One In Jesus

Female deacons

I am not very interested in the question of whether women may wear the deacon title, because I’d rather not bother with the title. Granting “deacon” as an honorific title only gets in the way of humble, servant-hearted volunteer work.

Several years ago, I was assigned to call several young men in the church and invite them to be deacons. My favorite calls — most of them, actually — were with men who said, “I don’t want the title. I’m happy doing the job you’ve asked me to do without the title. But if the elders think my having a title will help the church some way, I’ll accept it. But I’d rather not.” This is ideal, I think. Except more ideal would be for me to have not made the calls at all. Continue reading →

Defining the office: better hermeneutic

I remember receiving a call from a candidate for a ministerial position at my church. He asked why we didn’t have the deacons listed on our website. I asked why he cared. He explained that a church without deacons is not scripturally organized, and he could not work for such a church. I thanked him for his time and advised him that he need not bother to interview.

But we have deacons. We do. But anyone who would judge our soundness based on whether we advertise the presence of deacons on our internet site isn’t really what we’re looking for in ministerial leadership. I mean, what does posting your deacons’ names have to do with becoming disciples of Jesus? Or being formed into the image of the Messiah? Right denomination. Wrong faith.

Our salvation or soundness is not based on the titles we give our volunteers. It’s based on whom we follow. You see, our candidate thought deacons not only essential to our soundness but also thought that we should consider that so important that we would necessarily advertise our soundness by advertising our deacons. Isn’t that what a lost and hurting world is desperate for: a church with deacons? Continue reading →

Later church history

In the early church, we find further support for deacons being teachers. The Didache (100-125 AD) says that deacons “are to be honored, “for they too carry out the ministry of prophets and teachers” (Did. 15.1).

Later on, we find in the early church fathers evidence that deacons were involved in administering the Lord’s Supper, in handling church benevolence funds, and otherwise serving as aides to the elders or bishop. The office is also associated with administration of baptism, with female deacons being ordained due to the practice of some churches of baptizing converts in the nude.

In short, it’s difficult to declare that deacons did one and only one thing, but under Collins’ translation, their role in Acts 6 was as teachers, assisting the apostles in their ministry of the word. On the other hand, this translation leads to taking the Seven as something more like elders. Nor has this translation gained a scholarly consensus, whereas the scholars seem largely agreed on Collins’ re-definition of diakonos. Continue reading →

Deacon as church office/re-translating Acts 6:1-6

So what does mean with regard to the office of deacon? Well, we should not think of them so much as servants but as representatives, agents, or even attendants. That is, they serve at the behest of the elders to assist them in their duties.

The subtle question that the redefinition forces us to ask is: whom do the deacons serverepresent? If the word means “servant,” then we would naturally take the deacons as serving the church, and that has been our traditional interpretation (and the traditional interpretation of many others).

But if the word means “agent” or “representative” in this context, the church can’t be the answer. Rather, Acts 6 offers an example of the Seven taking on a role previously held by the apostles, doing work so that the apostles are freed for prayer and the ministry of the word. Continue reading →

John N. Collins and the meaning of diakonos

A couple of years ago, in a comment, Mike Cope referred me to Diakonia: Re-Interpreting the Ancient Sources (1990) ($38.95 at Amazon) by John N. Collins. In this book, Collins comprehensively surveys secular and Christian Greek literature to find the correct meaning of the terms diakonia and diakonos.

Collins has followed that 368-page book with a shorter sequel focusing on a handful of key passages, Deacons and the Church: Making Connections Between Old and New (2002) (out of print).

A helpful article summarizing Collins’ work may be found in a 1992 article by Karl Paul Donfried in the Concordia Theological Quarterly, especially beginning at p. 7 (free download).

Collins published a follow up article in 2011, “The problem with values carried by diakonia / “Diakonie” in recent church documents.” Collins points out that no less of an authority than Cardinal Ratzinger (who became Pope Benedict) adopted Collins’ arguments (also a free download). Continue reading →