Make Ruling Elders Visible Again

Why Church Leaders Should Lead in Worship

Visibility and Representation

The PCA is at a crossroads when it comes to worship. Who can lead in worship, what they can lead, and what leading actually means are all being hotly debated, especially with a revised and constitutionally binding Directory for Public Worship in the works. On the one side there are those who insist that for the church’s worship to be a true reflection of the priesthood of all believers (1 Pet. 2:5), virtually all believers can and should have a visible, up-front role in corporate worship. This can range anywhere from having non-ordained men leading portions of the worship service, women who read the call to worship and pray on behalf of the congregation, children who read the sermon text, and married couples together distributing the elements of the Lord Supper, saying, “The body of Christ, given for you. The blood of Christ, poured out for you.” And on the other side there are those, like me, who feel like this is all unnecessary.

Pardon my grouchiness for a moment, but the above sounds like participation trophy Presbyterianism to me. Now don’t get me wrong— I wholeheartedly believe in the priesthood of all believers, but that doesn’t make everyone a priest or minister. I rejoice in the fact that we are one body in Christ with diverse and gifted members, all of them needful; but I fundamentally reject that eyes need to do things reserved for ears and feet need to do things reserved for hands in order to demonstrate this unity. “Visibility” in worship is nowhere stressed in the pages of the Old or New Testaments. Worship has always been representative, never democratic (see Korah). By no means am I advocating that we turn the clock back and give Medieval clericalism another go. There’s a reason I’m Presbyterian—I wholeheartedly believe that the Bible commands and commends a plurality of elders ruling together in every church. I loathe the “pastor as CEO” mindset. But, as I scan the American evangelical landscape, I am far less concerned with visibility for [insert sidelined demographic] than I am with the widespread erosion of ministerial authority (many of us have lost our nerve) and congregational submission to church authority (see Twitter). Identity politics have come home to roost in many a Presbyterian and Reformed church and I for one think it is high time to return to the old, simple paths delineated for us in Scripture and that we offer no apologies for doing so. God’s Word is good, right, and enough.

Church Leaders Should Lead in Worship

Which leads me to my novel contribution to the “visibility” and “elevating voices” discourse: we need to make ruling elders visible again. Of all the groups of people in a church that need to be visible, it is the ruling elders. The sheep should be afforded every opportunity to know who their shepherds are. To be sure, worship is not the only place where elders should be seen by the congregation. If all a ruling elder does is lead in the order of service and teach a Sunday school class here or there, he is falling woefully shy of his responsibility to shepherd the flock of God. We don’t have an office of reader in the PCA. Elders need to be at the bedside, graveside, and side-by-side with members of the flock throughout the week.

Nevertheless, it has always struck me as ironic how in churches that button-mash visibility and representation that their elected representatives (viz. elders and deacons) exercise little to no visible leadership in the church’s most vital activity—corporate worship.

There are any number of reasons for this disappearance of ruling elders. For some churches, it may be that they are sincerely trying to counteract the 80/20 rule, that only twenty percent of the church does eighty percent of the work while the other eighty percent does only twenty percent of the work. They want to communicate that every member has a vital contribution to make for the sake of the body; they want to equip the saints for the work of ministry, not just officers. For others, it may be that the church has become increasingly staff led and not elder led. This is subtle shift, but a significant one. If you have gifted men and women on church staff, it feels only natural that they would exercise some form of leadership in corporate worship since they already are leading in other areas of church life. I can see how people get here. Still for others, the ruling elders themselves may feel that they are better one-on-one than they are up front. Many elders prefer to be invisible, to work behind the scenes, and they are more than happy to let those who have public gifts to exercise those gifts in service to the church. They’re humble men, but they feel ill-equipped for the work. There are certainly other reasons, but these three are top of mind for me.

Looking at the worship service as a whole—from call to worship to benediction—here’s my proposition: aside from the Lord’s Supper, baptism, and the bestowal of the benediction at the close of worship, there is no element of corporate worship that a teaching elder performs that a ruling elder cannot.¹ Such being the case, it stands to reason that those men who have been duly elected by the congregation and have vowed to devote themselves to the ministry of prayer and the word (Acts 6:4) would be the ones who lead those activities as the church gathers for worship. In short, elders, both teaching and ruling, and those preparing for the office of elder (BCO 18-5) should alone read the Scriptures and “lift holy hands” in prayer (1 Tim. 2:8). Leap-frogging over a church’s ruling elders and preferring non-ordained men and women to lead in worship is a mistake—ruling elders should be first in line. They are leaders after all.

But What About...?

Notice that my modest proposal doesn’t speak to who can assist in congregational singing. One need not be ordained in order to lend their voice to the corporate singing of God’s praise. For the same reason that I believe women can recite creeds, confessions, and sing God’s praise in unison with the entire body, so too do I think it is permissible for a woman to be mic’d for sound and so assist the congregation in song.²

Furthermore, because there is no element of worship that an ordained minister cannot rightly perform himself, there is no circumstantial necessity for a non-ordained person to perform any element of worship instead. So long as a minister or aspiring minister is present, there is no practical need for a non-ordained person to read the Scriptures or to pray on behalf of the body. Instead of asking, “Why can’t this non-ordained person do X?” we should be asking instead, “Why wouldn’t our ordained ruling or teaching elders be able to do X?” It’s time that the church expected more from her ruling elders. They are not CEO’s who make decisions behind closed doors. They are godly, gifted men who have been equipped by the Spirit for the work to which they’ve been called. They are to serve as models of what it means to worship in Spirit and in truth. Ruling elders ought to be visible. The church needs them to be visible.

Taking My Own Medicine

I pastor, by PCA standards, a small to mid-sized church. There are five ruling elders besides me and our associate minister. Every Sunday one of our ruling elders leads in worship. They call us to worship, offer a prayer of adoration, lead us in the confession of an ancient creed, and exposit the law of God using our confessional standards. Though none of them have been to seminary or taken homiletics courses, worship leadership factored heavily into their elder training. They read the same books that I did in seminary—Terry Johnson, Samuel Miller, and several articles on the subject. They each got practice leading a service before they were voted on by the congregation. As a result of their hard work and preparation, their prayers and leadership have proven to be a blessing to the body. In fact, in many cases, ours is the only church where lifelong Christians have ever seen someone other than the pastor or a paid staff person lead in worship. No, their prayers aren’t perfect. Sometimes they stumble over their words. Sometimes they announce the wrong hymn number, but you know who else has done that? I have. And so have you.

In an age where there is less and less respect for the office of elder, I wonder what effect it would have if churches started including their ruling elders in the order of service. From my experience as a minister, it’s been a net positive. My elders have blessed the congregation as a whole through their public ministry, and they’ve blessed me as well. I am not above being blessed by my ruling elders.

So here’s my challenge to you: give it a try. If you’re a ruling elder, approach your teaching elder and ask him what it would take for you to start leading in corporate worship. It may take some time for the practice to become regular and for you to be good at it, but be patient. Get a recommended reading list from your pastor and, if you do start leading, ask for critical feedback both from him and from members of the congregation. And if you’re a minister, encourage your ruling elders to come alongside you and to prayerfully consider leading in worship. You are not called to shepherd the flock of God by yourself and I do not believe corporate worship is the lone exception. Even if your church’s practice is to have only teaching elders lead in worship, look then for other opportunities for your ruling elders to minister visibly before the congregation. It is vital for them, for you, and for the whole church that they be seen laboring alongside you in the ministry of prayer and the word.

The PCA always has been and will be as strong as its ruling elders. May they shine as lights for the glory of Christ, and especially in his worship.

1. A ruling elder can regularly preach the Word upon being licensed according to BCO chapter 19.

2. I almost wrote, “lead in song (let the reader understand)” but I don’t want to be pegged as a pedant. I know what most people mean when they say they have a female “worship leader” and I don’t fuss at them over words.