The Myth of Church Leadership (3)

In my first post on this topic I challenged my readers to check out my claim (which many may think is radical and utterly false!) by what the scriptures clearly teach on this subject. Those who have been willing and have taken the time to list all scriptural references to the words “lead”, “leadeth”, “leading”, “led”, “leader”, “leaders”, “leadership” and words of similar meaning such as “guide”, “guides”, “guidance” , “direct”, “direction” and “directors” etc will be well aware that all such references in scripture are roughly divided into two groups: -those referring to God as the leader or guide of his people and those referring to mortal men who lead others.

Firstly, You will have found, as I did, that there are roughly 90 instances in Old and New testaments where God leads, directs or guides. He leads in the right way, in His way, in the way we should go, in light and truth, beside still waters, in paths of righteousness, to keep his statutes, in a plain path, in safety, in the way everlasting, into the way of peace, into the land of uprightness, by the springs of water, in the way of wisdom and in right paths. He leads His own sheep out, gently leading those that are with young, He leads from evil, into blessing, into all truth, to repentance, into the love of God, into patient waiting for Christ and finally unto living fountains of waters and wiping all tears from His people’s eyes.

Secondly, You will have found, as I did, that there are about 50 references in all the scriptures when mortal men lead, guide or direct. In only about 10 of those instances was such leadership of benefit and blessing. Those cases were only when Old Testament people were lead by God's appointed leaders such as Moses and Joshua, when Israel was lead into battle by divinely appointed leaders and captains and once in the New Testament when Saul of Tarsus was lead by the hand when he was physically blind.

In all the rest of the cases of mortals leading or guiding, Jeremiah’s declaration is most appropriate: “I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps.” And the prophet Micah warns us all, “Trust ye not in a friend, put ye not confidence in a guide.” Apart from mortal men being specifically appointed to leadership by God Himself,.... leadership by mortals is always “into a way that is not good”, i.e. God’s people are lead by mortal men into captivity or prison, into error, wickedness, destruction or death, into judgment before governors, councils or their enemies. The blind lead the blind into the ditch, into Babylon or into idolatry.

Thirdly, It is most important to notice that not once in all the NT is any mortal man or woman appointed by God to the responsibility of leading, guiding or directing other people!

Furthermore, if one is actually going to lead others, it is crucial that the leader have the trust or confidence of those who are lead. So a study of all that the scripture has to say regarding where our trust or confidence should be placed is most instructive…

Fourthly, If you were to look up all the instances in scripture of the various forms of the words “trust” and “confidence” you would find about 130 scripture passages which declare that God alone is worthy of our trust, instruct us to place our confidence in Him and describe the many blessings and benefits of doing so.

And Fifthly, by way of contrast, there are about 60 instances where we are forbidden to place our trust or confidence in man, in his gods, his wealth, his wisdom and where the follies, curses, harm and destruction of doing so are clearly described. Among these are many instances of warnings about trusting a friend or even your self!

It is for all five of these reasons above that I maintain that leadership by mortal men or women in the church of Jesus Christ is a myth without any scriptural support! When men or women are appointed to or assume leadership in the church it is a sure sign of rebellion against Christ and disobedience to the Word of God! While these words seem very harsh and critical, I also want to make clear that I do not believe that everyone who has been appointed to or has assumed positions of leadership in the church is wilfully and knowingly rebelling against God and His Word. Likely the vast majority, like myself for many years, are simply following a religious culture which has been steeped for centuries in a “leadership” mentality and believes that such is entirely Biblical!

I am simply saying that it is high time to search out the foundations of this teaching, recognize it for what it is, reject it and return personally and corporately to the scriptural mindset of being followers of God as dear children, rather than seeking to be leaders of other people! As each of us radically adjust our thinking to acknowledge and follow only One Leader, our Lord Jesus Christ we will exert a far greater influence than any professed “leader” ever could! If each of us purposes to be the best follower of Christ that we can possibly be, we will in turn become examples to encourage other saints and those who do not yet know our Saviour to also follow Him.

(more to follow in the next post regarding followers of Christ exerting powerful influence on others by example. But let me encourage you to “flesh out” this subject for yourself and others by your own comments questions and observations in “comments” below or in personal emails to me at bwood4d@gmail.com)

The Myth of "Church Leadership"

Since early in the year I have been enjoying some great discussions with a good friend and brother in Christ, Lance King. Just recently he sent me a paper of his entitled, “Can Women Lead?”. From Galatians 3:28 Lance suggests that, in Christ, men and women are equal not only in worth, but also in opportunity and therefore women in the church should function in positions of leadership, may be in charge and may hold offices which have traditionally been limited to males.


As I considered Lance’s article and the scriptures which relate to the many facets of this discussion, I became more and more amazed as I noticed something that neither Lance nor I had anticipated. Rather than focussing on the differing gender perspectives, my mind was drawn to the larger question of leadership itself. While “church leadership” has always been a hot topic among Christians, while thousands of books, articles, sermons and seminars have been produced to address this subject and though hundreds of schools have been established for the specific purpose of equipping and training “church leaders”…I was astounded to discover that the Bible has nothing at all to say about mortal men or women becoming leaders in the church which Christ is building, or in any church in your community which may gather around him!

The Lord Jesus never called anyone to be a leader. He never attempted to train leaders, and never assigned any of his disciples the responsibilities of being church leaders!

Before you write me off as an “heretic” or “one who obviously has never read his Bible”, I would simply challenge you to spend a few minutes with your own Bible and a concordance. See if you can find the Lord Jesus or the apostles ever addressing the subject of “leadership” being entrusted to mortal men or women in the church.(Look up all the words “lead”, “leadeth”, “leading”, “led”, “leader”, “leaders”, “leadership” etc)

Then look up words of similar meaning such as “guide”, “guides”, “guidance” and “direct”, “direction”, “directors”.

Then see if the Lord Jesus equips any mortal to be “Lord”, “Dominie”, “Reverend”, “Master” or “Rabbi”.

You will soon discover that only God is qualified to be Leader, Lord, Master or Guide of His blood bought people, the church! That position has already been filled and God is not taking any more applications!! The head is the only leader in a body and all body members are followers of the head. The Body of Christ already has a head and anyone seeking to be a leader in His church is usurping the place of Christ!

Contrary to popular opinion, rather than calling “leaders” and training them how to “manage” their followers the Lord Jesus rather called disciples to follow Him, trained them in following and sent them out as followers who would direct others to follow Him! His followers were never to take “positions of leadership”, “hold offices”, “take charge” of the flock or train others for such tasks. They were rather to enlist more followers of Jesus, train them to listen to Him, obey Him and to teach others to do the same!

As I read my Bible, it seems clear that there are some tasks in the church which God has assigned exclusively to males (i.e. elders of churches, among other things, must be husbands of one wife) and other tasks which He has assigned exclusively to females (i.e. older women are to teach younger women to love their husbands, to love their children, to be discreet, chaste, keepers at home etc). But no gender-specific task has to do with leadership! They have to do with responsibilities of followers of the Lord Jesus.

There are no restrictions by way of age, ability, gift, race or gender upon those who would be the greatest or the best followers. May each one of us who belong to Christ be more diligent than ever before to be followers of the Lamb!