Acts 14:23 is perhaps the definitive example, although there are many others, but
Acts 14:23 shows with particular clarity how presbyters serve in the hierarchy of the church, and also happens to be located in Acts, which is a book I should like it if you reread together with a history of the early church or one of the early books of church order**.
“Paul and Barnabas also appointed elders in every church. With prayer and fasting, they turned the elders over to the care of the Lord, in whom they had put their trust.”
In the original Greek the word used is πρεσβυτέρους (presbyterous), which means “elders” and which was Anglicized first as Prester, and later as Priest and Presbyter (hence the name of the Presbyterian denomination.*
I lament how the various English translations caused confusion by translating the Hebrew word Kohanim and the Greek words hierus and sacerdos as Priest, because this causes confusion with the Priesthood of All Believers, which should be translated as the Sacerdotalism of All Believers, in that every Christian is royal and hieratic, superior to the Jewish Kohanim because we are followers of Christ, a Hierus forever after the order of Melchizedek, but not all Christians are presbyters (elders) or bishops (superintendents).
This confusion was not due solely to Protestant translations of the Bible such as the KJV, but also Roman Catholic translations such as the Douai Rheims. This may be because Roman Catholics at the time regarded their clergy as being specifically sacerdotal in a manner in which the laity are not; I don’t know what the history of the doctrine of the Priesthood of All Believers is within the Roman Catholic Church, but I believe their understanding of it at present aligns with that which I have presented here (aside from their assignment of the title “VIcar of Christ” to the Pope of Rome).
I would note just about everything one needs to know about the early church can be found in Acts (for this reason, the persecuted Coptic Orthodox of Egypt call it the Praxis, meaning “Practice,” for their church is still governed according to the model of the early church. Acts documents all key functions of the early Church, including its ability to consecrate Apostles and their successors (Acts 1, where the Apostle St. Matthias was ordained to replace Judas Iscariot, and later the consecration of St. Paul), the ordination of the seven deacons including St. Stephen the Protomartyr, the first Christian who died for Christ, also documented in Acts, martyrdom being a major factor of the life of the early church, and also St. Philip, the casting out of heretics and the prohibition against purchasing ecclesiastical offices, a sin called Simony, because of the episode in Acts regarding Simon Magus, and the existence of synodal or conciliar governance, as demonstrated by Acts 15, as opposed to rule by an autocratic system of Papal Supremacy, and the inspiration of the leadership of the church through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit (see the Paschal and Pentecostal accounts in Acts 1).
It is my experience that most low church evangelicals, fundamentalists, non-denominationals and Sabbatarians who object to the Orthodox Church and the traditional liturgical Protestant churches like Anglicanism, Methodism, Lutheranism and so on, or who adhere to Nestorianism, Quietism or certain other theological errors, have not adequetely read the Gospel according to Luke and the Acts of the Apostles, also written by Luke (scholars frequently refer to these two books as Luke-Acts), just as those who deny the Incarnation demonstrate a lack of familiarity with the Gospel According to John (or in some cases, reject it or rely on intentional mistranslations of it, the latter being the approach used by the Jehovah’s Witnesses). I would be interested to know if my Orthodox, Methodist, Lutheran and Anglican friends
@prodromos @FenderTL5 @jas3 @MarkRohfrietsch @ViaCrucis @JM and
@Shane R agree.
*The Presbyterians unlike the New Testament church does not have superintendents (in Greek, ἐπίσκοπος or epískopos, Anglicized as Bishop, and later the basis for the names of the non-Juring Anglicans and Scottish Anglicans, who called themselves Episcopalians, because they had bishops whereas the established Presbyterian Church of Scotland did not, and also the Protestant Episcopal Church (now the Episcopal Church USA), the Methodist Episcopal Church (which was formed around the same time, in 1786, independently, since John Wesley was unaware of the efforts of American Anglicans to organize, and the bishops of the American Anglicans were ordained by the non-juring Episcopalians of Scotland and Northern England), which later merged with the Evangelical United Brethren to form the United Methodist Church, and finally the Reformed Episcopal Church, which separated from the Protestant Episcopal Church in a schism in the late 19th century and later joined the Anglican Church in North America, which I regard as the remnant of the Episcopal Church (one could argue that ACNA left the Episcopal Church, but my position is that the Episcopal Church left ACNA, by adopting unacceptable doctrines concerning human sexuality, abortion and other issues, which have caused a devastating decline in the membership of that denomination).
** These include first century books of church order such as the
Didache or the
Didascalia*** or the letters of the martyr St. Ignatius of Antioch, who was fed to lions in the Coliseum around the year 100, and whose writings, along with the sole letter of the first century bishop St. Clement of Rome, and likewise, the second century letter by St. Polycarp of Smyrna, and other second century writings such as those of St. Ignatius of Lyons and St. Justin Martyr, which all provide us with a great deal of information about the early church, its organization and its manner of worship. There are also two noteworthy books of church order from the third and fourth century: the
Apostolic Tradition of St. Hippolytus, written in the early third century and the Apostolic Constitutions, written in the mid fourth century. Finally, there is the Divine Liturgy of the church of Alexandria, which the Greeks call the Divine Liturgy of St. Mark, and the Copts, who use it much more frequently, regularly using it in Lent, call the Divine Liturgy of St. Cyril. This is the oldest surviving liturgical text in continual use in Christianity, with a substantial amount of it preserved in the second century fragment known as the Strasbourg Papyrus. It is also found in the oldest intact liturgical service book, the
Euchologion of St. Serapion of Thmuis, which dates from the fourth century and belonged to a colleague of the extremely important church father and defender of the doctrine of the incarnation against Arianism, St. Athanasius, who insisted, against Emperor Constantius and many others, and who endured exile and much persecution for this insistence, that our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ is fully God and fully Human. He also insisted on the canonicity of the Apocalypse of St. John, also known as Revelation, and certain other books, and was the first to publish the 27 book canon for the New Testament we all know and love, in his 39th Paschal Encyclical (a letter he wrote to all the bishops of Egypt telling them the date of Pascha, the Feast of the Resurrection, occasionally called Easter in English, but in most languages referred to as Pascha or a derivative thereof (for example, the Dutch word is Passen), and in his 39th such letter he also provided guidance on what scripture should be regarded as canonical and therefore read in church.
*** The Ethiopian Tewahedo Orthodox Church and the Eritrean Tewahedo Orthodox Church still make use of the
Didascalia, which I haven’t read, but I have heard it is very similar to the Didache.