Pastors Rule! No…Wait A Minute.

The Apostles, under inspiration, gave us ALL the instructions for order in the church (body of believers) in the New Testament. All added devices, like local church membership lists, Roberts Rules of Order, numbering, roll calls, quorums, board meeting, minutes, record keeping, constitutions, by-laws, Democracy and voting are additions which create all manner of chaos in the church. Every denomination is guilty of adding of countless schemes; some more so than others. The “one mind” Paul insisted on has been morphed into a worldly business model and the saints have been indoctrinated to follow after all manner of organizational devices which feed the pride of the flesh and make New Testament Christianity virtually impossible.

Preachers wave the King James Bible and defend its infallibility, but they make it of none effect by their establishment of a New World Order in the church.

To solidify their Papal aspirations, denominations have exalted the title of pastor. The word “Pastor” is only found in the New Testament once. In that one text, Ephesians 4:11, the pastor is told to minister, which is “to serve” and he is told to edify the saints.

Denominations, following after a worldly business structure of organization, have created rulers instead of servants.  Ruling, as in “Pastoral Rule” in denominational church governments today, is not pictured in the word “shepherd”. Shepherds lead, shepherds follow, shepherds feed, and shepherds shear the sheep. The only one of these most pastors have mastered is shearing sheep; a type of shearing that is so brutal it can only be described as scalping. These rulers leave no wool for the winter months. The Good Shepherd did not RULE his disciples and speak and teach in the demanding jack boot manner of the pastors who are rulers and not servants. So, the pastor of Ephesians 4 is NOT what we find inside the structural church today. We have popeish rulers who demand a type of obedience that is above questioning by those in the congregation; a dictatorial obedience which is not found in the examples set forth by Jesus, Paul or any other early church revelator. The leaders of the early church allowed questions to be asked of them.

If ruling were as important to the role of a pastor as modern jack boot pastors claim, there would be many citations of the word “pastor” in the New Testament and examples of ruling would be there. The proof of an apostle, deacon, or elder’s office and work is abundantly illustrated and defined. Pastor is there ONCE; hence, a pastor in the early church was NOT the central figure and whose role of teaching continued to diminish as we moved toward the acquisition of having a completed text.

Just as apostles were necessary in the formation of the early church, so were pastors. The question then arises, “Are there apostle today?” Well, if you understand the qualifications necessary to be an apostle you would know there are none living today. Those true men of God were necessary to bring us out from under the law and into the grace of Christianity.

Certainly we need leaders, but now that we all have access to the completed Word of God, the role of early church pastors/teachers is no longer relevant. I mean, we are commanded, as individuals, to “Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”