Rc on pastors

21

FAITHFUL SHEPHERDS

1 Peter 5:1–4

Earlier in the epistle Peter wrote, “The time has come for judgment to begin at the house of God; and if it begins with us first, what will be the end of those who do not obey the gospel of God?” (4:17). Judgment begins with us. Christians demonstrate a tendency at times to try to serve as judges of the world, but God is the judge. We are called to be vessels of His mercy, even to those outside the community of faith. If we do judge, we must begin with ourselves, for we bear a greater responsibility than those who are in the world. As we are taught, “Everyone to whom much is given, from him much will be required” (Luke 12:48). We who enjoy being special recipients of the grace of God should have no room for a judgmental spirit. “There but for the grace of God go I,” says the old adage. In speaking of one of his rivals, Winston Churchill once said, “There but for the grace of God goes God.” We live by grace and by grace alone.

With that in mind, Peter directs his attention to those in a position of leadership within the church. Specifically, he mentions the elders. There are many different kinds of church government or polity. Churches in which the authority resides in the congregation are called congregationalist. They tend to function as pure democracies. Churches that are governed by elected elders are called presbyterian. The most common form of government down through church history has been the episcopal type, in which individual pastors serve in local churches but are ultimately governed by a bishop who presides over a certain number of pastors within a given geographical area. From what we can discern about early-church government, it practiced some form of episcopal government. This later developed into the monoepiscopacy in which one bishop is set above the rest. The Roman Catholic Church emerged with this monoepiscopal form of government.

Christians differ about what constitutes the best form of church government. How the Lord intended the church to be governed is not as clear as some other matters of biblical doctrine. Of course, those who favor an episcopal form of government argue that the Bible supports that, and those who argue for a presbyterian form of government insist that this is the biblical way. Still others argue from Scripture for some form of congregational government. The difference between the word elder or presbyter and the word bishop or episkopos has been much debated. The matter is made all the more difficult by the many passages in Scripture where it seems that the terms are used interchangeably.

Because of the difficulties of biblical interpretation here, we ought to be patient and forbearing with our Christian brothers and sisters who favor and adopt a different form of church government from our own. We believe in the communio sanctorum, the communion of saints, so however we may be divided organizationally and governmentally, every Christian in every church has communion with every other Christian in every other church based upon the biblical principle of the mystical union that every believer has with Christ. Insofar as we are all are united to Christ, we are united one to another. Although there are legitimate reasons for specific denominations, our spiritual union transcends all those boundaries. Therefore, it is possible to have fellowship under one Supreme Ruler, even Christ Himself, who is the head of His church.

Apostles and Elders

Elders specifically are addressed here: The elders who are among you I exhort, I who am a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that will be revealed (v. 1). We could understand the term elders as people functioning in local church government as distinguished from pastors, or we could see the primary meaning as referring specifically to pastors. It is interesting that Peter calls himself an elder. Peter’s office in the early church was that of an Apostle. In the hierarchy of the structures of authority in the New Testament, at the top is God the Father, who then delegates all authority on heaven and earth to His Son, the head of the church. His Son, in turn, authorized some to speak with His authority, the Apostles.

Sometimes we use the terms disciple and Apostle interchangeably, but they are not synonymous. A disciple is a student, one who studied at the feet of Jesus, and an Apostle is one sent as a delegate to speak with the authority of Christ Himself. When He appointed His Apostles He said, “He who receives you receives Me, and he who receives Me receives Him who sent Me” (Matt. 10:40). The Apostles spoke with nothing less than the authority of Christ. In our day there are people who attempt to set the teaching of Paul over against the teaching of Christ, but to do that is to violate Christ’s commissioning of His Apostles. People who do not receive Paul do not receive Christ.

There were certain criteria, set forth in the New Testament, for the role of Apostle. To be an Apostle, one first had to have been a disciple under the teaching ministry of Jesus and an eyewitness of the resurrection. Another criterion—the most important—was a direct and immediate appointment to the office by Christ Himself. It is because of those criteria that the apostolic authority of Paul was so often challenged in the New Testament. He had not been a disciple during the earthly ministry of Jesus, nor had he been an eyewitness of the resurrection. Jesus did not appear to Paul until after His ascension into heaven. To the Corinthians Paul wrote, “[Christ] was seen by Cephas, then by the twelve. After that He was seen by over five hundred brethren at once.… After that He was seen by James, then by all the apostles. Then last of all He was seen by me also, as by one born out of due time” (1 Cor. 15:5–8). Three times in the book of Acts Luke records the rehearsal of the circumstances surrounding Paul’s conversion on the road to Damascus and his being called by Christ to be an Apostle. One reason for that was likely the challenge to Paul’s apostolic authority.

Paul’s call to be an Apostle was so extraordinary that it had to be confirmed by those whose apostleship met all the obvious criteria. That is important, because there are people today who claim to be Apostles and to speak with as much authority as did Peter, Paul, or John. No one today could possibly meet the criteria of apostolic authority set forth in the New Testament, because nobody alive today was a disciple during the earthly ministry of Jesus. No one alive today was an eyewitness of Christ’s resurrection in the first century. Some argue that God can call someone to be an Apostle today by giving them the charismatic gift of apostleship and with it the authority of the Apostle, but, unlike Paul, such a person would not be able to have his apostleship confirmed by the original disciples of Jesus.

The dimension of charismatic authority given to the Apostles did not continue past the first century, so we make a distinction between the extraordinary office of the Apostle and the ordinary offices of church officials. The Apostles established churches and within them the ordinary offices of elders, deacons, and bishops. There was a clear distinction, even in the New Testament era, between those who governed by the special measure of authority given to the Apostles and those who ruled at a lower level, under the authority of the Apostles. We speak first of the apostolic age and then of the sub-apostolic age, which generation was not on par with the authority of the Apostles.

In Paul’s first letter to the Corinthian church, he wrote to referee internal disputes about who held greater authority among them, and one of the great disputes had to do with the use of the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Some in the Corinthian community who had experienced marvelous gifts of God had made themselves authorities in the church rather than remaining submissive to the duly structured authorities that the Apostles had established. Paul rebuked them for this in both 1 and 2 Corinthians. Near the end of the first century, Clement, then the bishop of Rome, was asked to intercede in ongoing disputes in the Corinthian church, and in a letter to the Corinthians, he called the people of Corinth to submit to the authority of the Apostles. We see, therefore, that terms such as elder, bishop, or deacon reference the ordinary offices of church government rather than the extraordinary office of the Old Testament prophet or the New Testament Apostle.

Peter gives an exhortation to the elders among the recipients of his letter as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, and also as a partaker of the glory that will be revealed. A theme proclaimed frequently, not only by Peter but also by Paul, is that our baptism communicates that we are indelibly marked as those called to participate in the death of Christ and in His resurrection. If we are not willing to participate in the abasement that Christ suffered, if we are not willing to be united to our Lord in His humiliation, then we will by no means participate in His exaltation. This point is again brought up here when Peter points out that he was an eyewitness of the suffering of Christ but also a partaker of the glory that will be revealed. This glory is not something postponed until the future; Peter is saying that he was already participating in that glory.

Peter was an eyewitness of the humiliation of Christ. Indeed, he was a participant in it by virtue of his betrayal of Jesus. He also was an eyewitness to the glory of Christ (2 Pet. 1:16–19). John writes at the end of the prologue in his Gospel: “We beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). Peter’s letter is no casual correspondence from a first-century Christian but is from an eyewitness of the suffering of Jesus. Peter was there on the Mount of Transfiguration, and he saw Jesus in His resurrection. He earned the right to teach us.

Shepherds of Christ’s Flock

The admonition Peter gives to the elders is this: Shepherd the flock of God which is among you, serving as overseers (v. 2). Here we see the bishop as an overseer, a superintendent. The term bishop (episkopos), has a common Greek root that is intensified by the prefix epi. From the root, scopis, we get the English word scope. A telescope or microscope is an instrument we use to look at things. Episkopos means “to look at something with the most careful scrutiny.” The verb form, episkein, is translated in the New Testament as “to visit.” The incarnation of Jesus is celebrated as the visitation of God to His people, the “day of visitation.” The word used there came from the Greek military. The visiting general, the skopos, came to review the troops to see if they were battle worthy.

From the word episkopos we get the concept of “supervisor.” The word vision is involved here; supervisors are overseers. The purpose of the bishop is not to look at the flock and find the faults of the sheep but, rather, to shepherd the sheep. The image in Scripture of the shepherd, which is drawn from the work of Israelite shepherds, finds its zenith in Jesus’ declaration of Himself as the Good Shepherd who lays down His life for His sheep. His sheep know His voice (John 10:27). When someone comes to service our air handler in our yard, our large dog is frantic to get at this seeming intruder. However, when I am out in the backyard, our dog just stands still and watches me. She does not bark, because she knows me; she knows my voice. The sheep knew the voice of the Great Shepherd, and when the Shepherd spoke, the sheep listened and followed the Shepherd.

Peter says that those of us in positions of ministry are to be shepherds of God’s flock. The sheep do not belong to these shepherds; they belong to God. Surely ringing in Peter’s ears when he wrote this were Jesus’s words of reinstatement following Peter’s denial: “He said to him the third time, ‘Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me?’ Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, ‘Do you love Me?’ And he said to Him, ‘Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed My sheep’ ” (John 21:17). A shepherd protected the sheep from wild animals and from thieves, and his rod and staff provided comfort and safety, but the principal task of the shepherd was to feed the sheep. Peter had learned that and understood it well. Jesus did not tell the shepherd to entertain the sheep, and He certainly did not tell the shepherd to poison the sheep.

In churches today, particularly in America, enormous expectations are imposed upon the office of minister. Because of that, sixteen thousand pastors leave the ministry every year. Today a pastor is expected to be psychologist, theologian, biblical scholar, administrator, preacher, teacher, and community leader. The minister spends so much time on secondary matters that he has little time to do his principal work, which is to feed the sheep through preaching and teaching. The greatest service your minister can do for you is to feed you, not with his opinion but with the Word of God.

Peter reminds those who shepherd the flock of God to serve not by compulsion but willingly, not for dishonest gain but eagerly (v. 2). Ministers are not to shepherd from a sense of duty but from delight. The salary for most ministerial positions is low. In Old Testament times there was no income tax save for the tithe. God imposed a 10 percent tax on all the people out of which they were to pay the preachers and the teachers. God places a higher value on the care of our soul than we do, so He provided for the feeding of our soul through our gifts and tithes. Despite that, thousands of pastors in our country are exploited. I have heard businessmen say, “I don’t think the pastor should make what I make,” to which I respond, “Why not?” We need to readjust our thinking. Pastors leave the ministry often not because the salary is low but because of the implied message that their work is of little value. That is often the message sent, and it is a travesty on the kingdom of God.

Nor as being lords over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock; and when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the crown of glory that does not fade away (vv. 3–4). God in Christ is going to bestow a crown upon His servants who feed His sheep, that is, if they execute the office according to the Word of God. Above all things, a pastor must feed Christ’s flock the Word of God.¹

1 Sproul, R. C. (2011). 1-2 Peter (pp. 179–184). Wheaton, IL: Crossway.