Journal: Journal for Baptist Theology & Ministry
Volume: JBTM 02:1 (Spring 2004)
Article: Why Baptist Elders Is Not An Oxymoron
Author: Phil A. Newton

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JBTM 2:1 (Spring 2004) p. 63

Why Baptist Elders Is Not An Oxymoron1

Phil A. Newton

Senior Pastor
South Woods Baptist Church
3175 Germantown Road South
Memphis, TN 38119

Old photos of old men raised questions in my young mind. As a teenager, my curiosity was piqued upon seeing portraits of the pastors that served my home church during the nineteenth century. Each had the title, “Elder” under his name. I had some familiarity with elders among the local Presbyterian and Church of Christ congregations, but I had never heard of an elder in a one hundred year-old Baptist church. The old pictures were not lying—the First Baptist Church of Russellville, Alabama had once recognized elders. It appears that presbyters—plural eldership—from neighboring congregations held the responsibility for establishing and maintaining new churches in the area. First Baptist Russellville was founded in 1867 “with Elders R. J. Jennings and Mike Finney constituting the presbytery.”2

Admittedly, in some circles the title, “Elder,” was used much the same way that “Pastor” or “Brother” is used today. Beyond the title, however, the practice of plural eldership existed among some of the churches. While addressing the egalitarian distinction of Baptists functioning democratically, Baptist historian Greg Wills points out that in previous centuries, “Government [as distinguished from matters of discipline] related to the election of church officers—deacons,

JBTM 2:1 (Spring 2004) p. 64

elders, and pastors.” He further explains, “Antebellum Baptists frequently called ordained ministers elders. Some churches also appointed “ruling” elders, who were not ordained ministers.”3 In detailing the history of early Baptists of Tennessee, J. H. Grimes frequently refers to pastors as elder. He identifies Elder John Bond in Statesville as “only a licensed minister at this time, but was regularly ordained by Union Church AD 1820, by a presbytery consisting of Elders Joshua Lester and David Gordon.” Bond subsequently served as pastor, but was called elder even before assuming the pastorate. Within Tennessee Baptist churches, Grimes further identifies plural eldership of men involved in pastoral leadership but not drawing a salary, and thus serving in what was termed, “lay elders.”4

David Tinsley, a prominent Baptist serving in Georgia in the late eighteenth century alongside Jesse Mercer’s father, Silas Mercer, was ordained four times. “The first was to...

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