Church Leadership Must Be Based on Humility -- Peter's Instruction in 1 Peter 5:1-11
- mww
- Apr 30
- 20 min read
Updated: 2 days ago
A church needs godly leadership to handle persecution effectively.
Bible Study Ideas and Commentary for 1 Peter 5:1-11
In our final lesson in 1 Peter, Peter closes with instructions for church leaders: their church families will need steady, humble leadership to make it through this season of persecution. And the church members will need to humbly respect that leadership. And God will bless all of it with the power to resist the devil and keep the faith.
All of you clothe yourselves with humility toward one another (5:5)
May the Fourth
This isn't theologically connected to this week's lesson (for the love of all things, don't get your theology from Star Wars); it's just a fun get-to-know you topic. What's your favorite movie to quote? Or, what movie do you find yourself quoting a lot?
(Or in my case, why do I quote Ghostbusters so often? Not a great movie.)
What Are the Qualities that Help You Trust/Respect/Follow a Leader?
We have done versions of this discussion topic. Essentially, you want to create a list of the qualities/characteristics that your group finds important for a leader.
A twist you might use this week is to identify different areas of leadership: business leadership, civic leadership, church leadership, etc. Are those qualities different based on the different situations?
I would expect the lists to be slightly different (or else every successful businessman would be a great sports team owner or politician), but I would love for you to highlight the commonalities.
In this short article, I highlight vision, character, and heart (and include a list of wise and foolish traits from Proverbs):
I put a lot of emphasis on humility and servant-leadership (and you'll notice that throughout this post) because I think that's what the Bible tells us to emphasize.
Who Are the Most Respected People in Your Church and Why?
This is intended to be a fun topic that celebrates current church members. Who are the people in your church that you "look up to" or trust to offer wise counsel and leadership?
It's hard not to think about former church members who left "big shoes" when they died or moved away, but when I did this exercise for FBC, I was thrilled to think about members who have stepped into those shoes (as best they can).
Something I hope you accomplish with this topic: bringing awareness that every year, more church members need to grow into those shoes. The older we get, the more that younger, newer members will look to us as those dependable, respected members. Are we growing in our maturity and commitment as Christians?
Family Pecking Order
If you have siblings, or if you had a close extended family, you are aware of a "pecking order" that naturally occurs in every family. It's very often a simple product of age:
Dad or mom
Mom or dad
Older sibling
Middle sibling
Younger sibling
Why is the pecking order so often based on age?
I'd be really interested to know if your family didn't follow the age-train. If not, what quality/characteristic established the pecking order? What were the consequences of that modified pecking order?
A point that I would love for you to establish with this topic is that age is very often a prevailing factor in determining relative influence, but it is not always the dominant factor. We can then better appreciate Paul's words to Timothy, "Don’t let anyone despise your youth, but set an example for the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, and in purity." (1 Tim 4:12)
What Is Humility?
I'm going to bring up humility a lot in this post, so it might be useful to start with asking your group what they think "humility" means.
My fear is that they will give you a definition like from the Oxford dictionary:
low self-regard and sense of unworthiness.
Oh dear. That's a terrible definition of humility!
Here's a much better definition from the Holman Bible Dictionary:
the personal quality of being free from arrogance and pride and having an accurate estimate of one's worth (emphasis added).
Jesus gave us the ultimate picture of humility, and I know He did not consider Himself unworthy! Other qualities associated with humility include not looking down on others, gentleness, and grace.
In this week's passage, we are going to see the importance of humility both on the part of leaders and of followers.
Where We Are in 1 Peter
We're just about at the end of the letter. Peter has given a lot of tough news to these church members -- "life could get really hard, and you're going to need one another to successfully navigate it".
Well, it's going to take some committed and grounded church leaders to help them do that.
But this might bring up some questions about who those leaders are...
This Week's Big Idea: "Elders"
I have no idea if this will come up in this week's discussion, but I expect it might.
The most common word used of a church leader in the New Testament is "elder" (presbuteros, think "Presbyterian"). It's the same word used of Jewish leadership in the synagogue in the Gospels. The word generally referred to older, more mature community members who were naturally looked to as leaders. This word is not always used to describe an "office" in the Bible, but it can be.
Another word that shows up in this week's passage is "pastor" (poimen, lit. "shepherd"). The word is most often used to describe Jesus (the Good Shepherd of the church), but it is also used to describe a church leader in Eph 4:11, 1 Pet 2:25 and 1 Pet 5:2. In this week's passage, it is quite obvious that "shepherding/pastoring" is a function of the "elders".
The final word used to describe church leaders in the New Testament is "overseer" (episkopos, think "Episcopal"). This word is translated "bishop" in older versions of the Bible, and you'll realize why when I describe different church and denominational structures below. In our passage this week, the verb form of episkopos is used to describe something an elder does.
Here are two famous passages about church leaders:
1 Tim 3:1 This saying is trustworthy: “If anyone aspires to be an overseer, he desires a noble work.” 2 An overseer, therefore, must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, self-controlled, sensible, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, 3 not an excessive drinker, not a bully but gentle, not quarrelsome, not greedy. 4 He must manage his own household competently and have his children under control with all dignity. 5 (If anyone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he take care of God’s church?) 6 He must not be a new convert, or he might become conceited and incur the same condemnation as the devil. 7 Furthermore, he must have a good reputation among outsiders, so that he does not fall into disgrace and the devil’s trap.
Tit 1:5 The reason I left you in Crete was to set right what was left undone and, as I directed you, to appoint elders in every town. 6 An elder must be blameless, the husband of one wife, with faithful children who are not accused of wildness or rebellion. 7 As an overseer of God’s household, he must be blameless, not arrogant, not hot-tempered, not an excessive drinker, not a bully, not greedy for money, 8 but hospitable, loving what is good, sensible, righteous, holy, self-controlled, 9 holding to the faithful message as taught, so that he will be able both to encourage with sound teaching and to refute those who contradict it.
Remember these passages when we talk about "elders" in this week's passage. For our purposes, I think it is exceedingly clear that Paul used the words "overseer" and "elder" interchangeably.
And in this week's passage, "pastor" and "elder" are used to describe the same person(s).
So, I believe that "overseer" ("bishop"), "elder" and "pastor" are different words for the same position of leadership in a local church -- emphasizing different roles that person(s) must play.
Why did I go through all of that? Here's why:
(This topic is near and dear to me; I wrote a lengthy article about it for New Orleans's journal of theology all the way back in 2009.)
If you have any connection with a Presbyterian church, you know that "Presbyterian" and "Elders" go hand-in-hand. And the inflow of Reformed (Calvinistic) theology in Baptist circles over the past thirty or so years has logically resulted in some Presbyterian ideas making their way into Baptist churches. But their use of the title "Elder" refers to a specific type of church leader in a specific type of church structure.
So let me dust off a section of a course I led called "What's the Deal with Denominations?" In other words, I'm recycling material I have presented elsewhere.
There Are Three Common Denominational Structures
Episcopal: Those who argue for the episcopal structure admit that it cannot be found in the New Testament but say that it is the natural outgrowth of the New Testament church, led as they were by the Twelve Apostles of “apostolic authority”. For example, the Roman Catholic Church calls the pope the “successor” of Peter, “chief of the twelve”.
Presbyterian: Those who use a Presbyterian system say that the Bible uses the terms “elder”, “pastor”, “overseer”, and “bishop” to refer to separate leaders in the church. Further, New Testament letters were addressed to those leaders, not to their churches as a whole.
Congregational: Those who favor a congregational system remind the others that their entire governmental structure is based entirely on circumstantial evidence and conjecture. Every passage of scripture that refers to the workings of an actual local church always rests the authority of the church in the congregation itself. The “power” wielded by the apostles who planted those churches was due to the fact that they had to start from scratch (non-Christians).
(To be sure, the development of these structures owes more to history and politics than Biblical interpretation.)
Here is a graphic I put together to compare the various forms of church governance:
I am a staunch congregationalist. I believe that is the biblical model -- that God invested the authority of the local church in the congregation. This is why I made sure to put the title "Pastor/Elder" in two different places: one under "Not-Congregational" and the other under "Congregational". In a congregational model, the congregation can choose to invest authority in particular leaders, but the authority remains in the congregation (under God).
The difference is really quite simple -- does the "Pastor/Elder Board" sit above the church and tell the church what to do? Or are the "Pastors/Elders" invested with their authority by the congregation and accountable to the congregation in all things? In a Presbyterian church, the elders are given their authority by the Presbytery, not the congregation. In a Baptist church, the congregation might choose to invest authority in a specific group of church leaders that they appoint for a specific purpose, and the congregation retains the authority to remove those leaders from that position. That church might choose to call those leaders "Elders". In my opinion, that would be a Congregational use of elders. Do you see the difference between a Congregational use of Elders and a Presbyterian use?
Here's my personal story: I have a pastor friend who transitioned his church to an "elder model" and he later said to me, "It's so much easier to just tell the church what to do." I get it. Congregationalism (like true democracy) is messy and difficult. And the bigger your church gets, the more difficult and messy congregationalism gets (you'll notice that those were some large churches in that article who use an elder-rule model). I don't think that's a great argument in favor of "Ruling Elders".
Multiple Elders
There is one last point I want to address. Like in this week's passage, when the Bible refers to elders, it's always in the plural. So, what do we say to those churches that have a single pastor (and maybe that pastor is the only staff member)?
The value of multiple official leaders in a church is obvious: mutual accountability. In my experience, a lot of churches handle this informally through deacons, committees, or a church council. The point would be that there should be a system of checks-and-balances for "earthly power" in every local church. That's not just wise -- it's humble. Let's not have a pastor think of himself as above the church (or have a church member think of himself as the most important person in the church). Imagine a church in which every leader is humbly accountable to Jesus Christ. Sounds great!
I wish I had checked my previous posts on this topic -- here's one that goes into more detail about the qualifications for pastors and deacons:
[Editor's Update: the day after we covered this passage, this article was updated on Baptist Press in such a way as to be very applicable:
Don't miss the connection that Second Baptist is a huge church, and I'm sure congregational practices are cumbersome and difficult. But that's not a good reason to abandon biblical practice, is it?]
Part 1: Godly Church Leadership Is Vital (1 Peter 5:1-4)
5 I exhort the elders among you as a fellow elder and witness to the sufferings of Christ, as well as one who shares in the glory about to be revealed: 2 Shepherd God’s flock among you, not overseeing out of compulsion but willingly, as God would have you; not out of greed for money but eagerly; 3 not lording it over those entrusted to you, but being examples to the flock. 4 And when the chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the unfading crown of glory.
If you have read anything above, these verses should not be surprising.
You might remember from Acts and Paul's letters that the pattern for church planting was that Paul (or whoever) would gather new converts in a city, spend as much time there as possible teaching them the fundamentals of Christianity, and then formally appointing some of them to be "elders" (leaders). We do not know if Peter appointed any of the elders he calls out.
What is the value of formally appointing a person to a position of leadership in a group like a church?
And just as Peter has repeatedly encouraged his readers that he is right there with them, experiencing the same kinds of hardships and struggles, now he says the same thing to the church leaders. "I'm also a church leader; I take this very seriously." And he calls back to his repeated words in this letter about the reality of suffering, and the reality of eternal salvation that will be enjoyed when Christ returns.
Note the interchange of terms: "Elders (presbuteros), your job is to pastor (poimen, but the verb form) God's flock (your local church) and oversee it (eposkopos, but the verb form)." All three of them are used of the same person/group.
[Note that in some later manuscripts of the Bible, the term "oversee" was removed from the text, probably because they wanted to argue that "bishop" and "pastor" referred to two different offices. Hmmm.]
I can't read these verses and not think of Peter's final recorded exchange with Jesus:
John 21:15 When they had eaten breakfast, Jesus asked Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” “Yes, Lord,” he said to him, “you know that I love you.” “Feed my lambs,” he told him. 16 A second time he asked him, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” “Yes, Lord,” he said to him, “you know that I love you.” “Shepherd my sheep,” he told him. 17 He asked him the third time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter was grieved that he asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” “Feed my sheep,” Jesus said. 18 “Truly I tell you, when you were younger, you would tie your belt and walk wherever you wanted. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will tie you and carry you where you don’t want to go.” 19 He said this to indicate by what kind of death Peter would glorify God. After saying this, he told him, “Follow me.”
What Peter is saying to the leaders is simple: If you're doing this for the money or the power, get out now because God will have something to say to you if you don't.
Instead, do this because God has called you to it. Be a shepherd and be an example.
Realize that Peter is not talking about a literal crown. This is called a "metonymy" -- it's a figure of speech. You can't wear glory on your head like a physical crown! Instead, Peter is just saying that in heaven, you will have the glory of a lifetime of service to Jesus in Jesus' church.
The main point here: a church going through a hard time needs selfless, committed leadership to survive. Do you believe that? What's your experience with that situation?
Aside: Pastor Pay
Just to try to head this off, let me address this quickly. People in your group will probably wonder either "Are we paying our pastor too much?" or "Are we paying our pastor enough?" Whichever of those comes to your mind first says something about you.
Here is a handy, comprehensive article from a pastor (who would be happy to sell you his consulting services if your church wants help determining salaries):
He identifies two common mindsets among churches:
The Poverty Mindset which says that the pastor should be among the poorest in the church "for holiness purposes";
The Prosperity Mindset which says that the pastor should be among the wealthiest in the church to demonstrate God's blessings.
Both mindsets are often unhealthy.
Realize his subtext: it's more common for a church to underpay than overpay.
When a Pastor Seems to Be Wealthy
Look, we're all gawkers. I'm just as interested as you are in knowing if there are pastors out there who have gotten rich off of their ministries. Indulge your curiosity, but don't waste a lot of time with it. God wants you to focus on your church, not somebody else's.
The president of a rescue mission gets paid $1.5M. That seems ... high.
Charles Pierce of Glory of Zion made more than $2 million, which is a lot for a ministry the size of the one he leads. It’s also worth noting that Chad Foxworth made more than a half million dollars serving as Glory of Zion’s “pastor travel assistant.” We’ve written about Glory of Zion in the past. You can find Kim Roberts’ article here.
Hmmmmmmmm.
Taking Financial Advantage of a Church
Last week, I mentioned a recent warning about inurement. Inurement describes an incommensurate benefit from a non-profit that is not reported as income (for tax purposes) -- like driving the church bus as if it were your own and not claiming it as a benefit. We're not talking about using the church copier for a few copies, or taking some church pens home; those are things we allow (at FBC at least) of any of our church members. This is talking about taking advantage your position as a church leader for financial gain in a way that is incommensurate with reasonable expectations. I haven't heard any stories about that around Thomson (but that doesn't mean it hasn't happened). An acquaintance raised some eyebrows a while back when he more-or-less forced staff to do some repair work on his private residence; some of my friends thought that crossed a line.
Financial experts will say that such a thing is more likely to happen
when a church underpays staff, or
when a church hires a greedy pastor.
Don't do either.
Another scenario that is making the church rounds is the "hip pastor book". A pastor publishes a book that he wrote while on the church's dime (often a compilation of sermons he preached) -- if it sells really well, should the pastor get all of the profit? Or should he share it with the church? How much? There's some passionate discussion out there about it.
Part 2: Humility Must Work Both Ways (1 Peter 5:5-7)
5 In the same way, you who are younger, be subject to the elders. All of you clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. 6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God, so that he may exalt you at the proper time, 7 casting all your cares on him, because he cares about you.
In other words, while church leaders should humbly lead and serve their congregations, congregations should humbly follow and respect the leaders.
I had a conversation recently with a young woman who had stopped going to her church (not in Thomson) because she didn't feel like the church leaders respected her or her preferences (older generation vs. younger generation -- something we have talked about recently!). In talking, it became clear that the woman didn't respect the leaders and thus wasn't interested in what they were trying to do.
Interestingly, she also talked about the struggle of her high school daughter not respecting her, of not believing that she had her daughter's best interests in mind and that her instructions were based on a lifetime of experience and struggle. No, she didn't seem to realize the connection between those scenarios.
The solution? Respect in both directions, humility in both directions, and a mutual commitment to the well-being of everyone in the congregation (not just you).
When was a time that you grudgingly followed church leadership on a matter and later decided that they were in the right?
But church leaders should know that they're not always right! That's why humility equally applies to the leaders. Leaders should seek God's wisdom in all of its forms -- and that includes from younger Christians in their churches. Not the least reason is God's opposition to the proud. (Think about Peter's warning to the proud, oppressive husband in 3:7.) If God opposes the leader of a church, how will things go for that church?
All of this comes back to our trust in God. If we trust God -- trust how God is working in churches, trust how God in working in individuals -- we should have no trouble obeying God. And God is very clear to us all that we should be humble before everybody. And when we do so, He will take care of us.
Aside: Pastor Burnout
When we were in the depths of Covid, pastor burnout statistics (like those of medical personnel and educators) were rough. Lots of pastors questioned their calling. There was a post-Covid bump followed by "the grind of reality":
So, sure, that's better, but that's still 1/3 of pastors seriously thinking about quitting.
Setting aside the obvious questions of if some people are in ministry for the wrong reasons (like money and power, see above), a linked study included this astounding stat:
To that end, research finds that only about a third of U.S. adults say that pastors are a trustworthy source of wisdom and less than half of Christian believe this as well.
!!
Again: !!.
Well, that will likely contribute to pastor burnout! If I didn't feel respected or trusted, I would absolutely doubt my calling.
All of that to say this: the way we respect our church leaders has a big effect on their effectiveness.
Bonus Aside: The Fallout of Dropping Out
The following research has been compiling for a while, and it doesn't say anything unexpected. As young people drop out of things like churches (and every other organization), they suffer in their isolation. Remember that earlier article by the young woman who missed what she had in her church but didn't feel she could go back?
Participation in community organizations, clubs and religious groups has declined, and loneliness is now becoming as prevalent among young adults as it is among older adults. “Study after study shows that social connection is critical for happiness, and young people are spending less time with friends than they were a decade ago,” said Laurie Santos, a psychology professor at Yale and host of “The Happiness Lab” podcast.
Y'all, it's worth it to do the hard work of staying in a church where not everybody thinks the same thing about everything. But the "swipe left" culture that young people live in has taught them to back out at the first sign of disagreement or tension in a relationship or organization. If you're a Christian, that's not an acceptable attitude.
Part 3: Your Church Must Take This Seriously (1 Peter 5:8-11)
8 Be sober-minded, be alert. Your adversary the devil is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for anyone he can devour. 9 Resist him, firm in the faith, knowing that the same kind of sufferings are being experienced by your fellow believers throughout the world. 10 The God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, establish, strengthen, and support you after you have suffered a little while. 11 To him be dominion forever. Amen.
Wrapping his letter up, Peter reminds his readers that they cannot "try to be neutral". The devil (Peter would have been thinking about "satan" here, see Matthew 16:23, Luke 22:31, and Acts 5:3) -- the enemy of God Peter named in Acts 10:38 -- wants nothing more than to destroy God's beloved creation. Whether from jealousy or reckless hatred, Satan desires to ruin everything God loves.
Yes, Jesus is the "Lion", but in the illustration of God's people like sheep/a flock, "lion" is an effective descriptor of Satan.
The church faces enemies from the world who rejects our God, from each other as a result of our own sin, and from Satan and the powers of evil who wants to destroy us. The only way we can "successfully" stand against that is united as a church family in the power of God. We talked about this in Ephesians:
This is the third time Peter has mentioned "sober-minded" --
1:13 Therefore, with your minds ready for action, be sober-minded and set your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.
4:7 The end of all things is near; therefore, be alert and sober-minded for prayer.
I think this is the highest urgency Peter can put on an idea. What do you think "sober-minded" means here and why does Peter say it?
I see two truly profound things in here:
Satan can be resisted (not in our own power, of course, but in the power of the faith),
and believers all over the world are part of one big family.
[Note: this is why I recommend all of us bookmark and keep up with BaptistPress.com who keeps us up with pressing news like this from April:
Even though we may be insulated from that violence, we should be brokenhearted and in earnest prayer for those Christians' faith, hope, and survival. We must be in this with them.]
Peter offers a beautiful doxology. If you save time for this, ask your group to go back through 1 Peter and identify the different ways this doxology connects with things Peter has already said.
The Closing
If you can, read through the end of the letter. There are three marvelous tidbits:
Silvanus (also Silas) helped Peter write the letter; this is the same Silas who previously helped Paul. What a ministry by Silas!
Mark is almost certainly "The Gospel of Mark" Mark, which is why we think that Mark's primary source was Peter.
Babylon is likely code for "Rome", written to protect the courier and recipients; this suggests that persecution was mounting.
Our practical application is to see if we are being appropriately humble in our church. But our bigger-picture application is to ask ourselves if we are appropriately equipped to resist the devil and if we are living in such a way that Satan cares about us in the first place.
Read the entire letter again. What is it saying to you now, after you have studied it thoroughly?
Closing Thoughts: Pastor Humility
For church leaders who come across this post, I hope you are as concerned about this idea as I am. There are a few resources out there; I found this article helpful:
This comes up again because I saw the news this week that megapastor TD Jakes is stepping down from his megachurch (but not his megafoundations):
[Note we don't have time to get into Jakes's extremely problematic teachings, so I'll let another website cover that:
One article provided a quote that gave me a lot of pause:
After his recovery, Jakes came back to the pulpit at the church’s annual New Year’s Eve watch night service. He thanked the congregation for their prayers: “Had the enemy had his way, we wouldn’t have had a Christmas. We’d have had a homegoing service. But God.”
Yes, that means Jakes thought his church should "cancel Christmas" so they could spend more time mourning his death. I just don't see a lot of humility in that. Really any of it.
[FYI, Jakes and The Potter's House is a fascinating case study of church governance and leadership titles. We don't have time to answer these questions -- what exactly is Jakes the bishop of, and who made him bishop?]
Bonus Closing Thoughts: Editor's Addition 5/22/25
With the recent Conclave, I have mentioned the Roman Catholic Church a few times during our study of Peter's letters, generally in a negative light. I think it is appropriate to mention this article about the new pope's doctoral dissertation on the importance of humility in church leadership.
“There is no room in Augustine’s concept of authority for one who is self-seeking and in search of power over others,” he wrote in the 167-page text.
Yes, that's just basic biblical truth, but it speaks well of the new Pope Leo (who will forever be Pope Bob to me).
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