“Establishing Authority”

Friday, July 06, 2012

    How do you establish authority?  Specifically, how do you determine what we are authorized to do in the assembly in regard to "expedients" (i.e. social functions, missionary/orphan societies, etc.).  I'm looking for an organized sequence/chart to follow for establishing authority.

Sincerely,
All In Order

Dear All In Order,

What you are asking about is a major issue in religion and in life… how do we establish Bible authority for things?  There are a couple things to consider, and we’ll try and cover them in sequential order.

First of all, in order to do anything, we must have Scriptural authority.  It isn’t enough to say, “The Bible doesn’t say I can’t.”  According to Heb 7:14, 1 Cor 4:6, and Rev 22:18-19, silence in the Bible is prohibitive.  If the Bible is silent on a subject, we must be, too.  That is exactly why we don’t have instrumental music in worship – the Scriptures never authorize it, so, by default, it is prohibited.

With that under our belt, there are three ways to establish Bible authority:

1. A direct command.  If the Bible gives us a direct command on a subject, that is the easiest way to find authority.  For example, 1 Cor 16:2 is a direct command to take up a collection on the first day of the week.
2. Approved examples.  If we find an example in the New Testament that clearly is approved by God, we can use that to establish authority.  2 Thess 3:9 says that it is proper for Christians to imitate the faithful actions of those we read about in the Bible.
3. Necessary inference.  ‘Necessary inference’ is another way of saying that something must logically be true.  Necessary inference means that we use logic to put Bible concepts and teachings together to come up with proper conclusions.  For more on that subject, read “Necessary Inference”.

After finding authority through the Scriptures, the last thing to consider is how specific the authority is.  Every command that you find in the Bible has specific and general qualities to it.  For example, when God told Noah to build the ark, He told Noah to use a specific kind of wood (gopher wood – Gen 6:14) and build the ark to specific dimensions (Gen 6:15-16), but He left the details of how to cut, fasten, and construct the ark up to Noah.  It would have been wrong for Noah to use oak or birch, and it would have been wrong for Noah to change the dimensions of the ark, but aside from that, Noah had freedom to use his own wisdom in the engineering of the ark.  The things that God was specific on, Noah had to be specific on, too… but the things God was general about, Noah had freedom to decide for himself.

Another way of saying this is that anything required to fulfill a command is inherent within the command.  This means that if I ask someone to fill my car with gasoline, by default, I have given them permission to drive my car and take it to a gas station of their choosing.  Why?  Because driving my car and going to a gas station are necessary to fulfill that command, and I didn’t tell them which gas station I wanted, so I’ve left that to their discretion.

There are many things that congregations do today (such as own buildings, purchase songbooks, etc.) that the Bible never specifically authorizes, but they fall under general authority.  For example, the commands that give a congregation the authority to own property can be found in Heb 10:24-25 and 1 Cor 14:26.  In both those verses, the church is commanded to assemble.  We are told that we must assemble, or we will be displeasing to God… but we aren’t told where to assemble; that detail is left to our discretion.  We could meet in homes (if we had ones that were big enough), we could meet in a park (if it were legal and weather permitting), or we could buy some property and a building to use.

This is a lengthy answer, but it is a difficult question to answer without some length.  Hopefully, that helps as you try and find Bible authority for everything that you do.

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