: The Greek cheirotoneo literally means “stretching forth the hand”. In Greek literature of about 100 B.C., it certainly meant “selecting by show of hands”—voting. This author could not find an applicable reference work that disagreed with this fact. However, some references concluded that the word had changed meaning over the years to simply “appointed”. One cited Josephus’ Antiquities XIII 2:2 which contains a letter from Alexander, son of Antiochus Epiphanes, where he, of his own decision “appoints” (cheirotoneo) Jonathan as high priest. But does this example prove that cheirotoneo had changed in meaning, or is Alexander simply misusing the word to make his unlawful action look lawful? The new high priest was supposed to be the son of the last high priest—if no son existed a vote was often taken to decide the next priest. Would not Alexander write a nice word that meant “selected by show of hands” so that Jonathan could at least pretend to be a legitimate elected high priest, rather than a puppet? (Some present-day countries still hold mock elections and refer to some officials as elected, even though they are all appointed by a dictator.)

The two verses that use cheirotoneo are: “And when they had ordained [selected by show of hands] them elders in every church, and had prayed with fasting, they commended them to the Lord, on whom they believed” (Acts 14:23). “And not that only, but who was also chosen [selected by show of hands] of the churches to travel with us with this grace...” (2Cor 8:19). Weymouth’s New Testament in Modern Speech (By Richard Francis Weymouth, Harper & Row), does use the expression “selected by show of hands” in both of these verses. Adam Clarke’s and other commentaries agree with this translation. The Greek grammar indicates that Paul and Barnabas did the “selection by show of hands” in Acts, but it is possible that they simply conducted the election. However, in 2 Corinthians, it is clear that the congregation selected the person.

From a historical perspective, we must realize that most Jews of that day accepted the idea of voting—in the synagogues and in the Sanhedrin. This is not to say that the Early church was a “democracy”, and that people voted for every position—but it was apparently used sometimes. If Christ taught the apostles that voting was wrong, we would expect that they would have had to teach that idea to all the congregations. Why, then, would Luke and Paul have used the word cheirotoneo, a word that clearly meant “to vote” in Greek literature that was written only 100 years earlier?

Ekklesia Translated “Church” Instead of “Congregation” or “Assembly”: This is yet another case of choosing old theological terms to keep the people in line, rather than choosing the best translation. The Greek ekklesia simply meant assembly; it did not imply a specific “church building” or “church organization” like the word “church” does today. Of interest, ekklesia is translated “assembly” three times in Acts 19:32,39,41, once for a “lawful assembly”, and twice for a rather unruly mob. “And some cried one thing and some another, for the assembly [ekklesia] was confused, and most of them did not know why they had come together” (v 39). It is also used in Hebrews 2:12, a quotation from Psalm 22:22 to translate from the Hebrew qahal, which is usually translated “congregation” in the Old Testament. “Congregation” or “assembly” would have been a much better translation to use in all cases as the Darby Bible, and YLT, and Geneva Bible (1500’s) have done.

King James was still the head of the Church of England, and was well aware of the “wild things” that were happening on the continent, such as people assembling in houses (Rom 16:5; 1Cor 16:19; Col 4:15; Phm 1:2), without a Catholic priest—or any clergymen at all. King James did not want to be under the Pope, but neither did he want his subjects to think they could simply assemble together on their own to worship. He did not want to get away from the historical idea of “the church” as an official building with an “ordained clergy”.

(Note: For clarity in this paper, we use the term “congregation” to represent a local assembly of brethren, and “Church” for the entire body of Christ. In English, the word “congregation” does not mean many scattered groups of people, but “church” can mean that. If the KJV translators had consistently translated the Greek ekklesia as either “congregation” or “assembly”, one of those words would be used by Protestants instead of “church” today.)

Kingdom Conflict: Luke 17:21 was translated “the kingdom of God is within you” to perpetuate the teaching that the church was the “Kingdom of God” on earth. It was easy to push this deception on people who could not read the Bible for themselves and see the many parables about the Kingdom coming in the future, or read the context and see the Savior was not talking to his disciples but to antagonistic Pharisees. The Greek entos is also used in Matthew 23:26 where it describes things contained by a plate and cup but not embedded inside the material of the plate and cup. Luke was referring to our Savior, standing among the Pharisees, not to something inside each one of the Pharisees. The NRSV correctly states: “…the kingdom of God is among you.”

In Reference to “Arguments from Silence”: Many readers will have noted multiple uses, above, of statements like: “no scripture mentions ‘ordination’ to become a ‘minister’”, “the ‘office of pastor’ is not found in the Scriptures”, etc. Some will say that these are “arguments from silence”—just because the Bible does not say something does not mean it is untrue. For example, the Bible does not say that the Earth is the third planet from the Sun, but it is. Also, much of what we know about the Roman empire is not from the Bible. There are many other examples. However, when it comes to understanding how the Eternal governs, it is very important to know what the Bible does not say!

Once a person comes to realize that most modern-day church offices and organizations are not based on biblical instruction, then two good things happen: 1) It quickly becomes evident that most modern day “church offices” and “church governments” are creations of the Catholic Church and her successors. 2) It is much easier to look into the Bible and read what it does say about how Christ governs His people. If you are willing to accept a church government because you are used to it being done a certain way, and because the Bible does not specifically condemn that way, then this paper may not change your mind much. However, if your desire is to let Christ lead His Body the way He said He would lead it in the Bible, then you will probably realize that the traditional “church organization” is not what He commanded.

Did the New Testament Writers add New Concepts to Old Greek Words? Some church leaders defend their organizations by claiming that there were no Greek words capable of expressing the new “church” concepts, so the apostles had to appropriate existing Greek words and give them new meanings. Some will even go as far as claiming that these “new meanings” have been faithfully preserved by the Catholic and other large churches, and that we can “read them into the Bible” on that basis. This idea is wrong. The Scripture does not tell us about words that are given new meanings—turned into titles of “church offices”. Furthermore, secular church history shows that local “bishops” gradually concentrated their power over nearby congregations and that the “Bishop of Rome” gradually gained power over the other bishops. The earliest writings of the “church fathers” do not claim that they were filling hierarchical offices that Christ or the Apostle set up.

Every Greek-speaking person whom this writer has asked has confirmed that the Greek language is particularly suited to combining words to make new words. You can look in a concordance’s dictionary or in a lexicon and see that a high percentage of the Greek words are a combination of two or more other Greek words. One example is archisunagogos, the Greek word meaning “ruler of the synagogue” (Mark 5:22,35,36,38; Luke 8:49; 13:14,15; Acts 13:15; 18:8,17). This is undoubtedly a word coined by Jews who had learned to speak Greek—they did not simply want to use the Greek word for “king” or “ruler,” “priest,” etc.—they wanted a word that adequately described the position. However, the New Testament does not contain any “new” Greek words invented for “church offices”. We do not have a “ruler of the congregation”, “head of the congregation”, “spiritual-leader” or even a “spiritual servant”. Those Scriptures that describe leadership in the Church simply describe what the leaders did in every-day terms, they do not set up “leadership positions to be filled”.

What Is “The Church” Today and What Has It Been in the Past?

We cannot possibly reach a biblical conclusion on church government unless we know what “The Church” is. We have already explained that the Greek word translated “church” is ekklesia and that it simply means assembly. It was not an exclusively religious term. Unmodified, the Greek ekklesia or “church” refers to the entire body of believers as in Ephesians 5:25: “Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church [ekklesia] and gave Himself for it.” Other times it refers to a local congregation in a certain area: “To the church [ekklesia] which is at Corinth” (1Cor 1:2). The plural form is used to refer to multiple congregations: “so that we ourselves boast to you among the churches [ekklesia] of God” (2Thes 1:4).

Colossians 1:13-18 makes it clear that the “Church” is the body of Christ. 1 Corinthians 12:12 shows there is one body with many members. “…Now if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he is not His” (Rom 8:9). We must have His Spirit to be part of His Body. 1 Corinthians 12:4-6 provides some interesting insights: “Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are differences of ministries [services to others—diakonia], but the same Lord. And there are diversities of activities, but it is the same God who works all in all.” To summarize, it is the spirit inside a person that makes him or her a part of the Body of Christ—the Church, but members of the church may be involved in a great diversity of activities.

So how, then, do we relate this definition of “the Church” to the hundreds of “church organizations” that exist today? Is there one organization that is the “true Church”? Or, do multiple organizations make up the “true Church”? The truth of the matter is that the Bible says nothing about the formation of church organizations. If a church organization refuses to recognize brethren as equals who are “outside the organization”, then it is creating division contrary to Scripture. When the brethren in Corinth began to recognize one Bible teacher as preeminent over the others, Paul told them to stop it (1Cor 1:10-13; 3:1-23). Paul did not tell the Corinthians that they were “not in the church” because they were looking to individual leaders, but he told them they were “babes in Christ” and “carnal” (1Cor 3:1,3).

Today, we find that most people who claim to be Christians are members of some church organization. Some feel their group is the “only true church” or that it is at least somehow better than the others. Making this mistake does not mean that they are not a part of the True Church, but neither does church organization membership assure anyone that they are a part of the True Church. We are not given the job of determining who is and who is not a part of the True Church (James 4:11-12). If others hold doctrines we believe are wrong, or if their life is a poor example, we may decide not to fellowship with them. But no person is given the authority to determine who is and who is not a member of Christ’s True Church. When the sinning member in 1 Corinthians 5:2-7 was put out by the congregation, it was done so his spirit might be saved. He was put out of the local congregation, but the Scripture does not say that the Spirit of Christ was taken away from him or that he was severed from Christ’s body. Later, he repented and returned to the congregation (2Cor 2:5-8).

Someone may say, “I agree with your definition of the Church from the Bible, but we are commanded to assemble with brethren (Heb 10:25) and the only place I can do that is at a service sponsored by a church organization. Is it a sin to go?” The answer is “No”! The apostle Paul attended numerous synagogues. He prayed and sang with them, listened to them speak and they listened to him speak. Some gladly received his preaching of Jesus, others beat him up or threw him out. Similarly, a believer today who understands that church organizations are unbiblical may be able to happily fellowship with some of them, but others may ask about his or her different beliefs and then “put him (or her) out”.

For those who decide to attend services sponsored by an organization, please note that we are not saying that one organization is as good as another. Some church organizations have a high respect for the Bible and will consider the presentation of ideas based strictly on the Bible. Other church organizations teach only their established doctrine—some count their own traditions as equal in authority to the Bible. It is difficult to learn or even speak about much truth in the latter types of organizations. If you have to choose between several organizations for fellowship, you will need to pray about it, and then choose the group where you can learn and serve the most. It is possible that there are church organizations where most of the people have the Spirit of Christ. It is also possible that there are organizations where nobody has that Spirit.

Some people may be uncomfortable with the idea of scattered brethren—that there is no “church membership role” anywhere in the world identifying the true members of the Church. But note how the Eternal answered Elijah when he thought he was the only one left who was faithful to the Eternal (1Kngs 19:14): “Yet I have reserved seven thousand in Israel, all whose knees have not bowed to Baal, and every mouth that has not kissed him” (1Kngs 19:18). Elijah was a great prophet, yet he did not know about these righteous people, nor did the Eternal even tell him where they were. We can rest assured that our Father in heaven is carefully maintaining that information in the Book of Life (Phil 4:1-3). This book will be used to make sure that everyone is judged fairly (Rev 20:12,15).

Also some people may be uncomfortable with the idea that members of the true Church are scattered among groups and do not all hold the same doctrines. However, letters to the seven different congregations (Rev 1:11; chapters 2-3) show beyond any doubt that members and congregations can have different doctrines and still be part of the True Church. This is the only view that seems historically possible. There is no known church organization that has existed from the first century until now that has had the same doctrines the entire time. There is not even a historically-verifiable set of doctrines that have always been held by some people (regardless of organizational affiliation) for 1900 years. Every organization and every “movement of thought” varied to some degree in their doctrine—depending on whether they were learning more or sliding into error. We will simply have to trust Christ to straighten it all out in the end. “My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me” (John 10:27).

Christ Is the Head

When people learn of a church group, one of the first questions they ask is, “Who is the head of it?” The answer should come from the Bible: “...Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior” (Eph 5:23, KJV). But when people are asking this question about a specific church organization, the question they want answered is: “Who is the human head of the organization?” But, if our success or very salvation depends upon how well we follow the human head of a church organization, is it not amazing that the New Testament never contains a single statement about a “human head of the Church”? Would the Eternal really let our salvation hang on a concept not explained in the New Testament? It is much more difficult to believe in a leader whom we cannot see (John 20:29). But if we have a close relationship with our Savior and really believe that He lives in us and leads us, we should be able to follow Him whether we have a human to teach us or not:

That the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints (Eph 1:17-18).

That we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ (Eph 4:14-15).

The mystery which has been hidden from ages and from generations, but now has been revealed to His saints. To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles: which is Christ in you, the hope of glory (Col 1:26-27).

But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for everyone. for it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings (Heb 2:9-10).

But the anointing which you have received from Him abides in you, and you do not need that anyone teach you; but as the same anointing teaches you concerning all things, and is true, and is not a lie, and just as it has taught you, you will abide in Him (1Jn 2:27).

It should be clear from these verses that Christ is the Head, and that He works with each person in His Body, the Church.

There is Leadership: Apostles & Prophets are Foundation

Let us examine the main scriptures that indicate there is leadership in the Church.

[The household of God] having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for a habitation of God in the Spirit (Eph 2:20-22).

And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ; that we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness by which they lie in wait to deceive, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head¾Christ... (Eph 4:11-15).

And God has appointed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, after that miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, administrations [“governments” in KJV], varieties of tongues. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Are all workers of miracles? Do all have gifts of healings? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret? But earnestly desire the best gifts... (1Cor 12:28-31).

These verses leave no doubt that Christ is the Head, and the apostles and prophets are the principal leaders of the Church. In addition, we see many other spiritual gifts given to the brethren—not just to the apostles or “ministry” (see also Rom 12:3-8 and 1Cor 12:1-11). Paul told everyone to desire these gifts. He gave some relative order to three of these gifts in the last passage—listing apostles first as they were taught directly by Christ, prophets second as they speak for the Eternal, and teachers third because they have the critical task of teaching the brethren.

Since all of these lists of gifts differ, it is difficult to believe Christ had ever given a specific “list of Church offices in hierarchical order”. If so, why were not evangelists and pastors listed before teachers in the last passage? Also, are we to assume that miracle workers are in charge of the healers, the helpers in charge of the administrators, etc? Obviously not!

The Scriptures do not say that we must “lay hands on” men before they can do any of the jobs in these lists. However, there are several examples of the laying on of hands for some of these jobs (serving widows in Acts 6:6, Barnabas as an apostle in Acts 13:3; 14:14, and Timothy as an Evangelist in 1 Timothy 4:14 and 2 Timothy 4:5). We can find no scriptures against the modern day practice of laying hands on men for specific duties in our congregations, as long as we realize that this is not a permanent “rank”—that situations do change.

The purpose of all these gifts is highlighted in boldface in the second passage, above. They are not to control the believers, but to equip the saints (members) for the work of the service, so they attain the “fullness of Christ” and so they will not be fooled when tricky men come with false doctrines. Unfortunately, too many organizations have taken the opposite approach; they try to “shelter the flock” so they never hear or see any wolves, and make them completely dependent upon the “shepherds” for everything. Our Savior said He wanted all of us to be like Him (Matt 5:48; John 17:20-23). Human shepherds sometimes die, become transferred, lose their job, or turn into wolves. The purpose of spiritual gifts is to train all the brethren to be able to be like their Elder Brother, so they can stand both now and in the Kingdom.

What Makes an Apostle?

The Greek word used for “apostle” in the New Testament is apostolos. It means “one sent”. “Emissary” or “envoy” are acceptable translations. (The JNT translation uses “emissary” instead of “apostle”.) Its most common usage in the Bible is to designate those whom Christ specifically called to be witnesses to His work: “He [Jesus] called His disciples to Himself; and from them He chose twelve whom He also named apostles” (Luke 6:13). Also: “Paul, a bondservant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated to the gospel of God” (Rom 1:1). In these verses, “apostle” is used as a title—an official appointment by Christ.

But it is essential to realize that the Greek apostolos is also used to describe other “sent” individuals—who are not apostles in the above sense. “Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent [apostolos] greater than he who sent him” (John 13:16). In this verse, apostolos is used as a general term for anyone who is sent. Also: “…if our brethren are inquired about, they are messengers [apostolos] of the churches, the glory of Christ” (2Cor 8:23). Here, all the brethren are referred to as “apostles of the churches”. In a sense, every member represents his or her congregation. Please note that the term “apostle of Christ” is not used here.

There is one more case where apostolos is used for someone who was not a direct witness of Jesus. “Yet I considered it necessary to send to you Epaphroditus, my brother, fellow worker, and fellow soldier, but your messenger and the one who ministered to my need” (Phil 2:25). The text clearly states that Epaphroditus was “one sent” by the Philippians; he was not “one sent of Christ”.

Most of the uses of the Greek apostolos require no guesswork as to who is the one doing the sending. Paul explicitly states he is “Paul, an apostle (not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father who raised Him from the dead).” All these other references to “apostles” also specifically indicate that they “were sent” and specifically chosen “of Christ” (John 15:16; 1Cor 1:1; 2Cor 1:1; Gal 1:1; Eph 1:1; Col 1:1; 1Thes 2:6; 1Tim 1:1; 2Tim 1:1; 2Tim 1:10-11; Tit 1:1; 1Pet 1:1; 2Pet 1:1; 3:2; Jude 17). There is no chance that Christ’s apostles were appointed or elected by other men. When the scriptures tell us the Church is founded on the “apostles and prophets” (Eph 2:20) it must be referring to divinely appointed apostles and prophets, not those who are self-appointed or appointed of other men.

The original twelve were chosen directly by Christ after an all-night prayer (Luke 6:12-13). “And He appointed twelve, that they might be with Him and that He might send them out to preach, and to have power to heal sicknesses and to cast out demons” (Mark 3:14-15). It is important to realize that these apostles were never told that they were the human heads of church government or that they were to begin a “church organization”. They were called to witness Christ’s work and then demonstrate His power and truth to others. Christ repeated this purpose to the apostles shortly before His death. “And you also will bear witness, because you have been with Me from the beginning” (John 15:27).

After Christ’s death, the disciples realized they should replace Judas. They remembered what Christ said about the purpose of an apostle. “Therefore, of these men who have accompanied us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John to that day when He was taken up from us, one of these must become a witness with us of His resurrection” (Acts 1:21-22). Peter spoke this purpose, but “they,” the 120 disciples (Acts 1:15,23) recognized it and found two men that met the qualifications: Barsabas and Matthias. Yet, they did not take it upon themselves, nor did Peter take it upon himself, to “appoint” a new apostle. They prayed for the Father’s decision and they cast lots (see page 62 for more detail).

The original twelve apostles were sent to Israel. Later, it seems that “James, the Lord’s brother” was considered an apostle (Gal 1:19). (He should not be confused with James the son of Zebedee or James the son of Alpheus.) James, being from Christ’s own family certainly could bear witness to Christ in a way that most others could not.

Even though the apostle Paul was not with Christ during his early ministry, he was still called and taught directly by Christ. Parts of the story are related several places with varying details (Acts 9:1-19; Acts 22:6-21; Gal 1:11-24). Paul was chosen and taught directly by revelation from Christ for three years—a substitute for not having been with Him on earth (Gal 1:1,12,18). Paul and Barnabas were sent to the Gentiles. When Paul had to show his qualifications compared to some other “most eminent apostles,” he did not claim he was “head” of the Gentile converts and that “God’s government” was through him. He told them the “signs of an apostle were accomplished among you with all perseverance, in signs and wonders and mighty deeds” (2Cor 12:12). This is consistent with the many miracles of the original apostles.

In Acts 14:14 Barnabas is referred to as an apostle. He appears to be an apostle of Christ in the same way as the others. He was chosen by a revelation of the Holy Spirit:

Now in the church that was at Antioch there were certain prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon who was called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul. As they ministered to the Lord and fasted, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Now separate to Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’ Then having fasted and prayed, and laid hands on them, they sent them away” (Acts 13:1-3).

While the Scripture does not specifically say that Barnabas was with Christ during his earthly teaching, there is a very strong indication. Right after Christ’s death, Barnabas sold his land and gave the money to the other apostles (Acts 4:36-37). He must have known them for some time in order to give such a large part of his wealth to them. Also, the apostles must have known him well as they gave him a new name. Finally, we find that Barnabas had the “signs of an Apostle”—he was used to work miracles and wonders (Acts 15:12).

The New Testament also speaks clearly of false apostles (2Cor 11:13, Rev 2:2). It appears that some were calling themselves “most eminent apostles” (2Cor 11:5; 12:11), but Paul gives them credit for nothing worthwhile. Since Paul states he was an apostle “not through men... but through Jesus Christ” (Gal 1:1), some must have claimed to have been made apostles by men in some way. There is nothing positive recorded about these other apostles in Scripture.

Of course, there have been many people in many religions throughout history claiming to be apostles—maybe you know of some. However, this writer has never heard or read of anyone who claimed to receive all of his teaching directly from Christ, and who performed the signs and wonders of the original apostles. Some modern “apostles” may claim a few meetings or visions with Christ; others claim great inspiration from the Holy Spirit. Most claim to learn “directly by the written word of Christ, the Bible”. These “taught by Christ” claims all fall apart when we see that these men failed to discern the errors in the King James or other translations. Nearly all of these “would-be apostles” teach that “ministers” are “ordained” for spiritual service and “deacons” are “ordained” for physical service. But the New Testament does not teach that. How does “an apostle” who claims to be divinely taught, teach a major doctrine that is in opposition to the original New Testament teaching? The truth of the matter is that every human “apostle” alive today, whom this writer has heard of, has been taught mainly by the Bible, with occasional intervention by Christ. Today, everyone reads a Bible with some textual and translation errors—errors which they are not always aware of. Being taught by the Bible is not the same as direct teaching through Christ.

This writer is not claiming to have a perfect understanding of the scriptures, either. This writer realizes that he could grow old and die before he will have a chance to study thoroughly every biblical issue, taking into account all of the significant Hebrew and Greek words, and all of the possibly related verses. The point of this section is that we do not appear to have any human apostles in our day—people who were trained directly by Christ and who are used to perform great miracles. If there were some, they would know from their training where our Bible translations differ from the teachings of Christ—without looking at the Hebrew and Greek! (We should be able to verify their teaching by study, of course.)

Even if the Hebrew and Greek Scriptures were perfectly understood, they do not contain everything that Christ taught (John 20:30; 21:25). The apostles spent three years with Him. The New Testament can be read in three days or studied in three months. Now it is quite possible that somebody will be trained directly by Christ and sent in the future to witness and perform miracles. This person would be an apostle in the sense of the original apostles. “Elijah” is prophesied to come and restore all things (Mal 4:5-6, Mat 17:11). The original Elijah performed many miracles; John the Baptist, a type of Elijah, performed no miracles (Matt 11:13-14, John 10:41).

by Norman Scott Edwards

March 2004

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