What Does the Bible Say about Church Government?

The United Pentecostal Church International Manual, the handbook by which UPCI churches and ministers operate, notes that the organization practices a "congregational form of church government." What does this mean? More importantly, what does the Bible say about church government?

Dr. David K. Bernard looks to the New Testament for clues on how churches should be organized, operated, and led, and how it compares with the leadership structure of the UPCI and its member congregations.

For more information on this topic, see Dr. Bernard's book The Apostolic Church in the Twenty-First Century, available at PentecostalPublishing.com. Visit UPCI.org/Statements-Archive to access the UPCI's official position paper titled "Church Government."

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SPEAKER_00 0:01

The United Pentecostal Church International practices a congregational form of church government. What does this term mean? More importantly, what does the Bible say about local church government? That's coming up next on Apostolic Life in the Twenty First Century. Welcome to Apostolic Life in the Twenty First Century, a podcast dedicated to helping modern-day believers live out the teachings of the first century church. This podcast is part of the teaching ministry of Dr. David K. Bernard. Dr. Bernard has dedicated his life to studying the Bible and helping believers apply its message to their daily lives. In Apostolic Life in the 21st century, Dr. Bernard answers your questions about what the Bible teaches and how those teachings apply to everyday life. Thank you for joining us for this episode. If you enjoy this podcast, we encourage you to check out Dr. David K. Bernard's books. Dr. Bernard has written more than 30 books on biblical theology and Christian living and leadership. Visit Pentecostalpublishing.com and search David Bernard for a list of available titles. Enter promo code DKB10 at checkout to save 10% on your order. That's Pentecostalpublishing.com, promo code DKB10 to save 10% at checkout. In the UPCI manual, which is the handbook, of course, that lays out all the rules and guidelines by which UPCI churches and ministers operate, there's several references to the fact that our organization practices what's known as a congregational form of church government. What exactly does that term congregational mean? And more importantly, what does the Bible say about local church government? Does the New Testament offer any clues as to how local churches should be organized?

SPEAKER_01 1:54

Well, first let me give you some resources. So if you want more information, we do have a position paper on church government, which is available on UPCI.org under resources. So you can actually read a description of how we're organized and the biblical reasons for it. So it goes into much greater detail than we're going to be able to do here in the next few minutes. Also, I have a book called The Apostolic Church in the 21st Century. It has a number of chapters on ministry, church government, how we should operate in contemporary culture. And the, of course, it's all Bible-based. So let me give you a brief overview of church government. As far as the various denominations are concerned, there are basically three types of church government. The first is called hierarchical, which would be represented by the Roman Catholic Church, where it's top-down. So the Pope and the Archbishops, the bishops, they determine, they make the major decision for the church. So, for example, a local church or parish, uh the pastor is appointed by the hierarchy, not by the local people. And the pastor can be moved to another location by the hierarchy. So it's top-down. The national church owns all the buildings. That's hierarchical. In the middle is what's called Presbyterian, which is represented by Presbyterians and Reform, where it's a mixture of ministers and lay leaders called elders that are elected by the uh or chosen in the congregation, but those leaders have jurisdiction not only over one church, but over a group of churches. So, in other words, a local church is not in control of its own destiny, but the leaders of the region, both the ministers and the uh chosen lay leaders of a region collectively would make decisions for a local church. And then we have what's called congregational, uh, which the United Pentecostal Church International basically follows. The essential point is this the local church is self-governing. So the local church elects its pastor, the local church owns its property, the local church makes has its own bylaws. And while they need to have certain similarities to belong to the UPCI, we don't just allow anything and everything. For example, there must be a doctrinal identity that we agree with, but within parameters, the local church can choose its own bylaws. So how it conducts business can be different from another church in some regards. The local church decides who is a member. The local church decides who will be a volunteer employee or a paid employee. The local church who decides, uh supervises the activities. The headquarters doesn't, the district doesn't. And so that's called congregational. Now, we do have a local church government that we recommend. It's in our manual, and it becomes the default. So if a local church does not adopt its own bylaws, we already have bylaws provided for it. But as I said, the local church could adopt its own and modify or tweak it, uh, make some choices of its own. And for all credential ministers, uh the UPCI manual is available uh through UPCI ministers.org. Uh and it's um uh it's got um the local church government that I just mentioned. It's also got um uh resources for local churches, so various other policies that would be useful and helpful for the local church. But the point is, all these things are recommended. It's up to the local church to decide. Now, uh we do so we do recommend in that form that there be a church board which would represent the congregation. So some decisions can be made by the church board, some decisions need to be made by the whole congregation of voting members. So things such as purchasing property, uh, approving a loan for a building, uh, electing a new pastor, or voting for church board members, typically those would be voted on by the entire congregation. So we would recommend at least one business meeting per year uh to conduct the necessary business. Then the church board can handle more routine business or business throughout the year, and we usually think of the pastor as the chair of the church board. So it's congregational, the local church is self-governing, but with strong pastoral leadership. We do believe that's biblical. Now, when you study the Bible, there are principles of leadership. And when you study the New Testament, there are principles for ministry and church government. There are not a lot of details, and I think that's intentional. I think God designed it that way to give us flexibility. So on the local level as well as the national level, there's a lot of flexibility. Uh, and I think that's intentional because uh circumstances change. And so, what is the most effective way for a local church to be structured or even a national church to be structured in first century Palestine may be different from 21st century Palestine or 21st century America. And so, because of the differences of culture, society, laws, um, etc., God allows flexibility. But there are certain principles that we can see. So I say the church is local self-governing, but they're not independent. So, for example, when the early church um had a dispute over could Gentiles come into the church as Gentiles or did they have to uh be circumcised, did they have to become Jews first? Well, there was a conference, a council in Jerusalem. All the apostles and elders came to Jerusalem. So that would be the equivalent of what we would call credential ministers. And they discussed, they debated. It doesn't say they took a formal vote, but somehow they reached a consensus. They had pros and cons. They had people in support, people in opposition, they prayed, they studied scripture and cited relevant scripture. The leader, James, the brother of the Lord, got up and announced what he thought was the decision. They all agreed with it. They said it seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us. And they produced a written document of here's what we agree on. So by some means of debate and uh possibly vote, or at least gauging the support, they reached a consensus. They agreed, they approved a written document. Then they appointed delegates to go to the various churches. So uh that's all in Acts 15. In Acts 16, you see people like Paul and Barnabas going to local churches saying, here are the decrees from the Council of Jerusalem. Here is what we decided, and we're asking every local church to follow it. They didn't expect that a local church would say, you know, we're rejecting that. We're breaking fellowship with the United Apostolic Pentecostal Church International. You know, they were united. Um, they were Pentecostal, they were apostolic, uh, they were a church, and they were international. So I think it's fair to say, to use a label such as United Pentecostal Church International, although we don't think that we're the only people in the body of Christ. Uh, but I do believe there's a notice there, the local church were not, churches were not deemed as independent, but interdependent. And uh you also see leadership. For example, when Paul wrote to Titus, uh, Titus was over Crete, which was an island in Greece with a number of towns and villages. And so Paul said, you need to ordain elders in every church. So set up local church leadership, set up pastors. Well, if you think through that, you see several layers of leadership. You don't see a detailed description of how it interacts, but Paul said in Galatians that he was recognized by the apostles in Jerusalem as the apostle to the Gentiles. So maybe it's a little stretched, but maybe I could say he was the global missions director, at least for the Gentile world. Uh but they recognize you have you're called by God to lead our outreach among the Gentiles. So an exercise of that authority, Paul speaks to Titus and gives instructions to him. Titus is the leader over Crete, more than a local church. He's leading a group of local churches. Then he's supposed to set churches in order. Elders in each town, well, they would be leaders over the lay members of that town. So I see, okay, here are local church members. They have elders or pastors. The pastors are accountable to um the district superintendent of Crete, if you want to use that terminology. And uh the district superintendent of Crete is accountable to the Gentile Global Missions Director. And you see in Acts 21, Paul himself comes to Jerusalem as he did in Acts 15 to give an account to the apostles and elders in Jerusalem, so to the larger body. So he felt accountable to them. Now it was not a strict hierarchy because we find in Galatians that Paul could rebuke the apostle Peter, saying, You're doing wrong. You need to change your ways. So even the highest leaders, though, were accountable to one another and were accountable to the general body. So I see such things as accountability, uh, organization. Um, also go back to Acts 6 when there was a dispute over the widows of the Greek-speaking uh Jews. They felt like they were being mistreated, discriminated against. And so the apostles told the congregation, pick some qualified people. Here are the qualifications. They need to have wisdom, they need to be full of the Holy Ghost, but pick these some people that can administrate the business of the church, and we will lay our hands on them and commission them. Notice the lay members and the preachers got together to choose qualified lay leaders to administrate the business affairs of the church, namely collection of money to buy food and distribution of food to the widows. So everybody's treated fairly. The Greek-speaking and the Aramaic or Hebraic-speaking people all felt like they were being treated the same. And the apostles said, We've got to devote ourselves to prayer, the ministry of the word. We don't have time for all this other stuff, so we need lay leaders. Now, some of those leaders became preachers. Stephen and Philip seemed to go beyond their initial calling. But you might see here the genesis of what is later called in the New Testament deacons, because that word simply means ministers or servants of the church, or what we might call, I would say they're the equivalent today of church board members or department heads, senior leadership team. So the ministers of the church, I would say, are the equivalent of the elders. The lay leaders of the church, I would say the equivalent of the deacons. So what you see is uh shared governance. So the local members participated in the governance of the church. So it wasn't hierarchical like the Pope or like the general superintendent going to a local church and taking over. It wasn't even the pastor having soul discretion. He worked with, you know, the elders, the pastors worked with the lay leaders. So while the details can vary, as I've explained, I do believe a biblical form of church government would be the local congregation basically controls its own affairs, it's self-governing. The local congregation has elders, and I think, or pastors, and I think there is a senior elder, which that's a long subject, but I do believe there is a pattern of a senior leader for the local church that we would call the pastor or senior pastor. But there's a shared governance. There are lay leaders, such as deacons, but the whole congregation has a part. They have a part in the worship, they have a part in participation, they have a part of the governance. So shared governance, mutual accountability, and interdependence, not independence of local churches, but interdependence, where they're all integrated into a body. You can also see in the writings of the letters of Paul, the letters of John, they commend certain ministers and say receive them. They warn against certain ministers who have gone into false doctrine or have split churches and they say don't receive them. Well, that process of recommendation and withdrawal of recommendations is more formalized in what ministerial credentials and ministerial discipline. So all the elements that we have for our church government are present in the New Testament in principle, but the details are to be worked out. And I think this is appropriate because Jesus said in Matthew 18, and he talked about church disputes, a discipline, a personal difference between members should be resolved by the church. He also talked about binding together in prayer, and he also talked about coming together in worship, that he would be in their midst. And so he says, where two or three are gathered in my name, and where two or three agree on something. All in that context, including the solving church disputes, he said, Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loose in heaven. And I don't think that means unbridled discretion, but I think what we can say is when the church is sincerely trying to follow God's will and God's word and implement certain policies or procedures to fulfill that, well, then God will honor it and back it up. So the principle of being ordained for ministry, that's in the Bible in many places. But the procedure of how someone would qualify, that's left to us. And we have a particular procedure and we could change it. But I think God is saying, I will honor that. So when you, when somebody follows that procedure and gets ordained, I will put my anointing and blessing. It'll be more than just an organizational ritual. It'd be more than just a paperwork. It will be a spiritual thing as well, because I will back you up. And when you discipline a minister because of their failure to meet qualifications, I'll back that up too. And so I think it's a cooperation where we're trying to follow the principles of the Bible, especially what we see in the New Testament, and we ask God to put his hand a blessing and anointing upon our efforts.

SPEAKER_00 16:42

Thank you for listening to this episode of Apostolic Life in the Twenty First Century. If you enjoy this podcast, please take a moment to give us a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app. We also appreciate it when you share Apostolic Life in the 21st century with a friend or family member. And make plans to join us again next time as we look at how the Bible applies to everyday life.