ISBN 978-1-934741-03-0 Also, all of the members of the body of Christ are responsible for the decisions of a church. There is no hierarchy in a New Testament church. No pastor, deacon body, or any other individual or group is to lord it over the church (I Peter 5:3). Only Jesus is Lord of each person and of the church as a whole. Through prayer and respectful discussion as part of a loving fellowship, the members of the church are to seek to know the mind of Christ. Conclusion The Lordship of Christ is a basic Christian doctrine. For Baptists, it has special meaning and is related to other key Baptist beliefs, such as those about the authority of the Bible, soul competency, religious freedom, and the nature of what a church modeled after the New Testament churches is to be. For further information, see cbhh.dbu.edu The basic material in this leaflet originally appeared in a series of articles in theBaptist Standard in 2005. Wanting to share information about Baptist distinctives, Noble Hurley, shortly before his death in 2004, established the Jane and Noble Hurley Baptist Identity Fund to provide for publishing the series. He asked William M. Pinson, Jr. and Doris A. Tinker to prepare the articles. The financial assistance of The Prichard Family Foundation and Vester T. Hughes, Jr. enabled this series of nineteen leaflets to be produced based on the articles. Skyler G. Tinker designed and formatted the leaflets for publication. Each leaflet is for both individual and group study. The topics in this series: (1) Baptists: Who? Where? What? Why? (2) What Makes a Baptist a Baptist? (3) The Lordship of Christ; (4) The Bible as Authority for Faith and Practice; (5) Soul Competency; (6) Salvation Only by Grace Through Faith; (7) The Priesthood of All Believers; (8) Believer’s Baptism; (9) A Regenerate Church Membership; (10) Congregational Church Governance; (11) Church Autonomy; (12) Baptist Church Life: Organization, Worship, Officers, Ordinances; (13) Voluntary Cooperation; (14) Evangelism; (15) Missions; (16) Ministry; (17) Christian Education; (18) The Application of the Gospel; (19) Religious Freedom. © Copyright 2007. All rights reserved.
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