Starting and leading a local church
Topic: NewTestament Elders
By Pastor David Cox
The difference between the New Testament elders and the Old Testament elders is simply that within Judaism, there was a corruption of the elder system which was cronism, spiritual corruption, egoism, and self interests, and this was probably also part of why God chastised Israel by setting her aside for a long time period to use the church.
In this article I explain (give an introduction) to New Testament elders
a short book on preliminary things to heed before starting the pastor search.
Marks of an Unbiblical Church
By David Cox
See Tract:
Whereas a good church is a pretty focused thing, a bad or unbiblical church can take many different forms. Because of this we need to divide our study into areas. First of all, we need to separate what would be a “church” from a sects, cult, or false religion. Although really there is not much difference between them, I would consider a “church” that would identify itself with solid biblical doctrine something different from a cult. Some “Fundamental” or “Baptist” churches would officially hold to correct or biblical doctrine, but actually practice or secretly believe in unbiblical things. There may also be some groups that would do things as a biblical church would do them, but they hold tightly to some doctrine that is not biblical. Usually these groups always have some defective concept concerning salvation. So these characteristics are a composite of a whole bunch of bad and erroneous churches, sects, abusive churches, groups, etc.
The list of marks of a bad church (Marks of an Unbiblical Church) on this page therefore should be understand as a bad church can have this or that characteristic or mark, but it is defined as bad by any one, and not necessarily by all. Also let me add that some good churches are good on most things, and they may fall into one or more of these marks of a bad church. I do not pretend to know all churches, all situations, and how a person should act or the decision a person should take in such cases. I think soul searching your own heart in order to find what God wants you to do is most important in any situation, and it is essential in these cases. See my thoughts on Getting out of a Bad Church.
BiblicalViewpoint Tools for Bible Exposition is a short 2 page work on tools (books) on Hermenuetics. Biblical Viewpoint is a magazine for seminary students and pastors from the Bible faculty at Bob Jones University. This excerpt is presented as a fair use of a small part of the magazine for April 1971.
Let’s start with a definition of what is a missionary. A missionary is very simply a man of God who has the charge from God to carry the gospel message into a land where the gospel is not present, or is not abundant, and he organizes the converts of his evangelism into local churches which continue the work of the Lord after he is gone.
We do not find the work “missionary” in the Bible, but the concept is correctly identified in persons such as Paul, Barnabas, Luke, Mark, Titus, Timothy, and others. Technically missionaries have to be sent out from a group, and there are no “home missionaries” per se. Home missionaries confuse completely the concept of missionaries. Should those who are home missionaries now cease their ministries? No. They should be understood as being a part of a church in their area.
