Eastside Church of the Cross

Church Order

 

  Our Form of Church Government

            Our Ecclesiology

            (How our Church is Organized):

 

Our form of church government is simple: we are run by relationships that are glued together by God the Holy Spirit.

 

There are various ways that Christians have decided to organize their congregational life.  We have chosen to be what is known as Congregational. For us, that means we are a family, and God our Father has given us his Spirit, and as a family, we relate in homes and in our daily lives, and weekly we gather for worship (periodically we gather to make decisions as one body). 

 

Elders/Pastors in the Bible, do not dictate decisions, they wash feet (so to speak).  Jesus said in Mark 10 that the church is not to be run like the Gentiles conduct their businesses.  For us, that means that the pastor is not functioning as the CEO at the top of the hierarchy.  Instead, we are the family of God, and pastors and deacons serve as brothers — not as a decision making bodies.  The more leaders think of themselves as decision makers, the more they give up on biblical leadership, and the more they give up on being relationship builders.  They are to model relationship building.

 

We are all brothers and sisters in Christ, and within that reality we acknowledge that there are people who serve in various ways.  In this way, being “Congregational” does not erase distinctions within our relationships.  Some people will serve the elderly better.  Some will serve better in teaching.  Some will serve best by opening their home.  We are many parts.  

 

In contrast to other forms of church order, we do not follow any kind of judicial-court model for leadership where the elders and/or deacons serve as judges in closed-door decision making.  We all own the Congregational decision-making process even as we all own relationship-building.  And there is room at the foot of the cross for anyone to be best in this — chiefly because the ground at the foot of the cross is down-hill: anyone is free to be least, last, and lowest.  Christian-Gravity is what takes us to this low ground where we find ourselves naturally drawn to be least in this world.  And since so many people scramble up-hill for high ground—away from the depths of dying to self—there is plenty of room at the foot of the cross.  Kids can find there way there.  Housewives  can find their way there.  CEOs can get there.  Carpenters can make it to this low ground.   Leadership in the Kingdom of God is losing one’s life in cross-bearing relationships.

 

We are all servants.  And leadership in the church means out-serving.  It means rushing to the cross — first to weep, first to repent, first to be wrong — and that is the mark of Christian leadership.  Leadership is not handed off to a professional staff, but exists within a congregation of Christian relationships.

 

All of us have a relationship to the whole body.  When it comes to how we live our common body life in Louisburg, our success in reflecting Jesus spreads to all the members.  We are not ruled by the deacons and elders/pastors except that they rule by living the dying life.

 

We are not Deacon run.  We don’t have a ruling body that runs the church.  We have relationships.  We have the Holy Spirit!  The Deacons don’t gather as representative of the whole congregation.  And where we slip into thinking that about them, we hand off our relationship duties.  We are Congregational because we are Relational, and all the relationships in the church matter (not just those that exist among pastors and deacons).

 

We are not Pastor run.  The pastor is not a dictator.  He is responsible for explaining Jesus, and showing him in the Sermon, and protecting the sheep from false doctrine, and for being first in modeling servant-hood in relationships.   The pastor must lead by being humble, willing to be wrong, willing to die to self all the time.  The Pastor is also held accountable for how he leads in teaching these things — in living these things — and in holding forth Christ.  Pastors have to stand before God to give an account for how they ministered the Word and preached Christ. 

 

We are Relationship Run — and those relationship are connected by the Holy Spirit. As a body, we all share the burden of body life —   including helping those who are openly and willfully unrepentant: see Matthew 18

· In this case, we all share the relationship burdens of any members who are hurting.

· We warn one another not to wander away from community life (see the whole chapter Hebrews 10)

· Fear of authentic relationships must not keep us from being fully engaged in our corporate life.

· Relationships and Connections are the context of the cure for what it means to have authentic body life, and that is how we are Congregational

 

About Pastors and Deacons

 

Pastors/Elders

The words “pastor” and “elder” are synonymous in the New Testament.    There are not two kinds of elder (with two kinds of ordination).

 

Pastors are leaders only as they are lowly servants

      What servant-hood is and is not

            Examples from Matthew 25

            Warnings from Matthew 23

            Not like Gentiles: Mark 10

      Foot-washing is our model

 

The pastor is not the person who makes all the decisions.

The pastor is not the president.

Elders are not a supreme court.

 

All of this this does not mean that truth is decided by the congregation or by relationships among the members.  The pastor has a relationship to the Bible that fixes and guides the sermons.  The Bible and Jesus are the Sermon, and they rule over the words of the elders when they preach or teach.   The truth and the gospel and the commands of Christ are not voted upon in any instance, and this is where the elders have the obligation to explain who God is from His Word.

 

 

Deacons

      The Deacons Serve.  The label Deacon means servant.  They serve to make sure that relationships remain intact.  The care about relationships.  They are to be the ones who care most about the body life of the congregation — even at personal cost. 

 

Deacons oversee giving to the poor and needy within and outside of the congregation. The Deacons have a special ACTS fund they use to help the needy, and they do not need to ask the congregation how to spend that money — it is at their discretion.  They manage the money tables in this way.

 

The pastor is not the president of the deacons.

The deacons are not a small congress of representatives, acting as a body ruling on behalf of the whole.

 

We follow 1 Tim 3, Titus and Acts 20:17 – which specifies two offices in the Church, not more!

 

No great hierarchy required

 

Nor is this an open door to individualism

 

Business meetings

 

“Business Meetings” are times for the members of the church to make important choices, or to discuss matters that require the attention of everyone.  These meetings are family gatherings, and a way to coordinate our passions, ideas, finances, dreams, efforts and resources.

 

Louisburg, Kansas

Sunday School, 9:30am

Sunday Worship, 10:30am

Glorifying God by Enjoying Him Forever