If a brother is to be an adequate elder, or even an adequate leader in any church meeting, he needs to have the adequate knowledge of the truth. Anyone who does not have this knowledge of the truth cannot take care of the church, God’s flock, in a proper way. If you would be a leader in the church caring for the flock, and if you would keep spiritual germs away from the church life, you must have an adequate knowledge of the New Testament truths. As a help to gaining the full knowledge of the basic truths, I would encourage you to go through the entire New Testament using the Recovery Version with the notes and the Life-studies. According to a rough estimate, if a person spends two hours a day studying the New Testament in this way, he can go through the entire New Testament in five years.
Recently a brother raised a question concerning the appointment of elders. A person is born a human being and remains a human being permanently. No matter what kind of human being a person may be, he remains a human being. The appointment of elders is different. Anyone who desires to be an elder permanently should resign, and whenever a brother realizes that he is not qualified to be in the eldership, he should also resign.
In Acts 20:28 we have a word concerning the appointing of elders (overseers) by the Holy Spirit. We may say that here we have the divine appointment of elders to take care of the flock of God. However, I do not believe that all those who are elders in the church today are divinely appointed. Some have become elders in a natural way, perhaps because they were the first one in their locality, or because the church in their place was raised up through them. But who can tell such a brother that he should not be an elder? My purpose in saying this is not to disappoint anyone; my purpose is to present the situation in an honest way.
When some hear that certain brothers have become elders in a natural way, they may say, “Brother Lee, why don’t you do something about this?” My answer to this question is that I do not feel free to do anything. This is one reason I can testify that I do not control any church or any person. I care only to help the churches. I may realize that the appointment of a particular brother as an elder is not a divine appointment, but as I consider the situation I also realize that there is no way to do anything about it. Actually, we all need to humble ourselves and not regard our being an elder as divine. It is very possible that you have become an elder in some way other than that of a divine appointment.
Let us humble ourselves and realize that we are nothing. Others may regard me as something, but I do not consider myself to be anything. I have simply acted according to my conscience and have done the works I felt burdened to do. Let the Lord judge the nature of these works. As Paul says, “For I am conscious of nothing against myself; but I am not justified by this; but He who examines me is the Lord. Therefore do not judge anything before the time, until the Lord comes, who shall both bring to light the hidden things of darkness and make manifest the counsels of the hearts, and then there will be praise to each one from God” (1 Cor. 4:4-5).
Please do not think that your being an elder is a divine appointment. My intention in saying this is that we would all humble ourselves, not claiming to have the assurance that you have been divinely appointed to be elders.
Whether or not you have been divinely appointed to be an elder does not depend on your thought, or someone else’s confirmation; it depends on how much you have been constituted of the divine knowledge of the basic New Testament truths. The more you are constituted of the truths of the New Testament, the more you have been divinely appointed to be an elder. Today the divine appointment is nothing other than the adequate knowledge of the basic truths of the New Testament.
We are short of those constituted with the New Testament truths. The churches are somewhat weak simply because of the shortage of brothers who have the adequate knowledge of the basic truths of the New Testament. It would be a great help for a church to have even one such brother.
I would encourage you not to consider whether you have been divinely appointed to be an elder. Some in the Pentecostal movement claim to have a divine appointment, but the result of their so-called appointment is confusion. Others, by contrast, have become saturated with the New Testament truths. Those who are constituted even to some extent of the biblical truths are a great blessing to the church. Wherever they are they are a blessing as they simply live among the saints. They may not have the title or the position of an elder, but as long as they are present in a locality, the church receives the benefit. This is surely a divine appointment.
Do not think that according to my feeling the situation of the elders in all the churches is right. On the contrary, there are situations that I am not happy with. But I would not do anything to change those situations. Nevertheless, I have been falsely accused of being an “autonomous dictator.” However, the reason I have not done anything to adjust the situation in certain churches is not that I am afraid of being called a pope or a dictator; the reason is that I realize that such a thing would not be helpful to the church. It would be more profitable to the churches to do nothing about the situation than to do something.
My purpose in speaking concerning the divine appointment of elders is to point out our shortage. Our shortage is the adequate knowledge of the biblical truths. Any brother who becomes an elder should know at least fifty percent of the basic truths of the New Testament. I must tell you honestly that some of those in the position of elders know even less than five percent of the basic truths of God’s economy. But who can put these brothers out of the eldership? No one can do this. Furthermore, if these brothers were asked to resign, they would be disappointed.
Once again I wish to emphasize the fact that being an elder does not depend on a human appointment. Rather, being an elder depends on the degree to which one has the proper knowledge of the New Testament economy.
At present, the best way to gain the knowledge of God’s New Testament economy is to use the Recovery Version with the notes and the Life-study messages. Do not think that my intention in saying this is to promote my materials. I am simply telling you honestly what is the best way to be constituted of the New Testament truths.
It is difficult to gain from the writings of expositors the adequate knowledge of the basic truths of the New Testament. The reason is that those writings were not put out with this intention or burden. On the contrary, those writings, composed for scholarship, are in a different category and may actually hinder you from receiving the knowledge of the basic truths.
Again I say, if you would be qualified to be an elder and take care of the church, you need to be constituted of the New Testament truths. If you do not have this divine deposit in your being, you are not qualified for the eldership, because you lack the necessary “capital.”
Those who are not constituted of the truth may be able to bring people into the church life, but they are not able to take them on. One day, a certain person said to me, “Brother Lee, I can only bring people into the church. I am not able to give them nourishment and to build them up.” I replied, “Brother, it is very good that you realize this. I hope that you will not go beyond the matter of bringing people in. Do not try to go further. Let others do a further work on the saints.” However, this brother’s actual practice was very different. Because he did not have an adequate knowledge of the truth, he was not qualified to be an elder. To be sure, he was not divinely appointed as an elder.
Who is the one divinely appointed to be an elder? Again, I would say that the one who is divinely appointed is the one who knows at least a major part of the New Testament truths. This is his qualification and also his capital. Furthermore, I again encourage you to gain this capital by using the Recovery Version with the notes and the Life-study messages. I would also ask you to seek a way to help the saints in your locality to use these rich materials. This will be a great profit to all the churches.