The Process - Lesson 4

Welcome to this session where we will explore the selection process for elders in your local church. As a reminder, we’re using my church as a case study. We’re not suggesting that you should do things exactly the way we do things, but rather to hear the principles that we’re employing at our church and apply them to your particular context.

I. Types of Elders

Because my church is a case study for you, I want to remind you that we’re a multi-site church. We have campus elders and lead elders. They’re both biblically qualified elders. Campus elders in our context are never considered elders in training. The main functional difference between a campus elder and a lead elder is that campus elders focus solely on their campus while lead elders serve at their campus and attend monthly lead elder meetings. Attending these meetings is due to the fact that the additional responsibility of a lead elder is to provide spiritual, organizational, and fiscal protection for our entire organization. Another way to say it is that campus elders and lead elders are both elders. However, lead elders must also possess the gifts and demonstrate the ability to engage in big picture discussions and decision-making about the organization as a whole.

II. Bylaws Pertaining to Elders

Because my church is a case study for you, a few things about our church’s bylaws. In our church, both lead elders and campus elders serve four-year terms. A fifth year can be added to a term if extenuating circumstances exist and all the parties are agreeable. This should be the exception, not the rule. After a completion of a term, whether four or five years, an elder must take at least a one-year break from serving as an elder. No exceptions. They need a break.

In February of each calendar year, the lead elder team discusses and approves the number of lead elders and campus elders for the next ministry year. In our church, that’s July and around the calendar through June. Lead elders come to this meeting ready to present the perspective of their campus pastors. In regards to timing, our goal at our church is to onboard and train all of our elders from every campus each year at the same time.

There’s a step-by-step process that we go through for identifying, selecting, and training our elders. It’s also worth noting here that while I’m going to walk through a timeline, it starts at a certain point and ends at a certain point, it’s okay to work well in advance of the initial date as long as you don’t get any of the steps out of order. Also worth noting here is it’s really important to be careful to never make any potential candidate feel like it’s a done deal or a slam dunk on the front end. We need to be diligent to allow the discernment process to function the way that it’s intended.

III. Step 1 of Elder Selection Process: Adding Names

Step one in our process is collecting names for people that would be considered to join the elder team. We do this at our church. In our timeline, we identify January. That’s because our ministry year at our church runs from July 1 and around. When we are thinking about adding elders, we’re thinking about a selection process that runs from about January through May. New elders are selected to add to the team. We train them June, July, and August during the summer. We start a new ministry year, and they would serve their four-year term around that calendar cycle. You’ll need to adjust the dates based on your particular church setting; but we start in January by collecting names. This is step number one.

You’re collecting names of people in your church who are possible elder candidates to add to a master list of potential elders. Now we do this in a variety of ways. And once again, we are a multi-site church. We have campuses that have thousands of people. We have campuses that have a few hundred people. Depending on the size of the campus, you’re going to collect these names in different ways.

For example, at our smallest church campuses, it’s quite likely that the campus pastor already knows everybody at that campus and has a pretty good idea of who they would add to their potential list. At our larger campuses or even our medium-sized campuses, sometimes what we’ll do is if we’re at a prayer meeting, we have two prayer meetings a week at our church for staff and pastors, and we might be at a prayer meeting and we might bring index cards. Before we even start the prayer meeting, we say, okay, everybody take a few minutes. We’re going to start collecting names of potential future elders. We want you to write down on a card the names of anybody that you think might be a good potential elder. We take the pressure off of them because sometimes people think like, “Oh no, what if I write a name on a card, and they end up being a not very good elder?”

We’re going to let our process run. Nobody has to worry about providing potential names. We don’t ask them to really overthink it. Most of our pastors understand what our elders do and the general biblical qualifications of being an elder, but we’re not getting very specific here. We just want a master list of potential names; because in a church like ours, we may not even be familiar with everybody in the church that is a good potential elder. They might be serving in children’s ministry or student ministry, and I personally may never have contact with them. And so we start by collecting names. Larger campuses, we might do it by asking people to write down names on cards. I will ask current elders if they know anybody. I just start asking questions, and we start gathering names. At our smaller campuses, it is often the campus pastors that know people by name and add to the master list. So step number one for vetting, selecting, training, and deploying elders is simply to collect names.

IV. Step 2 of Elder Selection Process: Initial Screening

Step two in the process is what we call initial screening. So you’ve collected a master list of names of potential future elders. Now you go through the step of doing some initial screening. This is really about looking into how each person on the list is currently active in the life of the church. So we’re looking for basics like: Is this person baptized? Are they an official member of our church? (Which means they’ve gone through our membership course.) What are their giving patterns like? And Scriptures are very clear that where our treasure is, there our heart is also. How we utilize our money, our material resources, says a lot about our heart condition and our orientation towards the kingdom of God; so we look at people’s giving patterns and ask the question, “Does their money say that they are committed to this local church and the kingdom of God?” And we look at their serving involvement. Are they currently serving in the church? Have they come to understand how God has gifted them by his spirit? Are they using those gifts to serve other people in love? So once again, we’re looking at baptism, membership, their giving patterns and their serving involvement. What we are looking for is, is this person currently a healthy, active member of our local church? Generally speaking, would we hold them up as an example to other people in our church? This is the initial screening.

Step one is to gather a master list of names of potential elders. Step two is this initial screening. This is all done behind the scenes. In our context, we can do a lot of this work with our church database, but sometimes we have to talk to different ministry leaders and come to understand who this person is a little bit better. All of this is happening behind the scenes. We keep a master list. Right now, if I was to show you the spreadsheet, which I will not, we have a master list of hundreds of names that have been brought up over the course of several years. Everyone is on this master list. There are columns. In the initial screening, there are notes there about what we have discovered about this person.

So I’m just going to make up a hypothetical here. Let’s say we have someone on the list of names. We do the initial screening. We find out they’re baptized. They’re a member of the church. They’re actively serving. But their giving—their financial giving—to the church is not what we would consider something to hold up as an example to other believers. We don’t delete that person from the list. We might ask a ministry leader or a pastor on staff, “Why don’t you spend some time discipling this person and talk to them about financial matters?” And because maybe over the course of several years, this person is discipled in this area of their life. Now all of a sudden, they are a really good, well-rounded example for other people in the church that we might consider to be an elder in the future.

So this initial screening helps us to figure out who’s who and where they are. Even if someone never becomes an elder on our elder team, this process is so good when it comes to making disciples; because we’re intentionally looking at their behavior and asking the question, "Is this the behavior of a maturing disciple of Jesus?" Then we’re able to talk with other pastors and ministry leaders and say, "Hey, you know, we dug into this, and this might be an area where you could take this person out for coffee a few times over the next year and dig into this area of their life and disciple them in this area.” This is the initial screening.

Step one, you’re collecting a master list of names of potential future elders. Step two is a basic initial screening, and all of this happens behind the scenes. Step three is now an initial conversation with the potential elder.

V. Step 3 of Elder Selection Process: Initial Conversation 

Step three is now an initial conversation with the potential elder. If a person passes the initial screening, what then happens is an existing lead elder or one of our campus pastors sets up a meeting to discuss with the individual if they would consider engaging in the process to be considered for serving in the role as elder. This discussion is approached somewhat informally. At this discussion, the campus pastor or elder would explain the role and the discerning process to the potential candidate. The potential candidates [recte are] asked to take some time, one to three weeks to pray, and consider if they would like to continue with the process.

During this initial conversation, sometimes questions are asked that may not have been clear from the initial screening of the candidates. For example, are they in a community group? Those are our small groups. Are they on a serving team? How have they been engaged in the past? Whoever’s having this initial conversation is getting some clarity on some things that may not be clear from the initial screening. Now, we make it really clear in our process that it’s very important that we do not ask the potential candidate at this point if they would be interested in being an elder. That’s not the question we’re asking them. We’re asking them if they would be open to engaging in the discerning process when it comes to potentially becoming an elder.

And here’s why this is really important to us: there are many reasons why people go through the process, and either they or the existing elders conclude that the person should not join the elder team at that time. Once again, we make it very clear to our campus pastors and our existing elders, when they’re having this initial conversation, we’re not asking, “Are you interested in becoming an elder?” It’s not just their choice. It’s a discerning process. Sometimes potential elders go through the process; and they self-select out when they learn more about the role, or they know things about their own lives that we don’t know yet. They tell us, “Well, this area of my life, I think it disqualifies me from being an elder. I want to work on that.” There are a variety of reasons that people would enter the process, but not ultimately end up becoming an elder. We want to be very clear about that at this point in the process. 

VI. Step 4 of Elder Selection Process: Second Conversation 

Step four is a second conversation. If after a few weeks of prayerful consideration, the candidate is agreeable to continuing in the process, then they are sent materials to read through. This includes our church bylaws, all of our theological position papers, and a few other items for their review. These materials should be read through prior to the second conversation. This second conversation moves a bit from the informal approach of the first conversation. This second conversation includes the candidate’s wife if he is married.

The campus pastor or elder leading this conversation will later be asked to present whether or not the candidate should be moved to the next step. We inform our campus pastors or existing elders who are engaging in this conversation to make sure they take good notes, to treat it like an official interview; because we’re going to be relying on that information gathered to determine if this person should be moved on in the process.

Here are some of the questions that are involved in this second conversation:

• First, we ask the potential candidate if they have any questions about the reading materials that were provided for them.
• Do they understand everything in the bylaws?
• Do they have any questions about our theological position papers and some of the other reading materials that we provide for them?

Probably worth noting here in our context, we do not expect every elder to fully agree with all of our position papers. We ask that all of our elders can affirm the position paper where they would not become divisive or argumentative. They say, “That may not be the particular position I hold, but I understand how an intelligent, spirit-filled believer could hold these views.” We’re looking for affirmation of the position papers, not 100% agreement. These are local church things that you’ll have to decide for yourself which way you want to play that.

Some of the other questions that we ask during this second conversation, we use the scriptural qualifications of eldership—Titus 1, 1 Timothy 3, 1 Peter 5. We’re really big on 1 Peter 5, that leaders in God’s church should not lord it over the people, but rather be an example to the flock. In this second conversation, our campus pastors or existing elders are asking any question they want to regarding the qualifications of being an elder.

This is really where we’re digging into the person’s life. We’re asking questions about their private life. We’re asking questions about their marriage. We’re asking questions about their relationship with alcohol. We’re asking questions about their money. We’re asking all of the questions here in this second conversation, and nothing is out of bounds.

We also ask questions in the categories of our church’s values. We call them the marks of a disciple: belonging, growing, serving, and reaching. What those words mean to us is belonging. We’re talking about belonging to God as your heavenly father. So have you put your faith in Jesus? Have you surrendered to Jesus as both your savior and your king? Have you been adopted into God’s family? How are your relationships with your brothers and sisters in Christ? We belong to God, and we belong to each other. We ask any questions we can think of about belonging. 

We ask questions about growing. In our context, when we say growing, we’re talking about two primary things: reading and studying God’s word, and developing a vibrant prayer life. We ask questions about their Bible study habits, their rhythms, their prayer life. We’re really trying to discern whether or not this is a growing follower of Jesus.

Then serving, serving one another in love, recognizing the gifts that God has distributed by his spirit. Is this person serving in the context of the local church? We’ve already screened, remember in a previous step, we’ve already identified that they are, but now we’re asking more questions about their serving role in the church and how they came to understand their gifts and what they think about that. We’re digging in a little bit further.

Then reaching. This is all about evangelism, sharing the good news of Jesus with our family members and our friends and our neighbors and our coworkers. Does this person have an evangelistic edge to them? In this conversation, we’re really starting to dig in to ask the question, “Is this person a biblically qualified elder? Are they the kind of person that we would hold up as an example to the rest of the flock?” Once again, it’s Titus 1 and 1 Timothy 3 and 1 Peter 5. Then in our context, it’s our church values of belonging, growing, serving, and reaching.

You would apply this to your context in this conversation. By the time you leave the conversation, if I am the person leading the interview, I’m telling myself when I get done with this conversation; I need to report back to the team, and I need to tell them, I think this person should continue in the process, or I need to recommend that this person not continue in the process. I need to be able to share my rationale.

VII. Step 5 of Elder Selection Process: Official Interview 

Step five is now the official interview. If it’s determined that the candidate should continue on in the process, and if the candidate is still interested in continuing, then an official interview is scheduled. Since our elders serve often as married couples, if they’re married, the spouse is required to attend the interview. In this interview session, it’s the potential elder and his spouse and all of our existing lead elders and their spouses—it’s a lot of people in the room. We do that. One of the reasons we do it is we want the collective wisdom of all the existing elders and their spouses. But also, there’s the appropriate amount of weight in the room when you show up for an interview, and there’s 20 to 25 people in the room. 

Now, if it’s a candidate for a campus elder role, then that interview is slightly different. That interview is conducted by the campus pastor, elders from that particular campus, and then we also ask that a lead elder from another campus joins that interview process; because we always want to remind everyone in the highest levels of leadership in our church that their particular campus is not the only church campus, that we’re part of a larger whole.

This is the interview portion of the process. At these interviews, a wide range of questions can be asked, and we trust the discernment of our current elders and their spouses to ask appropriate and poignant questions. Once again, back to the second conversation, you’re talking about anything related to the qualifications in Titus 1 or 1 Timothy 3 or 1 Peter 5, asking any questions about our church values of belonging, growing, serving, and reaching. And quite often, my observation has been this sitting in on these interviews. A candidate will answer a question or the spouse will answer a question. Maybe it is one of the elder’s wives that picks up some dissonance between how the wife was answering the question and how the husband was asking the question. They might dig in a little bit more about their relationship with one another or their prayer lives together. I have always been incredibly impressed with the wisdom in the room when you gather together a bunch of intelligent, spirit-filled, high-level leaders to engage in this interview process. The interview normally is about an hour, hour and a half. Once again, any question, any appropriate question, is asked in this setting. Then we get to the end of the time, and the process still isn’t done. At the end of the interview, the candidate is instructed to take a day or so to determine if they would accept the role if it was offered to them. Then the interviewing team makes a decision and reaches out to the candidate within 48 hours.

VIII. Step 6 of Elder Selection Process: Name Made Public 

The sixth and final step in the process is that the name is made public for consideration. If the role is offered to the candidate, and the candidate is still interested in the role; then their name is made public to the entire congregation for a period of three weeks in our church for comments and consideration.

In our church, the names are published in a variety of ways. We have a weekly e-newsletter that gets emailed out. We also email all of our official members listed in our church database. Then the piece of paper that we hand out every week at the weekend worship service, we call them weekly welcomes. There’s a section there that says this person is being considered to be an elder in our church, and it gives them an email address to email if they have any concerns or questions or comments. After that three-week window, if we haven’t heard of any reason why this person should not serve as an elder, then they are selected to join the elder team, and we move on to training.

IX. Reflection Questions

 Here are your reflection questions for this session.

1. What has hearing this process caused you to consider about your current process at your church?
2. Read through Titus 1:5-9, 1 Timothy 3:1-17, and 1 Peter 5:1-4. Where are you the strongest, and where are you the weakest?