No one among the church outright desires to usurp Christ’s authority. Everyone – if asked – would profess that they desire to live under the rule of Jesus Christ as Master and Lord of their life.
However, that does not mean that we always succeed in living “under Christ’s archy.” (Where have I heard that phrase before?)
Recently, I published a series of posts on my blog examining how authority among the church (that is, authority exercised by church leaders) may actually be undermining and usurping the authority of Christ inadvertently.
Here are the posts:
- Authority among the church? Starting a new series.
- What did Jesus say about positions of authority under his own authority?
- In the church, how does someone lead without exercising authority?
- Does the existence and recognition of elders indicate that they have positional authority?
- Does shepherding and overseeing suggest exercising authority?
I also added this addendum, which I also think is an extremely important foundation to my argument above:
I would love to get your thoughts on these posts, and perhaps discuss how mature believers can “lead” others (which we see in Scripture) without exercising authority over them (which we do not see in Scripture).
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