In case you’re interested, the Southwest Baptist University Bearcats are #7 in NCAA Div. II basketball, and last night’s win over Washburn was pretty impressive, and I had a great time seeing lots of familiar faces. Go ‘cats!

There has been a movement during the past few years, to ‘rediscover’ the purpose of Deacons in the evangelical church.

To ‘Deac,’ we are told, means to serve. The classic example is serving food. In Acts 6, the first Deacons were there to serve food (”wait tables”) to the Hellenistic widows in Jerusalem who were being ignored. A member of my own church said “[...] according to my Bible, [Deacons] are basically in charge of delivering spiritual meals on wheels.”

I learned something a couple of weeks ago in a Bible study that made me rethink the level of Deacons’ service. Many people focus on “diakoneo” — the verb ’serve,’ as in, “[i]t is not reason that we should leave the word of God, and serve tables.”

But the key word is not “serve,” the key word is “tables” (Gk: ‘trapeza’). Did the apostles give up service for the word? No, we all know that true study of the Word requires living it out through service. Service is everyone’s job, not just a small group of believers. The Apostles weren’t trading “service” for “learning” (cf. “doers” and “hearers”), but trading one kind of service for another — table service for word service.

So, table service is like table-waiting, right? Well, maybe. But consider the context of the passage. In Acts 5, the Apostles were dealing with the hilarious giving of the early church. People kept running up to them and throwing money at their feet! And the Apostles, mostly Jewish followers of Jesus, were dividing it up as they saw the need.

Now take a quick look at this link to the Central Bank of Greece, and click on the Greek Flag. See that familiar looking word in the middle of the page? ΤΡΑΠΕΖΑ! As in the Central ‘Trapeza’ of Greece! Trapeza, even at the time of Christ, was often a term of art meaning “banker’s table,” or “money changing table.”

Given the context, then, it seems more reasonable that the Apostles are weary of dividing up the money! They asked the congregation to select seven men to serve as the bankers of the church, waiting the money tables as gifts came in, and deciding how to put that money into ministry! It is as if the leaders of the church said, “we have been called to the service of preaching, not the service of spending money — pick seven men from among yourselves and let them decide how to handle the money, while we devote ourselves to teaching the Gospel.”

Two observations: First, the Apostles have supreme confidence, then, that the Gospel will bring about the right division of funds. Enough so that they are willing to let others have control over the gifts to the church. How many pastors/elders today would take the same approach? “We’re tired of parishioners throwing money at our feet — can a few of you take care of this hassle?”

Second: Deacons are still Deacons, and not elders or bishops — they’re still devoted to meeting the needs of the congregation. But they’re not powerless, and they’re not limited to simple tasks. Their role as Deacons was to allocate ministry money. That is an important job, one that requires qualifications like an elder. In other words, the Deacons’ original role might have been a much different than the one we see today.

*PS: Eric Connell, the leader of our Bible study, indicated that there might be some reason to think the “council of seven” were not “the deacons” identified later in the Epistles. Most sources I’ve seen rely on the verb form of deacon, diakoneo, which does appear. Even if the Acts 6 group were different, it does provide a striking early church example of lay-determined ministry.

I’ve been following the hubub down in Richmond, where the IMB Trustees have asked the Convention to remove Trustee Wade Burelson — following closely after Wade’s blogging about the IMB’s new “private prayer language” and baptism policies. I’ll try to add something more substantive later, but I did want to quickly pass on: this issue’s got legs.

Last night, my wife and I went out to dinner on 39th Street in Kansas City, a place with lots of restaurants, but a low number of Baptists per capita for several miles in all directions. We picked a Spanish restaurant which has received good reviews, but we sat down in a mostly empty, quiet dining room. A few minutes later, another group of three sat down — two people about my age, and a man a little older. I did not know any of the three.

Dinner was fine, but about half way through, someone in the other group said “blog,” and my ears perked up. And to my surprise, they were talking about Wade Burleson, and what a shame it was that the board appeared to be punishing Wade.

My point is this: there may be issues of broken trust and accountability that need to be addressed — but when two out of two dining groups on 39th Street in Kansas City, Missouri, are discussing the apparent unfairness of the International Mission Board on a random Friday night, there’s a perception problem. The “broken trust” and “accountability” charges should be laid out in greater detail; trustee unity does not trump the need for IMB credibility.

My good friend Mike Sense has started a new blog, findingwaldo.blogspot.com, but had the poor sense to ask me to write the first post. Mike has a diverse set of friends, and I hope Finding Waldo generates some good discussion on some important ideas.