A Pilgrimage Of Faith, J.B. Toews, 1993

f the local church. The governance structure was somewhat hierarchical, but the power of the hierarchy was always tempered by two factors: (1) authority was shared, and (2) the congregation had signifi- cant involvement in deliberations and decision-making. Fur- 220 HOW SHALL WE THEN BE LED? thermore, because the leaders had emerged from within the church, they had earned the confidence and trust of the mem- bership. Time-tested service and earned trust provided the basis for authority. In some congregations people who were not ordained as ministers or deacons, but had gained the confidence of the membership as models of faith and life, were added to the leadership team. The leading elder was always viewed as an equal in the leadership group.6 In larger churches, where the deaconate required more deacons, boards of elders often functioned as an executive committee/ The elders were the guardians of Scripture in nurture, fel- lowship and watchcare for the life and needs of the flock. The exercise of authority was implicit, guided by the motto, "Thus says the Scripture." Until the 1930s in the United States and the 1950s in Cana- da, local ministers and elders were bivocational people* With the transition from an agrarian to an industrial, professional and commercial culture, the need emerged for full-time paid pastors (but still within the context of a multiple ministry). This transition to paid leadership caused repeated testing of the biblical teachings on leadership. Officially, the conference remained firmly committed to a multiple leadership model, with a clear preference that it emerge from within the congre- gation. The importance of the spirit of servanthood and mu- tuality was stressed even more than before. Local church governance began to change with the intro- duction of paid pastors. The dislocations of immigration and the depression, as well as the professionalization of the min- istry, disrupted the organic spiritual process of leadership de- velopment within local churches. People in growing urban communities no longer knew each other as well, and pastors preferred more centralized forms of church leadership. Church councils began to emerge as an alternative form of church governance. 221 A PILGRIMAGE OF FAITH Church council polity offered a representative form of leadership. Instead of leaders being discerned on the basis of spiritual giftedness, as before, they arose out of the various programs of the church, such as Christian education, youth, music, deaconate and board of trustees. The model was func- tional in character The