We need better ways to think about authority in the church

Christa McKirland begins her book on authority by recounting an experience I suspect many women in the church can identify with. Driving home after teaching Bible study one evening, she asked herself a question: “Do I have authority over other Christians?”

I connected with this immediately, having asked myself similar questions when I was given teaching and leadership roles at our former church. As a woman, I’d been taught I could not hold authority “over” men. But what exactly did that mean? And was I supposed to have authority “over” the women I taught?

Dr. McKirland, waiting at a stoplight, came to a quick conclusion: “As accurate as I felt the teaching was…I felt a growing discomfort with the idea that I had been authoritative in any way that evening. Instead, the locus of authority was external to me, held in my hands as the Scriptures. This authority was internal to me only insofar as I was being led by the Holy Spirit. I, Christa, was not in authority over anyone.”

This careful distinction, coming just two pages into the book, confirmed to me that I was in for a great read. “A Theology of Authority” has been immensely helpful to me already, and I’m certain I’ll be returning to it often.

Early on, McKirland stakes out her conclusion that no Christian, woman or man, is called to have authority “over” any other Christian, especially since “focusing on who can have authority in the church can distract from the church’s calling and the empowerment of all believers.”

This doesn’t mean the church should become a disorganized free-for-all, however: “It is possible to maintain the value of leadership and even recognize leadership without requiring some in the body to have authority over others.”

Wait… Leadership doesn’t have to include “authority over”? ( 🤯 ) This was one of many times throughout the book I bumped up against my own unexamined assumptions about church practices. Each time, McKirland was a helpful guide to thinking more carefully about practices many of us take for granted.

There is a LOT in this book, and I can’t do it justice in the space of a Substack post. However, I’ll try to summarize some of my biggest takeaways (which hopefully will motivate some of you to get the book for yourselves and your church leaders!)

Evangelical churches have tended to reduce “authority” to one overly simplistic category — being able to tell someone else what to do — and this has led to confusion, conflict, and far too many abuses of power.

We can have more fruitful conversations (not to mention healthier churches) when we distinguish between categories of authority. McKirland spends nearly 75 pages carefully defining these, but for the sake of brevity I’ll reduce them down to two main groups: executive and non-executive.

• Executive authorities can tell someone what to do, and/or they have the right to do something to or on behalf of others. These authorities usually have power to enforce consequences, as well. Example: a parent can use consequences to ensure a child cleans his or her room.

• Non-executive authorities are those who have some kind of knowledge, qualifications, or character that others do not. We follow their advice or example not because they can impose punishment, but because we trust their expertise or wisdom. For example, McKirland’s child is learning the language of Aotearoa New Zealand at school, and is therefore an authority in this area relative to her mother. But this doesn’t mean her child can “force” her to learn.

For decades, such simple distinctions of authority have been conspicuously absent in discussions about who can be a “pastor,” especially with regard to gender roles within the church.

In “Recovering Biblical Manhood and Womanhood,” the foundational text of complementarianism, John Piper famously wrote about how a man driving his car might get lost and need to ask a woman for directions:

“A housewife in her backyard may be asked by a man how to get to the freeway. At that point she is giving a kind of leadership. She has superior knowledge that the man needs and he submits himself to her guidance. But we all know that there is a way for that housewife to direct the man that neither of them feels their mature femininity or masculinity compromised.”

Here and throughout the rest of his writing on male “headship,” Piper seems to assume any and all leadership/authority belongs within the executive category. The housewife’s superior knowledge of local roadways qualifies her to “guide” and “direct” the man, who must “submit” to her. The words Piper uses belong to functions of executive authority — to the sphere of force, coercion, and power over — when in fact a person who can help a lost motorist back to the highway is simply acting as a nonexecutive authority: a guide who comes alongside to share information with someone in need.

Unfortunately, most discussions about complementarianism have reduced authority to this type of simplistic binary: one person or group gets to tell another what to do, and that other is required by God to submit. It’s no wonder the debates around women’s ordination, gender roles, and pastoral qualifications have been so heated. When “authority” is equated with coercive power, we will covet it, fear it, and fight to ensure only the “right” people get it.

McKirland’s book can help us have more productive conversations on these issues, while encouraging more care in how we practice authority in the church.

Evangelical churches have tended to proof-text their way to power, taking a verse or two and building out extensive justifications for existing authority structures. But we can’t do this in a healthy way unless we also examine our ecclesiology, eschatology, and pneumatology.

I’ve seen far too many discussions of “biblical” authority that all share the same problem: one passage becomes a handy weapon, pulled out whenever someone asks too many questions. Such passages are often used to build extensive arguments about who must submit to whom. For example:

• Parenting and family discipline? (“the rod,” Prov. 13:24)

• Pastors and elders? (“obey your leaders,” Heb. 13:17)

• Gender roles in the church? (1 Tim 2:12)

• Marriage? (“the husband is the head of the wife,” Eph. 5)

• Government and politics? (“be subject to the governing authorities,” Rom. 13)

But when we go to the Bible with the question “who’s in charge?” we will quickly end up in unhealthy territory unless we set up some important guardrails. McKirland outlines some important considerations:

Pneumatology

The fact that every Christian is indwelt by the Holy Spirit must inform every relationship within the church. This truth is too often taken for granted, and many churches function as if their pastors/leaders possess some measure of God’s presence that isn’t available to the commoners in the pews. As McKirland explains:

“The Spirit is central in our understanding of what it means to be the church (ecclesiology), for the Spirit is how we can be in the same spiritual family .. the Spirit is the reason authority in the church should look different from authority anywhere else in the world.”

Ecclesiology and eschatology

God has created and called us to be his image-bearers in the world, representing him in creation. God’s invitation to Adam and Eve in Genesis, often called the “Dominion Mandate,” is frequently cited in discussions of authority as a kind of justification for humans to practice power over other creatures and even each other. But as McKirland points out, God does not exercise God’s own power in this way, and we are called to the same: “humans are given the immense honor to represent God through faithful stewardship of creation — using their power over to give power to … to ensure that creation is fully flourishing.”

Knowing God has given us this calling must also shape our relationships in the church. McKirland encourages us to consider, “What visible practices — especially relating to power and authority — will best express [God’s] coming kingdom? … How does our church life visibly point to the restoration of all things?”

In fact, Jesus rejected the kind of authority many pastors and church leaders embrace today.

Citing Jesus’s well-known teaching from Matthew 20 (“the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve”), McKirland points out that Jesus specifically refused to adopt the practices of authority that were common among Jewish and Greco-Roman cultures of his time. These “rulers” consistently wielded power over. Instead,

“Jesus turns their value system on its head… instead of claiming executive imperative authority, Jesus endorses nonexecutive exemplary authority. We are not meant to have authority over one another within the family of God. But Jesus does not stop there. He goes on to name the replacement for this kind of relating. That replacement is an exemplary life of sacrificial service that is epitomized in Jesus himself.”

McKirland also points out that while Jesus gives his disciples authority over spiritual forces, sickness, and sin — as a means of authenticating their gospel message — “nowhere does Jesus explicitly give individual followers authority over other human beings.”

We can’t assume that Paul’s role — or those of other leaders in the New Testament — comes with the same expectations and authority as leaders in the church today. And we need to recognize that Paul followed Jesus’s practice of leadership, not ours.

Most churches I’ve attended have emphasized that their leadership structure is “biblical,” with pastors pointing out how their offices and practices are reflected in New Testament passages. It’s common for pastors to equate their own roles with that of the Apostle Paul, or to describe Timothy and Titus as “church planters” or young pastors in need of Paul’s advice. Since those men were told to “command,” “exhort,” and “reprove” other believers, Paul’s letters are taken to mean that pastors and elders today are entitled to do the same.

But even the recipients of the “pastoral epistles” were not equivalent to our pastors today. Rather, McKirland argues, Titus and Timothy were delegated apostolic authorities. No one today holds that kind of power.

Despite his special status as an apostle, Paul followed Jesus’s example of leadership through sacrificial service. “Instead of claiming special honor and status because of his authority, Paul often ‘parades his own weakness’.” He exemplifies “the counterintuitive use of power through weakness.” Rather than “commanding” fellow believers, he far more often exhorts and encourages fellow believers, writing with humility as a peer, not a superior. Only on a few occasions — in emergencies — does he use an authoritative tone.1

Which brings us to my final major takeaway.

By contrast, our unhealthy and non-”biblical” assumptions about power means that relationships between leaders and members are framed (implicitly or explicitly) as CEO-employees, parent-child, or leader-follower. But throughout the New Testament, the most consistent framework for relationships in the church is that of siblings.

Relationships between believers were not the kind of power structures we see in the church today. While some were singled out as leaders, all the sisters and brothers in Christ lived in submission to one another, considering and deferring to others rather than grasping for power over them.

We’re probably all familiar with the practice of calling other believers “sisters in Christ” or “brothers in Christ.” But this term carried significant meaning for early Christians: “this was the most intimate form of relating in that ancient context, even closer than marriage!” And since Jesus the firstborn Son has shared his inheritance among his siblings, all are equal in status — there’s no need to fight for positions of prominence.

In this family, siblings who love one another will take opportunities to help each other “grow up.” (This is the opposite of a church family where a spiritual “father” holds onto power while letting others remain weak, childish, and dependent on his superior strength or wisdom.)

“We are meant to be a spiritual family that is a learning community,” McKirland writes. “Leaders will lean on others, fostering interdependence instead of independence, since the royal-priestly calling is collective.”

These brief 5 points barely skim the surface of “A Theology of Authority.” I believe this book — including the many helpful questions and practical applications McKirland provides — can help us rethink and rework our current leadership practices.

Our faulty and “unbiblical” beliefs about authority in the church have created a culture where abuse of all kinds seems to be flourishing, where believers are formed into passive consumers of content rather than divine image bearers with a royal-priestly calling, and where some groups of people — frequently men — claim power over others, ignoring the voices of siblings who have been empowered by the same Spirit.2

McKirland encourages those of us who want something better to step forward and begin the work: “The responsibility for changing our church culture belongs not just to those in formal leadership roles; all post-Pentecost believers share this responsibility.”

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P.S. — I apologize to Dr. McKirland if I’ve inaccurately summarized her book or missed important points! Again, if you’re interested in these topics, you should definitely buy it. Here it is at ThriftBooks and Bookshop.org. (not affiliate links, just my favorite places to buy books)