tiro

Charis,

Nice to see someone else ‘gets’ what I’m pondering about. 🙂

Relative to that are the admonishments about elders in 1 Tim. The Greek word has a foundation in one being older. There are words that just mean aged, that mean aged man or woman, that mean elder in ministry and that mean an elder man or woman in ministry. They all share a root that mean aged/elder. The thing that is important about it IMO, is that an older person has some maturity (well not all ) from the experiences of life and seeing his perspectives change. As well, an older person is not as controlled by hormones. Sometimes hormones are like “blood in the eyes”. We still see something through them but they definitely color what we see.

As you can tell I am not in agreement with the view that being “an elder” in the church is just about being in a supervisory ‘position’ of authority over. IMO it is about an older more experienced and mature person being a spiritual watcher over those who are younger. There are those elders who teach and there are those elders who watch and whatever else that entails.