Many existing churches already have a Senior Pastor carrying the whole load. Moving toward this model is a restructure — and a sensitive one, because it has a spiritual element as well as a financial and operational one. It therefore needs the joint oversight of both the Committee and the Eldership: the Committee for the legal, financial, and employment dimension; the Eldership for the spiritual discernment. Neither acts alone.
An open discussion, not a top-down decision
The course of action is worked out in open discussion with the Saints and the eldership. Each body’s circumstances differ, so there is no single prescribed path — the discernment is genuinely shared.
The financial reality
The honest constraint is money. A church may not have the funds to employ both a full-time pastor and a full-time operations manager — and often neither is needed full-time. This is precisely why the “Senior Pastor” role exists: it lumps the two together to fit a single salary. Understandable, but to be discouraged, because it rebuilds the very overload this framework exists to prevent.
Ways through
There is no prescription. Depending on what the body needs and can fund, a church might prayerfully consider:
| Possible path | What it can look like |
|---|---|
| Find more funds | Fresh, Spirit-led giving raised for the purpose, or existing budget reallocated toward the two functions. |
| Reallocate or release roles | Where existing paid roles no longer fit the model, they may be reshaped or, where appropriate, made redundant — handled pastorally and lawfully. |
| Part-time allocations | A part-time pastor and / or a part-time operations manager, sized to what the body actually needs and can fund. |
| Keep the two joined (transitional) | In a small body the functions may remain in one person for a season — adopted with clear eyes about the risk, not held as the settled goal. |
The principle. Whatever the path, one principle holds: pastors should pastor, and operations managers should administer. Spiritual work and operational work are different in kind, and the structure should keep them distinct — the Acts 6 pattern, where the apostles gave themselves to prayer and the word and others were appointed to serve.
Calling and releasing the Pastor
Because a Pastor is one Elder among elders who carries the shepherd-teacher gift, he is called as elders are called, not as a chief executive is hired. Three roles stay distinct, and none does another’s part.
The Eldership selects the person. Discerning whom the Lord is calling to shepherd and teach is spiritual work: “Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honour, especially those who labour in preaching and teaching” (1 Timothy 5:17). The person is weighed against the qualifications of 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1 and appointed as elders are: “And when they had appointed elders for them in every church, with prayer and fasting they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed” (Acts 14:23); “appoint elders in every town as I directed you” (Titus 1:5).
The Church Manager and Committee handle the employment. The contract, terms, compliance, payroll, and — where it comes to it — any release are matters of employment law, carried by the operational and legal layer, not by a congregational vote. Releasing a Pastor is first an employment-law matter handled lawfully by the Committee; where the cause is spiritual, the Eldership discerns it and the Committee effects the release in compliance with the law. Churches should take their own local legal and employment advice.
The body affirms. The framework’s default is that the body receives and stands with the person the Eldership has appointed, without a separate ballot — the pattern of Acts 14:23 and Titus 1:5, where the leadership appoints and the body receives those set over them. A church whose Constitution or law requires a Members’ vote adopts one of the alternative models set out in Doc 13 Section 5 (the Eldership presenting one person for the body to affirm, or a vetted shortlist for the body to choose). The discernment stays with the Eldership either way.
Why this matters for scale
The two functions can stay joined in one person in a small body. But this does not scale. As a church grows, the Senior-Pastor model breaks under its own weight and runs a real risk of pastor breakdown. Churches should set themselves up to scale on the early-church model — and that is exactly what makes the separation clear: spiritual and operational responsibility kept distinct, so the body can grow without crushing the shepherd.
Next step: two full role descriptions — the redefined Pastor and the new Church Manager — with the Saints-and-elders boundary clearly marked so nothing drifts back onto either role.
Church, revive and rise. To God alone be the glory.