Beloved,
Prior to seminary, Tessa and I were members of a Reformed Baptist church. They would have affirmed nearly everything we have said up to this point about God-exalting leadership in the church (the exception being their denial of the distinction between ruling and teaching elders). Our Reformed Baptist brothers and sisters believe that Christ wills, as the head of the church, to govern every local congregation through a plurality of elders assisted by a plurality of deacons. They espouse what is often called elder-ruled congregationalism, and we ought to praise God for the elder-ruled part because many other Baptist churches don’t have elders at all and others that do function more like board members of a corporation than under-shepherds of Christ’s blood-bought sheep.
Where we must part ways with our confessional Baptist friends, however, is the congregationalism part. There is much we could say about congregationalism, but for our purposes today we simply need to note that this system views each local church as completely independent from other local churches. The local church is autonomous (under Christ, of course!). One church might have close relations to another and the elders of a number of churches might gather in conferences for mutual edification, but at the end of the day there is no church government beyond the body of elders at the local level.
How vastly different this is from Presbyterianism! Robert Reymond speaks of what he calls “Presbyterian connectionalism.” This is his way of saying that local churches are formally bound together in mutual accountability, dependency, and submission.
Cornerstone is a local congregation with its own government of a three-member session and a one-member diaconate under Christ. But we are not all on our own! In a somewhat analogous way to the various levels of civil government in our nation (i.e., local, state, and federal), so too there are various levels of ecclesiastical government which entail vital connection to other congregations. At the regional level, we are formally connected to the churches in the Presbytery of the Southeast (spanning Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, North Carolina, and South Carolina). While a local session could rightly be called a presbytery since the term simply refers to a body of elders, we reserve the term presbytery for the assembly of elders representing the regional church. Beyond this regional connection, there is the broader denominational connection which is realized in the annual General Assembly, the gathering of elders representing the entire church. To put it simply, we are not an island unto ourselves.
Here is how our Book of Church Order puts it: “Government by presbyters or elders is a New Testament ordinance; their joint exercise of jurisdiction in presbyterial assemblies is set forth in the New Testament; and the organization of subordinate and superior courts is founded upon and agreeable to the Word of God, expressing the unity of the church and the derivation of ministerial authority from Christ the Head of the church” (III.2).
In the coming weeks, we will flesh out the biblical principles that lead us to espouse this formal and authoritative “connectionalism” between churches, as well as the practical benefits of it in contrast the dangers of the radical autonomy of congregationalism. In so doing, we will get to the heart of what it means to be presbyterian!
Yours in Christ,
Pastor Nick
