Did the early church have bishops?

Depends what you mean by "episkopos"

Perhaps you’ve come across the word “gay” while reading the Chronicles of Narnia to your kids. In 1940s British English, Lucy Pevensie was “gay.” Under age seven, the kids don’t miss a beat. A little older, and not-quite-knowing chuckles commence; they know something’s off, and it amuses them. By middle school, they get it. The meaning of the word has changed. Pre-teen commonsense notwithstanding, somewhere in academia a grad student is probably working on a dissertation queering CS Lewis and queuing up quotes with the word “gay” to prove his point. Hopefully you wouldn’t fall for it. Demonstrating the frequent use of the word “gay” in Lewis’ children’s stories does not prove that he was secretly a man ahead of his times.

In the last stack on the church in Roanoke, I began engaging the problem of bishops. Are they necessary for the very being of the church — the “esse position” — as the Catholic traditions maintain? Does the gift of grace flow through the centuries like oil through a pipeline, passing from one bishop to another and only thence to God’s people? Are pastors who have not been ordained by bishops in apostolic succession really ordained? Are the sacraments they administer real? Is the Word they preach authoritative? Are the flocks they shepherd “churches” in the full sense? These are questions we have to take up as we think through the ecumenical challenge, and they all turn on the significance of the bishop for the church.

Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Anglican apologists point to the numerous passages in Scripture and the early church fathers that highlight the importance — in some cases, necessity — of bishops. Take Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, writing around a.d. 110 en route to his martyrdom in the Colosseum:

Do all things in the harmony of God, with the bishop presiding in the place of God and the presbyters in the place of the council of the apostles (Magn. 6.1).

You must not engage in any activity apart from the bishop, but be subject also to the presbytery as to the apostles of Jesus Christ (Trall. 2.2).

All who belong to God and Jesus Christ are with the bishop, and all those who come into the unity of the church through repentance will belong to God (Phil. 3.2).

Let no one do anything involving the church without the bishop. Let that eucharist be considered valid that occurs under the bishop or the one to whom he entrusts it. Let the congregation be where the bishop is, just as where Jesus Christ is, there is the catholic church (Smyrn. 8.1-2).

Clearly, Ignatius has a high view of bishops. The question is: when in his early second-century Greek he writes the word “episkopos,” does he mean what contemporary Orthodox, Roman, and Anglican Christians mean when they speak of their “bishops”? For that matter, does he quite mean even what third- (let alone forth-) century catholic Christians meant by the same word, episkopos, or by the Latin episcopus?

If he doesn’t, then episcopal apologists may, mutatis mutandis, be guilty of queering St Ignatius.

“Episkopos” in the New Testament

Let’s look at a few passages in the NT, starting with Philippians 1.1-2:

Paul and Timothy, servants of Messiah Jesus, to all the saints in Messiah Jesus who are Philippi, with the episkopoi and deacons: Grace to you and peace, etc.

Same format as any email. From: Paul and Timothy. To: the church in Philippi, which is comprised of the saints there together with the bishops and deacons. Re: grace and peace, etc. The saints are the baptized, the grace-saved, blood-washed flock; bishops and deacons are specially appointed (“ordained”) servant-leaders of the community. By the time of Ignatius’ letters, the emerging picture of the latter group in Antioch is of one bishop surrounded by multiple presbyters and further supported by deacons. Some 50 years earlier, circa a.d. 60, there are multiple “bishops” in the one church of Philippi. The ESV’s literal translation of episkopoi provides helpful interpretation: these men were not “bishops” overseeing multiple congregations, but “overseers” leading a single local church.

Let’s stick with Paul’s letters, 1 Timothy first:

The saying is trustworthy: if anyone aspires to episkopē, he desires a noble task. Therefore the episkopos must be above reproach … (1 Tim 3.1-2; qualifications for the bishop, then the deacon, follow in vv. 2-13).

Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophecy when the council of presbyters (presbuterion) laid their hands on you (1 Tim 4.14).

Let the presiding presbyters (presbuteroi) be considered worthy of a double honor, especially those who labor in word and teaching (1 Tim 5.17).

The material in 1 Tim 3 on qualifications for leadership (episkopē: over-seeing) maps neatly onto Phil 1.1: bishops and deacons, but no mention of presbyters (literally, “old/er men” or “elders”). However, presbyters appear a chapter later in the same letter — without any reference to bishops — as ministers of ordination, leaders/overseers, preachers and teachers. The simplest explanation of the two sets of passages is that “bishop” and “presbyter” are different words for the same office. This is confirmed by the parallel passage in Titus 1:

This is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remained into order and appoint presbyters (presbuteroi) in every town as I directed you — if anyone is above reproach, the husband of one wife, and his children are believers and not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination. For a bishop (episkopos), as God’s steward (oikonomos), must be above reproach (Tit 1.5-7a).

There are to be multiple presbyters in every town: old/er men of wisdom set apart to serve the flock as overseers (bishops) and stewards (cf. 1 Cor 4.1: “servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God”). This matches Luke’s narration of Paul’s standard missionary practice: he (and Barnabas) “appointed presbyters for them in every church” (Acts 14.23). That these town-specific church leaders could also be called “bishops” is clear from Paul’s valedictory address to the presbyter-bishops of the church in Ephesus: for the same men are named “presbyters of the church” at Acts 20.17 and “bishops” in v. 28.

In short: in the NT, “presbyter” and “bishop” are two names for the same office; they both refer to the pastors of the little flocks, who feed Christ’s sheep through the Word and the mysteries viz. sacraments.

Presbyter-bishops in 1 Clement

Possibly the earliest post-apostolic document we have is the “First Letter of Clement,” written around the turn of the second century. St Clement was a leader in Rome, but he did not write this letter — at least, not in his own name. Rather, it was sent from “the church of God sojourning in Rome” (1 Clem., pref.). Clement seems to have been the ecumenical officer of the Roman church: the Shepherd of Hermas, written sometime in the first half of the second century, names him the man responsible for collecting and circulating important correspondence among the churches, “for that is his commission” (Shep. 8.2). Since later tradition regarded him as the “bishop” of Rome at this time, he may well have been the leader of the presbyter-bishops who served the church there and in any case the best writer. Be that as it may, the letter reproduces the bishop-presbyter equivalence we find in the NT:

As [the apostles] preached throughout the countryside and in the cities, they appointed the first fruits of their ministries as bishops (episkopoi) and deacons (42.4).

Our apostles knew through our Lord Jesus Christ that strife would arise over oversight (episkopē) (44.1).

We commit no little sin if we remove from oversight (episkopē) those who offer the gifts in a blameless and holy way. How fortunate are those presbyters (presbuteroi) who passed on before … (44.4-5).

It is shameful, loved ones, exceedingly shameful and unworthy of your conduct in Christ, that the most secure and ancient church of the Corinthians is reported to have created a faction against its presbyters (presbuteroi), at the instigation of one or two persons (47.6).

Only allow the flock of Christ to be at peace with the presbyters (presbuteroi) who have been appointed (54.2).

You who laid the foundation of the faction should be subject to the presbyters (presbuteroi) (57.1).

As in the NT, “bishop” and “presbyter” are two names for the same office; the men who hold it are entrusted with general leadership (probably a better translation of episkopē) in the local church.

Mid second-century Rome: church of churches, college of presbyters

Or perhaps, in the local churches. Reformed/Baptist champions of “the plurality of elders in the local church” are advised not to pounce too quickly on these proof-texts, for that, too, may be an anachronistic interpretation. Were the presbyters in a given place leaders within a single congregation? Or did each serve as leader of one of the house churches which together made of “the church” in that city? In his book on Irenaeus, drawing on Peter Lampe’s definitive research on early Roman Christianity, Orthodox historical theologian John Behr proposes that well into the 2nd century “the” church of Rome was a collective of house churches, each led by a presbyter-bishop. Despite lacking an organized leadership structure, this “church of churches” enjoyed a strong sense of forming a single Christian community: “one spoke of the Church in Rome, as well as of the churches there present.” The word “church” was fruitfully flexible, referring both to the particular communities and to the collective whole (see esp. pp. 22f, 45f). A presbyter led each little flock; gathered together into a college, the presbyters took counsel regarding matters that affected the whole church in Rome — including affairs of sister-churches such as Corinth.

Behr argues that Irenaeus was himself a presbyter-bishop along these lines, only in Vienne and Lyons not Rome. And, that circa 190 he wrote Against Heresies with a specific purpose in mind: to help a friend from Asia, now a presbyter in Rome and possibly leader of an Asian-Christian emigre community there, to counteract the gnostic teaching infesting other house churches in the city (and emanating from some of the presbyters, p. 75). He, too, uses “bishop” and “presbyter” interchangeably:

When we refer them [gnostic teachers] again to the tradition that derives from the apostles and is guarded in the churches by the succession of presbyters, they are opposed to tradition and claim that they are wiser not only than the presbyters but even than the apostles (AH 3.2.2).

We are able to enumerate the bishops who were established in the churches by the apostles, and their successions even to ourselves (AH 3.3.1).

[Referring to Paul’s conference with the Ephesian church’s leaders in Acts 20]: When the bishops and presbyters of Ephesus and of other neighboring cities had been called together at Miletus (AH 3.14.2).

It is incumbent to obey the presbyters who are in the church — those who, as I have shown, possess the succession from the apostles: those who, together with the succession of the episcopate, have received the certain gift of truth (AH 4.26.2)

Adhere to those who hold the doctrine of the apostles, and who, together with the order of the presbyterate, display sound speech and blameless conduct (AH 4.26.4).

It’s just possible, perhaps, to discern a subtle shift in AH 4.26, a teasing apart of the two names into two offices. That is to be expected at this point in the development: a link connecting the second-century norm — presbyter-bishops — to the third-century novelty: bishop-and-presbyters. But the passage is ambiguous. On the whole, the overlap and indeed identity of the two titles for the single office this late in the 2nd century — and in so prominent a church father as Irenaeus — is striking.

“What about the Roman succession list in AH 3.3.3?”, you ask. Starting with Linus, ending with Eleutherus (175—89), Irenaeus lists the twelve men who had held “the bishopric for administering the church” in Rome. Both the Orthodox Behr and the Lutheran Herman Sasse think the list is accurate as far as it goes, but anachronistic. For the monoepiscopate was only emerging in Rome at the time of Eleutherus and his successor, Victor. The men who precede them in the succession list were leaders in the college of presbyters, surely, but not “bishops” in the later sense. Behr goes further, suggesting that the list — which Irenaeus came upon in Rome — is designed to bolster Eleutherus’ position as “not simply one among the many presbyters in Rome, but the first among them” (p. 48). That is, “the bishop of Rome.” He also notes that there are exactly twelve men in the list, a hint that it is designed to suggest the fulness of the Roman bishop’s apostolicity. Not, however, his standing as Peter’s successor; for Irenaeus, Peter and Paul are together the martyr-founders of the Roman church, yet neither the one nor the other were the first bishop of Rome. They were apostles, and as such in a class of their own; Linus, not Peter, was the first bishop.

Behr’s proposals help explain the slippage between presbyter and bishop in the immediate context of AH 3.1-3: in the late second century, both in Rome and in Gaul, the succession of the one is the succession of the other; the office is the same. It also makes sense of the modest, historically correct way Irenaeus describes the collective authorship of 1 Clem at AH 3.3.3, when discussing the ministry of St Clement: “The Church of Rome wrote a very forceful letter to the Corinthians.” Not Bishop Clement, let alone Pope Clement, but the church herself wrote that forceful letter. And, it also explains Irenaeus’ own “very forceful letter” to Eleutherus’ successor, Victor (189—98).

You will have heard of the Quartodeciman Controversy. The church of Asia had long celebrated Pascha on 14 Nisan, the date of Jewish Passover. In Rome, however, the solar calendar was preferred to the lunar, with Easter always falling on a Sunday. When the Asians didn’t get in line, Victor excommunicated them.

Just who were these Asian Christians? Behr makes a compelling case that they were not in Asia Minor at all, but in Rome: the aforementioned emigre house church there. It’d be centuries before the bishop of Rome could lay interdicts on entire nations, so it’s difficult to see how Victor could have done this to churches as far from Rome as Asia Minor. On the other hand, it’s easy to imagine the house churches of Rome — and their ambitious leaders — quarrelling with one another. Probably, then, Victor led one of the larger (and/or wealthier) “Roman” house churches: and his move against the emigre church was an intra-Roman powerplay.

When Irenaeus wrote Victor to set him straight, it wasn’t an early case of a small fry provincial pastor (Luther) daring to take on the papacy (Leo X). It took hutzpah, no doubt, but it wasn’t of that scale. Rather, the leading presbyter of the church in Lyons, having learned of the arrogant behavior of a leading presbyter in Rome, wrote as a peer to admonish his brother to live peaceably with the rest of the churches in Rome and their presbyters.

St Jerome on the 3rd-century development

In early 2nd-century Antioch, the monoepiscopate was already coming to the fore; in late 2nd-century Rome, it was only just starting to emerge. By the turn of the fourth century, however, it had been pretty well established across the Roman world. Writing a century later, St Jerome (342?—420) — himself a presbyter, not a bishop — opines about what happened in between:

The apostle [Paul] clearly teaches that presbyters are the same as bishops … But at a later date the choice of one who was placed ahead of the others was taken as a remedy against schisms, lest some one person by attracting a following would rend the church of Christ. Thus at Alexandria from St Mark the Evangelist down to the bishops St Heraclas [d. 247] and St Dionysius [d. 265], the presbyters always chose one of their own number whom they would place on a higher level and call bishop, just as if an army were to make an emperor (Letter 146 to Evangelus).

Similarly in his commentary on Titus 1:

The presbyter is the same as the bishop, and before rivalries came about in our religion through diabolic impulse and they would say among the people, “I am of Paul,” “I am of Apollo,” “I am of Cephas,” the churches were governed by a common council of presbyters. Later on some individual believed that those whom he baptized were his, not Christ’s, and it was decreed in the whole world that one of the presbyters should be chosen and placed over the rest and have the care of a single church and the seeds of divisions be removed.

He then appeals to Phil 1.1 to justify what he realized had already become a controversial viewpoint:

If anyone should think that this opinion — that the bishop and the presbyter are one and that the one designation refers to his age and the other to his office — is our own and not that of the Scriptures, let him read again the words of the apostle when he speaks to the Philippians … Philippi is one city of Macedonia, and certainly in a single city there could not have been a number of bishops, as they are called. But because at that time the same persons were called bishops and presbyters, he speaks on that account without distinction about bishops as he does about priests.

Jerome does not hesitate to draw a moral from this exegesis and church history:

Among the ancients, bishops and presbyters were the same; but gradually, in order that the emerging shoots of dissension might be plucked out, the whole responsibility was transferred to a single person. Therefore, as the presbyters know that they are subject to the one who has been placed over them by an ecclesiastical custom, so the bishops should know that they are greater than presbyters more through custom than through the verity of an ordinance of the Lord and that they all ought to rule the church in common.

Himself a presbyter, and one who did not appreciate being dictated to by bishops, Jerome looked fondly on the bygone era when presbyter-bishops “ruled the church in common.” True, he allows, the singling out of one presbyter as “bishop” over against the rest does — can? — serve the purpose of preventing rivalry and schism. But this is a matter of prudential human judgment honed through lived experience, not a divine command. According to Scripture, bishops and presbyters are identical. And it would be a good thing for all if the bishops remembered this. Otherwise they might get too big for their britches.

Taking stock, part 1: history

Usually, partisans of this or that ecclesiastical polity cherry-pick their preferred proof-texts to cancel out the others they don’t like. Catholics choose Ignatius to demand bishops. Reformed Baptists wield Phil 1.1 like a sword to cut down these claims. Lutherans insist on the unity of the one pastoral office with Jerome and urge everyone else to stop fighting about the details. But it just may be that if we listen to the several voices of the pre-Nicene church, we’ll find resources for our own mission today. We have a good deal of biblical and patristic data to work with, and we need a theory that explains as much of it as possible.

Here’s what I think happened.

In the earliest phases of the apostles’ missionary work, they appointed presbyter-bishops in every town. Probably, one for each house church. In some cities, there would have been a great many of these micro-flocks from early on because the whole church there was quite large. The mother church in Jerusalem was about 3,120 strong from day 1, with no grand cathedral or megachurch to fit into comfortably for public worship. The twelve apostles led this great church until the persecution that arose with St Stephen’s martyrdom dispersed them. But already before then, we know that they set apart “the seven” to care for widows and the poor, as deacons (Acts 6). By the time of Barnabas and Saul/Paul’s first official trip from Antioch to Jerusalem, we know that there were “presbyters” in the mother church, too (Acts 11.30). When were these men ordained into this office? My guess is quite early on. How else were the twelve to attend to the spiritual needs of so vast a congregation? In all likelihood, from near the start the apostles ordained men to serve under them as shepherds of the little flocks that together made up the great church, i.e., presbyters. After the twelve dispersed on mission, these men assumed episkopē in the Jerusalem church. One of them, James the Just, emerged as the unquestioned leader among the rest; but he was not “the bishop” of Jerusalem, merely the leading presbyter-bishop in Jerusalem.

The other great church in the early days was of course the church in Antioch, where the disciples were first called “Christians” (Acts 11.26). Its leaders, per Acts 13.1, were known as “prophets and teachers”: Barnabas, Simeon the Black, Lucius, Manaean, and Saul/Paul. My hunch is that these five men were the presbyter-bishops of the church there. Interestingly, two of them were also apostles; this apparent oddity fits well with 1 Pet 5.1, where St Peter refers to himself as both a “fellow presbyter” and as a “witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker of the glory that is going to be revealed.” The presbyters of the churches in the dispersion (1 Pet 1.1) had not seen Jesus Christ with their own eyes, as Peter had. They were not apostles. Yet Peter himself, by this point in Rome (1 Pet 5.13), was but one presbyter among the others serving the church there: so it was right for him to address the presbyters in the dispersion as his fellows in that office.

A half-century later, by the time Ignatius wrote his powerful letters, the church in Antioch had presumably grown in numbers — and in number of presbyters. As James emerged in Jerusalem the leader among his brother presbyters, so Ignatius emerged in Antioch. Reading between the lines, it would appear that his emergence as “bishop” over against the rest of the presbyters was not without protest; men do not insist so emphatically on their position unless their authority is being questioned. Perhaps this explains why, in one of the early letters, he requests prayer for a disturbance in his home church. Indeed, it may explain Ignatius’ overeagerness to suffer in Rome. Red martyrdom is the most golden parachute of all. Be that as it may — and I do not wish to uncover the nakedness of my fathers — when Ignatius writes of his unique office it is clearly still in harmony with the presbyters (and the deacons). I’d bet the difference between the organization of the church in Antioch in his day and that in the mother church — and for that matter also in Rome — was a matter of degree, not of kind.

Over the course of the second century, the kind of evolution in church order that we see in Antioch probably happened in other cities around the Mediterranean. But in Rome itself, the development did not take place until quite late in the game. This, we know from the texts; in the other cases, where data is lacking, it stands to reason that the move from presbyter-bishops to bishop-with-presbyters was neither early, rapid, nor consistent.

Mid third century, St Cyprian the martyr-bishop of Carthage introduces the idea of apostolic succession in his letters; prior to this, as we saw in Irenaeus, the fathers had spoken rather of the succession of presbyter-bishops, the first generation of whom had been ordained by the apostles. This was a natural development to make — but it was a development: a point not to forget. To this period, too, date the accounts of the rise of the bishop in Alexandria supplied by St Jerome. The process he describes, of presbyters choosing one of their number as leader and “bishop,” is the familiar stuff of ordinary social organization. It is quite plausible historically that the same process took place in countless other churches throughout the Roman empire.

It is also quite plausible that after the great change in our circumstances that came about in fourth century vis-a-vis the empire, the consolidation of power in a single bishop ruling over (sic) the presbyters of a single diocese became the order of the day. “No bishop, no king,” realized James I and his sons. Likewise, though in reverse, once you have a Christian king you are in position to create bishops who wield power in his behalf. The rulers of the gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them: and alas, it became so among us.

A wrinkle in time

Imagine a modern Orthodox or Roman or Anglo-Catholic bishop transported by time machine to Rome in the year 155. He wanders from house church to house church, searching for “the” bishop of Rome to no avail. All he finds are house churches, each led by a man who preaches, teaches, baptizes, shepherds, and presides at the Supper. In some of the houses, he’s referred to as a presbyter; in others, as bishop. Yet considered phenomenologically, they’re all just regular pastors. The presbyter-bishops gather together from time to time as need arises: to dispute with the heretic Marcion, say, or to write a very forceful letter to a troubled congregation in another place, or to settle disputes between the brothers in Rome. When they gather, one of them serves as leader of the presbytery — primus inter pares, you might say — but he is so worried about the word “first” that if anything he’s over-anxious to yield the floor to the other presbyters and put them first. In fact: one of his main concerns as leader among the brothers seems to be making sure that none of them, himself included, cares too much about being the leader. Christ alone is King, after all. Yet the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.

After a couple weeks, our time-traveling bishop has given up finding out who the real bishop of Rome is. He’s starting to worry about the validity of the Roman presbyters’ orders. So, just to be sure, he tries convincing them to let him ordain them. The senior presbyter, a man named Pius, is troubled by this — is this wandering teacher suggesting they aren’t really servants of Jesus Christ? — and gathers the brothers to hear him out and if necessary administer correction through Scripture. The time-traveler — an Anglican bishop, as it happens, consecrated in a succession line assured through the “Dutch Touch” of the Old Catholics — explains that where there is no apostolic bishop, there are no true presbyters, and therefore no true sacraments, and therefore no true catholic church. From memory, he even cites the appropriate passages from Ignatius. At this point, the room explodes with joy: for when they were very young, two of the presbyters had met the great saint in Rome before his passion, and one had seen him battle Death with his own eyes. “Yes, yes,” says the bishop, “but back to the point: bishops, you see …”

At just this point his lecture is interrupted by pounding at the door. Fear fills the room; Pius rises, walks to the door, and opens it. He is met by a group of soldiers, led by an imperial official. They are looking for Justin, the philosopher, who has done such great damage through his teaching. Not being a presbyter himself, and having no business with the college that day, Justin isn’t there. But the brave presbyters refuse to divulge knowledge of his whereabouts. Partly to make an example of them, partly to interrogate under torture, the official orders the arrest of three presbyters, including Pius, whom the soldiers bind and lead away.

As the initial shock wears off, the remaining men kneel to pray for their brothers.

A quarter hour later, convinced the coast is clear, our time-traveler crawls out of the cellar he’d been hiding in and joins them.

After an hour spent mainly in the Psalter, a Syrian named Anicetus concludes the prayers. Noticing the bishop’s nerves are still unsettled, he suggests they resume their conversation about leadership in the church. Anicetus — whom the room now looks to as leader among the brothers — explains how things have worked in Rome since the time of the apostles’ glorious victories under Nero. What began as one cramped house church before either Paul or Peter arrived has grown up into a great church of churches. Each little flock is served by one or two presbyters, who preach, teach, baptize, and preside at the Supper of the Lord. Before hands are laid upon them, these men are tested for their good character, for the genuineness of their faith, for their fruitfulness in love and mission, and for their readiness to suffer death for the name of Jesus Christ. Above all, these men must hold the faith and teaching of the apostles as set forth in holy Scripture — the whole of it: Torah, prophets, writings, Gospels, and epistles — and summed up in the rule of faith, the tradition of the presbyters. These men gather in a little synod or college to take counsel together regarding matters that concern the whole church; usually, for practical reasons, one of them is recognized as leader. “Now that Pius has been arrested,” Anicetus says, grimacing, “I have taken his place as leader of the college.”

Things more or less end there, for our time-traveler no longer feels up to arguing his case. Somehow, the apostolic succession of bishops doesn’t seem to matter quite as much as it had before Pius and the brothers were hauled off in chains. Besides, alongside these brave men, he doesn’t feel so apostolic anymore.

Three days later, Pius and his companions refuse to offer incense to the image of the emperor. They are put to death by the sword.

Taking stock, part 2: theology for the church in Roanoke

Back to the question we started with: are “apostolic bishops” necessary for the church in Roanoke?

If we stop queering the word bishop, then the answer is an unequivocal Yes. For the very being of the church, it is necessary that there be men ordained into the apostolic ministry of Word and sacrament. All such men are bishops: overseers of the flock, and overseers of the teaching. They are also presbyters, stewards, shepherds, farmers, fishermen, and warriors. But typically, we go by the simple and unassuming title, “pastor.” And that, I think, is as it should be.

This is the clear teaching of the Augsburg Confession, articles 5, 14, and 28, as well as the Treatise on the Power and Primacy of the Pope (also in the Evangelical-Lutheran Book of Concord, and also from Philipp Melanchthon’s pen).

Now, the churches of Roanoke are chock-full of such presbyter-bishops. But as I’ve been pointing out in this series, we aren’t living out together the fullness of what Christ died to win for us. And we aren’t sharing together the riches of the manifold gifts of the Spirit that have been entrusted to each for the good of the whole. And so we are not, with one voice, glorifying the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Instead, we’re holed up in siloes, passionately concerned with our own interests and pretty much unconcerned for the interests of others.

I think we should do something about this.

After prayer, fasting, and perhaps even a little substack theology, the obvious next step is doing what came naturally to early Christian leaders in Jerusalem, Antioch, Rome, and Gaul. To wit: we should gather together the presbyter-bishops to take counsel regarding matters that concern the whole church in this place. There are all sorts of issues to address: inter-personal, inter-ecclesial, missional, liturgical, and those having to do with church order. Above them all looms the biggest and hardest point of disagreement, yet also the most important — the teaching of the church. This, it will be remembered, is the raison d'être in second-century Christianity for the succession of presbyter-bishops: the preservation of the apostolic teaching, as summed up and secured by the tradition of the presbyters in the rule of faith.

Along with a miraculous, life-giving advent of the Holy Spirit, this is what we need more than anything else: the reformation of the church through the power of the living and abiding Word of God.

Probably, one of the older pastors would serve as first-among-equals in the presbytery of Roanoke; we might even call him our “bishop.” But he’d be a humble bishop, like the men of old. Not a “monarchical bishop,” as some say with no sense of irony, but servus servorum dei, a servant of the servants of God. A man who reminds us of 1 Pet 5.1-5 every time he walks in the room. A man ready, like the author of 1 Pet 5, to suffer and to die for the name of the Lord Jesus.