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Church Oversees Foreign Evangelists?
It has become a common belief among some brethren that a preacher going to a foreign field must have one church to “sponsor” him. This means that all support from other congregations for the one doing the preaching is funneled through his "sponsoring church." His “sponsoring” church guarantees his support and he, in turn, considers himself to be under their oversight and is directly answerable to them. There are some inherent problems with the practice and the concept behind it.
Peter makes it clear that oversight by elders is exercised “among them,” (1 Peter 5:1-4). No one outside the fellowship of brethren together in a congregation can be under the oversight of elders in a congregation. Elders are also called “shepherds” whose responsibility it is to shepherd the flock (Acts 20:28 – “feed” literally means “shepherd”). Under the figure of “the shepherd and the flock” it is impossible to conceive of elders (shepherds) having “tending” responsibilities to another flock or, as far as that is concerned, for sheep to be related to shepherds outside their own flock. It is scripturally impossible for a congregation to "oversee" someone who is not a part of their fellowship.
What, then, is the relationship between a congregation or congregations who send support and the evangelist who is in another field of work?
Such support is sometimes called communication ("fellowship" from Greek "koinonia" or "koinoneo" ?? note Philippians 1:5 and 4:15, cf. 4:14), because it involves a sharing which enabled work to be done. Even though the church at Philippi was not doing the preaching themselves at Thessalonica, they were having partnership with Paul as a result of their sending to Paul's needs that enabled him to preach. The word "fellowship" here does not refer to Paul's being a part of the Philippian brethren's relationship to each other nor was he under the oversight of the church at Philippi. It is used with reference to their "joint participation" with him in preaching the Gospel as he departed from Macedonia and at Thessalonica – they gave; Paul received and that established a “fellowship.”
On another occasion Paul called financial support "wages" ?? "I robbed other churches, taking wages of them, to do you service," (2 Corinthians 11:8). “Wages” involves the sending congregation’s rightful expectation of labor for the wages sent. But, when a congregation decides to help a preacher, it selects the man to support and sends directly to him – not through another congregation or organization. It decides how much and how many times it is going to send. That is the extent of the oversight. This "partnership" is based on trust and each sending congregation has the right to expect the preacher to labor faithfully. Therefore, if he departs from the faith or does not labor faithfully, they cannot be partners with him. (Note 2 John 9-10). – Jim R. Everett
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