Abstract
In recent decades, many Baptist churches have experienced a quiet shift away from historic congregational polity toward centralized elder governance. Often motivated by theological seriousness and a desire for institutional stability, this transition has frequently occurred without formal congregational assent or careful examination of Baptist ecclesiology. This article argues that historic Baptist congregationalism was not a pragmatic preference but a theological conviction grounded in regenerate church membership, the authority of Scripture, and the responsibility of the gathered assembly. By tracing the historical development of Baptist polity, examining the rise of hybrid “presbygational” governance models, and reassessing the biblical arguments commonly advanced in support of elder rule, this study contends that the erosion of congregational authority represents not reform but structural displacement. Recovering Baptist ecclesiology, it concludes, requires renewed clarity regarding authority, office, and accountability within the local church.
Few Baptist churches have voted to abandon congregationalism. There has been no widespread rebellion against historic polity, no formal repudiation of the principles that once distinguished Baptist life. And yet, across much of the evangelical landscape, congregational authority has quietly receded. In many churches, the language remains. Members still “affirm,” churches still hold “votes,” and while “Baptist” may remain on official documents, it has quietly disappeared from many church websites — and from the operational substance of church life itself. Authority has shifted, often gradually and unintentionally, from the gathered congregation to a centralized leadership structure few churches ever explicitly chose.
This transition has not been driven primarily by doctrinal compromise. Many of the churches experiencing it remain confessionally orthodox, committed to the authority of Scripture, and deeply serious about the gospel. Nor has it been the product of malicious intent. In most cases, faithful pastors and elders have sought stability, efficiency, and protection for their churches in an increasingly fractured cultural moment. What has changed is not belief, but architecture — the underlying structure through which authority is exercised and accountability enforced.
Historically, Baptist churches located final earthly authority not in pastors, committees, or councils, but in the gathered body under Christ. Congregational governance was not a concession to democracy, nor a relic of frontier individualism; it was a theological conviction rooted in regenerate church membership and the belief that Christ governs His church through the whole assembly. Pastors were to lead, teach, and shepherd — but the ultimate responsibility to guard doctrine, examine and ordain leaders, and exercise discipline belonged to the church herself.
Over the past two decades, however, many Baptist congregations have adopted a hybrid form of governance often described as “elder-led and congregationally affirmed.” Drawing heavily from Reformed evangelical models, this approach has emphasized plural visible leadership while retaining the vocabulary of congregational authority. The result has been a structure that feels familiar and biblical, yet differs significantly from both historic Baptist congregationalism and classical Presbyterian polity — a system increasingly common, rarely examined, and carrying consequences few anticipated.
What Baptists Historically Meant by Congregationalism
When Baptists speak of congregational governance, we are not describing a mere decision-making process or a preference for democracy over hierarchy. Congregationalism is not an organizational convenience but a theological conviction flowing directly from Baptist beliefs about the nature of the church itself. Because the church is understood to be a regenerate body — composed of professing believers accountable to Christ — authority necessarily resides in the gathered congregation under His lordship.
From the earliest Particular Baptist confessions through the formation of the Southern Baptist Convention, Baptists consistently affirmed that Christ governs His church not through an external hierarchy or a ruling class of clergy, but through the whole assembly acting together in submission to Scripture.1 Pastors were entrusted with teaching, shepherding, and leading the church toward faithfulness, but they did not possess independent governing authority. The final responsibility to guard doctrine, recognize officers, administer discipline, and steward the church’s life rested with the congregation itself.
Charles Haddon Spurgeon articulated this conviction plainly, insisting that “the government of the church is in the hands of the whole body of the members,”2 and rejecting the idea that even godly leaders could rule apart from congregational consent. The church, he argued, remained responsible before Christ for the actions of its officers — not the other way around.
This understanding was not uniquely Baptist. Jonathan Edwards, whose theological influence spans the entire Reformed tradition, likewise affirmed that “the power of discipline is in the church, and not in the elders alone.”3 For Edwards, a local congregation of visible saints united by covenant constituted the highest earthly authority Christ had established within the church. Elders served and led, but authority was exercised corporately through the body.
These convictions shaped Baptist practice in tangible ways. Church members examined and ordained their pastors. Matters of discipline were addressed openly and corporately. Financial decisions were debated and approved by the body. Even when pastoral leadership was strong, it remained accountable to the congregation that called it. Authority was exercised publicly, not privately; deliberation was assumed, not feared.
Over time, this structure proved remarkably resilient. Congregational governance allowed Baptist churches to correct error, remove unfaithful leaders, and recover doctrinal clarity without reliance on external courts or denominational enforcement. While it was sometimes messy and inefficient, it embodied a shared responsibility for faithfulness that prevented authority from concentrating in ways Scripture never intended. Congregationalism was not a barrier to ministry — it was one of the primary means by which Baptist churches sought to preserve it, and fundamental to why Baptist churches held fast to scripture while mainline denominations abandoned it.
How Authority Functioned in Practice
Historic Baptist congregationalism was not merely a statement of belief but a lived ecclesiology that shaped the daily life of the church. Authority was not theoretical, nor was it exercised through abstract documents or distant committees. It functioned concretely through identifiable practices that made responsibility visible and accountability unavoidable.
Pastors were called by the congregation and entrusted with the public ministry of the Word. Their authority was real and substantial — exercised through preaching, teaching, exhortation, and spiritual oversight — yet it was never autonomous. The pulpit was not a platform for personal vision, but the ordinary means by which Christ shepherded His people through Scripture. Because pastoral authority flowed from the Word, it remained accountable to the body that recognized and affirmed that calling.
For this reason, Baptist churches historically understood the elder or pastor to be a preaching office.4 While many within the church might teach in various contexts, the authoritative instruction that bound the conscience of the congregation belonged to those ordained to minister the Word publicly. They carried the doctrinal banner. The elders who led were the elders who taught; responsibility for doctrine could not be separated from responsibility for leadership. Oversight was inseparable from proclamation.
Congregational authority operated not in competition with pastoral leadership, but in cooperation with it. Members did not micromanage sermons or ministries, nor did pastors rule by decree. Instead, authority moved along clear lines of responsibility. The congregation recognized, examined, and ordained its pastors.5 The pastors instructed and led the congregation, equipping them for the ministerial duty of governance (Eph. 4:12). When disputes arose, or discipline was required, the church acted corporately — not as a rubber stamp, but as the final earthly court of appeal under Christ.
This structure fostered clarity rather than confusion. If teaching error entered the pulpit, responsibility rested with the pastors charged to guard it. If discipline was mishandled, the congregation retained authority to correct its leaders. If doctrine drifted, the members possessed both the right and the responsibility to act. Authority was never diffused so widely that no one could be held accountable, nor centralized so narrowly that correction became impossible.
Even administrative matters reflected this logic. While churches appointed treasurers, committees, and deacons to steward resources wisely, financial authority remained with the congregation itself. Budgets were presented transparently, debated openly, and approved corporately. Leaders proposed; the church disposed. Efficiency was valued, but never elevated above accountability.
Such a system was not without friction. Congregationalism required patience, maturity, and spiritual courage. It could be slow. It could be messy. It risked hurt feelings, bruised egos, and interpersonal conflict. Yet it embodied a conviction deeper than pragmatism: that Christ rules His church through the gathered body, and that no leader — however gifted — should bear authority without visibility, or responsibility without answerability.
In this way, Baptist congregationalism created a network of mutual obligation and submission (Eph. 5:21). Pastors were protected from being overworked, being isolated from faithful brothers in the pews, or the perils of unchecked power. Congregations were protected from doctrinal drift and personality-driven leadership. Authority existed — but it was always tethered to office, function, and accountability, not charisma or organizational role.
The loss of congregational authority, however, did not occur through a single decision or theological revolt. It emerged gradually, shaped by historical pressures that few churches anticipated — and by a form of faithfulness that, paradoxically, outpaced formation.
When Faithfulness Outpaced Formation
Part of the present crisis is not the result of compromise, but of conviction. Throughout the twentieth century, Baptist churches held fast to the inerrancy and sufficiency of Scripture while many mainline denominations surrendered those commitments under the pressures of theological liberalism. As a result, countless Christians left their denominations in search of churches that still believed the Bible. Baptist congregations became theological refuges — places where Scripture was preached plainly, and where the authority of God’s Word was treasured by both ordinary believers and ordained ministers.
Yet many who arrived came with little understanding of why Baptists ordered their churches as they did. Congregational authority was often assumed to be a matter of preference rather than principle — an organizational habit rather than a theological safeguard. In the urgency to reaffirm the truthfulness of Scripture, the ecclesiology that had historically protected Baptist churches from doctrinal drift was rarely taught, examined, or intentionally passed on. Many assumed that Baptist polity was a byproduct of American democracy rather than a theological conviction that long predated it, and therefore regarded alternative models of church governance as more sophisticated or spiritually mature.
In this way, Baptist churches were often treated as a kind of institutional “do-over” — a place to recover confidence in biblical authority while retaining assumptions about church leadership inherited from other traditions. Scripture was rightly affirmed as external, immovable, and sufficient, yet the structures designed to ensure its faithful application within the local church were frequently taken for granted. The result was a growing disconnect between what Baptists believed about the authority of the Bible and how that authority was safeguarded in practice.
Over time, men were brought into leadership who loved the Scriptures deeply but felt little responsibility to steward the Baptist inheritance they had received. Appeals to history or polity were dismissed with well-intentioned but misplaced refrains: “I don’t care what Baptists believe — I care about what the Bible says.” Such statements sounded pious, yet functioned as evasions — as though the question of whether historic Baptist practice reflected biblical conviction could be ignored. They assumed that centuries of Baptist polity emerged as incidental to Scripture rather than in conscious submission to it.
The result has been a kind of ecclesiological amnesia. Baptist churches came to be doctrinally orthodox yet structurally undefined — institutions shaped primarily by confessional minimalism rather than by a coherent theology of the church. Congregationalism, once recognized as a God-given means of accountability and self-correction, was reduced to an optional tradition easily replaced by whichever leadership model appeared most efficient, scalable, or capable of providing institutional stability.
Ironically, many of the structures now dismantled were among the very features that made Baptist churches such safe havens in the first place. Like a wall torn down without first asking why it was built, congregational authority was quietly removed in the name of biblical faithfulness — even though it had long served as one of the primary defenses against doctrinal drift, pastoral excess, and institutional capture.
The Rise of the Presbygational Church
The erosion of congregational authority did not occur in a vacuum. It was shaped by a broader movement within evangelicalism that sought greater seriousness, theological depth, and biblical clarity in church leadership. In many respects, this movement arose as a corrective — a reaction against the excesses of seeker-sensitive pragmatism, celebrity-driven ministry, and the managerial church-growth model that dominated the late twentieth century.
During the 1970s and 1980s, a renewed interest in the New Testament language of elders, overseers, and shepherds prompted many evangelicals to reexamine long-standing assumptions about pastoral leadership. Influential works such as Alexander Strauch’s Biblical Eldership argued persuasively that Scripture envisioned a plurality of elders rather than a solitary pastor exercising unchecked authority.6 For many churches weary of personality-driven leadership and pastoral isolation, the call to shared oversight seemed not only biblical but urgently needed.
At the same time, prominent evangelical ministries operating within elder-rule structures demonstrated remarkable doctrinal stability and long-term faithfulness. John MacArthur’s Grace Community Church, perhaps the most influential example, modeled a robust commitment to expository preaching, biblical inerrancy, church discipline, and theological seriousness within an autonomous local-church framework governed by elders. For many Baptists, the visible fruit of such ministries suggested that elder governance was not merely compatible with conservative theology, but perhaps even conducive to it.
These influences converged in the late 1990s and early 2000s alongside the rise of the so-called Young, Restless, and Reformed movement. Conferences, publishing platforms, and church-planting networks — including Acts 29 — emphasized elder plurality, strong pastoral leadership, and a renewed focus on ecclesiology shaped by Reformed theology.7 A generation of pastors was trained to see congregationalism as a historical artifact and elder-led governance as a biblical recovery.8
Alongside these developments, ministries such as 9Marks sought to recover ecclesiological seriousness within broadly Baptist contexts. Unlike many contemporary networks, 9Marks has consistently affirmed congregational authority, famously summarizing its position with the dictum, “Elders lead; congregations rule.” Its emphasis on regenerate church membership, meaningful discipline, and pastoral plurality represented a genuine attempt to restore biblical church order rather than replace it.9
At the same time, 9Marks’ advocacy of congregational authority struggled to carry persuasive weight among more conservative proponents of elder governance. As broader evangelical discourse became increasingly shaped by the language of racial reconciliation and related cultural frameworks, some prominent congregational churches appeared — fairly or not — to many observers to be susceptible to the ideological pressures of the moment. For critics already wary of congregational decision-making, this reinforced the perception that authority vested in the Body left churches vulnerable to cultural influence.
In this environment, elder rule came to be viewed not merely as a theological preference, but as a form of insulation — a means of protecting institutional stability by concentrating authority in trained leaders rather than in congregations perceived as easily swayed. Whether that diagnosis was accurate is a separate question. What matters is that the association of congregationalism with cultural accommodation, however tenuous, further diminished its credibility within conservative Reformed circles and accelerated the turn toward centralized governance.
While organizations like 9Marks defended congregational authority clearly in principle, the practical mechanics of congregational governance often received less attention. In churches already weakened by decades of minimal polity formation, the renewed focus on elder plurality and pastoral leadership was sometimes adopted more readily than the slower, more demanding work of congregational catechesis. As a result, structures emphasizing leadership visibility often advanced more quickly than those preserving congregational authority.
As Baptist churches absorbed these various influences, a crucial distinction was frequently overlooked. Presbyterian churches that practiced elder rule did so within systems of graded courts, external accountability, and formal processes of appeal. Elder authority was never absolute, nor confined to the local session alone. By contrast, Baptist churches adopting elder governance retained their historic autonomy while importing only the internal authority structure of presbyterian polity.
The result was a hybrid model — neither fully Baptist nor truly Presbyterian — in which local elders exercised final authority without external oversight and without meaningful congregational governance. Plurality replaced accountability, and dispositional affirmation replaced palpable authority. What emerged was not classical elder rule, but something new: a centralized leadership structure operating within an autonomous congregation, bounded neither by congregational checks nor by presbyterian courts.
This “presbygational” model proved attractive precisely because it appeared to offer the best of both worlds. It promised shared leadership without denominational control, theological seriousness without congregational conflict, and stability without the inefficiencies of democratic process. In practice, however, it subtly redefined the nature of authority within the local church. Governance became internal, self-perpetuating, and increasingly disconnected from the gathered body Christ had charged with final responsibility. And sadly, it left leaving the church as the only means by which Spirit-filled believers could reliably adjudicate their concerns.
Importantly, this shift was not driven by ill intent. Many pastors embraced elder-led structures out of sincere desire for faithfulness, protection, and clarity. But good intentions cannot substitute for careful ecclesiology. As Baptist churches adopted the language and assumptions of elder governance without its historic guardrails, they unknowingly exchanged one set of risks for another — trading congregational disorder for centralized authority without meaningful appeal.
The Privatization of Ecclesial Disagreement
Alongside these structural changes has emerged a subtle but consequential shift in how disagreement is handled within the church. Where Baptist congregationalism once assumed defined, open processes by which members could raise concerns and the body could deliberate together, many churches now rely almost exclusively on informal pastoral reassurance. Members are told that they “have a voice,” that leadership is “always listening,” and that questions or objections are welcomed — yet the means by which those concerns are addressed has quietly changed.
Increasingly, disagreement is redirected away from the gathered church and into private conversation. Concerns that once would have been examined openly are now met with a familiar refrain: “Let’s talk about it over coffee.” While often well-intentioned, this practice functions to remove the matter from congregational visibility. The discussion becomes relational rather than ecclesial, personal rather than corporate, and the rest of the body is excluded from witnessing either correction or clarification.
The consequence is not merely procedural but formative. When disagreements are resolved privately, the congregation is denied the opportunity to be instructed — whether by seeing leaders persuaded and adjust, or by watching faithful shepherds patiently explain why a concern is misplaced. In either case, the body is deprived of edification. Over time, this pattern produces a church in which accountability exists only in theory, and authority is never meaningfully tested in public.
Such dynamics also create an environment in which pastoral fallibility is affirmed rhetorically but never demonstrated visibly. Leaders may speak openly of their imperfections, yet the structures of church life provide no occasion for public repentance, correction, or reconsideration. In practice, the pastor is never wrong — not because he is infallible, but because the mechanisms by which error could be acknowledged have been removed. What remains is not transparency, but reputation management; not shepherding through truth, but the careful containment of dissent. And sadly, congregations too often learn of metastasizing issues within their church after they’ve passed the point of no return and their pastor has resigned.
Private Counsel and Public Responsibility
Appeals to private reconciliation are often raised in defense of these practices, most commonly by reference to Jesus’ instruction in Matthew 18. Yet the passage itself does not envision perpetual privacy. Private confrontation is the first step of accountability, not its terminus. When matters bear upon the doctrine, direction, or governance of the church, the error is not merely a personal sin (Matt. 18:15), and the biblical pattern assumes eventual visibility — not to shame individuals, but to preserve truth and communal responsibility.
Matthew 18 addresses personal sin between brothers; it does not provide a framework for resolving questions of teaching, leadership, or institutional authority behind closed doors. To apply it indiscriminately to every disagreement is to collapse moral categories Scripture itself keeps distinct. What begins as private counsel must not become a mechanism by which the church is prevented from knowing, discerning, and learning together.
Nor can appeals to church size resolve the issue. Growth may require delegation of process, but it cannot nullify the congregation’s responsibility to govern.10 If a church becomes too large to exercise meaningful congregational authority, the problem is not size but structure. Biblical responsibility does not diminish with attendance; it demands careful preservation.
When concerns that affect the whole body are consistently resolved away from the body, congregational authority exists only as an abstraction. The church may be assured that it has a voice, but it no longer possesses a forum. Over time, authority migrates from the gathered congregation to the private discretion of leaders — not by declaration, but by default.
Reformed Theology and Unexamined Ecclesiology
The spread of elder-led governance within Baptist churches also coincided with a renewed interest in Reformed theology among younger pastors. In the closing decades of the twentieth century, many congregations rediscovered the doctrines of grace as an antidote to theological shallowness, pragmatism, and revivalistic excess. This recovery represented not a departure from Baptist tradition, but a return to it. Historically, many of the earliest Baptists were unapologetically Reformed in their soteriology while remaining firmly congregational in church polity.11 12 13 14
Yet while theological depth was recovered intentionally, ecclesiology was often assumed rather than examined. For many pastors shaped within broadly evangelical and Reformed-leaning institutions — including Dallas Theological Seminary, Gordon-Conwell, The Master’s Seminary, and others — formal instruction in Baptist polity was minimal. Questions of church governance were frequently treated as secondary matters of wisdom or context rather than as theological convictions requiring careful stewardship.
At the same time, influential ministry networks and publishing platforms such as Acts 29, The Gospel Coalition, and Redeemer City to City fostered a shared Reformed evangelical culture that transcended denominational lines. These spaces prioritized doctrinal fidelity, expositional preaching, and missional engagement — all laudable aims — but rarely distinguished between Reformed theology as a system of belief and Presbyterian polity as a system of governance. As a result, elder plurality was often received as part of the broader Reformed ministerial imagination rather than as a distinct ecclesiological commitment requiring congregational assent.
In this environment, many Baptist churches became more theologically Reformed without becoming more ecclesiologically Baptist. The doctrines of grace were embraced with clarity, while the congregational structures historically designed to protect those doctrines were left underdeveloped or quietly reconfigured. What emerged was not a rejection of Baptist identity, but an incomplete recovery of it — one in which soteriology was taught carefully, and polity was inherited casually.
This convergence helps explain why elder governance came to feel not merely permissible, but natural. Authority structures were adopted not through theological argument so much as familiarity, shaped by the dominant voices within the Reformed evangelical ecosystem. Congregationalism, where acknowledged at all, was often viewed as procedural rather than principled — a remnant of history rather than a theological safeguard bound to the very doctrines being recovered.
Ecclesiastical Integrity
Beneath these structural developments lies a more fundamental ethical question — one that cannot be resolved merely by appeals to efficiency or effectiveness. Scripture requires truthfulness not only in speech, but in intent. “Let your ‘yes’ be yes,” Christ commands, “and your ‘no’ be no.” That standard applies with particular weight to those entrusted with spiritual authority.
It is therefore difficult to reconcile pastoral integrity with the practice of accepting leadership positions in churches whose governing convictions one fundamentally rejects. Disagreement with Baptist polity is not sinful; many faithful churches operate under different structures. What is troubling is the willingness to assume office within a congregation while privately believing its defining commitments to be misguided, temporary, or in need of quiet transformation.
When pastors enter Baptist churches intending to reshape their polity rather than steward it, the result is not reformation but displacement. Congregations believe they are calling men to lead within a shared framework, while leaders operate with a different understanding altogether. Such arrangements depend upon ambiguity and, ironically, congregational ignorance of their own church’s commitments. The combination of ecclesiastic ambiguity and congregational ignorance is a disqualifyingly unstable foundation on which to build the pastoral role of congregational enlightenment.
Ecclesiology is not incidental to pastoral ministry. It defines where authority resides, how correction occurs, and who ultimately bears responsibility before Christ. To accept a call while withholding honest agreement on these matters is not theological flexibility; it is a failure of candor. Churches deserve shepherds who will say plainly what they believe — and pastors deserve congregations that know exactly what they are affirming.
In this respect, this quiet transformation of church polity has mirrored the preceding rise of the church growth movement, in which pragmatic marketing methods were introduced under the banner of renewal but functioned instead to standardize churches according to external models. When theological commitments are treated as malleable branding rather than binding convictions, local churches cease to be shepherded and begin to be managed.
Rethinking the Scriptural Case for Elder Rule
The modern defense of elder rule typically begins with the assertion that Scripture assigns governing authority to elders rather than to the congregation. Central to this claim is the interpretation of a small number of New Testament texts — particularly 1 Timothy 5:17 — which are said to establish a class of elders whose primary function is governance rather than teaching.
Yet this conclusion depends upon an interpretive move the text itself does not require.
When Paul writes, “Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching,” the argument for two distinct categories of elder turns on the word especially. Elder-rule proponents commonly read the phrase as delineating a subgroup — ruling elders who govern, and teaching elders who preach.
The Greek term translated “especially” (μάλιστα, malista), however, does not function as a divider but as an intensifier. It highlights a subset within a single group based on degree of labor, not difference of office. Paul is not distinguishing between elders who teach and those who do not, but emphasizing those whose work in preaching and teaching is particularly demanding and therefore deserving of recognition in the form of material provision.
Read plainly, the verse affirms that elders who lead faithfully are worthy of honor — with special attention given to those whose vocational labor in the Word is most extensive. Nothing in the grammar requires or even suggests a second, non-teaching class of elder. The distinction is one of effort and emphasis, not authority. As Robert Wring notes, the Greek term μάλιστα “adds energy to the assertion” and denotes “a distinction of service and not one of rank.”15
This reading accords with historical Baptist practice16 and the broader witness of the New Testament. In every passage where elders are described, doctrinal competence is essential. Elders must be “apt to teach,” able to exhort in sound doctrine, and capable of refuting error. No provision exists for elders whose authority lies primarily in administration, management, or organizational oversight apart from teaching.
The nature of elder “rule” must therefore be understood accordingly. Scripture does not present elders as executives directing institutional affairs, but as stewards of doctrinal fidelity. Their authority is exercised through discernment — judging what conforms to the Word of God and guarding the church against false teaching. Elders rule in the same way a judge rules on law, or a referee rules on conformity to the rules of the game: by applying an external standard, not by generating authority from office alone.
For this reason, the elder office is inseparable from the public ministry of the Word. While many believers may teach in various settings, the teaching that binds the conscience of the church occurs in the gathered assembly.17 It is this corporate instruction — preaching and authoritative exposition — that Scripture associates uniquely with eldership. Teaching divorced from the pulpit is insufficient to define the office; ordination recognizes responsibility for the church’s doctrine as a whole.
When churches therefore ordain men whose primary responsibilities are administrative or operational, the office itself is distorted. Roles such as financial oversight, organizational management, or facilities supervision may be vital to the health of a congregation, but they carry no uniquely doctrinal burden. They do not require ordination, because they do not entail responsibility for guarding the faith once delivered to the saints.
The consequences of such expansion are significant. When eldership is detached from preaching, doctrinal accountability becomes diffused. Teaching authority no longer corresponds to teaching responsibility. The congregation cannot easily discern who bears final responsibility for theological instruction, and the elder office becomes a status marker rather than a defined stewardship.
The New Testament presents a more coherent vision. Elders are pastors. Pastors are teachers. Their authority flows from the Word they proclaim, and their oversight consists in ensuring that the life of the church conforms to that Word. Governance arises not from institutional control but from doctrinal clarity exercised openly before the congregation.
In this light, the question confronting Baptist churches is not merely whether elders should rule, but whether eldership itself has been redefined. When ordination is severed from the public ministry of teaching, the church does not gain protection — it loses the very means by which Christ governs His people.
Even proponents of elder governance have at times articulated a more restrained understanding of pastoral authority. John MacArthur, when asked what authority a pastor holds over the lives of congregants, answered simply: “None. No authority.”18 His point was not to deny leadership, but to locate authority exclusively in the Word of God faithfully taught. A pastor possesses no intrinsic power to bind conscience; his authority exists only insofar as Scripture speaks through him.
Yet if pastoral authority — as Bavnick argued — is truly ministerial rather than magisterial,19 it cannot become something different by crossing an institutional threshold. The church is not an entity separate from its members, nor does Scripture recognize distinct spheres of obedience within the Christian life. The same Word governs believers privately and corporately alike. What changes in the gathered church is not the nature of authority, but the weight of accountability borne by those who teach.
When pastoral authority is reconceived as institutional power rather than declarative truth, it ceases to be Protestant — and begins to resemble the very clericalism the Reformation rejected.
Why This Model Feels Biblical
The persistence of elder-led governance in Baptist churches cannot be explained merely by institutional momentum or cultural drift. For many pastors and congregations, the model feels deeply biblical. Scripture speaks frequently of elders. The language of shepherding, oversight, and submission resonates with believers who rightly desire leadership marked by seriousness and clarity.
Moreover, the model promises stability in an age of volatility. As Western culture grows increasingly hostile to Christian conviction, concentrated leadership appears safer than shared authority. Trained pastors seem better equipped to withstand cultural pressure than congregations perceived as theologically uneven or emotionally reactive. In this context, elder-led structures are often embraced not as power grabs, but as safeguards.
The language used to describe the model further reinforces its plausibility. Terms such as elder plurality, shared leadership, and biblical oversight evoke images of humility rather than hierarchy. In practice, however, these phrases often conceal an important shift: authority is no longer exercised publicly through the congregation, but privately through leadership consensus.
The appeal is understandable. Congregationalism requires patience, catechesis, and trust in the Spirit’s work among ordinary believers. Elder governance offers speed, efficiency, and decisiveness. Yet what feels orderly is not always what Scripture prescribes — and what feels protective may quietly displace responsibility rather than preserve it.
What Happens When Guardrails Disappear
When congregational authority erodes, the effects are rarely immediate. Churches often continue to function smoothly for years. Teaching may remain sound. Attendance may grow. Ministries may flourish. The danger lies not in chaos, but in quiet redefinition.
Without defined congregational authority, accountability becomes internalized. Leaders increasingly answer primarily to one another, and disagreement is managed relationally rather than adjudicated ecclesially. Over time, governance shifts from shared discernment to professional consensus.
This shift becomes most visible in how church discipline is understood and taught. In many contemporary catechisms, membership materials, and discipleship curricula, Jesus’ instruction in Matthew 18 is subtly altered. Where Scripture commands, “tell it to the church,” the language is frequently rephrased — either overtly or by implication — as, “take it to the elders.”20
The change is often presented as practical or pastoral, yet its implications are profound. Christ did not assign final disciplinary authority to a group of leaders, but to the assembled congregation itself. The term He uses — ekklesia — refers not to an office or committee, but to the gathered body.
The New Testament confirms this reading. When Paul applies Jesus’ teaching in 1 Corinthians 5, he does not instruct the elders to act on behalf of the church. Instead, he addresses the congregation directly: “When you are assembled… remove the wicked man from among you” (1 Cor. 5:4). Paul’s second letter makes it clear that discipline of the wicked man was the decision of “the majority” (2 Cor. 2:6). Discipline is portrayed not as a private ruling issued by leadership, but as a corporate act of obedience carried out under Christ’s authority.
To replace “the church” with “the elders” is therefore not a neutral paraphrase. It relocates authority, alters responsibility, and transforms congregational discipline into elder adjudication. What Scripture assigns to the whole body becomes the exclusive domain of leadership.
The consequences extend beyond discipline itself. When such matters are resolved privately among leaders, the congregation is denied the opportunity to witness repentance, confirm obstinacy, or learn through shared obedience. Accountability becomes invisible, restoration becomes procedural, and one of the church’s most formative practices is quietly lost.
In this way, congregational authority rarely disappears through formal decision. It erodes through catechesis. What the church is taught to do — and not do — gradually reshapes what it believes itself to be.
The Problem of Self-Authorization
One of the more troubling features of this transition is the logic by which it often occurs. Pastors may come to believe that Scripture assigns governing authority to elders and then proceed to exercise that authority in order to restructure the church accordingly. Yet this creates a fundamental problem: authority is being exercised before it has been granted.
In congregational churches, final earthly authority resides with the gathered body under Christ. Leaders, therefore, cannot unilaterally redefine governance — formally or in practice — without contradicting the very structure under which they were called. To act as though elder authority already exists in order to compel the church to formally recognize it is not reform, but self-authorization.
The argument becomes circular. Authority is claimed because Scripture is said to grant it, and Scripture is interpreted as granting it because the authority is already being exercised. In effect, leaders appeal to an authority they do not yet possess in order to require the congregation to bestow it upon them.
This logic would be impermissible in any other sphere. Civil officials cannot rewrite constitutions by invoking powers not yet granted. Corporate boards cannot expand their jurisdiction by executive decree. Neither can pastors restructure the locus of church authority by acting as though the outcome were already settled.
Whatever one concludes about elder governance as a theological question, it cannot be established through unilateral action. Authority in Christ’s church is not seized, assumed, or retroactively justified. It is recognized — by the Body to whom Christ has entrusted it.
Plurality Is Not Accountability
The most common response to concerns about self-authorization is the appeal to plurality. Pastors insist that authority is not being exercised unilaterally because decisions are made together. Elders, it is said, hold one another accountable.
Yet mutual agreement is not the same thing as accountability. Accountability requires the possibility of correction by someone who does not share the same authority. A group cannot meaningfully hold itself accountable if every question of legitimacy is resolved internally.
Plurality may restrain excess, but it cannot generate authority. Ten men cannot confer upon themselves what one man lacks. Authority does not arise from consensus among leaders, but from recognition by those they are called to serve.
When elders derive authority from one another, the system becomes closed. There is no external court of appeal, no mechanism by which the church may correct its leaders, and no practical distinction between accountability and mutual affirmation. What is described as shared oversight is, in fact, collective self-authorization.
Scripture does not present church authority as circulating horizontally among leaders. It flows downward from Christ through His Word and is recognized by the congregation that submits to it. Elders lead by teaching and persuasion; the church governs by discernment and obedience.
For this reason, plurality without congregational authority does not solve the problem of unilateral rule — it merely distributes it. Authority remains unaccountable not because it is concentrated in one man, but because it is no longer answerable to the body Christ has charged with final earthly responsibility.
When Calling Replaces Recognition
Closely related to this problem is the way pastoral “calling” is sometimes invoked to justify authority apart from congregational recognition. Elders may speak confidently of having prayed together and discerning that “God has called this man to be an elder here.” While such language is often sincere, it introduces a dangerous shift in how authority is established.
In Scripture, calling is never self-authenticating. A man may be inwardly compelled toward ministry, but that calling becomes authoritative only when it is recognized by the church.21 Spiritual conviction alone does not confer office. Authority arises not from private certainty, but from public confirmation. This is not to deny the reality of internal calling, but to insist that calling alone cannot establish corporate authority.
When leaders appeal to their shared sense of divine leading as justification for ordination or governance, the congregation is placed in an impossible position. The claim cannot be examined, weighed, or corrected. To disagree appears not merely administrative, but spiritual — a resistance not to men, but to God Himself.
This epistemology mirrors the very logic Protestants have long rejected in charismatic and authoritarian movements: unfalsifiable spiritual impressions invoked as binding authority. The vocabulary differs, but the mechanism is the same. What cannot be tested cannot be governed.
The New Testament offers a different pattern. God’s will for His church is revealed through visible means — Scripture proclaimed, qualifications examined, character observed, and leaders recognized openly by the body. Where recognition is replaced by revelation, authority ceases to be accountable. And where authority is no longer accountable, it no longer resembles the governance Christ ordained for His church.
The Coming Identity Crisis
Baptist churches now face a question they can no longer postpone: What does it mean to be Baptist?
If congregational authority is optional, if ordination is detached from teaching, and if governance is functionally indistinguishable from elder-rule traditions, the term ceases to describe a theological identity and becomes merely historical branding.
This ambiguity cannot endure indefinitely. Churches will either recover the convictions that once defined their polity — calling Spirit-filled sons and daughters of God to do the work of ministry under the equipping of ordained brothers — or gradually abandon the distinctives that once shaped their common life. What cannot continue is a posture of inherited identity without inherited practice, at least not if spiritual maturity and shared responsibility are expected to flourish.
The issue is not denominational loyalty, but theological honesty. Churches must eventually decide whether congregationalism is a conviction worth preserving or an inconvenience to be managed.
A Call for Honesty, Not Uniformity
This argument is not a plea for uniform structures across Christ’s church. Faithful congregations have long differed in polity while remaining united in the gospel. Presbyterian churches need not become Baptist, nor must Baptists adopt episcopal forms.
What Scripture does require is truthfulness.
Pastors should speak plainly about what they believe regarding authority before accepting a call. Congregations should know whether their leaders intend to steward inherited convictions or to propose change. When structural reform becomes necessary, it must occur openly — through patient instruction, transparent deliberation, and the informed consent of the church — not gradually, quietly, or by default.
Churches must not find themselves living in contradiction to their stated convictions. Faithfulness is not measured by whether procedures can be amended after the fact, but by whether belief and practice remain aligned in the present. Integrity requires that leaders submit themselves to the church’s confessed commitments even as they seek to persuade the church concerning them.
The future health of Christ’s church does not depend upon efficiency, influence, or innovation, but upon clarity. Christ governs His people not through ambiguity, but through truth. Churches need not fear disagreement when it is handled honestly, nor decline when authority is exercised visibly and accountably.
The path forward is not nostalgia, reaction, or institutional preservation for its own sake. It is faithfulness — expressed through structures that align conviction with practice and words with deeds.
If Baptist churches are to remain Baptist, they must once again believe that congregational authority is not a liability to be contained, but a gift entrusted by Christ Himself to His gathered people.
- The Second London Baptist Confession of Faith (1689), chap. 26, pars. 7–9; James P. Boyce, Abstract of Principles (1858), art. 8. ↩︎
- Charles H. Spurgeon, The Metropolitan Tabernacle: Its History and Work (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1861), 27. ↩︎
- Jonathan Edwards, An Humble Inquiry into the Rules of the Word of God, Concerning the Qualifications Requisite to a Complete Standing and Full Communion in the Visible Christian Church (Boston: S. Kneeland, 1749), 84. ↩︎
- John Gill, A Body of Practical Divinity, in The Works of John Gill, vol. 2 (London: Mathews and Leigh, 1819), bk. 3, chap. 6, “Of the Officers of the Church.” ↩︎
- Leon McBeth, The Baptist Heritage: Four Centuries of Baptist Witness (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1987), see esp. pp. 210-212. ↩︎
- Alexander Strauch, Biblical Eldership: Restoring the Eldership to Its Rightful Place in the Church, rev. ed. (Littleton, CO: Lewis and Roth Publishers, 1995). ↩︎
- See Alexander Strauch, Biblical Eldership: Restoring the Eldership to Its Rightful Place in the Church (Littleton, CO: Lewis and Roth, 1995); John F. MacArthur Jr., The Master’s Plan for the Church (Chicago: Moody Press, 1991); Acts 29 Network, “Doctrinal Distinctives,” https://www.acts29.com/about-us/distinctives/; Mark Dever and Paul Alexander, The Deliberate Church (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2005).. ↩︎
- Collin Hansen and Jonathan Leeman, Rediscover Church (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2021), 145–152. ↩︎
- Mark Dever, Discipling: How to Help Others Follow Jesus (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2016), 138–141. ↩︎
- Jonathan Leeman, Church Discipline: How the Church Protects the Name of Jesus (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012), 44–45. ↩︎
- Gordon L. Belyea, “Origins of the Particular Baptists,” Themelios 32, no. 3 (2007): see abstract and discussion describing them as “independent Calvinistic believers” and “rather more Congregationalist.” ↩︎
- The Second London Baptist Confession of Faith (1677/1689), chap. 26, pars. 7–9, especially the statements that each gathered church has “all that power and authority” needful for worship and discipline, that officers are “chosen and set apart by the church,” and that elders are chosen by the “common suffrage of the church itself.” ↩︎
- Thomas J. Nettles, By His Grace and for His Glory (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1986), 51–60. ↩︎
- James Leo Garrett Jr., Baptist Theology: A Four-Century Study (Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2009), 321–326. ↩︎
- Robert A. Wring, “Elder Rule and Southern Baptist Church Polity,” Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry 3, no. 1 (Spring 2005): 195–196. ↩︎
- J. L. Dagg, Manual of Church Order (Charleston: Southern Baptist Publication Society, 1858), 95–101. ↩︎
- James Bannerman, The Church of Christ, 2 vols. (1868; repr., Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 2015), 1:322–326. ↩︎
- John MacArthur, “John MacArthur on a Pastor’s Authority,” Grace to You, August 29, 2017, video, 00:23, posted by Grace to You, YouTube video, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X65vspiZLLA. ↩︎
- Herman Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, vol. 4 (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008), 353–355. ↩︎
- Leeman, Church Discipline, 44–45. ↩︎
- John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion, trans. Henry Beveridge (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1989), 4.3.10. ↩︎
Bibliography
Acts 29 Network. “Doctrinal Distinctives.” Accessed January 19, 2026. https://www.acts29.com/about-us/distinctives/.
Bannerman, James. The Church of Christ. 2 vols. 1868. Reprint, Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 2015.
Bavinck, Herman. Reformed Dogmatics. Vol. 4. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008.
Belyea, Gordon L. “Origins of the Particular Baptists.” Themelios 32, no. 3 (2007).
Boyce, James P. Abstract of Principles. 1858.
Calvin, John. Institutes of the Christian Religion. Translated by Henry Beveridge. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1989.
Dever, Mark. Discipling: How to Help Others Follow Jesus. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2016.
Dever, Mark, and Paul Alexander. The Deliberate Church: Building Your Ministry on the Gospel. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2005.
Edwards, Jonathan. An Humble Inquiry into the Rules of the Word of God, Concerning the Qualifications Requisite to a Complete Standing and Full Communion in the Visible Christian Church. Boston: S. Kneeland, 1749.
Gill, John. A Body of Practical Divinity. In The Works of John Gill. Vol. 2. London: Mathews and Leigh, 1819.
Garrett, James Leo Jr. Baptist Theology: A Four-Century Study. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 2009.
Hansen, Collin, and Jonathan Leeman. Rediscover Church. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2021.
Leeman, Jonathan. Church Discipline: How the Church Protects the Name of Jesus. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2012.
MacArthur, John F., Jr. The Master’s Plan for the Church. Chicago: Moody Press, 1991.
MacArthur, John. “John MacArthur on a Pastor’s Authority.” Grace to You. August 29, 2017. YouTube video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X65vspiZLLA.
McBeth, Leon. The Baptist Heritage: Four Centuries of Baptist Witness. Nashville: Broadman Press, 1987.
Nettles, Thomas J. By His Grace and for His Glory. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1986.
Spurgeon, Charles H. The Metropolitan Tabernacle: Its History and Work. London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1861.
Strauch, Alexander. Biblical Eldership: Restoring the Eldership to Its Rightful Place in the Church. Rev. ed. Littleton, CO: Lewis and Roth Publishers, 1995.
The Second London Baptist Confession of Faith. 1677/1689.
Wring, Robert A. “Elder Rule and Southern Baptist Church Polity.” Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry 3, no. 1 (Spring 2005): 188–212.
David Morrill is a writer and editor whose work focuses on ecclesiology, church governance, and contemporary evangelical movements. He is the founder and publisher of the Protestia Network and editor of Reformation Journal. A U.S. Army veteran with twenty-five years of service, he is currently completing a Master of Arts in Worship Music at Liberty University. He lives in Colorado with his wife and two sons and is a member of a Southern Baptist church.
