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Originally Posted by YP0534
I guess the real question is: how did it come to be that there was such a practice of appointment? I am not aware of any place wherein Paul declares that God has directed him to make such appointments. I am also not aware of any information that such a practice of appointment was a custom among the Jews. To the extent that elders were merely older, what is the function of appointment? Isn't a calendar going to do the job for you?
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I like the word in verse 22, preceding the 'appointment' of elders; that they 'confirmed' the souls of the believers. They affirmed what God had done; they did not push something that was not already there.
Is there any connection in the 'confirmed' in verse 22 to 'appointed' in verse 23? If these words in the original greek seem in apposition to each other, then we would have to lean more towards 'selected' as the reading for the appointment of elders.
There is some confirming going on there in Acts. When Peter goes to Cornelius, the Jews in Jerusalem have to confirm that God has moved among the Gentiles. When Ananias lays hands on Saul and baptises him, the brethren at first shrink back from this converted murderer and blasphemer; Ananias exhorts them to receive Saul/Paul as a brother, which they do.
And Jerusalem, when it is not sending out Judaizers, must at least confirm, or affirm, that Paul is of God's move, both when they lay the right hand of fellowship on Paul and Barnabas and send them off, and in Paul's account in Galatians when he returns to Jerusalem after 14 years and presents his case to the brethren there.
So Jerusalem didn't appoint much of the doings of Paul; but they did confirm it. Did Paul in any way confirm what God was doing in the local assemblies? Is there any record of elders being raised up, by some kind of local assembly agreement, then to be confirmed by Paul, just as Jerusalem confirmed him?
If Paul didn't take "orders" from the de-facto headquarters in Jerusalem, did he also not try to impose his version of order on the assemblies of saints gathered here and there? Or did he?
The other thing about elders; it's not just chronological maturity. It is also spiritual maturity. Else some dotty old fellow would end up "in charge"...