A Commentary on the CCT Process Within the FEB
By Paul Carter
Spurgeon used to say of John Bunyan, “Prick him anywhere – his blood is Bibline;” 1 after two years on the Affirmation of Faith Committee and another 18 months on the CCT Committee I think you could prick me anywhere and I would bleed Baptist polity. I’ve spent way more time than I ever imagined thinking about what an elder is, what a pastor is, what a deacon is and why it matters. I’m thankful to have been a part of these various committees, and also thankful that our work is drawing to an end. It has been hard, long, difficult, frustrating, but necessary work that was done faithfully, prayerfully and passionately by a group of people who love Jesus and who care about the health and vitality of his church.
It was truly an honour to be included.
I don’t intend to summarize the timeline for the various online and in person meetings associated with the AoF and CCT processes. To read the review of the process prepared by The Fellowship and made available to member churches, see here and here.
Shortly after our last in person meeting, I mentioned to our FEB President Steve Jones that I thought it might be useful for a few of us to write a commentary on our experience and to share our perspectives on the documents that it produced. There has been so much speculation and so much concern about this process – understandably so – that some reflections from those who were a part of it from day one might help our people to understand why we landed where we did.
This article represents my attempt to provide some context and framing.
To be clear others could, and I hope will, write their own commentaries and they might recall things differently than I do and they might offer different hypotheses for why we made the decisions that we did. That is only to be expected. I am not presenting this as any kind of “authoritative analysis.” This is my take and nothing more. This is an account of what I remember, what I was feeling at the time, what I was hoping for throughout and what I decided at the end that I could live with. If it helps you better understand and appreciate the documents that we produced, then it will have served its purpose.
From the AoF to the CCT
The Affirmation of Faith Committee, or AoF for short, met for roughly two years with a mandate from The Fellowship to update and improve our statement of faith. The original Affirmation of Faith came about largely as a compromise between fundamentalist Baptists and reformed Baptists. (N.B. I recognize that all such labels can be heard as offensive or judgmental. I use them here for the purposes of taxonomy only) It was also written to buttress The Fellowship against certain movements in the wider culture. As such, there were areas of obvious emphasis and areas that were clearly, though unintentionally underdeveloped. To give one example, the original AoF does not explicitly affirm the humanity of Christ because it was the divinity of Christ that was under assault in the mid-20 the century, whereas issues of anthropology only became front burner concerns in the 2020s. One of the issues around which there was immediate and unanimous agreement within the committee was the need to more fully articulate the humanity of Christ so as to undergird what we wished to affirm with respect to biblical anthropology.
The AoF team came together with a mandate to maintain the heart and soul of our original statement, while also addressing gaps, defending against new threats from the culture and
updating language and terminology where required. A strong preference was expressed for maintaining the original phrasing wherever possible. We were also frequently reminded to “make it sing.” We wanted this document to sound less like law and more like liturgy. With this complex and multi-faceted mandate in mind, we set to work.
My own preparation for involvement with this committee involved studying a wide variety of
historic and current Baptist confessions. I suspect that part of the reason I was invited to
participate is that I had recently co-written two faith statements for other organizations. Each member of the committee emerged as having an area of particular expertise. There was “the grammar guy”, the “make it sing” person; I think I was generally recognized as the “historical reference” guy. I arrived at the first meeting with The Baptist Confession of 1689, The New Hampshire Confession of 1833, The Baptist Faith and Message 1925, 1963 and 2000 all lined up on my computer, ready to be called upon as reference points if necessary.
As the conversation progressed, I became aware of the deep complexity that exists within our fellowship of churches. There are real and significant differences between the regions. Within regions there are real and significant differences between churches that have more of an American Fundamentalist heritage, as opposed to those with more of an English Reformed Baptist heritage. These differences were most noticeable in two categories: eschatology and ecclesiology. The Fellowship had decided at its inception in the 20 th century that it would not divide over the particulars of eschatology, and our statement was intentionally vague on those matters so as to accommodate that; it became clear to me that our challenge in the 21 st would be to decide whether or not similar compromises would be acceptable and workable in the area of ecclesiology.
It did not surprise me at all that the one article in the new AoF that did not receive adequate
support from National Conference was the article on the church. I would have been shocked if it had passed. Throughout the AoF process I discovered that we have (at least) three different polity systems operating within our fellowship. The following represents my summary of those various systems, in so far as I can perceive and distinguish them:
1. Pastor and deacons. In this system the only “elder” is the pastor. He is responsible for
spiritual matters such as preaching, pastoral care and prayer. The deacons oversee the
finances and the building. There may be a benevolence committee to oversee food
ministry and care for the aged and infirm.
2. Elders and deacons, with the pastor and associate pastors being understood as elders.
(Version 2 b. of this system would see only the Lead Pastor being considered an elder.
This is sometimes referred to as “Senior Pastor Complementarianism.”) In this system
there are elected elders who oversee the church, inclusive of doctrine, discipline and
finance, and the pastor(s) are considered staff elders. The only real distinction between
pastors and elders is that pastors are typically vocational, such that the term “pastor”
means basically “staff elder”. The deacons oversee benevolence ministries.
3. Trustees, pastor and staff. In this system a group of trustees function as directors of the
corporation, providing financial and legal oversight. The pastor is the sole elder and
serves as the day-to-day overseer of the spiritual affairs of the church. Underneath the
pastor there are a variety of staff members who may or may not be referred to as “pastor”
but who do not have oversight authority.
These polity differences appear to cross reference generally with the regional and historical factors referenced above such that, while each option exists in every region, options 1 and 2 are predominate in central and eastern Canada with options 2b. and 3 predominating in western Canada. These polity differences lead to significant variations in terminology and practice, making it unlikely in the extreme that we would pass an article on ecclesiology without having done the groundwork now being undertaken by the CCT; but of course, hindsight is 20/20.
To read the full AoF, with notes on all the changes and edits, see here. The article on the church, the only one not to pass, reads as follows:
The Church
We believe that the universal church, the Body of Christ, comprised of all true believers in
heaven and on earth, is expressed on earth in local churches. We believe a properly ordered local church consists of believers, baptized by immersion, who have been called out from the world, separated to the Lord Jesus; and voluntarily associated for the ministry of the word, the mutual edification of its members, the propagation of the faith, the observance of the ordinances, and the doing of good works. We believe it is a self-governing body responsible for exercising its own divinely awarded gifts, precepts, and privileges under the lordship of Christ, the Head and Chief Shepherd of the church. We believe that its officers are biblically qualified elders, who shepherd and oversee God’s flock, and deacons, who serve and support.
Matthew 16:18; 1 Corinthians 1:2; Acts 2:41-43; Ephesians 4:3-6; Titus 2:14; Romans 12:3-8; 1 Corinthians 12:4-7, 12-13; Ephesians 4:11-16; Hebrews 10:24-25; 1 Peter 5:1-3; 1 Timothy 3:1-15; Titus 1:5-9; Acts 6:1-7
As you can well imagine, the last sentence of this article required the greatest share of our time and attention. There was a hesitance on the part of several committee members to use “elder” and “pastor” in the same sentence in any way that would seem to equate those terms. These concerns were particularly common amongst those that came from churches reflecting polity options 2b. and 3. For reference sake, the Baptist Confession of 1689 says here:
“… the officers appointed by Christ to be chosen and set apart by the church (so called and
gathered), for the peculiar administration of ordinances and execution of power of duty, which he entrusts them with, or calls them to, to be continued to the end of the world, are bishops or elders and deacons.”
The word “bishop” was used unapologetically by the early Baptists as a synonym for “overseers” and is used in the Baptist Confession of 1689 interchangeably with the world “elders”; thus the two offices recognized are bishops/elders/overseers and deacons.
In fairness to those who did not wish to use the word “pastor” as a synonym for “elder” in our statement, it should be noted that the Greek word usually translated “pastor” is more commonly used as a verb in the New Testament, in order to describe what elders do; so for example, it says in 1 Peter 5:1-2:
So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed: 2 shepherd the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight (1 Peter 5:1-2 ESV)
In that passage Peter tells elders to shepherd (or pastor – the words are equivalent) the flock of God as an aspect of oversight. Thus, elders pastor. But that is different than saying that elders are pastors and pastors are elders. To make a simple but effective analogy: all cats are animals but not all animals are cats. It is true that all elders ought to pastor, but it is not necessarily true that all who pastor are elders. The word “elder” is associated with a formal, authoritative, oversight office in the New Testament, whereas the word “pastor” is used as a verb to describe a set of actions associated with the oversight of elders.
That difference matters.
As such, after a great deal of discussion, the group settled on a very carefully worded sentence that I think is both faithful to the text and transferable to our current ecclesiological context:
I think it is a shame that this article did not pass as written. Had there been more discussion about the meaning of the various terms and the spectrum of permissible applications, I suspect it would have.
Whether or not it should have passed, it did not pass, and as such, the National Council put
together a CCT (Complementarian Congruence Team) in order to pursue a shared understanding of what the practice of “complementarianism” should look like within our fellowship of churches, with the ultimate goal of improving the article and providing further operative clarity through the bylaw and associated definitions. It was comprised of several members of the original AoF Committee as well as several new people who reflected common viewpoints and practices within our wider constituency.
The CCT Process
I must confess that our first day of meetings as a committee depressed me a great deal. I was shocked by the level of diversity in our practice as a national fellowship. To be clear, I am not opposed to diversity and I don’t believe that everyone has to agree with me on matters of ecclesiology in order to be a true Christian, but to work effectively as a fellowship of churches requires a certain level of agreement. I can shake hands with my evangelical Anglican friend, but I can’t plant churches with him. I can pray daily for my Pentecostal egalitarian pastor friend, but I can’t run a seminary with her. To do the kinds of things we are trying to do as The Fellowship of Evangelical Baptists in Canada we need to be on the same page on some things, and it appeared to me in that first meeting as if that was not the case.
I must also confess that I felt that the process was somewhat “rigged” at that first meeting. It seemed obvious to me that who you put on a committee determines what that committee will eventually decide. It appeared to me as if the committee had been designed to produce a particular outcome. I went to bed that evening worried that I was participating in a bit of political theatre, as opposed to a true process of study, prayer, deliberation and recommendation.
The second meeting represented something of a turning point for me. Maybe it was because we started to get to know each other. I know myself well enough to recognize that I argue differently with people I love. I tend to frame their position in the best possible light, and I tend to be more optimistic with respect to their intentions and underlying agendas. It was during the second day of meetings that I felt like we began to recognize each other as brothers and sisters in Christ who had honest differences of opinion about what the Bible requires, permits and forbids with respect to church governance. As we got to know each other and to hear each other’s personal stories, the temperature in the room dropped considerably. Positions were still being shared forcefully and passionately, but the tone was noticeably different.
There was a significant breakthrough near the end of that first group of in person meetings. The group appeared to achieve consensus around the fact that the oversight office in the church, however labelled, should be restricted to biblically qualified males only. As I recall, there was only one person in the room who indicated a need for more time to process that.
That was the turning point in the conversation.
From that point on the discussion turned mostly to wording and application. How tightly can we define the word “elder”? How tightly can we connect “pastor” and “elder”? What about churches that use the word “deacon” for what most of us mean by “elder”? Can we affirm male and female deacons without requiring some standardized use of these terms? What about churches that have pastors who are not considered authoritative overseers? What about churches with only one elder? Are we as concerned about plurality as we are about gender?
Those were intense conversations, but they were collegial and constructive, and we were all feeling a sense of forward momentum.
When it came down to the final wording of the proposed article and the associated by-law, I
believe we all had the sense that we were far closer to “congruence” on these matters than when we started, but we were also honest enough to recognize that there is still a challenging level of diversity within our fellowship with respect to terminology and practice. We all voted for the final statement, if I recall correctly, but none of us seemed entirely comfortable with it. Some saw it as a bit too restrictive. Some saw it as leaving several important things unclarified. I believe I characterized it at the time as: “the best statement we can achieve with our present level of agreement.”
I stand by that assessment.
Here is the article as revised and presented by the CCT:
The Church
We believe in the universal church, the Body of Christ, comprised of all true believers in
heaven and on earth, which is expressed on earth in local churches. We believe a properly
ordered local church consists of believers, baptized by immersion upon their confession of
faith, who have been called out from the world, separated to the Lord Jesus; and
voluntarily associated for the ministry of the word, the mutual edification of its members,
the propagation of the faith, the observance of the ordinances, and the doing of good
works. We believe local churches are self-governing bodies responsible for exercising their
God-given gifts, precepts and privileges, and implementing their Spirit-guided decisions
and directions under the lordship of Christ, the Head and Chief Shepherd of the church. We
believe that its officers are biblically qualified male pastors/elders, who oversee God’s
flock, and deacons, who serve and support.
Scripture Support:
Matthew 16:18; 1 Corinthians 1:2; Acts 2:41-43; Ephesians 4:3-6; Titus 2:14; Romans
12:3-8; 1 Corinthians 12:4-7, 12-13; Ephesians 4:11-16; Hebrews 10:24-25; 1 Peter 5:1-3;
1 Timothy 3:1-15; Titus 1:5-9; Acts 6:1-7
The key change there is found within the final sentence. For comparison’s sake, see the last line in the article as proposed and unpassed in 2025 followed by this new submission:
In this new statement we have identified the authoritative oversight office as being occupied by “pastors/elders”, as opposed to “elders, who shepherd and oversee” in the 2025 version. This serves to connect the word “pastor” to “elder” though one will have to read the accompanying bylaw to understand the nature of that connection.
Here is the by-law as revised and presented by the CCT, with slight changes made by National Council for the purpose of legal conformity:
Bylaw Article 4.1(a)(iii)
Notwithstanding the provisions in 1.3(c), it accepts that the office of pastor/elder in the
church is reserved for biblically qualified men recognized by the church for oversight of
the doctrine and discipline of the church; notwithstanding that some churches may have
pastors who are not elders; further, it accepts that the office of deacon is open to biblically
qualified males or females, provided they are engaged in ministries of service and support.
It accepts that terminology and governance structures may vary in MEMBER churches,
provided that oversight of the doctrine and discipline of the church remains with those men
biblically qualified for the office of pastor/elder;
Thus, the bylaw clarifies that the authoritative oversight office in the church is to be filled only by biblically qualified men who are pastor/elders. This leaves open the possibility of a church having pastors who are not elders and who do not exercise authoritative oversight and who therefore need not be biblically qualified males. It helpfully defines what a deacon is and what deacons do so as to positively affirm that the office is open to both men and women.
Here are the by-law definitions as presented by the CCT:
New Bylaw Definitions:
Pastor/elder: Those who occupy the office of overseer of the local church’s doctrine
and discipline reserved for biblically qualified men, notwithstanding the provisions in
1.3(c).
Deacon: A person appointed to the office of exercising a ministry of service and support in
the local church.
Pastor: According to the practice of some local churches, a person shepherding in the local
church under the oversight of pastors/elders.
The definitions helpfully connect the office of pastor/elder to the specific responsibility of
authoritative oversight of the church’s doctrine and discipline. It codifies that the office of
deacon is for the purposes of service and support in the local church. It recognizes that some churches have pastors who are not “pastor/elders” and who do not exercise authoritative oversight in the church.
The Case For the Statements as Presented:
An argument can be made that the statements produced by the CCT represent a significant step forwards toward congruence and should therefore be adopted, notwithstanding the need for further dialogue around the issues of terminology and application. It is true that you cannot have a fellowship of churches without a certain amount of flexibility on such matters. Terminology develops as a result of shared history and experience, and those things vary group to group and region to region and there should be some recognition of that. To be a national fellowship will require good natured and generous compromise on a variety of matters, as demonstrated to us all in the accommodations made around eschatology in our original Affirmation of Faith. A strong argument could be made that we should imitate the example of our founders by exercising the same level of flexibility, within biblical boundaries, with respect to our current differences in the area of ecclesiology. While I don’t believe in unity at the expense of truth, I do believe that we see through a glass darkly, and therefore, I’m sympathetic to the argument in favour of adopting the statements as written, while pursuing further clarity and commonality on these matters
moving forward.
The Case Against the Statements as Presented:
There are significant deficiencies in the statements as written. The statements permit churches to have pastors who are not elders, as such, there will be churches with female pastors, and that will be interpreted by many as a failure to uphold a consistent complementarianism. In addition, these statements do not clearly require that the preaching of the sermon within the gathered worship service be done by a biblically qualified male elder and so some churches will have female preachers operating under the oversight of male elders. In fairness, few of our churches have a clearly articulated policy around this. Can only elders preach in your church? Do male seminary students, who are not elders, ever preach? What about retired pastors? What about guest preachers? What about missionaries home on furlough, be they male or female? The CCT felt that it was beyond our purview and capacity to adjudicate these matters, however, many will view the absence of clarity on these issues to be a reason to vote against the statements as written. To many it will seem somewhat ridiculous to refer to ourselves as a complementarian fellowship while having churches with female pastors who preach the sermon on Sunday at the main worship gathering.
Summary and Personal Recommendation:
As I stated above, I believe that the article, bylaw and definitions as here stated represent the best we could produce with the level of agreement present on our committee. Committees are democratic. Statement A is proposed and voted on. If it doesn’t get a strong majority of votes, then Statement B is proposed and voted on until the group is able to produce something that can be accepted by the majority of members. Inevitably, the statements become less clear, and the bar gets a little lower with each iteration and amendment. In our final meeting I stated my opinion that we had taken this process as far as we could given the makeup of the committee and the amount of authority we’d been given. It was now up to the National Council and the delegates at National Conference to do the rest.
I wrote earlier in this article that I initially felt that the committee had been designed to produce a particular outcome; but I think I would say now that it rather accurately reflected the diversity that truly exists within our fellowship of churches. I now see, or at least believe, that the committee was put together as a “focus group” or “trial run” so as to get all the hard work and tough conversations out of the way in a smaller and more manageable context. In essence, we had the arguments so that you don’t have to.
And we did.
Several of us in the room pushed hard for a statement that clearly and unambiguously related the words “pastor” and “elder” in such a way as to eliminate the use of the title “pastor” for any individual who was not also understood as an elder. To be clear, this would put pressure on churches that have 23-year-old male Youth Pastors, who are not elders, just as much as it would on churches that have 40-year-old female Women’s Ministry Pastors, who are not elders. There was a significant minority within the group that felt that this ambiguity should be addressed and a clear policy articulated within either the article or the bylaw and definitions.
Pushing back on this perspective were those who argued, with conviction, that the Bible does not speak of an “office of pastor” (and nor do the early Baptist Confessions), rather this is a contemporary usage that should not be imposed on other churches who have adopted a different usage. The key issue, they contended, is that the authoritative officers in charge of discipline and doctrine must be biblically qualified male elders.
We couldn’t come to agreement on those issues as a committee and I don’t suspect that we will be able to do so as a national body, as such, I believe that further work and discussion are required. What we’ve produced represents a fairly low level of agreement that I do not believe will be sufficient to support the sort of robust ministry fellowship that most of us aspire to. As such, my personal recommendation is to pass the article as written, but to debate, table and subsequently revise the bylaw and definitions. The bylaw revision and definitions as written will codify a level of diversity and confusion that will be unsustainable for us as a fellowship of churches. That’s probably not what anyone wants to hear, but I believe it is the path of wisdom.
Unity is hard, but it is always worth fighting for.
Throughout this process my own convictions have not shifted, but I have become more
sympathetic to the perspectives of those “on the other side.” I would hate to see our fellowship divide over this issue, particularly when progress is being achieved, understanding is being gained and generous, but faithful compromises are being made. But there is more work to be done. Specifically, there needs to be more conversation about our use of the word “pastor”. As historians will point out, the popular adoption of this term by Protestants is fairly recent; there is far more historical precedent for the use of the words “bishop”, “elder”, and “presbyter” than there is for “pastor”. As biblical scholars will point out, it is difficult to make an airtight case that the word “pastor” was understood as precisely equivalent with the word “elder” in the New Testament era. It is clear that elders were expected to be pastoral in their oversight, but it is not clear that there was a group of people called “pastors”. And yet, communities can make decisions about terminology on the basis of reasonable inference and sanctified common sense, and it is likely past time for us to do that in this case.
My prayer is that we will make the commitment to do this work together.
For the glory of the Lord and for the good of all those he has entrusted to our care.
O God help!
Pastor Paul Carter
If you are interested in more Bible teaching from Pastor Paul you can access the entire library of Into The Word episodes through the Audio tab on the Into the Word website. You can also download the Into The Word app at the App Store or Google Play.
1 “Mr. Spurgeon as a Literary Man,” in The Autobiography of Charles H. Spurgeon, Compiled from His Letters, Diaries, and Records by His Wife and Private Secretary, vol. 4, 1878-1892 (Curtis & Jennings, 1900), p. 268.
Spurgeon used to say of John Bunyan, “Prick him anywhere – his blood is Bibline;” 1 after two years on the Affirmation of Faith Committee and another 18 months on the CCT Committee I think you could prick me anywhere and I would bleed Baptist polity. I’ve spent way more time than I ever imagined thinking about what an elder is, what a pastor is, what a deacon is and why it matters. I’m thankful to have been a part of these various committees, and also thankful that our work is drawing to an end. It has been hard, long, difficult, frustrating, but necessary work that was done faithfully, prayerfully and passionately by a group of people who love Jesus and who care about the health and vitality of his church.
It was truly an honour to be included.
I don’t intend to summarize the timeline for the various online and in person meetings associated with the AoF and CCT processes. To read the review of the process prepared by The Fellowship and made available to member churches, see here and here.
Shortly after our last in person meeting, I mentioned to our FEB President Steve Jones that I thought it might be useful for a few of us to write a commentary on our experience and to share our perspectives on the documents that it produced. There has been so much speculation and so much concern about this process – understandably so – that some reflections from those who were a part of it from day one might help our people to understand why we landed where we did.
This article represents my attempt to provide some context and framing.
To be clear others could, and I hope will, write their own commentaries and they might recall things differently than I do and they might offer different hypotheses for why we made the decisions that we did. That is only to be expected. I am not presenting this as any kind of “authoritative analysis.” This is my take and nothing more. This is an account of what I remember, what I was feeling at the time, what I was hoping for throughout and what I decided at the end that I could live with. If it helps you better understand and appreciate the documents that we produced, then it will have served its purpose.
From the AoF to the CCT
The Affirmation of Faith Committee, or AoF for short, met for roughly two years with a mandate from The Fellowship to update and improve our statement of faith. The original Affirmation of Faith came about largely as a compromise between fundamentalist Baptists and reformed Baptists. (N.B. I recognize that all such labels can be heard as offensive or judgmental. I use them here for the purposes of taxonomy only) It was also written to buttress The Fellowship against certain movements in the wider culture. As such, there were areas of obvious emphasis and areas that were clearly, though unintentionally underdeveloped. To give one example, the original AoF does not explicitly affirm the humanity of Christ because it was the divinity of Christ that was under assault in the mid-20 the century, whereas issues of anthropology only became front burner concerns in the 2020s. One of the issues around which there was immediate and unanimous agreement within the committee was the need to more fully articulate the humanity of Christ so as to undergird what we wished to affirm with respect to biblical anthropology.
The AoF team came together with a mandate to maintain the heart and soul of our original statement, while also addressing gaps, defending against new threats from the culture and
updating language and terminology where required. A strong preference was expressed for maintaining the original phrasing wherever possible. We were also frequently reminded to “make it sing.” We wanted this document to sound less like law and more like liturgy. With this complex and multi-faceted mandate in mind, we set to work.
My own preparation for involvement with this committee involved studying a wide variety of
historic and current Baptist confessions. I suspect that part of the reason I was invited to
participate is that I had recently co-written two faith statements for other organizations. Each member of the committee emerged as having an area of particular expertise. There was “the grammar guy”, the “make it sing” person; I think I was generally recognized as the “historical reference” guy. I arrived at the first meeting with The Baptist Confession of 1689, The New Hampshire Confession of 1833, The Baptist Faith and Message 1925, 1963 and 2000 all lined up on my computer, ready to be called upon as reference points if necessary.
As the conversation progressed, I became aware of the deep complexity that exists within our fellowship of churches. There are real and significant differences between the regions. Within regions there are real and significant differences between churches that have more of an American Fundamentalist heritage, as opposed to those with more of an English Reformed Baptist heritage. These differences were most noticeable in two categories: eschatology and ecclesiology. The Fellowship had decided at its inception in the 20 th century that it would not divide over the particulars of eschatology, and our statement was intentionally vague on those matters so as to accommodate that; it became clear to me that our challenge in the 21 st would be to decide whether or not similar compromises would be acceptable and workable in the area of ecclesiology.
It did not surprise me at all that the one article in the new AoF that did not receive adequate
support from National Conference was the article on the church. I would have been shocked if it had passed. Throughout the AoF process I discovered that we have (at least) three different polity systems operating within our fellowship. The following represents my summary of those various systems, in so far as I can perceive and distinguish them:
1. Pastor and deacons. In this system the only “elder” is the pastor. He is responsible for
spiritual matters such as preaching, pastoral care and prayer. The deacons oversee the
finances and the building. There may be a benevolence committee to oversee food
ministry and care for the aged and infirm.
2. Elders and deacons, with the pastor and associate pastors being understood as elders.
(Version 2 b. of this system would see only the Lead Pastor being considered an elder.
This is sometimes referred to as “Senior Pastor Complementarianism.”) In this system
there are elected elders who oversee the church, inclusive of doctrine, discipline and
finance, and the pastor(s) are considered staff elders. The only real distinction between
pastors and elders is that pastors are typically vocational, such that the term “pastor”
means basically “staff elder”. The deacons oversee benevolence ministries.
3. Trustees, pastor and staff. In this system a group of trustees function as directors of the
corporation, providing financial and legal oversight. The pastor is the sole elder and
serves as the day-to-day overseer of the spiritual affairs of the church. Underneath the
pastor there are a variety of staff members who may or may not be referred to as “pastor”
but who do not have oversight authority.
These polity differences appear to cross reference generally with the regional and historical factors referenced above such that, while each option exists in every region, options 1 and 2 are predominate in central and eastern Canada with options 2b. and 3 predominating in western Canada. These polity differences lead to significant variations in terminology and practice, making it unlikely in the extreme that we would pass an article on ecclesiology without having done the groundwork now being undertaken by the CCT; but of course, hindsight is 20/20.
To read the full AoF, with notes on all the changes and edits, see here. The article on the church, the only one not to pass, reads as follows:
The Church
We believe that the universal church, the Body of Christ, comprised of all true believers in
heaven and on earth, is expressed on earth in local churches. We believe a properly ordered local church consists of believers, baptized by immersion, who have been called out from the world, separated to the Lord Jesus; and voluntarily associated for the ministry of the word, the mutual edification of its members, the propagation of the faith, the observance of the ordinances, and the doing of good works. We believe it is a self-governing body responsible for exercising its own divinely awarded gifts, precepts, and privileges under the lordship of Christ, the Head and Chief Shepherd of the church. We believe that its officers are biblically qualified elders, who shepherd and oversee God’s flock, and deacons, who serve and support.
Matthew 16:18; 1 Corinthians 1:2; Acts 2:41-43; Ephesians 4:3-6; Titus 2:14; Romans 12:3-8; 1 Corinthians 12:4-7, 12-13; Ephesians 4:11-16; Hebrews 10:24-25; 1 Peter 5:1-3; 1 Timothy 3:1-15; Titus 1:5-9; Acts 6:1-7
As you can well imagine, the last sentence of this article required the greatest share of our time and attention. There was a hesitance on the part of several committee members to use “elder” and “pastor” in the same sentence in any way that would seem to equate those terms. These concerns were particularly common amongst those that came from churches reflecting polity options 2b. and 3. For reference sake, the Baptist Confession of 1689 says here:
“… the officers appointed by Christ to be chosen and set apart by the church (so called and
gathered), for the peculiar administration of ordinances and execution of power of duty, which he entrusts them with, or calls them to, to be continued to the end of the world, are bishops or elders and deacons.”
The word “bishop” was used unapologetically by the early Baptists as a synonym for “overseers” and is used in the Baptist Confession of 1689 interchangeably with the world “elders”; thus the two offices recognized are bishops/elders/overseers and deacons.
In fairness to those who did not wish to use the word “pastor” as a synonym for “elder” in our statement, it should be noted that the Greek word usually translated “pastor” is more commonly used as a verb in the New Testament, in order to describe what elders do; so for example, it says in 1 Peter 5:1-2:
So I exhort the elders among you, as a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed: 2 shepherd the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight (1 Peter 5:1-2 ESV)
In that passage Peter tells elders to shepherd (or pastor – the words are equivalent) the flock of God as an aspect of oversight. Thus, elders pastor. But that is different than saying that elders are pastors and pastors are elders. To make a simple but effective analogy: all cats are animals but not all animals are cats. It is true that all elders ought to pastor, but it is not necessarily true that all who pastor are elders. The word “elder” is associated with a formal, authoritative, oversight office in the New Testament, whereas the word “pastor” is used as a verb to describe a set of actions associated with the oversight of elders.
That difference matters.
As such, after a great deal of discussion, the group settled on a very carefully worded sentence that I think is both faithful to the text and transferable to our current ecclesiological context:
We believe that its officers are biblically qualified elders, who shepherd and oversee God’s flock, and deacons, who serve and support.
I think it is a shame that this article did not pass as written. Had there been more discussion about the meaning of the various terms and the spectrum of permissible applications, I suspect it would have.
Whether or not it should have passed, it did not pass, and as such, the National Council put
together a CCT (Complementarian Congruence Team) in order to pursue a shared understanding of what the practice of “complementarianism” should look like within our fellowship of churches, with the ultimate goal of improving the article and providing further operative clarity through the bylaw and associated definitions. It was comprised of several members of the original AoF Committee as well as several new people who reflected common viewpoints and practices within our wider constituency.
The CCT Process
I must confess that our first day of meetings as a committee depressed me a great deal. I was shocked by the level of diversity in our practice as a national fellowship. To be clear, I am not opposed to diversity and I don’t believe that everyone has to agree with me on matters of ecclesiology in order to be a true Christian, but to work effectively as a fellowship of churches requires a certain level of agreement. I can shake hands with my evangelical Anglican friend, but I can’t plant churches with him. I can pray daily for my Pentecostal egalitarian pastor friend, but I can’t run a seminary with her. To do the kinds of things we are trying to do as The Fellowship of Evangelical Baptists in Canada we need to be on the same page on some things, and it appeared to me in that first meeting as if that was not the case.
I must also confess that I felt that the process was somewhat “rigged” at that first meeting. It seemed obvious to me that who you put on a committee determines what that committee will eventually decide. It appeared to me as if the committee had been designed to produce a particular outcome. I went to bed that evening worried that I was participating in a bit of political theatre, as opposed to a true process of study, prayer, deliberation and recommendation.
The second meeting represented something of a turning point for me. Maybe it was because we started to get to know each other. I know myself well enough to recognize that I argue differently with people I love. I tend to frame their position in the best possible light, and I tend to be more optimistic with respect to their intentions and underlying agendas. It was during the second day of meetings that I felt like we began to recognize each other as brothers and sisters in Christ who had honest differences of opinion about what the Bible requires, permits and forbids with respect to church governance. As we got to know each other and to hear each other’s personal stories, the temperature in the room dropped considerably. Positions were still being shared forcefully and passionately, but the tone was noticeably different.
There was a significant breakthrough near the end of that first group of in person meetings. The group appeared to achieve consensus around the fact that the oversight office in the church, however labelled, should be restricted to biblically qualified males only. As I recall, there was only one person in the room who indicated a need for more time to process that.
That was the turning point in the conversation.
From that point on the discussion turned mostly to wording and application. How tightly can we define the word “elder”? How tightly can we connect “pastor” and “elder”? What about churches that use the word “deacon” for what most of us mean by “elder”? Can we affirm male and female deacons without requiring some standardized use of these terms? What about churches that have pastors who are not considered authoritative overseers? What about churches with only one elder? Are we as concerned about plurality as we are about gender?
Those were intense conversations, but they were collegial and constructive, and we were all feeling a sense of forward momentum.
When it came down to the final wording of the proposed article and the associated by-law, I
believe we all had the sense that we were far closer to “congruence” on these matters than when we started, but we were also honest enough to recognize that there is still a challenging level of diversity within our fellowship with respect to terminology and practice. We all voted for the final statement, if I recall correctly, but none of us seemed entirely comfortable with it. Some saw it as a bit too restrictive. Some saw it as leaving several important things unclarified. I believe I characterized it at the time as: “the best statement we can achieve with our present level of agreement.”
I stand by that assessment.
Here is the article as revised and presented by the CCT:
The Church
We believe in the universal church, the Body of Christ, comprised of all true believers in
heaven and on earth, which is expressed on earth in local churches. We believe a properly
ordered local church consists of believers, baptized by immersion upon their confession of
faith, who have been called out from the world, separated to the Lord Jesus; and
voluntarily associated for the ministry of the word, the mutual edification of its members,
the propagation of the faith, the observance of the ordinances, and the doing of good
works. We believe local churches are self-governing bodies responsible for exercising their
God-given gifts, precepts and privileges, and implementing their Spirit-guided decisions
and directions under the lordship of Christ, the Head and Chief Shepherd of the church. We
believe that its officers are biblically qualified male pastors/elders, who oversee God’s
flock, and deacons, who serve and support.
Scripture Support:
Matthew 16:18; 1 Corinthians 1:2; Acts 2:41-43; Ephesians 4:3-6; Titus 2:14; Romans
12:3-8; 1 Corinthians 12:4-7, 12-13; Ephesians 4:11-16; Hebrews 10:24-25; 1 Peter 5:1-3;
1 Timothy 3:1-15; Titus 1:5-9; Acts 6:1-7
The key change there is found within the final sentence. For comparison’s sake, see the last line in the article as proposed and unpassed in 2025 followed by this new submission:
We believe that its officers are biblically qualified elders, who shepherd and oversee God’s flock, and deacons, who serve and support.
We believe that its officers are biblically qualified male pastors/elders, who oversee God’s flock, and deacons, who serve and support.
In this new statement we have identified the authoritative oversight office as being occupied by “pastors/elders”, as opposed to “elders, who shepherd and oversee” in the 2025 version. This serves to connect the word “pastor” to “elder” though one will have to read the accompanying bylaw to understand the nature of that connection.
Here is the by-law as revised and presented by the CCT, with slight changes made by National Council for the purpose of legal conformity:
Bylaw Article 4.1(a)(iii)
Notwithstanding the provisions in 1.3(c), it accepts that the office of pastor/elder in the
church is reserved for biblically qualified men recognized by the church for oversight of
the doctrine and discipline of the church; notwithstanding that some churches may have
pastors who are not elders; further, it accepts that the office of deacon is open to biblically
qualified males or females, provided they are engaged in ministries of service and support.
It accepts that terminology and governance structures may vary in MEMBER churches,
provided that oversight of the doctrine and discipline of the church remains with those men
biblically qualified for the office of pastor/elder;
Thus, the bylaw clarifies that the authoritative oversight office in the church is to be filled only by biblically qualified men who are pastor/elders. This leaves open the possibility of a church having pastors who are not elders and who do not exercise authoritative oversight and who therefore need not be biblically qualified males. It helpfully defines what a deacon is and what deacons do so as to positively affirm that the office is open to both men and women.
Here are the by-law definitions as presented by the CCT:
New Bylaw Definitions:
Pastor/elder: Those who occupy the office of overseer of the local church’s doctrine
and discipline reserved for biblically qualified men, notwithstanding the provisions in
1.3(c).
Deacon: A person appointed to the office of exercising a ministry of service and support in
the local church.
Pastor: According to the practice of some local churches, a person shepherding in the local
church under the oversight of pastors/elders.
The definitions helpfully connect the office of pastor/elder to the specific responsibility of
authoritative oversight of the church’s doctrine and discipline. It codifies that the office of
deacon is for the purposes of service and support in the local church. It recognizes that some churches have pastors who are not “pastor/elders” and who do not exercise authoritative oversight in the church.
The Case For the Statements as Presented:
An argument can be made that the statements produced by the CCT represent a significant step forwards toward congruence and should therefore be adopted, notwithstanding the need for further dialogue around the issues of terminology and application. It is true that you cannot have a fellowship of churches without a certain amount of flexibility on such matters. Terminology develops as a result of shared history and experience, and those things vary group to group and region to region and there should be some recognition of that. To be a national fellowship will require good natured and generous compromise on a variety of matters, as demonstrated to us all in the accommodations made around eschatology in our original Affirmation of Faith. A strong argument could be made that we should imitate the example of our founders by exercising the same level of flexibility, within biblical boundaries, with respect to our current differences in the area of ecclesiology. While I don’t believe in unity at the expense of truth, I do believe that we see through a glass darkly, and therefore, I’m sympathetic to the argument in favour of adopting the statements as written, while pursuing further clarity and commonality on these matters
moving forward.
The Case Against the Statements as Presented:
There are significant deficiencies in the statements as written. The statements permit churches to have pastors who are not elders, as such, there will be churches with female pastors, and that will be interpreted by many as a failure to uphold a consistent complementarianism. In addition, these statements do not clearly require that the preaching of the sermon within the gathered worship service be done by a biblically qualified male elder and so some churches will have female preachers operating under the oversight of male elders. In fairness, few of our churches have a clearly articulated policy around this. Can only elders preach in your church? Do male seminary students, who are not elders, ever preach? What about retired pastors? What about guest preachers? What about missionaries home on furlough, be they male or female? The CCT felt that it was beyond our purview and capacity to adjudicate these matters, however, many will view the absence of clarity on these issues to be a reason to vote against the statements as written. To many it will seem somewhat ridiculous to refer to ourselves as a complementarian fellowship while having churches with female pastors who preach the sermon on Sunday at the main worship gathering.
Summary and Personal Recommendation:
As I stated above, I believe that the article, bylaw and definitions as here stated represent the best we could produce with the level of agreement present on our committee. Committees are democratic. Statement A is proposed and voted on. If it doesn’t get a strong majority of votes, then Statement B is proposed and voted on until the group is able to produce something that can be accepted by the majority of members. Inevitably, the statements become less clear, and the bar gets a little lower with each iteration and amendment. In our final meeting I stated my opinion that we had taken this process as far as we could given the makeup of the committee and the amount of authority we’d been given. It was now up to the National Council and the delegates at National Conference to do the rest.
I wrote earlier in this article that I initially felt that the committee had been designed to produce a particular outcome; but I think I would say now that it rather accurately reflected the diversity that truly exists within our fellowship of churches. I now see, or at least believe, that the committee was put together as a “focus group” or “trial run” so as to get all the hard work and tough conversations out of the way in a smaller and more manageable context. In essence, we had the arguments so that you don’t have to.
And we did.
Several of us in the room pushed hard for a statement that clearly and unambiguously related the words “pastor” and “elder” in such a way as to eliminate the use of the title “pastor” for any individual who was not also understood as an elder. To be clear, this would put pressure on churches that have 23-year-old male Youth Pastors, who are not elders, just as much as it would on churches that have 40-year-old female Women’s Ministry Pastors, who are not elders. There was a significant minority within the group that felt that this ambiguity should be addressed and a clear policy articulated within either the article or the bylaw and definitions.
Pushing back on this perspective were those who argued, with conviction, that the Bible does not speak of an “office of pastor” (and nor do the early Baptist Confessions), rather this is a contemporary usage that should not be imposed on other churches who have adopted a different usage. The key issue, they contended, is that the authoritative officers in charge of discipline and doctrine must be biblically qualified male elders.
We couldn’t come to agreement on those issues as a committee and I don’t suspect that we will be able to do so as a national body, as such, I believe that further work and discussion are required. What we’ve produced represents a fairly low level of agreement that I do not believe will be sufficient to support the sort of robust ministry fellowship that most of us aspire to. As such, my personal recommendation is to pass the article as written, but to debate, table and subsequently revise the bylaw and definitions. The bylaw revision and definitions as written will codify a level of diversity and confusion that will be unsustainable for us as a fellowship of churches. That’s probably not what anyone wants to hear, but I believe it is the path of wisdom.
Unity is hard, but it is always worth fighting for.
Throughout this process my own convictions have not shifted, but I have become more
sympathetic to the perspectives of those “on the other side.” I would hate to see our fellowship divide over this issue, particularly when progress is being achieved, understanding is being gained and generous, but faithful compromises are being made. But there is more work to be done. Specifically, there needs to be more conversation about our use of the word “pastor”. As historians will point out, the popular adoption of this term by Protestants is fairly recent; there is far more historical precedent for the use of the words “bishop”, “elder”, and “presbyter” than there is for “pastor”. As biblical scholars will point out, it is difficult to make an airtight case that the word “pastor” was understood as precisely equivalent with the word “elder” in the New Testament era. It is clear that elders were expected to be pastoral in their oversight, but it is not clear that there was a group of people called “pastors”. And yet, communities can make decisions about terminology on the basis of reasonable inference and sanctified common sense, and it is likely past time for us to do that in this case.
My prayer is that we will make the commitment to do this work together.
For the glory of the Lord and for the good of all those he has entrusted to our care.
O God help!
Pastor Paul Carter
If you are interested in more Bible teaching from Pastor Paul you can access the entire library of Into The Word episodes through the Audio tab on the Into the Word website. You can also download the Into The Word app at the App Store or Google Play.
1 “Mr. Spurgeon as a Literary Man,” in The Autobiography of Charles H. Spurgeon, Compiled from His Letters, Diaries, and Records by His Wife and Private Secretary, vol. 4, 1878-1892 (Curtis & Jennings, 1900), p. 268.
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