Part 6 of 9 of the theme 'Leadership of elders ' by Gijs van den Brink

Earlier we saw how "elders" functioned in the Christian congregation in Jerusalem and Antioch. They were not elders of one local congregation, but elders for the whole city, for all believers scattered over multiple house churches. And those were as many as 5,000 believers in Jerusalem scattered over at least 150-165 house churches. Today we look at the situation in Ephesus in Asia Minor, today's Turkey.

With regard to the city of Ephesus, the book of Acts deals with the same distinction between the congregation "at home" and the congregation "by city" (Acts 20:17). From Miletus, Paul sent a message to Ephesus to call the elders of the congregation to him. In Luke's verbiage, as well as the congregation of Jerusalem" (Acts 11:22), and "the congregation throughout all Judea, Galilee and Samaria" (Acts 9:31), this refers to the entire city congregation. And it is not plausible in this metropolis of Ephesus, as in Antioch, that the Christian congregation at this stage consists of only a few dozen Christians. There is undoubtedly several house churches here as well. And Luke thus speaks of the joint elders of a city congregation, which consisted of several house congregations.

Again, the elders (in keeping with the Jewish status of elders) are not appointed, they appear to already be there, and a little later Luke has Paul say, "Take good care of yourselves and of all the flock over which the Holy Spirit is leading you (episkopoi, overseer) has appointed to pasture the church of God" (20:28). It is obvious to assume that in each home church, the house father or house owner was the host or hostess of the congregation (called overseer?) and was responsible for the home church. Collectively, they are called the "elders" of the city church of Ephesus, because they provide leadership for the various house churches that made up the church at Ephesus.
Next time, more on the situation in Ephesus in the letter to Timothy.

Author: Gijs van den Brink
From: Study Bible Magazine

This is part 6 of 9 concise blog on the topic "Leadership of elders" from Study Bible Magazine, Some of which we will be posting online in the near future. We hope this will help you understand the Bible better!