The Sponsoring Church Arrangement

Chapter 6 examined whether a local church may route its funds through a separate human institution to accomplish a benevolent work. The present chapter takes up a related but distinct question. Both questions are about the flow of the local church’s funds. Both questions rest on the same hermeneutical ground established in Chapter 3. But the arrangement examined in this chapter is not a separate human institution. It is a second local church.

The Question, Stated Precisely

May one congregation oversee a work too large for any single church to undertake alone — the preaching of the gospel by radio or television, for example, or the support of foreign missionaries on a large scale — while other congregations across the country pool their contributions and send funds to the overseeing eldership to support that work?

Several questions must be cleared away before the real question can come into view.

The question is not whether a congregation may preach the gospel on radio or television. It may. A local church may use any medium of communication to proclaim the gospel, so long as what is proclaimed is the gospel and the expense is the church’s own. A small rural congregation that broadcasts its Sunday morning preaching on a local AM station, paid for out of its own treasury, is doing its own evangelistic work with its own funds. No question arises.

The question is not whether congregations may cooperate. They may. The New Testament shows congregations cooperating in several ways, which are surveyed below.

The question is not whether large works are legitimate. They are. The preaching of the gospel is not restricted in Scripture to the reach of a single congregation’s budget. The Great Commission is worldwide in scope (Matt. 28:19–20), and the pattern of the apostolic churches shows the word going forth into regions far beyond the churches’ own local communities (1 Thess. 1:8).

The question is specifically this: may the local church, as a collective body, send money from its treasury to another local church so that the receiving church’s eldership may oversee and direct an ongoing work in which many other congregations are participating at once?

The arrangement in view has particular features. It is not a one-time relief gift. It is not temporary assistance to a church in distress. It is an ongoing, structured arrangement in which one eldership — the “sponsoring” eldership — takes oversight of a work whose scope exceeds what that eldership’s own congregation could fund alone. Other congregations across the country, sometimes numbering in the hundreds or even thousands, send regular contributions to the sponsoring eldership, which then administers those pooled funds in the conduct of the work.

The clearest twentieth-century example, and the one that brought this question to a head in the 1950s, was the Herald of Truth. Launched in February 1952 by the Highland congregation in Abilene, Texas, the Herald of Truth was a nationwide radio program (later expanding to television) conceived and administered by the Highland eldership. Congregations throughout the country were invited to send contributions to Highland, which used the pooled funds to pay for air time, production, and staffing. Within a few years, the program was reaching hundreds of radio stations, and the scope of its operation far exceeded what the Highland congregation itself could have funded.

The question is not whether the message preached on the Herald of Truth was the gospel. Through most of its history it was. The question is not whether good came of it. Many heard the gospel through its broadcasts who otherwise would not have. The question is narrower: was the arrangement itself — one eldership overseeing a work funded by many congregations — authorized in the New Testament?

The Institutional Position, Stated at Full Strength

The institutional argument for the sponsoring church arrangement proceeds along these lines.

The work itself is authorized and necessary. The church is commanded to preach the gospel to the whole creation (Mark 16:15). In the twentieth century, new media made it possible to reach audiences on a scale impossible in any previous generation. A nationwide radio or television program can preach the gospel to millions in a single broadcast. To forgo such an opportunity would be to refuse a providential means of accomplishing the Great Commission.

No single congregation could undertake such a work alone. The cost of nationwide air time, production, and ongoing operation is beyond the budget of any ordinary local congregation. If the work is to be done at all, it must be done cooperatively — many congregations pooling their resources to accomplish what no single one could accomplish alone.

Cooperation is a New Testament principle. The New Testament shows churches cooperating. The Macedonian churches cooperated in sending relief to the saints in Jerusalem (2 Cor. 8–9). The Philippian church cooperated with Paul’s preaching in Thessalonica and Corinth (Phil. 4:15–16; 2 Cor. 11:8–9). Cooperation between churches is not an innovation of the 1950s; it is an apostolic pattern.

A sponsoring arrangement is simply cooperation at scale. Since churches cooperated in the New Testament, and since the new scale of twentieth-century media requires pooled resources, a sponsoring church arrangement is simply the modern expression of the New Testament principle of congregational cooperation. The Highland eldership oversees because someone must oversee; the other congregations participate because no other mechanism permits them to reach this scale of audience.

The sponsoring eldership oversees its own work, not the work of contributing churches. On this reasoning, the Herald of Truth is Highland’s work. The other contributing congregations are simply helping Highland do what Highland has determined to do. No contributing church is relinquishing oversight of its own work; it is choosing to fund Highland’s work. The elders at Highland exercise oversight only over their own elder-ship’s program. The elders at the contributing churches exercise oversight over their own churches’ decisions, one of which is the decision to contribute to Highland.

The arrangement is expedient. The New Testament does not specify the method of cooperation in detail. Where Scripture is silent on method, expediency governs. A sponsoring church arrangement is an expedient method of accomplishing an authorized work — the preaching of the gospel — at a scale that authorized work requires in the modern era.

This is the argument in its strongest form. A reader who has defended the Herald of Truth or similar arrangements should recognize the reasoning here. It rests on the legitimate Scriptural concern to preach the gospel widely. It draws on genuine New Testament examples of cooperation. And it treats the method as a matter of expediency where Scripture has not directly spoken.

The non-institutional answer does not dispute the goodness of preaching the gospel, nor the legitimacy of cooperation, nor the reality of expediency. It asks a narrower question: is this specific form of cooperation — one eldership overseeing an ongoing work funded by many — what the New Testament actually exemplifies?

The Non-Institutional Position, Stated at Full Strength

The non-institutional argument begins by looking carefully at what the New Testament pattern of cooperation actually is. The argument is not that churches did not cooperate. They did. The argument is that the form of cooperation shown in Scripture is consistently different from the form required by a sponsoring church arrangement.

The New Testament pattern is direct support to preachers. Paul tells the Philippians that from the beginning of his preaching after Macedonia, no church shared with him in giving and receiving but Philippi alone, and that even in Thessalonica they had sent more than once for his needs (Phil. 4:15–16). He tells the Corinthians that other churches supported him while he labored among them (2 Cor. 11:8–9). In both cases the support flowed directly from the contributing church to the preacher. No intermediate church received the funds and disbursed them. No sponsoring eldership took oversight of Paul’s preaching. Paul was not Philippi’s missionary, in the sense of operating under Philippi’s direction with funds others sent to Philippi. He was his own preacher, supported directly by the churches that chose to fellowship his work.

The New Testament pattern of inter-church aid is relief to a church in need. When Paul and Barnabas carried funds from Antioch to the brethren in Judea, the funds went directly to the elders of the churches suffering the need (Acts 11:27–30). The Antioch church did not send money to one church in Judea which then oversaw the distribution to other churches. The funds went where the need was. The same pattern appears in the great Jerusalem collection. Paul writes that Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make a contribution “for the poor among the saints in Jerusalem” (Rom. 15:26). The contributing churches sent directly to the church in need, not to a sponsoring eldership that then distributed to other places. The instructions for the collection in 1 Corinthians 16:1–3 confirm the pattern. Each church was to lay by in store on the first day of the week, and when Paul arrived, the church would select messengers to carry the contribution to Jerusalem. The collection was administered by each contributing church until it was delivered to the church in need.

The New Testament shows no example of a sponsoring church arrangement. Nowhere in the New Testament does one church take oversight of an ongoing work, receive regular contributions from many other churches, and administer those pooled funds in the conduct of the work on the other churches’ behalf. The pattern is direct, not channeled. The relief goes to the church in need. The preacher is supported directly by the churches that choose to fellowship his work. The sponsoring model, in which one eldership oversees and many contribute, is simply not in the text.

The jurisdiction of elders is the flock of God among them. Peter writes, “Shepherd the flock of God among you” (1 Pet. 5:2). The phrase “among you” is not decorative. It marks the boundary of an eldership’s shepherding responsibility. The elders of a local church shepherd the flock among them — the members of their own congregation — not the membership of other congregations, not a national audience, and not a pooled operation funded by congregations across the country. Paul’s practice confirms the boundary. Elders were appointed in each church, not across churches (Acts 14:23). The elders at Ephesus were charged to “be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood” (Acts 20:28). The jurisdiction is local and bounded. An eldership taking oversight of a work funded by many churches, with participants and activities reaching far beyond its own local flock, has reached beyond the jurisdiction Scripture assigned it.

This is the Scriptural heart of the non-institutional concern. The question is not whether elders are good men. They may be excellent men. The question is whether the oversight of one eldership may lawfully extend to a work whose scope is national, whose funding comes from hundreds of congregations, and whose participants are not members of the sponsoring church. The New Testament’s description of eldership authority says it may not.

The analogy to the missionary society. When the missionary society was defended in 1849, the reasoning was that the church is commanded to preach the gospel, that the work is larger than any single congregation can accomplish, and that cooperative arrangements are necessary to meet the scale of the work. That reasoning produced the American Christian Missionary Society — a single organization with its own officers, funded by contributions from many churches, overseeing the collective preaching work on behalf of the contributing congregations. The churches of Christ rejected the missionary society on the ground that Scripture had not authorized such an organization.

The sponsoring church arrangement differs from the missionary society in one respect: the sponsoring church is itself a local congregation with its own eldership, whereas the missionary society was a distinct organization with officers not tied to any local church. That difference is not trivial, and institutional defenders have relied on it. But the structural similarity is striking. In both arrangements, one body of men takes oversight of a work too large for any single congregation, receives pooled funds from many contributing churches, and administers the work on the contributing churches’ behalf. The fellowship that rejected the missionary society on the hermeneutical ground that Scripture had not authorized it must, on the same hermeneutical ground, examine whether Scripture has authorized a functionally parallel arrangement when the overseeing body is called an eldership rather than a society.

The Question of Expediency

Institutional defenders have relied heavily on the argument from expediency. The reasoning is that cooperation is authorized, the method is not specified, and therefore any method not specifically forbidden is permissible as an expedient.

Chapter 3 established the principle by which this argument must be tested. Where Scripture specifies, silence on unspecified alternatives is restrictive, not permissive. When God specified gopher wood for the ark, He did not authorize oak as an expedient — even though oak was not on a list of prohibited woods. When God specified that the priests were to be from the tribe of Levi, He did not authorize priests from Judah as an expedient — and the Hebrew writer appeals to Moses’s silence on Judean priests as conclusive evidence against them (Heb. 7:13–14). The principle is consistent throughout Scripture: specification excludes the unspecified.

Applied here, the principle asks whether Scripture has specified the form of inter-congregational cooperation. And it has. The New Testament shows cooperation flowing directly — from contributing church to preacher (Phil. 4:15–16; 2 Cor. 11:8–9), from contributing churches to the church in need (Acts 11:27–30; Rom. 15:26; 1 Cor. 16:1–3). Each contributing church acts under its own eldership’s oversight. Each receives delivery under its own eldership’s oversight. The sponsoring arrangement — many contributing, one overseeing, pooled funds administered by the overseeing body — is a different form that Scripture does not exemplify.

A reader who holds that the specification of direct inter-church cooperation permits a sponsoring arrangement as an expedient is invited to consider the same logic applied at the other boundary. If specification of direct cooperation permits a sponsoring eldership, then specification of direct cooperation also permits a sponsoring institution — such as the American Christian Missionary Society of 1849. The hermeneutic that permits one must permit the other. The hermeneutic that restricts the missionary society as unauthorized cooperation must, on the same reasoning, restrict the sponsoring church as unauthorized cooperation.

The Practical Consequences

Scripture does not always tell us in advance what the practical consequences of a departure from its pattern will be. But in several places it warns that departures from the pattern tend to deepen, and that what begins as a modest innovation becomes, over time, a structure difficult to reverse (Gal. 5:9; 2 Tim. 2:17). The history of the sponsoring church arrangement illustrates that pattern.

The Herald of Truth began in 1952 as a single radio program funded cooperatively. By the mid-1950s it had expanded to television. By the 1960s the scale of its operation required a substantial administrative apparatus within the Highland congregation — a staff, offices, production facilities, fundraising infrastructure. The Highland eldership’s oversight of the Herald of Truth became, of practical necessity, a substantial part of what that eldership did. Similar concentrations appeared in other sponsoring arrangements. The pattern was not peculiar to any one congregation’s character; it was structural. When an eldership takes oversight of a work funded by hundreds of other congregations, the operational demands of that work are not negotiable.

A further consequence, more difficult to document but repeatedly observed, was the informal pressure such arrangements exert on contributing churches. A congregation that contributes substantially to a sponsoring work develops, over time, a financial and emotional commitment to the work’s continuation. A contributing eldership that later has questions about the arrangement finds that those questions are difficult to raise without appearing to criticize the sponsoring eldership, or the preachers whose labor depends on the arrangement, or the program itself. The informal pressure is not a Scriptural argument against the arrangement — the arrangement must stand or fall on the Scripture — but it is a practical observation about what these structures tend to produce.

Neither of these observations settles the Scriptural question. A practice could be Scripturally authorized and still produce practical difficulties. A practice could be Scripturally unauthorized and still produce many apparent goods. The point of this section is narrower. It notes that the trajectory concern voiced by the non-institutional brethren in the 1950s — that sponsoring arrangements tend, over time, to concentrate oversight and narrow the circle of what contributing congregations may question — has not been disproven by the subsequent history. Readers of any conviction may weigh that observation for themselves.

Letting the Text Carry the Conclusion

The specific question of this chapter admits a specific answer. The New Testament does not show one congregation taking oversight of an ongoing work funded by many other congregations. The pattern of cooperation it shows is direct — relief flowing from contributing churches to the church in need, and support flowing from contributing churches to the preacher whose labor they choose to fellowship. In every case, each contributing church acts under its own eldership’s oversight, and each receives disbursement under its own eldership’s oversight.

The arrangement is not a matter of how much good the preaching accomplishes, nor of how faithful the sponsoring eldership is, nor of how many souls have been reached. A Scripturally unauthorized arrangement may produce many good outward effects, and a Scripturally authorized practice may sometimes appear less productive than an unauthorized substitute. The question is not productivity. The question is authority. Where has the New Testament authorized one eldership to oversee an ongoing work funded by many congregations? What does the text actually say?

If the New Testament pattern is direct cooperation under local eldership’s oversight, the pattern is restrictive, not permissive. A congregation that chooses to preach the gospel by radio or television does so from its own treasury, under its own eldership, within its own means. A congregation that chooses to fellowship another preacher’s work does so by supporting that preacher directly, not by routing funds through an intermediate eldership. And a church in need receives relief directly from contributing churches, not through a sponsoring arrangement.

Chapter 8 takes up the third of the specific questions: the scope of the local church’s benevolent treasury. Where Chapter 6 asked about the vehicle through which benevolence may flow, and the present chapter has asked about the structure of inter-congregational cooperation, Chapter 8 asks about the recipients. May the local church’s collective benevolence extend to all in need, or is it limited to needy saints? That chapter will be the longest of the four, because every relevant New Testament passage requires its own examination.

For Reflection and Discussion

1. Read Philippians 4:15–16 and 2 Corinthians 11:8–9 slowly. How did the Philippian church support Paul’s preaching — directly, or through an intermediate sponsoring church? What does the New Testament pattern of direct support suggest about whether a sponsoring arrangement is the apostolic form of cooperation or a later innovation?

2. Read Acts 11:27–30, Romans 15:26, and 1 Corinthians 16:1–3 together. In each passage, identify the direction of the flow of funds: who is contributing, and who is receiving? Do any of these passages show a sponsoring church receiving funds from many congregations and administering the funds on the contributing churches’ behalf?

3. Peter tells elders to shepherd “the flock of God among you” (1 Pet. 5:2). Does the phrase “among you” suggest any limit on the jurisdiction of an eldership? If so, what does that limit imply about an eldership’s oversight of a nationwide work funded by many congregations not under its shepherding?

4. The chapter observes a structural similarity between the sponsoring church arrangement and the American Christian Missionary Society of 1849: in both, one body of men takes oversight of a cooperative work too large for any single congregation, with pooled funds from many contributors. Do you agree that the similarity is real? If so, does it affect your evaluation of either arrangement? If not, what is the relevant difference?

5. The Great Commission (Matt. 28:19–20) is worldwide in scope. A common argument for the sponsoring church arrangement is that the scale of modern media makes cooperative oversight necessary to obey the Commission at all. Does the Great Commission authorize any method that accomplishes its scope, or only the methods Scripture patterns? What Scriptural principle guides the difference between the command and the method of its fulfillment?