Beloved,
I tried my best not to burst out laughing. Part of what was so hilarious was how serious the boy was who posed the question. He wasn’t trying to be funny at all. He was dead serious when he asked me, “Are you the boss of this church?”
A picture flashed through my mind of myself in a big leather chair, hair slicked back (yes, I had hair!), and feet on my desk as I barked orders at the members of Cornerstone. With a chuckle, I responded, “Well, not exactly.”
Last week, we began talking about our fourth core principle, God-exalting government. When we talk about authority, often times people get uncomfortable. There are at least two reasons for this:
- In our sinful world, authority is abused for oppressive and self-serving ends.
- In our sinful world, autonomy is believed to be the path of freedom.
Authority has always been an issue in a sinful world. That is why God devotes the fifth commandment to comprehensively addressing the various authority structures in the world (using the principle of synecdoche and setting forth the parent-child relationship as the chief example of every authority-submission relationship in the created order). Whether we are talking about parents, presidents, or pastors, authority is delegated to them by God as a vehicle of love (that is, after all, the sum and substance of the fifth commandment). Authority is unto service.
Always.
No exceptions.
If ever there was a boss of Cornerstone OPC, His name would be Jesus. He is the one who wields ultimate authority over our lives and demands our entire allegiance. But He does so as one who serves us in the most profound of ways. He gave up the glory of heaven for us. He subjected Himself to the weakness and temptations of a human body in a fallen world. He died for us, suffering our curse. As the Lord of the church, He wielded His authority to pour Himself out for our eternal good, and He continues to do so now as He reigns at the right hand of His Father.
When Jesus raises up leaders, He calls them to follow in His steps: “But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Mk. 10:43-45).
While those words apply to all peoples, they were specifically directed at Christ’s arrogant apostles. The temptation would be to abuse their authority to serve themselves. But Jesus forbid this. Authority is unto service of others. The greater the authority, the lower one must get.
The call to ordained office (or any position of authority, for that matter) is a call to die unto the benefit of others. For authority is to be carried out in love, and love is a treasuring affection that seeks the temporal and eternal good of its object at its own personal cost. Love is costly. It does not seek its own gain like a boss (of course, not all bosses are like this!), but instead it seeks to give of itself like a servant.
In case you have wondered, I am not the boss of this church. Neither are the ruling elders. Neither is the session as a whole. “We are your servants for Christ’s sake” (2 Cor. 4:5).
Church government is not something to fear so long as the men in authority are filled with the Spirit of the lowly, loving Lord Jesus. Pray for your leaders that God would keep us from the fleshly temptation to abuse our authority. Pray for us that we might grow to reflect our humble Lord who spent Himself for the sake of souls. For when authority is wielding in the way of Christ, it results in blessedness all around. That, not anti-authoritarian autonomy, is the path of true life and liberty in the family, in the church, and in the world.
Yours in Christ,
Pastor Nick