Correctly understanding the issue of authority in any relationship or set of relationships is not only important to the effective functioning of any organization, it is emotionally vital -- yea, essential. The word authority itself produces heightened feelings, concerns and reactions in most of us. In our pre-Christian days, we have run amok with those in authority over us, often in very painful ways. The human tendency to enjoy the limelight and the control that goes with it is all too prevalent. While we quickly recognize that tendency in others, truthfully, it is not always absent from any of us who lead.

Right now in the movement, we are struggling with a paradigm shift in our view of leadership and the authority that accompanies it. The earlier days of our movement were unquestionably too authoritarian. Authority was viewed primarily as positional in nature, not dissimilar to that found in the military. The higher the position, the greater the authority, and very often in practice, the higher the position, the less care was actually taken in the exercise of that authority. It should have been quite the opposite, as the principle of James 3:1 clearly indicates. The wrong use of authority is nearly always accompanied with insensitivity and/or harshness, and harshness carries with it more ramifications than we can possibly imagine. One's view of authority affects, and maybe determines, the view of God that especially younger and weaker disciples develop.

In addition to the authoritarian mindset with its attendant abuses, God's name and the Bible were sometimes invoked to uphold that authority. The view that God specifically put everyone in the authority positions that they held, that they were in fact "God's anointed," was unquestionably espoused in many quarters. Thus, being authoritarian in heart and demeanor was one mistake made, but dogmatically affirming God's blanket approval for what we did was likely a worse mistake spiritually.

This present reevaluation of our views of authority is certainly colored by our former emphases and abuses. One real danger is that we will allow the pendulum to swing too far, causing us to shy away from the practical need for authority and from the biblical injunctions for exercising the right kind of authority. One hopeful aid in helping us avoid this overreaction is to better define and understand the different types of authority.

Positional authority has to be handled very carefully, to be sure, but it must be said that this type of authority is not the principal type conveyed in the New Testament, even in the practice of Jesus (to whom all authority had been granted). A comparison of John 13:13 and John 15:15 will surely demonstrate that point. Jesus was very desirous of having a relationship with the disciples that was characterized by being friends with them rather seeing them as merely servants to him as the Master. Of course, he is the Master, but he doesn't call excessive attention to that as a way of making people obey him.

Our leadership roles may vary, along with the authority which is inherent in them, but relationships are yet another thing. The idea that role determines relationship is a bad idea, yet a common idea. It grew out of the assumption that our closest personal relationships should be reserved for those at similar levels of leadership. Again, the military model rears its ugly head. Relationships between disciples should always move in the direction of peer relationships, just as they should in a family. The goal of godly parenting is to develop maturing relationships with our children that are age appropriate at each stage, with the ultimate aim of exchanging our parent hat for a friend's hat. That same goal must define our relationships in the kingdom. Our roles may be different, but our relationships must become that of peers, of friends. As sinners, we are all on level ground at the foot of the cross, and we cannot ever forget that.

With our former experience of feeling the heavy hand of positional authority and the dictated unity it emphasized, we now have to be willing to forge unity now, avoiding the real tendency to run toward independence and even autonomy. Surely we must avoid that tendency like the plague that it is. Having been raised in the mainline Church of Christ, with its focus on autonomy, I am absolutely certain that I never want to go back to that unbiblical system. Too many in our movement are presently overreacting, and if they stay on that track, they will end up in places that mitigate against the very unity for which Christ prayed and died. Therefore, let's look more deeply at the other types of authority that are both biblical and practical.

Essentially, we work with two basic types of authority: that of position and that of influence. In the case of authority via influence, it may be based on one of two things: relationship or knowledge. Relationship authority is exercised when we trust someone enough to be influenced by their input. Knowledge authority is exercised mainly through the knowledge or expertise of another person. For example, we go to the doctor and then do about anything he says. Why? Not because he has any positional authority at all over us, and usually not because of a close personal relationship with him. We simply trust his experience and training. The ideal authority would be a combination of relationship and knowledge.

It is not difficult to demonstrate biblically that church leaders do have some positional authority through their role. However, these leaders are still in the persuading business. Hebrews 13:17 says: "Obey your leaders and submit to their authority. They keep watch over you as men who must give an account. Obey them so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no advantage to you." The word obey here means literally "be persuaded," which implies that the leader has the task of persuading those under his leadership. Of course, it must be noted that the passage is addressed to followers, not leaders, but the implication is there nonetheless. Hence, the authority enjoined here is more that of influence than positional, especially when viewed in combination with what Hebrews 13:7 stated just prior. This passage clearly refers to influence authority of a leader, wielded through his life example. At bottom, the church is a volunteer organization and will not forever even tolerate a leadership that persists in being heavy-handed. The authority of relationship and influence has to be developed, and to develop it, we must be committed to it. We must forge it, which means that we are willing to engage the process and to see it through to biblical unity.

Another way to look at it comes through the family analogy. The husband is the head of the wife -- he has positional authority over her biblically. However, if he is a loving leader, he exercises the authority through influence (relational and expertise) rather than appealing to his positional authority over her. The parents are the authority over their children, and this authority is by definition positional in nature. However, as the children age, the exercise of parental authority moves more and more into that of influence through relationship and knowledge, not through a "Do it because I say so" approach.

What is the overall concern that prompts the writing of this article? Simply stated, the human tendency to overreact is very real, and the current pain and suffering many of us are feeling because of past exercise of positional authority, abusively applied, ushers in a strong temptation to throw out the baby with the bathwater. We can so overreact to that abuse that we move away from the right kind of authority, and move toward an independence that is prideful and anti-unity. We may naively think that autonomy looks like a better solution than what we have seen, but that cost must be counted carefully before we go down the road toward a system that has clearly been shown to have systemic liabilities of magnitude. (See the separate article on Church Autonomy, or that section from chapter 9 of Prepared To Answer.)

My appeal is for restudy and reconsideration, but not reaction. Authority is God-ordained, and without it, chaos reigns. The only thing arguably worse than poor leadership, or even harsh leadership, is no leadership at all. A close second on the negative side of the leadership ledger is independent leadership rather than interdependent leadership that focuses on building family and teamwork. We are a brotherhood, not a loosely connected group of churches that eschews the development and practice of relational and expertise authority. We are our brothers' keepers and they are ours. That means that we seek the input of other leaders, and take that input seriously, and we are willing and anxious to provide that to others. Whatever the failures of our movement, they have often been more failures of implementation than principle. Let's deal with these failures, and hang on to the principles that have produced, in spite of the abuses in application, to some pretty amazing accomplishments in planting and building churches all over the world.