Who leads a church? Why is this important to God? God cares about his glory, and he means to display his glory through the church. For this very end, God has established elders and deacons, members, and congregational authority. This primer on church structure connects the different offices of the church to one another and to the glory of God.

Congregational authority is less about the meetings and more about the mission. Congregationalism has a bad rap for well-known reasons: inefficient meetings, upstart members, browbeaten ministers. But biblical congregationalism isn’t so much about the meetings. It’s about empowering the whole church to promote and protect the gospel. Pastors lead and equip. Members get to work strengthening one another and pursuing Christ’s mission in the world.

A brief, helpful look at the office of "elder." It tackles the Biblical texts first. Then it looks at Baptist history. After that, it proceeds to address practical implication. Dever does a fantastic job, and every Baptist who wants to seriously think through ecclesiology should read this short booklet.

Church membership is not just a status, it’s an office. Leaders shouldn’t fire members from the responsibilities given to them by Jesus—they should train them! When members are trained, the church grows in holiness and love, discipleship and mission. Complacency and nominalism are diminished. Jesus gives every church member an office in the church’s government: to assume final responsibility for guarding the what and the who of the gospel in the church and its ministry. Similarly, Jesus gives leaders to the church for equipping the members to do this church-building and mission-accomplishing work. In our day, the tasks of reinvigorating congregational authority and elder authority must work together. The vision of congregationalism pictured in this book offers an integrated view of the Christian life. Congregationalism is biblical, but biblical congregationalism just might look a little different than you expect. It is nothing less than Jesus’ authorization for living out his kingdom rule among a people on mission.

This is a sociological and historical analysis of the conflict between the state and the Catholic Church in China between 1949 and 2001 during half of a century of the socialist regime. The relationship began with conflict, followed by accomodation and finally a cooperative spirit had developed for a complex web of political and diplomatic reasons. Never in the past the Catholic Church has shown a rigorous growth under the encouragement of the Communist Party to shape the Church in the image of a indigenous and local church and to minimize the influence of the Vatican. There remains a persistent struggle between the underground church, those who remain loyal to early missionaries and to the Holy See, and the official national church controlled by the Party/State. The authors argue that there is hope that the conflict will eventually disappear as the new leadership in Beijing may one day restore a diplomatic relationship with the Vatican.

Who leads a church? Why is this important to God? God cares about his glory, and he means to display his glory through the church. For this very end, God has established elders and deacons, members, and congregational authority. This primer on church structure connects the different offices of the church to one another and to the glory of God.