Deacons: Why I Disagree with the Traditional Views, Part 2 (No Deacons Without Elders? Ignoring the Acts 6 Qualifications?)

I’m continuing to explain why I disagree with the traditional views regarding deacons.

Traditional view 2: Scripturally organized churches have deacons, but only if they also have elders.

It’s argued that if there are no elders, then the deacons become de facto elders and thus the deacons (“diaconate” is the word for the deacons as a group) should be disbanded.

I disagree. You see, the problem of deacons becoming de facto elders only arises if the deacons are accustomed to meeting and acting as a board. There is simply no justification for the deacons to act as a board — as though they were junior elders.

If the deacons each have an assigned job, and that’s what they do, then they’re no more likely to take over the elders’ role than the volunteers who prepare communion or the guy in charge of keeping the baptistery water algae free and warm.

Traditional view 3. Deacons are men who meet the qualifications of 1 Timothy 3:8-13 who’ve been ordained by the church for the office.

It’s not that I disagree with Paul’s instructions in 1 Timothy 3, so much as it’s plainly a mistake to omit the other qualification statement:

(Acts 6:3 ESV) ³ Therefore, brothers, pick out from among you seven men of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we will appoint to this duty.

Many in the Churches of Christ are uncomfortable with this passage because “full of the Spirit” contradicts their belief that the Spirit no longer influences Christians personally (as opposed to representatively, that is, through the influence of the text of the Bible). But that’s what the Bible says, and we have no right to repeal it by ignoring it.

And if we were to take that instruction seriously, many of the problems we have with deacons — deacons not doing their jobs, deacons usurping the elders’ authority — would never happen.

Traditional view 4. Only males may be deacons.

The text says,

(1 Tim 3:11 ESV) ¹¹ Their wives likewise must be dignified, not slanderers, but sober-minded, faithful in all things.

(1 Tim 3:11 NIV) In the same way, the women are to be worthy of respect, not malicious talkers but temperate and trustworthy in everything.

The text is ambiguous because the word translated either “wives” or “women” carried both meanings in the Greek. The translators of the NET Bible explain,

Or “also deaconesses.” The Greek word here is γυναῖκας (gunaikas) which literally means “women” or “wives.” It is possible that this refers to women who serve as deacons, “deaconesses.” The evidence is as follows: (1) The immediate context refers to deacons; (2) the author mentions nothing about wives in his section on elder qualifications (1 Tim 3:1–7); (3) it would seem strange to have requirements placed on deacons’ wives without corresponding requirements placed on elders’ wives; and (4) elsewhere in the NT, there seems to be room for seeing women in this role (cf. Rom 16:1 and the comments there). The translation “wives”—referring to the wives of the deacons—is probably to be preferred, though, for the following reasons: (1) It would be strange for the author to discuss women deacons right in the middle of the qualifications for male deacons; more naturally they would be addressed by themselves. (2) The author seems to indicate clearly in the next verse that women are not deacons: “Deacons must be husbands of one wife.” (3) Most of the qualifications given for deacons elsewhere do not appear here. Either the author has truncated the requirements for women deacons, or he is not actually referring to women deacons; the latter seems to be the more natural understanding. (4) The principle given in 1 Tim 2:12 appears to be an overarching principle for church life which seems implicitly to limit the role of deacon to men. Nevertheless, a decision in this matter is difficult, and our conclusions must be regarded as tentative.

The translators summarize the arguments well enough, but I disagree with their conclusion. 1 Tim 2:12 refers to the appropriate authority for women, and deacons are not given any authority at all. There is no reason to suggest that Paul’s limitations on female authority in 1 Tim 2:12 (assuming that’s what he meant — a topic for another day) restricts women from being deacons. To reach that conclusion, you must assume that deacons have authority over men, but they have no inherent authority as deacons at all.

They are servants of the church. That’s what the word means. Many deacons are given tasks that involve no authority over anyone. Indeed, the only reason to assume that all deacons have authority is to assume that they act as some sort of oversight board — and they just don’t.

Moreover, as we’ll see as we continue in this study, the work of deacons we find the scriptures is exactly the sort of thing that women do quite well — and often better than men. Indeed, if we didn’t attach an honorific title to the job, we’d quite naturally have women in this role.

Traditional view 5. Deacons are to oversee a ministry.

Where is this in the Bible? 1 Tim 3:8-15 says nothing about what deacons are to do. In Acts 6, they are charged to “wait on tables” (Acts 6:2).

Even if assume that Acts 6:2 is intended to be synecdoche (that is, that they are to do much more than wait on tables), it’s clear that this is not a middle management position. Rather, the deacons are charged with doing this task as a group.

Clearly, the apostles did not appoint a single deacon to oversee a ministry. Rather, they appointed seven men to do ministry. They are not a board; they are a team tasked with a job.

This is a much better system than creating an artificial structure in which a man — male, married, and fertile — oversees the children’s ministry without necessarily being involved in the ministry or even knowing much about it.

I find it particular poor oversight to prevent the women who know what’s going on and what they’re doing from speaking directly with the elders. The absurd rule that they must go through a deacon to access the elders is terrible management and horribly insulting to the female volunteers. It just doesn’t work very well and is plainly not required by the scriptures.

I know of churches where the youth minister cannot speak with the elders. Rather, he must speak with the “youth deacon,” who represents his views to the elders. This is horribly inefficient, creates a make-work position, and triggers just all sorts of communication problems.

Years ago in my home church, we made a list of every single ministry. There were about 70 in a church of 350 or so! And less than half were overseen by a deacon. The rest weren’t even on the organizational chart — because they were overseen by women!

And the women were delighted to be off the chart and hence not having to answer to a deacon uninvolved and uninformed of their work for Christ. In fact, they were terrified that the elders’ discovery of their “off book” ministries would result in a bureaucratic structure that would impede their service — and they were quite right to feel that way.

What actually happened is this. The leaders of the various ministries were urged to join in the deacons’ meetings. (It seemed very forward-thinking, you know.) But this resulted in having something like 50 people at the meetings, making it impossible to have a conversation or any kind of real collaborative decision making.

As a result, the group broke down into smaller groups to discuss issues of common concern. But, of course, there often were no issues of common concern, and it quickly became apparent that there was no reason for a monthly meeting at all — because the ministries ran just fine without having a monthly meeting with the elders. And so the meeting — which was once the deacons’ meeting — was happily abandoned as a waste of time.

And that’s reality. When we insist that deacons be department heads, well, we never asked whether God wants that. Nor did we ask whether the men we ordained were gifted to be department heads. And we forgot to ask whether the departments need heads at all, much less heads who just happen to be male, married, and fertile.

Making deacons — servants — into departmental supervisors is a bad idea, and has no justification in scripture. And our experience with this experiment has not been good.

It just makes so much better sense to find those individuals gifted by the Spirit to lead in each area, and then let the gifted do what they have been gifted to do.

(Rom 12:6-8 NRSV) 6 We have gifts that differ according to the grace given to us: prophecy, in proportion to faith; ⁷ ministry, in ministering; the teacher, in teaching; ⁸ the exhorter, in exhortation; the giver, in generosity; the leader, in diligence; the compassionate, in cheerfulness.

(Some translations insert the pronoun “he” throughout, but the Greek does not suggest that all those who are gifted are male.)

Paul says that those gifted to lead should lead diligently. There is no basis for taking good men and insisting that they oversee a church ministry, when they are not gifted to lead that particular ministry.

We sometimes get so caught up in being “scripturally organized” (which is just not required) that we forget to honor the work of the Spirit among us. We impose traditions in direct contradiction to the guidance God gives us through the gifting of the Spirit. After all, if God himself equips someone to do a task, surely they are authorized to do that task.

You see, rather than being scripturally organized, we should look to be Spiritually organized.

(1 Cor 12:7-28 NRSV) 7 To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. … 11 All these are activated by one and the same Spirit, who allots to each one individually just as the Spirit chooses. …

28 And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers; then deeds of power, then gifts of healing, forms of assistance, forms of leadership, various kinds of tongues.

If we were to believe what the text says, we’d organize ourselves very differently.

[to be continued]