New Testament Leadership
Chris Tweedy
Editor’s Note: This article is adapted from a message at the 2026 Rocky Mountain District Conference in Cheyenne, Wyoming.
It was at a pastors leadership conference that I had a thought: if the Apostle Paul hosted a leadership conference, what would it look like? What would be the keynote topics? It struck me that by spending some time in the pastoral passages of the New Testament, I could get a pretty good idea.
Returning from the conference, I began a careful survey of 1 and 2 Timothy, Titus, 1 Peter 5, and Acts 20. I read through these passages and noted every time an instruction was given to a pastor or elder. General encouragement or commands excluded, I counted 60 different passages that contained 91 admonitions. Looking for themes in these admonitions, I found five basic categories.
The second most common category was on matters of personal holiness, with 19 different admonitions. There were, in third place, 18 different admonitions to lead and oversee faithfully, followed by nine admonitions to courageously endure difficulty, and eight times in which Paul warned Timothy to avoid specific traps. By far, the largest category of pastoral instruction was related to the topic of doctrine – 37 distinct admonitions.
“By far, the largest category of pastoral instruction was related to the topic of doctrine – 37 distinct admonitions.”
I found this interesting, and somewhat unexpected. Recall that the early church faced a host of significant leadership challenges. It had to navigate the Gentile-Jew divide, an issue difficult to get our 21st century, American minds around. We may have dealt with masks or no-masks during COVID-19, but they were constantly faced with meat or no-meat when it came to purchasing in the markets. We may have to deal with social media distraction, but the early church was dealing with emperor worship and the killing of Christians. And yet, by far, the bulk of the New Testament admonitions to the church’s leadership was in regard to doctrine.
As I poured over these verses, 2 Timothy 2:15 stood out as distillation of the entire group: “Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.” [1] The grammatical construction of the verse reveals the following. The “one approved” is a “worker” who “has no need to be ashamed” because of “rightly handling the word of truth.” [2] The pastor or elder is to be a man of the Word.
Further, in these 37 passages, I noticed five points of emphasis challenging the leadership’s engagement with doctrine.
First, we are to know doctrine.
“If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed. Have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths. Rather train yourself for godliness” (1 Tim 4:6-7). In Greek, a present active imperative indicates ongoing, continuous action. Therefore, we could read that last sentence as “keep on training yourself.” Paul’s word to Timothy: “You were trained in the words of faith, in good doctrine, now keep on training yourself.”
At this point in his life, Timothy is no slouch. He is certainly no stranger to ministry. Remember, Paul was charging him to command certain people not to teach. This meant that Timothy was to rebuke standing teachers. Paul gave him instructions for appointing elders. He was to command the church in certain areas, rebuke older men, and even correct elders. And yet, Paul’s word to Timothy was a reminder that the training he had received in doctrine laid the foundation for the training he had gained in godliness. Now Timothy must keep up that pattern of training and apply it to himself.
A common notion of my generation is that doing, not knowing, is most important. Barry Taylor, who was part of the Emergent Church movement, perhaps said it most bluntly when he said, “What we know means nothing. What we live means everything.” [3] But this is not true. We believe, and then we do. We are to bear fruit in every good work as we increase in the knowledge of God (Col 1:10).
“We believe, and then we do.”
The regular pattern of the New Testament letters, especially in Pauline literature, is that of intercession, doctrine, and then application. Paul’s letters rise out of or begin with his prayers for the church, then he moves to teaching doctrinal truth, and finishes with the application of that truth.
Perhaps the best example of this mistaken bifurcation comes to us in the poem I Stand by the Door by Sam Shoemaker.
I stand by the door.
I neither go too far in, nor stay too far out.
The door is the most important door in the world —
It is the door through which men walk when they find God.
Shoemaker’s poem progresses to describe the great house of God wherein all the saints go deep and dwell, and how outside are poor, lost sinners. There are some, he says, that,
must inhabit those inner rooms
And know the depths and heights of God,
And call outside to the rest of us how wonderful it is.
Sometimes I take a deeper look in.
Sometimes venture in a little farther,
But my place seems closer to the opening.
So I stand by the door.
...Near enough to God to hear Him and know He is there,
But not so far from men as not to hear them,
And remember they are there too.
Where? Outside the door —
So I shall stand by the door and wait. [4]
His poem is mistaken. There is, my friends, no tension between the deep things of God and the mission of God. Who went deeper into the things of God than any other man? Jesus! Who was the most mission-minded, sinner-loving, lost-seeking person to ever live? Jesus! Shoemaker’s poem betrays a misconception that knowledge of God is to be pursued only sparingly. False. The more we truly understand the things of God, the more he changes us into the image of the Lord Jesus – which includes his missional heart.
“There is, my friends, no tension between the deep things of God and the mission of God.”
Secondly, we are to guard doctrine.
In 2 Timothy 1:13-14, Paul commands, “Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you.” Guard it from what? From drift. From corruption.
Every generation has its heresy. They aren’t new, they are recycled, but given that the cycle can be hundreds of years, they often seem new to us. For example, in our day we are seeing a resurgence once again of teaching that insists on the core goodness of man. Have you noticed that nearly every present-day villain has a victim origin story? From Thanos to the Green Witch in Wicked to the most recent versions of the Joker and Cruella, these evil villains are misunderstood victims. They are inherently good, but trauma, abuse, or rejection have forced them to develop unhealthy coping mechanisms.
This thinking is creeping into “Christianity” as well. An extreme example of this would be Richard Rohr, who teaches that we have a “true self’ that is good – the divine Christ within, and that salvation, therefore, is merely realizing that Christ is already in us. [5] A milder and more palatable version might sound like this: “Your primary problem is that you have wounds that need to be healed and/or lies that you’re believing that need to be unlearned.” It may be true that people have wounds, or that they believe lies, but the primary problem is that they have rebellion that needs to be repented of. Paul’s assessment of the human condition in Romans 1 and 2 must be taken into account. In our fallen condition, we are all self-justifying truth suppressors.
The gospel is to be guarded against the intrusion of false doctrine. Pastors are on the front edge of that defense.
Thirdly, we are to teach doctrine.
Paul writes, “I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus…preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching” (2 Tim 4:1-2). Preach the Word. There is pressure today, as in every age, to preach something else. Rarely is the temptation to teach straight heresy. Rather, it is to teach something…else. Something…extra. Something… more interesting. Christopher Heuertz is someone who promotes one such “add on.” In an interview describing his system, he articulates:
“Rarely is the temptation to teach straight heresy. Rather, it is to teach something…else. Something…extra. Something… more interesting.”
I sort of wonder if the evolved evangelical is getting a little worn out from the same old literal Bible study interpretations of stuff. At least Catholicism can appeal to tradition and saints. I wonder if some evangelicals have gotten bored with what their tradition offers, and therefore, they find a deeper and more contemplative system like [this] appealing. [6]
Paul on the other hand says, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (Rom 1:16a). The message itself is the power of God. The gospel is what the Spirit is pleased to use, inhabit, and empower to exalt Christ, to release his transforming power into our lives. The Scriptures are sufficient!
Fourth, we are to exhort with doctrine.
It is tempting to exhort with something other than doctrine. For instance, it is tempting to exhort with passion. Someone is struggling and we, fired up, encourage them with excitement and zeal – “Don’t worry about it, everything is going to be fine. God is on the throne! He’s got this!” It’s tempting to exhort with relationship. “We love you, we care for you, we’re here for you!” We can often exhort by identifying with the person. “I know how you feel; I’ve been there.” Or, with experience. “One time that happened to me as well. Here’s what I did.” While these types of exhortation have their place, people primarily need to be exhorted with the Word of God. We are to take them to the Scriptures through which the Spirit is pleased to work.
Fifth, and finally, we are to correct false doctrine.
Of the 37 injunctions regarding doctrine, 10 of them direct the pastor to correction and rebuke. In 1 Timothy 3 the pastor/elder is to exemplify a godly life, yet there are only two direct actions they are to offer to the church. They are to teach and oversee the church (1 Tim 3:1-7).
Teach the Word…and then everything else. Oversight of the church encompasses a myriad of responsibilities. Yet they are lumped together and set beside teaching the Word. In the more condensed version of Titus 1:9 oversight of the church is left out completely. The leaders are simply charged with teaching doctrine and rebuking false doctrine. Whatever the reasons may be, we have a general distaste for rebuke and correction. Yet, this is part of our calling; part of our responsibility; part of correctly handling the word of truth.
The pastor, properly ordained, didn’t get there because he wanted to be a leader of men. Nor was it because he was struck by the glories of building an organization. He arrived after the Holy Spirit took these pages of Scripture and by them opened his eyes to his sin, and to the matchless love of God that extended redemption to him through God’s glorious Son, Jesus. And this is what burned within us and drove us to share and exhort and teach and proclaim the truth about Jesus. So keep on. Keep on knowing, keep on guarding, keep on teaching, keep on exhorting, keep on correcting, with abiding in the Word as your primary concern. Aim to be a workman pleasing to the Lord.
Chris Tweedy - Assistant District Superintendent - Rocky Mountain District
[1] Scripture quotes ESV unless otherwise noted.
[2] The Greek is clear: rightly handling the word of truth modifies having no need to be ashamed which modifies worker which modifies one approved. There are not two clauses here, but one. Of the 52 families of English translations, only 5 agree with the NIV (CEV, EXB, PHILLIPS, NCV, NLT). Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved…that is – a worker who has no need to be ashamed…because he is – rightly handing the word of truth.
[3] Barry Taylor, talk at Capo Beach Calvary, San Juan Capistrano, California.
[4] Shoemaker, Helen Smith. I Stand by the Door: The Life of Sam Shoemaker. New York: Harper & Row, 1967. (The poem "I Stand by the Door" appears on pp. 217–219.)
[5] Rohr, Richard. Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2013. "The True Self is who you objectively are from the beginning, in the mind and heart of God." (p.3) Throughout the book, Rohr presents salvation as the discovery or awakening of one's "True Self" in God.
[6] Heuertz, Christopher. Interview by Warren B. Smith. Lighthouse Trails Research Project, "An Interview with Emerging Church Leader Christopher Heuertz." Originally published online, c. 2006–2007.