Presbyterian Polity

by Guy Prentiss Waters | September 8, 2023

Most Presbyterians have attended an ordination service, but many Presbyterians don’t fully understand what they are witnessing. What exactly is (not) happening when men are ordained to office in the church? What are the benefits and blessings of ordination to the church’s officers?

The PCA’s Book of Church Order defines ordination as “the authoritative admission of one duly called to an office in the Church of God, accompanied with prayer and the laying on of hands, to which it is proper to add the giving of the right hand of fellowship” (BCO 17-2). In the New Testament, we see the church’s officers doing just this. We find both examples of ordination (Acts 6:6, 13:3; 1 Tim 4:14; 2 Tim 1:6) and commands to ordain men to church office (Tit 1:5; 1 Tim 5:22). Ordination is, therefore, a biblical ordinance.

But what does ordination mean? Some might be familiar with the sacrament of holy orders in the Roman Catholic Church. According to Rome, “grace is conferred by sacred ordination” such that “a character is imprinted [upon the soul of the ordinand] that can be neither erased nor taken away.”[1] Such a high claim rightly provoked strong Protestant reaction at the time of the Reformation. In the centuries since, some have feared that practicing ordination in any form invites superstition and ritualism into the life and ministry of the church.

The Presbyterian doctrine of ordination captures the balance reflected in the teaching of the Scripture. As James Bannerman has well stated the point, “ordination is less than a charm, but it is more than a form.”[2] It is, on the one hand, “less than a charm.” The Bible sees ordination neither as a sacrament of the church nor as a transaction in which grace is transmitted from one or more church officer(s) to another. It is, on the other hand, “more than a form.” Ordination is not a rite of human devising that the church is free to disregard. Nor is ordination without significance in the life and ministry of the church.

What exactly, then, is taking place when a man is set apart to the office to which he has been elected and called by the church? To begin, “the laying on of hands by the presbytery implies that in their judgment the person ordained possesses the grace and other qualifications which fit him for the office.”[3] Ordination is a formal recognition, on the part of the church, that a particular man has the gifts and graces requisite for that office. It is this point that underlies Paul’s exhortation to Timothy, “Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands” (1 Tim 5:22).

Ordination, furthermore, is the “authoritative admission” of that man to office (BCO 17-2). Ordination is the act of the church putting a man in office and “giv[ing] him full ecclesiastical authority to discharge [the office’s] functions.”[4] We see this point illustrated in Acts 6:6. It is after the apostles ordain the seven gifted men, who have previously been chosen by the church in Jerusalem, that these seven men enter into the office of deacon. It is in this sense that George Gillespie, speaking of pastors, says that “ordination … maketh men ministers.”[5]

Furthermore, it is at the point of ordination, Bannerman notes, that “we have warrant to believe that, in answer to prayer, all the promises connected with the office are fulfilled, and the special blessing or grace suited to the office will be conferred.”[6] In the ordinance of ordination, the church looks to God to supply richly to the man being ordained what he needs to conduct an effective, faithful, and fruitful ministry in the church. Precisely because ordination is “a Divine appointment,” we are confident that, “if done in a right spirit, [it] will not be without the presence and peace of Christ, owning His own institution and blessing His own ordinance.”[7] Ordination is neither a sacrament nor a superstitious transaction. But neither is it empty of meaning and importance. It is an ordinance that Christ has instituted and is pleased to bless for the upbuilding of his church.

What, then, are the practical implications of ordination for the officers of the church? In the first place, ordination is a wholesome reminder to the church that officers have no sufficiency in themselves for the work that they are poised to undertake (2 Cor 2:16; 2 Cor 3:5). It is an occasion for the whole church – non-officers and officers alike – to look to God to pour out his blessing upon the man being set apart to church office. Second, ordination impresses upon the church the fact that each officer is an officer of Christ. Church officers receive a reminder that their authority derives from Christ alone, and not from the church or from themselves. They “have been dedicated to a special service under the King,” and are therefore accountable to him for their life and labors as officers of the church.[8] Christ’s Word alone is their rule and guide in all that they do as officers. Non-officers receive a reminder of their call to honor and to submit in the Lord to their leaders (1 Thess 5:12; Heb 13:17). That call includes the responsibility to speak well of and respectfully to their leaders, to encourage their leaders, to work for the spiritual good and encouragement of their leaders, to provide for the this-worldly support of their leaders, and to obey their leaders in the Lord.

Ordination is a reminder of the Lord Jesus Christ’s ongoing care for his church. When we attend a service in which men are ordained to office in the church, we are witnessing the faithful love of Christ for his bride. And that is a blessing indeed!

Guy Prentiss Waters (PhD, Duke University) is a PCA Teaching Elder serving as the James M. Baird, Jr. Professor of New Testament and Academic Dean of Reformed Theological Seminary in Jackson, MS.[9]

[1] “Council of Trent: Doctrine and Canons on the Sacrament of Orders,” Heinrich Denzinger, Compendium of Creeds, Definitions, and Declarations on Matters of Faith and Morals (eds. Peter Hünermann, Robert Fastiggi, and Anne Englund Nash; 43d ed.; San Francisco: Ignatius, 2012), §§ 1766, 1767.

[2] James Bannerman, The Church of Christ (2 vols.; 1869; repr. Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1960), 1:470.

[3] Thomas Witherow, The Form of the Christian Temple: Being a Treatise on the Constitution of the New Testament Church (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1889), 417.

[4] Ibid.

[5] George Gillespie, A Treatise of Miscellany Questions (1649; repr. Edinburgh: Robert Ogle, and Oliver & Boyd, 1844), 13.

[6] Bannerman, The Church of Christ, 1:470.

[7] Bannerman, The Church of Christ, 1:472.

[8] Witherow, The Form of the Christian Temple, 143.

[9] Author’s Note: I am a member of the Standing Judicial Commission of the General Assembly. According to the requirements of the “Operating Manual of the Standing Judicial Commission” (OMSJC), I am committed to “perform the duties of [my] office with impartiality and shall be diligent to maintain the impartiality of the Commission” (OMSJC 2.10). Thus, I am not permitted to make “any public or private statement that might reasonably be expected to affect the outcome of a pending matter or impending matter in any court of the church” (OMSJC 2.5). That notwithstanding, I am permitted to “make public or private statements in the course of [my] duties as a presbyter . . . with respect to biblical teaching, confessional interpretation, the principles of the form of government and discipline. . . .” (OMSJC 2.6). Nothing I have said in this essay is intended to intimate, hint, or suggest which party should prevail in any case that might come before me.