We appreciate your coming. We wanted to take this opportunity—maybe about an hour and a half, until about three. These brothers have some questions they wanted to ask you, so the format will be that I ask the questions they gave to me.
The first question is: Should those people who are functioning as elders and deacons be acknowledged before the local body as such?
Well, I do not know how those who function as elders or deacons come about. Do they come naturally, or how do they come about?
When we first got together, some brothers began to meet. There was not any leadership except what was provided in teaching. Then we came to a point where we felt we needed to talk about leadership. Through this, the Word showed us that He wanted leaders, and He appointed His leaders through the group.
Later, we felt we needed some deacons to take care of functional matters—property responsibilities and other practical matters. So deacons were appointed to serve, while the elders were in leadership. That is how it came about, and that is where we are now.
My question is: Have they not all been recognized already?
Let us forget the local situation and just go to the principles that govern this matter of responsibility in the church.
I think we know that the church is a spiritual body. Being a spiritual body, you do not try to organize it from outside, because if you try to organize it from outside, it ceases to be a spiritual body. It becomes an organization.
As a spiritual body, everything comes out from life within. There is an organization; as a matter of fact, our body is very well organized, highly organized. But it is not organized from outside. It is the natural development and expression of life.
So, the church being a spiritual body, whether those who function as elders, those who function as deacons, or those who function in different areas, it should be a matter of life. As life begins to express itself, those with spiritual eyes will see it without doubt.
Even though in Scripture you find, for instance, that Paul came back and, as it were, recognized certain ones as elders, in Acts 20 he told the elders in Ephesus that it was the Holy Spirit who had appointed them. In other words, the apostles simply recognized and confirmed what the Holy Spirit had already manifested.
First of all, in any assembly, elders should not be appointed by anyone. Elders should be manifested by the Holy Spirit from within the body. As people begin to come together naturally, there will be some upon whom the Lord puts a sense of responsibility. Out of that sense of responsibility, they begin to function faithfully.
In doing that, everybody knows. You do not need to make an announcement concerning who the elders are. By their functions, people know that they are functioning as elders.
Why is it that they need to be recognized publicly, in a formal way? My understanding is that such recognition is not for those who are spiritual. It is for those who are not spiritual.
People who are spiritual recognize and know their place in the body. But people who are not spiritual need something formal to make them understand where the responsibility is. Public recognition is for the sake of those who are not able to recognize what the Lord has done. It helps them know their place and function in coordination.
But we have to remember that, basically, elders and deacons are not offices. They are functions. The problem comes when it becomes more of an office than a function. Then the church has fallen into organization.
In the early days, you do find that elders were appointed. But let me put it this way: in the church at Jerusalem, we never find any clear word concerning how the elders in Jerusalem came to be.
In the beginning, you find the apostles, trained by the Lord Himself. When the church began, naturally they took up all the responsibilities. As a matter of fact, they took too much responsibility.
Finally, the Holy Spirit had to correct them through the murmurings of the Hellenistic Jews, because their widows were not being cared for properly. To expect twelve people to take care of ten thousand people in every way was impossible. They took care of both the spiritual and physical matters, and everything else. This was not God’s will.
In other words, the Lord did not lay down a kind of rule and say, “Now, what are the functions of elders, the functions of deacons, and who is to do what?” The Lord never gave them such instructions. They had to find their way through the Holy Spirit’s revelation and discipline.
In the beginning, the apostles took care of everything in the church. In doing that, they were not able to do everything. Not only that, but in a sense they hindered others who should have functioned in the church.
Finally, the Lord raised up a situation, and thank God they were humble enough to recognize that they were not superhuman—Superman.
You first find the seven chosen in order to meet a need. The apostles asked the brothers and sisters to choose seven men full of the Holy Spirit, of good report, and so forth, and to recommend them. The first seven were not chosen by the apostles. They were chosen by the church, by the brothers and sisters, and recommended to the apostles. The apostles then appointed them.
Even so, you do not find these seven called deacons. The word deacon was not there. Scripture never says that these seven were deacons. Today, looking back, we say they were deacons because the work they did was the work of deacons. But the title was not there.
In other words, it was not an office; it was a function. They did not have the title, but there was a function there. They were doing it.
Because some of them were faithful, you find that when the particular work of serving tables was no longer needed because of persecution, the Lord gave them a higher work. You find Stephen, and you find Philip becoming an evangelist.
When you come to Acts 11, you find the elders in the church at Jerusalem. These elders were no longer simply the apostles. Perhaps Peter and John also served as elders in the church at Jerusalem, but apart from these two, the other ten were not there as elders.
How the elders came about at that time, there is no record. Whether they had deacons afterward, we do not know. We would say that the functions must have been there, because if you have a group of people, some must take the lead and others must do the practical work.
That shows that the church is a spiritual body. Function is the principle, and office is not the important thing to consider.
With the Gentile churches in different places in Galatia, Paul publicly recognized elders later on, but he did not do it in the beginning. He simply let the brothers and sisters meet together without saying who was to take the lead. He let the Holy Spirit manifest it. When the Holy Spirit manifested it, Paul recognized it with spiritual understanding.
Unfortunately, as the church began to grow, if you read church history, you find that more and more people fell into taking elders and deacons as offices. When you take these as offices, you are confronted with the question of who will appoint them, how they should be appointed, and whether they should be publicly recognized.
Different denominations, whether Catholic, Greek Orthodox, or otherwise, do these things differently. Each may have some truth in it, but you find that human interpretation and human ways begin to develop all these things. Christianity becomes more an institution than a spiritual body.
For us today, there are two things we should consider. One is this: in view of the confusion that exists in Christianity today, are we able to restore elders and deacons as offices? Or is it that, in the Spirit of God’s recovery, the function is restored but not the office?
By office, I mean something publicly appointed and recognized as such.
For example, take Bridgeville. You are not the only Christians meeting in Bridgeville. There are others. In Scripture, you find elders of the church in a locality; you do not find elders of a group of Christians.
In the thought of the Word of God, God’s people are one. To express that oneness, locality is the way to express it. People living in the same community are together, and that expresses unity. It is recognized as the church in Jerusalem or the church in Antioch.
Today, however, this becomes an impossibility because God’s people are scattered, even within one community. They are not together. If you try to appoint elders, what kind of elders are you appointing? You may be able to appoint elders for a group of believers, but they cannot represent the elders of the whole church in that locality.
Many years ago, a dear brother, greatly used by God, told me that he appointed elders in different cities and was himself an elder in his own locality. I asked him, “Suppose some brothers and sisters are not meeting with you. Are you able to exercise your eldership and supervision over them? Are you able to deal with them or discipline them when discipline is needed?”
Of course, you cannot, because they do not belong to you and are not with you. Your jurisdiction is restricted to those brothers and sisters meeting with you.
If this is the case, then that kind of eldership is not scriptural—not in the scriptural sense. In Scripture, an elder is an elder of the whole church, never merely an elder of a group of believers.
To me, in our day, unless you go to virgin soil where there are no Christians and you begin a work there, so that all the believers are really together, then this is possible, as in the early days of the church. But in our day, I feel it is impossible. Even if you do it, it is not really Scripture; you have already changed it.
Personally, I feel this is the day of recovery. In the days of recovery, it seems to me that God does not recover the outward form. He recovers the inward reality, because that is the thing which can be recovered and must be recovered. Outward things are secondary.
The function of elders and deacons should be recovered, but the title is something to which we do not need to give too much attention.
The second thing is this: suppose we want to do it. Then how are we going to do it? In Scripture, you only have examples. As a matter of fact, you do not have teaching, but examples that Paul appointed elders.
Paul not only appointed elders, but he wrote to Titus and asked him to appoint elders in Crete. One thought, then, is that elders can only be appointed by apostles. But then you have to go back to apostolic succession. Otherwise, you have a problem.
If you do not believe in apostolic succession, then you have to believe there are apostles today. Who are the apostles today? That becomes a matter of great controversy.
Thirty years ago, people commonly said there were no more apostles. But today, in certain circles, everybody is an apostle. So you have a problem.
If you say elders must be appointed by apostles, then who are the apostles? Even an apostle is not universal. An apostle is only an apostle to those churches he has brought into being. Paul was an apostle to Gentile churches, but when he came to Jerusalem, he could not exercise apostolic authority. On the contrary, he submitted himself to the authority of the church in Jerusalem.
Consider the church at Antioch. No doubt they had elders, but the Bible never mentions elders in the church at Antioch. The church existed before there were apostles. Actually, apostles were produced from the church.
You do not have any appointment of elders in Antioch. The church at Antioch was not brought into being by apostles. Some people say that without apostles there can be no church, but here you have a church that had no apostle and actually produced apostles.
If apostles were produced out of the church, do you think Paul and Barnabas could appoint elders in the church at Antioch? I do not think so. But that does not mean there were no people functioning as elders in the church at Antioch. There must have been. Yet elders are never mentioned.
The function is there. In different places, even in the early days, matters were different. In some places, elders were appointed. In other places, they came naturally without being appointed. In some places, they were publicly recognized; in other places, they were never publicly announced.
It depends on the situation in different churches. There is no teaching telling us how to appoint elders, but we do see that wherever God’s people are, there are people functioning as elders.
The term “responsible brothers” is not scriptural in the sense that it is not found in Scripture. It describes a function; it is not a title. The function is to take responsibility for the whole church.
Once an elder is appointed, is he an elder for life? What is his tenure? There is a real problem. Scripture never tells us how to retire an elder.
If an elder commits sins, we have Scripture telling us how to deal with that. But if an elder does not sin, yet rarely comes to the meetings, does not take responsibility, and other brothers and sisters are going ahead, while he is still standing as an elder, he becomes a hindrance instead of leading the church. How are you going to deal with it?
If he is appointed for life, like a Supreme Court justice, then you must wait until either he dies or wants to retire. We do not have any Scripture to go by.
Can we learn from the history of the church concerning this matter? So far as I know, there is nothing in church history that can serve as an example, because things have already gone so far away from Scripture. Different denominations have different ways of doing things, but they are too far away from Scripture to use as examples. When you go to Scripture, you do not find much there either.
Again, I would say there are two possibilities. One possibility is based on spiritual principle. Those who function as elders do so as a function. Whenever that function is no longer functioning properly, that is the time the man should retire. If other people are raised up by the Lord and manifest that function, then they should be in that place of responsibility.
Personally, I do not feel right appointing elders. When I was in New York, people asked me to appoint elders, and I refused. To me, it is a function. God wants to recover function.
As Scripture says, those who aspire to eldership desire a good work. All the brothers should have a desire to serve. This desire to serve is a good desire, and we should encourage all the brothers and sisters to have a desire to serve.
To serve as elders is actually to be the servant of all. Elders are really the servants of all the brothers and sisters. They serve and labor more than the other brothers and sisters. That is what elders really are. It is not an office or a position, but a service, just as our Lord served His disciples and washed their feet.
If those who function as elders come because the Holy Spirit manifests them through their functioning, then naturally they will be dropped if their function begins to wane or stop. Other people raised by God should naturally take over.
We are still functioning on that basis. We have seven brothers taking responsibility, but all the brothers and sisters know that any brother whom the Lord manifests will be drawn into responsibility. If those in responsibility are not able to function properly—perhaps because they travel too much or are no longer in touch—then naturally they should be dropped.
Through the years, we have had people drop out and people added. Then the problem of whether elders are for life does not arise.
The only instance I can think of is in the Old Testament. You find the Levites came into service, and when they were fifty, they retired from active service. But Scripture says that they took the charge.
As Levites, they served in the temple. It was daily service and physical activity. They were actively involved. When they were fifty, they retired. They were not in active service anymore, but that did not mean they had nothing to do with the temple. They took the charge of the temple.
There is no definition of what “taking the charge” means. But, to my understanding, they were actually promoted. To take the charge is more important than daily activity. People can be involved in daily activity and yet not know what it is all about or why they are doing these things.
To take the charge is to know what God really desires for His people. It is vision. They have vision, experience, discernment, and understanding. They are there to watch and see lest the whole thing begin to go in the wrong direction. They are keeping the charge, seeing that the testimony is maintained in a spiritual direction.
With the children of Israel, there was a physical way of doing things. With us today, it is not a matter of age. It does not mean that you must be thirty and then retire at fifty. It is a spiritual thing.
It is a good thing when brothers who have been in responsibility for some time encourage younger ones to come up and take more and more responsibility. When the day comes that these younger ones catch the vision and are able to take over the responsibility, I think it is very good if the older ones retire themselves and let the younger ones go ahead.
Why do I say this? I say it for two reasons. When people become too old, or have been in responsibility too long, they tend to get into a certain pattern. They have been doing things for so long that this is the way they know, and it feels safe and secure. Gradually, they can lose touch with the younger generation. They do not know their needs.
It is good if the older generation steps aside and the second generation begins to care for the third generation, instead of the first generation taking care of the third or fourth generation. I think there is wisdom in that.
But again, it is a spiritual matter. Whether the younger ones are ready, whether the older ones have given them enough training and help, whether a whole generation must step aside, or whether some should retire while others remain for a period to help—it depends on how the Lord leads.
The next question concerns Ephesians 4:11-13, particularly in relation to verse 13. When will verse 13 take place in connection with the gifts in verse 11?
And He gave some to be apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers;
for the perfecting of the saints, unto the work of ministering, unto the building up of the body of Christ:
till we all attain unto the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God,
unto a full-grown man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.
Verse 11 tells us that Christ, the Head, because He loves the church, gave the church four different classes of men as gifts: apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastors and teachers. Pastors and teachers are one class, so actually there are four classes of people whom Christ the Head gives to the universal church as His gifts.
He gave them to the church for a specific work of ministry. That specific ministry is to perfect, equip, and mature the saints. Through their ministry of the Word, they build up the saints spiritually so that they are able to function as members of the body of Christ.
Their work is not to build the church directly. Their work is to build the brothers and sisters spiritually, so that, being built up, matured, and equipped, they are able to function as members of the body of Christ.
Their ministry has a view: it is with a view to the work of ministry. The ministry referred to there is not the ministry of the four classes of men. It is body ministry.
The ministry of the four classes of men is the ministry of perfecting and equipping the saints. As Paul said, it is to present everyone perfect in Christ Jesus. But the work of ministry is another ministry: the ministry of the body.
The body of Christ is built by the ministry that comes out of the body, not merely by ministry coming upon the body. Until all the members of the body begin to function, the body of Christ is not built.
This is re-emphasized in Ephesians 4:16:
From whom all the body fitly framed and knit together through that which every joint supplieth,
according to the working in due measure of each several part,
maketh the increase of the body unto the building up of itself in love.
The body builds itself up. How does it build itself up? It is built by all the different ministries that come out of the body. This is the meaning of edification: the building up of the body of Christ until we all arrive.
You need to encourage and help all the members of the body to come forward, contribute, participate, and exercise the gifts God has given them. This is the way that eventually we may arrive at the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God.
Obviously, not every fellowship will have apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers. How then can a local fellowship be fully equipped to attain unity without having access to all these classes of gifted people?
There is no problem. Suppose in an assembly God has not sent an apostle, prophet, pastor and teacher, or evangelist. That does not mean the church cannot receive the ministries of apostles, prophets, teachers, and evangelists.
We have all these books and tapes. We can still receive help from them. As a matter of fact, we are still receiving help from Paul the apostle.
Perhaps it is better not to have all these people present, because you may have more problems if you do. Unfortunately, God’s servants today are not as pure as they should be.
The other thing is that the Lord will never raise up an assembly and fail to provide for it. I do not believe that. People come to me and say they do not have anyone to teach them or speak to them. They ask, “How can we go on without such help?”
I always ask them, “Can you imagine that the Lord would raise up a group of brothers and sisters and, being the Head of the church, not be responsible to supply what they need?” I cannot imagine that.
The problem is that brothers and sisters are not taking up their responsibility. If brothers and sisters take up their responsibility, even if they all have one talent—no one with two talents and no one with five talents—let all those one talents circulate. Then you have enough teaching, exhortation, encouragement, and everything else.
No problem. You have less trouble.
A body far from here has been without a pastor for about a year. They are seeking someone from outside their body to fill that position. How can they be exposed to the truth of the functioning of the corporate body? Would it be appropriate for someone to assume a pastoral-teacher role until they can walk on their own, or would it be more scriptural to teach them through occasional visits and trust the Spirit to teach them from within?
You cannot correct a wrong concept by starting on the wrong foot. You cannot accept the pastorship of that place and then try gradually to bring them out of that pastorship. I do not think you can do that.
What you can do is visit them, teach them, and try to show them until they see it.
It is not easy, because people’s minds are probably set. To have no pastor means that they must take responsibility, and people do not want to take that responsibility. Whether you will succeed in guiding them into the right way, I do not know. But if they come to you, you should try to help them, though probably the success rate will be very low.
Would a person who takes responsibility to go to such a group be functioning in the role of an apostle?
Yes, but I hesitate very much, because apostle in Scripture has different senses. In a general sense, apostles are sent ones—those sent by the Lord for a mission. That is an apostle in the broad sense.
But apostle also has a narrower, stricter sense. In that sense, you find some apostles, some prophets, some teachers, and some evangelists. Not all sent ones are apostles. Some who are sent may be teachers or evangelists, but they are not apostles.
Those who are sent are sent by the Lord. If I remember correctly, in 2 Corinthians, perhaps chapter 9, two brothers sent by the churches to take care of the contribution are called messengers of the churches. The original word is apostles—apostles of the churches—because they were sent out.
That is the broad sense of the word. I hesitate to say that every work is an apostolic work, because that is putting too much into it.
How do we, as members of the body, function with other believers who do not have a vision of the united church or the corporate body? Is there a basis for ongoing contact and fellowship?
Those who have a vision of the body are open to fellowship with all brothers and sisters. In their minds, there is no such thing as, “You belong to a Baptist church,” or, “You belong to a Methodist church.” In their minds, the question is: Do you belong to Christ?
With that mentality, you ignore denominational lines and fellowship with believers on the basis that they are members of the one body. That is the basis of our fellowship.
The basis of fellowship is life. The degree of fellowship is light.
You cannot make light the basis of fellowship. For example, if I believe in immersion and make that the basis of fellowship, that is wrong. The basis of fellowship is life. But it is true that the degree of fellowship is measured by light.
With some people, you can fellowship to a certain degree. With others, you can have full fellowship. But that does not mean you should have no fellowship with anyone who has less light or different light. You still should fellowship.
Are there basic issues where we would deny ourselves fellowship with other believers—for example, with a Christian who believes abortion is acceptable?
You fellowship with him only in Christ. If anything is outside Christ, of course there is no fellowship. You can fellowship with him concerning the Christ you know and the Christ he knows. But if he goes outside Christ, then there is no fellowship.
You do not need to cut off fellowship because he has something that is outside Christ. Fellowship with him in whatever is in Christ. That is safe. Do not try to fellowship with him outside Christ, or try to convince him that something outside Christ is part of Christ and must be believed.
First of all, love the brothers.
When missionaries receive a burden to go forth into the mission field, how necessary is it for the corporate body to share that burden? If someone is called from a fellowship into ministry elsewhere, what is the fellowship’s responsibility?
I think there is a great misunderstanding of Acts 13. In Acts 13, Paul and Barnabas were sent out by the Holy Spirit. In the church at Antioch, you find five prophets and teachers ministering together. They represent the local ministry; they are not the elders of the church.
The Holy Spirit said:
Separate Me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them.
Then, having fasted and prayed, and having laid their hands on them, they let them go. Who were “they”? The other three prophets and teachers.
Today, people interpret this as though the whole church at Antioch laid hands on them and sent them out. But if you read the context, it was the other three, because they were ministering together and two of them were going out. They laid hands on them to show that, though the Holy Spirit had sent them out, they were with them.
The church never sent out anybody. It is the Holy Spirit who sends out. It is the Lord who sends out. Therefore, those who go are not servants of the church in the sense that the church controls them.
Missionaries today are often sent out by churches, so the church has control over them. But they are the Lord’s servants, not church servants. They are responsible to the Lord.
That does not mean the church says, “We have nothing to do with that.” When Paul and Barnabas had difficulties in Acts 15, Paul chose Silas and went forth, “being commended by the brethren unto the grace of the Lord.”
The brethren were the church at Antioch. They did not send them out, but they commended them to the grace of God. In other words: “We are with you. We will pray for you. We will support you financially as the Lord leads.”
They did not promise to send a fixed amount every month, but they were with them. They were interested in what God had called them to do, and they would pray, stand by them, and support them in every way the Lord enabled them to do.
There is a thing called the work. The work is actually the work of God. In one word, the work of God is to build the church.
The Lord said:
My Father worketh even until now, and I work.
And Christ said:
I will build My church.
The work, therefore, is to build the body of Christ—to build the church. The four classes of gifted people build up the saints so that the church may be built. That is the objective of the work.
Those involved in the work are sent out by the Lord of the harvest, not by the church. The church is what the Lord builds through the work.
These two things are distinct, but they are complementary. They work together. Through the work, the church is built; and when the church is built, it supports the work. That is the relationship between the church and the work.
In the church, those who represent the government of the church are the elders. In the work, those who represent the work are the apostles. They are two different areas.
The church is local in practice. The work is regional in practice. The work is not confined to one locality; it can cover a greater area. Paul’s work covered territory from Antioch all the way to Rome. But the church in Antioch was in Antioch, and the church in Rome was in Rome. They work together, but they are not one and the same thing.
One thing we have done here, about two and a half years ago, is to begin having the Lord’s table every Sunday. Before that, we took it infrequently. We had been concerned that it might become routine, that frequency would diminish its meaning. We have found that not to be the case.
The question concerns John 6, Christ as the bread of life, and the Lord’s table. Would you speak about the different aspects of Jesus as bread and blood feeding the church, and the distinction between the Lord’s table and Christ as bread and wine?
People today use John 6 and apply it to communion, to the Lord’s table. Strictly speaking, they are two different things. I personally do not object to the application, but if you want to be very careful with Scripture, John 6 and the Lord’s table are two different things. John 6 is not speaking about the Lord’s table.
The Lord’s table basically has two aspects: remembrance and communion. In 1 Corinthians 11, it is remembrance. In 1 Corinthians 10, it is communion.
On the one hand, the Lord’s table is to remember the Lord—what He has done for us and what He is to us. At the same time, through the bread and the cup, in spirit, we are in communion with the Lord.
Each time we take the Lord’s supper, it reminds us of what the Lord has done for us. At the same time, it refreshes us into living fellowship with Him.
There is nothing of transubstantiation in it. If you read the little book Spiritual Reality or Obsession by Brother Nee, he addresses this carefully.
The Catholic position is based on the Lord’s words, “This is My body.” They take the word is literally and teach that when the priest blesses the bread, it is transubstantiated into the literal body of Christ.
The Protestant teaching says, “No, this is not the body; it is symbolic or representative.” In other words, it represents the Lord.
Both are wrong. On the one hand, even after the Lord said, “This is My body,” Scripture refers to it again as bread. That shows it has not been transubstantiated.
The Lord’s table is a spiritual experience. It is neither a merely literal thing nor merely representative. It is a spiritual reality.
If you eat the bread and drink the cup with faith, in spirit you are in communion with the body and blood of the Lord Jesus. You are experiencing His forgiveness and atonement. You are experiencing Him as your strength, as the bread of life.
It is spiritual. It is not merely representative or symbolic. If it is only symbolic, it becomes a ritual. If it is merely literal, it is physical. Only when it is spiritual is it real.
The Lord’s table is a deep spiritual experience.
The final question is: Is the bride still making herself ready? If so, what can we do to hasten the process? You have said many times that the church is hindering the return of Christ.
There is much to do in hastening the coming of the Lord, or in hastening the preparation of the bride. What we can do is allow the Lord to do more in our lives. That is what it really comes down to.
The reason the bride has not made herself ready is that she has not given herself to the Lord and let the Lord perfect her. We cannot perfect ourselves. This is the work of the Holy Spirit. He is in charge of the work of conforming us.