19 Bible Verses About Pastors, and Why the New Testament Barely Uses the Word

Christian Pure Team

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Summary

  • The noun “pastor” appears once in the New Testament, in a list of gifts, and it is the ordinary word for a shepherd.
  • Acts 20:28 and 1 Peter 5:2 stack elder, overseer and shepherd onto the same people in a single sentence.
  • Of the fifteen or so items in 1 Timothy 3:2-3, only one — able to teach — is a skill; the rest are character and household.
  • Paul moves from honour to wages without changing subject, quoting a rule about not muzzling the ox that treads the grain.
  • Hebrews 13:17 puts the joy or the groaning of a pastor’s work in the congregation’s hands, not the pastor’s.

The New Testament almost never uses the word pastor, and when it does, it is not a job title. The noun appears once, in a list of gifts, and it is the ordinary word for a shepherd. Everywhere else the same people are called elders or overseers, and Luke and Peter both stack all three words onto one group in a single breath — elders who are to shepherd the flock as overseers. What the letters describe is a set…

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Bibliography (Click to show)

Scripture quotations are from the English Standard Version.

The Greek noun poimen, shepherd, is translated “pastor” only at Ephesians 4:11; elsewhere the offices are presbyteros (elder) and episkopos (overseer).

Luke calls the same men elders at Acts 20:17, eight verses before Paul calls them overseers.

The rule about the ox is quoted at 1 Timothy 5:18, from Deuteronomy 25:4.

Jeremiah’s charges against the shepherds who failed are at Jeremiah 23:1-4.

Paul’s account of being driven out of Thessalonica is at Acts 17:5-10.

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