Who appoints elders?<\/a>” it was shown that you first had to have men who aspired to serve as elders and who have stretched themselves to show they meet the qualifications listed for an elder.<\/p>\nUsing the example of the selection of deacons found in Acts 6, we see that the current leadership of the church — the apostles, did not choose the deacons, but gave the qualifications to the church and asked the church to select men who met those qualifications. The apostles then appointed those selected men to their duties.<\/p>\n
We don’t find a direct reference to the church selecting elders. We do find the list of qualifications given to preachers in I Timothy 3 and Titus 1. And, we find that preachers appointed elders (Acts 14:23; Titus 1:5). But the step in between, the actual selection of the men to be appointed is not mentioned.<\/p>\n
Lacking additional direction, we must assume the selection of elders was done in a similar manner to the selection of deacons. The church is taught what to look for in man considered for the eldership and the church then offers up men for appointment by the preacher.<\/p>\n
Since Paul warned Timothy, “Do not lay hands on anyone hastily, nor share in other people’s sins; keep yourself pure<\/i>” (I Timothy 5:22), we conclude that the preacher is not to blindly give approval to whoever is selected, but must double-check that the man meets the qualifications laid down by the Holy Spirit.<\/p>\n
I find no indication that elders selected additional elders or elders selected deacons. Rather there is an implication in Acts 6:2-4 that it was not for the leadership to do the selection. As leaders in a congregation, it would be the elders’ responsibility to help guide the congregation toward finding qualified men. Their wisdom ought to carry weight with the congregation; however, the congregation as a whole must find men to whom they are willing to submit (I Peter 5:5).<\/p>\n
I think much of the problem you are seeing stems from a prevalent view that the elders not only represent the congregation but are the congregation. Such is not taught in the Bible. Elders oversee a congregation (Hebrews 13:7, 17). Their rule is by shepherding or guiding the congregation into making correct decisions. For an eldership to decide for a church is to violate what Peter stated, “Shepherd the flock of God which is among you, serving as overseers, not by compulsion but willingly, not for dishonest gain but eagerly; nor as being lords over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock<\/em>” (I Peter 5:2-3). They cannot be lords (those who exercise dominion) over the church.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Question: Is it scripturally correct for elders to choose another elder and have him installed by an outside evangelist? The process I’m speaking of was one where two elders announced to a group of the members that the elders would be “selecting” the new elder(s) and deacon(s). Shouldn’t the “selection process” be left up to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[123],"class_list":["post-9489","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-answer","tag-elders"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":20574,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/who-selects-elders\/","url_meta":{"origin":9489,"position":0},"title":"Who selects elders?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 2, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: We are stuck in the selection of elders for our church, Only one brother qualifies to be an elder. In the absence of a church eldership, who does the selecting of a faithful brother to lead the church? Please help. We very urgently need the answer. Answer: The design\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":31472,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/should-a-woman-be-on-the-committee-to-select-elders\/","url_meta":{"origin":9489,"position":1},"title":"Should a woman be on the committee to select elders?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 27, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hi, I attend the church of Christ in a small town. We are looking at appointing elders in our congregation.\u00a0 There is what I feel a potential problem, since we are so small, most of the men who have been elected as potential elders leave very little left to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":31598,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-should-an-elder-do-if-no-other-elders-left-in-the-congregation\/","url_meta":{"origin":9489,"position":2},"title":"What should an elder do if no other elders left in the congregation?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"February 3, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: If you have three elders in the church and two elders resigned, what is the function of the elder who is left? He still has a continuing desire to shepherd the flock and the rest of the congregation has no grievance with him. Answer: A man can preach without\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":68309,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/why-arent-the-elders-helping-me-to-learn-to-preach\/","url_meta":{"origin":9489,"position":3},"title":"Why aren’t the elders helping me to learn to preach?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 8, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I hope this email finds you doing well. I have a question. I finally got to preach and teach for a month in another congregation. I asked the elders in my church to attend one day and give me pointers. One finally attended, but all the elders said that\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2007,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-happens-if-an-elders-wife-dies\/","url_meta":{"origin":9489,"position":4},"title":"What happens if an elder’s wife dies?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 26, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: If a man is qualified to serve as an elder but his wife dies before he is installed, can he still become an elder? If an elder's wife dies may he continue to serve? Answer: In looking for qualified men to be elders, we put so much emphasis on\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":25118,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/are-elders-responsible-for-the-employment-of-preachers\/","url_meta":{"origin":9489,"position":5},"title":"Are elders responsible for the employment of preachers?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"November 30, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I enjoyed and appreciated your article on\u00a0the work of the evangelist.\u00a0 I find it quite different from many by what you might consider institutional churches of Christ. I am concerned about the final paragraph on the selection of the minister.\u00a0 As I understand first-century history,\u00a0 many preachers were involved\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9489"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9489\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}