“Who in the world are the elders?”

Steve Brown:
Who in the world are the elders? The answer to that and other questions on Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
Key Life exists to communicate that the deepest message of Jesus and the Bible is the radical grace of God to sinners and sufferers. Life’s hard for everyone, so grace is for all of us. But there’s a lot of confusion about how grace applies to real life. So, here’s seminary professor and author Steve Brown and Pete Alwinson from ForgeTruth to answer your questions.

Steve Brown:
Thank you Matthew. Hey Pete.

Pete Alwinson:
Happy Friday.

Steve Brown:
Happy Friday to you too. How’s the podcast going?

Pete Alwinson:
It’s coming good. We’re enjoying it. ForgeTruth podcast.

Steve Brown:
You do that every week?

Pete Alwinson:
We put a new one out every other week because we found that our guys were getting behind.

Steve Brown:
Oh, I see.

Pete Alwinson:
So, we’re doing one every other week.

Steve Brown:
Well, do you, can people just go to ForgeTruth.com and there’s a link to the podcast.

Pete Alwinson:
Absolutely. Thank you for asking. Yeah.

Steve Brown:
Just want to, check it out guys. It’d be a great thing. Pete, as you know, comes in on Fridays, we spend the broadcast answering your questions and we love your questions. You can record your question, 24 7, by dialing 1-800-KEY-LIFE. And follow the instructions and sometimes we put your voice on the air. Or you can send your question to

Key Life Network
P.O. Box 5000
Maitland, Florida 32794

or in Canada

Key Life Canada
P.O. Box 28060
Waterloo, Ontario N2L 6J8

or you can e-mail your questions to [email protected] and we will take you and your question seriously. If you can help us financially, please do. We’re a member of ECFA in the States and CCCC in Canada and both of those organizations oversee our books to make sure that our practices are ethical. We are anyway, before they were around, but they are good at credentialing the truth that’s a part of Key Life. So, help us if you can, and I promise we’ll be faithful with your gift. And if you can’t, we understand that. Say a prayer for Key Life, we would appreciate that. Pete, why don’t you pray and then we’ll answer some of these questions.

Pete Alwinson:
You got it. You got it. Our Holy God, what a joy it is today to come into your presence. What a privilege to be granted access into the presence of the Most Holy God. We honor you, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. You are truly wise and holy and truthful in every way, shape, and form. You’re merciful and gracious and loving in ways that we even struggle to understand, but we lift up your Holy Name. And Lord, you know us and you know our need for you far beyond what we even know that we need from you. And so, we ask that by your Spirit, you would speak to us, Lord Jesus, that you would continue to develop us and take the grace and the gospel kingdom message into our hearts and transform us. Even today, we give you the problems of this week and ask that you would deal with our needs in your way, your time. Father, we pray for our leaders and what a joy that we have pastors and teachers and elders and deacons in our churches and staff members. And we pray for all of them, Lord, that as we get ready for worship this week-end, you would build into them, build a unity in your local church, bring healing in your local church where there’s needed and bring power as God’s people gathered together to bring glory to your name. Use us in a powerful way to advance the kingdom to those who need to hear. We just commit now this time of Q&A to you thankful for all that you do in your Holy Name we pray. Amen.

Steve Brown:
Amen. Okay. Let’s go to our phone lines.

Caller 1:
I’m listening right now on a great teaching about Pentecostal and miracles and charismatic church. My specific question is about healing, the Scripture that says that the elders can anoint with oil and you can have healing services. My question is, who are the elders? I know who elders are in an organized denomination in a church. But outside of that, in the full picture as God sees the whole body of Christ, who are the elders?

Steve Brown:
You know, when you say, not in the context of the church, you’re missing a central Biblical teaching. It’s within the context of the church that we define eldership and deacons and leadership. When you’re sick, the Scripture doesn’t say go find an old guy and ask him to pray for you because he might be a pagan and he may not be anointed and you may not being obedience to Scripture. And so, when this is taught in Scripture, remember it’s church stuff. It’s talking about a reality that’s in existence, where elders are tested and called and anointed and ordained for that particular office. And so, when James says that, and other places say it too, about having the elders pray, then that means the church elders, not the Rotary Club elders. There’s a difference. And so, tell us a little bit what an elder is.

Pete Alwinson:
No, that was very good. And I Timothy 3 and Titus 1 give the qualifications for elders

Steve Brown:
in a church

Pete Alwinson:
in a church. And you’re right. It’s the covenant community, the people of God. And so, elders are those men in the New Testament church that have, have gotten to a certain point of maturity and commitment to the expanding of the Great Commission.

Steve Brown:
And I would add cynicism, because if you take a new Christian and you make them an elder, what’s the Greek word for elder?

Pete Alwinson:
Elder, there’s two, right? Presbuteros and Episcopos.

Steve Brown:
Okay. If you make a young person who’s a new Christian an elder, they’ll become a Buddhist after two weeks. So, you’ve got to have not only maturity but realism about what goes on in the church.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s true. Understanding that the church is filled with God’s redeemed, but still sinful people.

Steve Brown:
That’s so true.

Pete Alwinson:
And so, really it’s the elders, the leaders is what a leadership ministry it is to be able to come alongside those who are sick, counsel them, finding out where they are in their walk with Christ. And then praying, laying hands and praying for them, asking God to do the healing.

Steve Brown:
And anointing with oil.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
That’s legitimate and good.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
and Biblical. So, I hear what you’re saying, you’re saying if I’m sick and I get somebody to call outside of the church, they aren’t outside the church.

Pete Alwinson:
Right.

Steve Brown:
Those elders are there, they may not be formally recognized, but it’s best they be by the church itself, then call them and ask them to pray.

Pete Alwinson:
You know, I say to the men that we minister to through Forge that in a sense, the qualifications for elder and deacon are the character qualifications of any mature man or really woman too in Christ. And so, that’s important, but this also is a big argument for being connected to a local church.

Steve Brown:
Yeah.

Pete Alwinson:
And that this is a big part of it.

Steve Brown:
Especially in our culture, the most important thing you can do is to be a member of a church and support it. And you say, well, I don’t agree with them. I don’t either. I mean, I’ve never found a church where I agreed with everything.

Pete Alwinson:
You never will.

Steve Brown:
Or liked everybody.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
But I’ll tell you, this is a time for all good folks to stand up and be counted, and the best way to do it is not to be a secret Christian, but to find a church, to join it and support it. And when you’re sick, call the elders.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right. That’s right. So, let’s break the cycle that got started during the COVID time. There’s still some that are hanging back and watching it.

Steve Brown:
That’s true.

Pete Alwinson:
Get out there.

Steve Brown:
Hey, listen, and you and I were discussing this off air before, this is an e-mail question. What guidelines can we use to discern who are true and who are false prophets and ministers and pastors?

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah, great question. And really based on what we just said, qualifications are one thing is that sense of character. But I would say, first of all, do they have a true testimony? Has the church recognized them, has the broader body of Christ, elder board, Presbyterian or recognized

Steve Brown:
district or whatever.

Pete Alwinson:
that this leader is, is a godly leader. Is their character godly? Or how do they lead? Are they servant leaders or getting others to follow them as servants? The big issue is here, are they teaching the Word of God as well?

Steve Brown:
Is the authority of Scripture clearly the basis of their truth?

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
And not other truths.

Pete Alwinson:
Or yes, not other truths. Are they saying, I am the authority. I really, I think we see a lot of people today that are claiming to be receiving direct revelation from God. And that has to be clearly regulated as I Corinthians 12:13 and 14 does.

Steve Brown:
Yeah. So, if it’s a false prophet who stands up and says, listen to me, cause God speaks to me directly. Now, God does speak. We’re not suggesting that God doesn’t lead his people. But when you start doing the formal action, the pedagogy of the church where you teach. This is Scripture and if it’s not within those bounds, then run. Let the church see only heels and elbows as you make your way out of the church as fast as you can.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s good. That’s good. The best prophets are those pastors, I think these days that teach the word of God and apply it to our lives.

Steve Brown:
That’s right. When did the disciples receive the Spirit?

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. Now, that’s an interesting question.

Steve Brown:
Yeah, it is.

Pete Alwinson:
Because we see in the book of Acts that the apostles were the ones that had the keys of the kingdom that opened it up and people did seem to receive the Spirit at different times.

Steve Brown:
That’s true. Was the Spirit not in the Old Testament.

Pete Alwinson:
Holy Spirit was there, alive and well.

Steve Brown:
There was a new thing. Yeah.

Pete Alwinson:
How was it different in the New Testament?

Steve Brown:
Well, it was a very, very much on fire and personal and used in a tremendous way to impact the world. And it was a different kind of thing because God was doing a new thing.

Pete Alwinson:
Right.

Steve Brown:
And you find in the Old Testament and throughout Scripture, the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God is mentioned over and over again. But when you move into Acts, God’s doing something new. And He still is.

Pete Alwinson:
And I think the whole, the disciples receive the Holy Spirit. At some point they were converted because by John 15, Jesus says, you guys are clean. You’re clean. So, they have the Holy Spirit, but what we see after the day of Pentecost is that those who receive Christ receive the Spirit.

Steve Brown:
All right. Got to go. Key Life is a listener supported production of Key Life Network.