Tim: Ok, since our last discussion we have put a team together and the church is behind this effort, though somewhat tentatively. But, we have some great guys on board. Well … there is one fellow that I really want to be part of this, but he is wary. He doesn’t want any part of it, but couldn’t really explain why.
Paul: Let me ask you, is he a good friend of the pastor that just left?
Tim: Yes, how did you guess?
Paul: Well it’s not uncommon for people to feel that moving toward BE may be a criticism of past leadership.
Tim: I got that impression but wasn’t sure how to respond to him.
Paul: It may be helpful for you to explain to him that you agree that the Lord used the pastor greatly in bringing blessing to the church and that he did a great job of shepherding the church. However, stress that your concern is not to focus on the past, but move ahead in obedience to the Word of God in looking to the future. This is not an indictment on the man. Rather, it an effort to pursue eldership as a positive move toward a more biblical pattern of church leadership.
Tim: That’s a great way to put it. I’ll call the fellow right away!
Paul: That’s great to make every effort to bring him on board. If he is not swayed, don’t let the one with hesitations hinder the enthusiasm of the others who want to move ahead. Use your prayerful judgment as a team to determine how best to bring him fully on board.
Tim: What’s next, then?
Paul: It would be easy to jump right out and make an announcement to the congregation. But, it may be better for the team to sort through a few things. Without a good plan, the potential for messing up is great. We would encourage the transition team to study the subject of BE together, work on a plan to involve the congregation and develop a position statement on leadership that you can recommend to the church.
Tim: As usual, I’m all ears on learning how to do this.
Initial Team Tasks
Establishing Guidelines
Now that the transition team has been empowered by the church, it’s time to determine what the team will actually do. First, as a group, you will need to set up guidelines for operation, your group’s agreed-upon parameters for working together. Write them down—even conscientious people are prone to forget what they agreed to.
Here are some things to consider:
- Select a coordinator (a.k.a. team leader or facilitator) who is good at planning, keeping discussions moving, holding team members accountable for accomplishing tasks, etc. If you choose more than one leader, define who will lead and when.
- Devise a schedule for frequency and length of meetings.
- Determine expectations for each meeting and each transition team member (attendance, reading notes from the meetings, etc).
- Agree to a decision-making process. We recommend a simple consensus approach similar to the approach in Acts 15, where the apostle James sensed the group’s consensus and created a proposal everyone could generally agree on. Voting on every detail can be overkill, so keep it simple. A show of hands is usually sufficient, and going with the majority on most issues prevents a minority from hindering progress. The leader should be on the lookout for serious resistance to a proposal and guide the discussion to find resolution, taking care not to disregard strong feelings. From the outset each member should ultimately agree to support the thinking of the majority.
See our “Decision Making” resources for helpful insights.
Prayer
Because spiritual unity among the transition team members is essential, we recommend establishing a regular time of prayer at each of your team meetings.
Reading
Each member of the team should absorb the “Readiness Reading” resources.
- The main biblical texts: Acts 14:23, 20:17-38, 1 Peter 5:1-4, 1 Timothy 3:1-7, Titus 1:5-9
- The Biblical Eldership Booklet, a brief (47-page) introduction to the importance and biblical basis for eldership.
- Leading With Love by Alexander Strauch, an essential read on the importance of love in providing leadership in the church.
- Agape Leadership, the biography of Robert C. Chapman, an example of loving leadership from the 18th century. Chapman provides an excellent model for the kind of leadership that God can use to influence people—leadership that is characterized by love.
Determining Objectives
First the team should polish the provisional purpose statement so that each member fully embraces it.
Next, determine the specific objectives of the transition process, such as:
- Develop a written proposal for a BE structure and function for the church.
- Develop a comprehensive plan for guiding the congregation through the investigation, understanding, and embracing of BE.
- Oversee the evaluation and installation of the interim elder council.
- Work out a rough timetable for when things will happen.
By this time the gifted administrators and leaders on the team should be leading the transition team more actively.
Develop a “Consensus” Understanding of BE
There are many ways to approach consensus; every team will be unique. You can use this worksheet for assistance and adapt the following guidelines to your situation. If you have some additional ideas on doing this, please share them with us so we can add your wisdom to ours.
The team needs to work toward a shared agreement on the essential principles of biblical elders. Encourage open, thoughtful, and respectful discussion, as this will uncover new insights, areas of concern, misunderstandings, and questions that need to be addressed. Amazingly, two people can read or listen to the same thing, and even use the same wording, yet come away with different meanings. Be alert for subtle differences in perspective, not just adherence to the same words and sentences. We can’t emphasize this enough. We know of situations where people fully agreed t on written statements, but tension existed because the different parties understood the same words differently. The goal is not to agree to the same wording, but to come to the same understanding.
“… make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose” (Phil. 2:2 NASB).
What Should Be Discussed?
Biblical eldership is a large subject, so it is best to break it down into subtopics such as:
- Function: The broad scriptural functions of elders and how that would look in a job description.
- Structure: Biblical structure of government, that is, the lines of authority and responsibilities.
- Qualifications: The scriptural qualifications for elders (working out the interpretative/applicative issues of “husband of one wife,” “having children under control,” “having children who believe,” “apt to teach,” etc.).
- Decisions: The decision-making processes relative to elders, deacons, and the congregation.
- Congregational Response: Biblical perspective on the congregation’s response to the elders.
- Constitution: Changes required within the church’s legal documents in order to accommodate BE.
- Identifying Elders: The process for identifying/selecting elders.
- Sustainability: Term limits/rotations, preventing burnout, elder sabbaticals, new elders, continuing elder education, disqualifications, etc. (NOTE: This will be dealt with in more detail in the final step on “Plan For Sustainability”).
To help you work through each of the above steps, see the extensive list of issues compiled by one church that transitioned to BE, Patterson Park Church in Beavercreek, Ohio.
Formulate a Written BE Proposal Statement
When a consensus has been reached on the general principles of BE, produce a written statement that will function initially as a working document. This will need to be polished first by the transition team as it is being hammered out, and then ultimately by the congregation in the next stage, as they all interact with the team’s proposal.
Again, there are many ways to approach this, but here are some ideas to stimulate your thinking:
- An effective statement should summarize the agreed-upon view of biblical eldership that the transition team is proposing to the congregation. It should solidify and clarify without being overly wordy. No one will read it if it is too long! Writing it down forces the team to carefully think through the main aspects of BE before the actual transition begins. The exercise might reveal that a consensus has not yet been reached.
- It might seem easier to simply “borrow” another church’s statement. While it may be helpful to see how others have crafted theirs, you will benefit from wrestling with the statement for BE within your own church situation.
- Assign a member of the team who is gifted at writing and thinking clearly to draft the document, and then have all the members interact with it. This may result in a few editions in order to get the wording right and agreed upon. As noted before, make sure the words reflect the genuine thinking and consensus of the whole group.
What Happens if the Team Disagrees?
- First, some disagreement is inevitable. Where thinking people work together for a common goal, there will be divergent views and opinions—otherwise someone is not thinking! Prayer for unity, understanding and grace should bathe the whole process.
- Make sure you keep to the agreed upon rules for decision-making.
- Seek God’s grace and ask for the wisdom of Solomon.
- For the final document, we recommend everyone set aside minority concerns for the sake of ratifying the final document.
- If major disagreements occur, the timeline needs to slow down for prayer and a grace-filled time of seeking resolution. It may be that the move to BE needs to be delayed for a while. We know of one church that implemented BE after about 20 years of waiting on God’s timing in working with the whole congregation. His ways are not always the same as ours. So be patient and gracious. Transitioning with a divided transition team or divided congregation would be an invitation for disaster.
- We recommend that the document be finalized and dated with the signatures of all the transition team members.
What’s Next?
The next step is to devise a plan for bringing the proposal to the congregation, teaching about BE and leading them to embrace the transition to BE. For that, continue to the next section, Engage The Church.