Let me state my conviction upfront, briefly defend it and then answer a couple of possible objections. I think that legitimate churches can exist without elders. That is to say, I do not think elders are essential to the existence of legitimate churches. I do think that elders are essential for healthy churches and any church without elders is sub-optimal and not ultimately healthy. All churches should be aspiring to appoint multiple elders if they are to be healthy churches. But legitimate churches can exist without elders.

First, let’s just define what a church is. A church is a gathering of God’s people who are meeting together regularly to sit under the right teaching of the Word and to administer the ordinances. These are the markers of a true church as defined by the reformers. So, we can say a legitimate church exists if it is a gathering of God’s people who are meeting together regularly to sit under the Word being rightly taught and who are rightly administering the ordinances of baptism and communion, including the application of church discipline. Where such exists, we have a legitimate church.

Theologically, the reformers also made much of the priesthood of all believers. No longer was there to be a clergy/laity divide, but all were priests to God. This meant any true believer with the ability to rightly handle the Word of God was able to teach it in appropriate forums and any believer capable was able to baptise and deliver communion. These were not tasks reserved for a special caste of clergy but a priestly function able to be fulfilled by all true believers who are part of the priesthood of all believers.

If such is true, one doesn’t need to be “set apart” in order to rightly handle the Word, to baptise somebody or to lead communion. Indeed, we recognise this well enough by allowing non-elders to preach in our churches, to let non-elders lead services and to permit them to baptise people and lead communion. These functions are not reserved for clergy alone, nor for elders functioning like clergy, but can be fulfilled by any member of the priesthood of all believers who is capable of fulfilling the task. All of which is to say, you don’t necessarily need elders to hear sound teaching, to receive communion, to baptise new members into the church nor to remove errant members and stop them receiving the Lord’s Supper. If it is possible to have these things without elders, it is possible to have legitimate churches without elders.

What is more, the Bible isn’t silent on this. When Paul and Barnabas help the churches appoint elders, one thing seems obvious enough: they are already churches before the elders have been appointed. Ditto so far as sending Titus and Timothy to do the same is concerned. There were congregations of people meeting together, under the Word, administering the ordinances and practicing church discipline before there were any elders in them.

Further, the church itself is given certain responsibilities clearly in scripture. For a full case as to what these are, you can wait for my upcoming book on eldership or you can do worse to get yourself a copy of Pure Church and read Mike Gilbart-Smith’s chapter on Independency (in my view, a chapter worth the cost of the book on its own). But in short, the church is given the authority to determine who belongs, who should lead and what is taught.

The means by which it fulfils these things is to baptise into membership those who should belong and remove communion from those who should not. That is to say, the church as a whole are responsible for the right administration of the ordinances and church discipline. Similarly, the church as a whole are given the authority to determine what is taught in the church and told to clear disassociate from those who depart from orthodoxy. Again, right teaching of the Word is given clearly to the church as a whole to guard. Even the appointment of elders – necessary for a healthy church – rests with the church as a whole. Again, you can get those books mentioned above to hear the case for those areas of responsibility. But suffice to say, such churches necessarily existed before elders were appointed in order to appoint them and they have the authority to remove those elders and – should they be faced with all the elders falling into error – do not cease to be a legitimate church should they have to remove them all from fulfilling that function.

Of course, churches without elders are functioning sub-optimally and cannot be considered properly healthy. But that is an altogether different question as to whether a church exists without elders. I would agree, a church without elders is sub-optimal and not functioning healthily. It certainly isn’t following God’s long-term plan and pattern for healthy churches. But that doesn’t stop churches existing and being legitimate churches without elders. Biblically, it seems there were churches without elders, they were legitimate churches (even if not entirely healthily) without elders and they are repeatedly called churches by the Apostles despite their lack of elders.

Someone might argue that churches existed in the New Testament prior to the office of elder being established. That may be true, but it bears saying that doesn’t change the fact that churches clearly did exist prior to elders being there. Even if they existed before the office of elder was established, we must affirm that they existed without elders and were deemed legitimate churches. If the Apostles were content to call these churches even though there were no elders in them, shouldn’t we be content to accept the same?

Further, we also have to contend with various situations that suggest a church exists without elders. For example, a new church plant would meet the definition of a church outlined above, but may not have elders established in it. See particularly the argument below concerning whether these are actually churches or not. Similarly, we must consider established churches losing their elders. Do these churches suddenly cease to be churches because they lose their elders even though everything else about the church continues? What about a church that has dwindled down in number and is still creaking on? They are still meeting under the Word, still administering the ordinances but don’t have any elders. Has that ceased to be a church or not? These things don’t seem to make sense of what a church is, even if they might raise serious questions about the long-term health of the local church.

Others might argue that what we see described in the New Testament prior to the establishment of elders are closer to what we might call a Church Plant. Again, that may well be true. Nevertheless, a few things seem worth saying. First, if a group of believers are meeting together, under the Word and administering the ordinances and practicing church discipline – whether we call it a plant or not – it meets the definition of a church. If it meets the definition of a church, ought we not to call it what it is?

Second, Paul (and other Apostles) repeatedly call congregations without elders churches. If we want to argue these are just church plants – and come up with a different definition of a church plant – we have to reckon with the fact that we are ascribing a term the Bible never uses to a situation that the Bible does specifically describe and refers to as a church. This is to create a definition and term that doesn’t exist in scripture to describe something that does exist in scripture and to which the Bible gladly ascribes the term church and insist it ought to have said something else.

Now, to be clear, I am not against the term church plant. I think it legitimately describes something a church might do succinctly; namely, sending out some believers to establish a new church. It describes something we see in scripture and acts as a summary term. But I don’t think it is valid to define a church plant as something unique that warrants a unique term when the exact situation is described in scripture and is termed a church by scripture. We run the risk of creating terms to justify our definition of something that the Bible both describes, recognises and nevertheless still categorises as a church.

We cannot define a church plant as a group of believers aiming to be a church without elders when the Bible describes a group of believers aiming to be a church without elders and ascribes the term church to it. It is to create a non-biblical term to describe an overtly described scenario in scripture and to refuse to use the terms the Bible itself uses. All of which is to say, if we think a church without elders is a church plant, we have to explain why the Bible expressly calls such situations churches and therefore doesn’t constitute something definitionally different.

Let me reiterate, I do not think a church without elders is healthy. I do not think a church without elders is functioning in line with God’s ultimate plan for the church. Churches without elders should be working towards being churches with elders if they are to be obedient to scripture and function as healthy churches in line with God’s instruction. But are they nevertheless real churches and exist legitimately as churches without them? I think so.

I think Independency – particularly a congregation of believers meeting together regularly under right teaching of the Word, right administration of the ordinances and application of discipline – is more fundamental to the existence of a legitimate church than the existence of elders. Indeed, it is only for legitimate churches to appoint elders otherwise – if they aren’t legitimate churches before they appoint elders – whoever they appoint cannot be considered legitimate themselves because they would have been appointed by what is not even a legitimate church! But the Bible seems to recognise legitimate churches even without elders who should then appoint qualified elders who can legitimately lead legitimate churches in the healthy way that God intended.