Credentials Manual of the Church of God

Credentials Manual of the Church of GodThe Church of God began in 1880 by reacting dramatically to an excessive institutionalization of church life, often characterized as the heavy laying of human hands on Gods holy body of believers. However, after about thirty years of existence, this reformation movement (as it often has been known) had begun to feel the pain of insisting on virtually no human organization being allowed in its own life. It had begun to permit small appearances of

The Church of God began in 1880 by reacting dramatically to an excessive institutionalization of church life, often characterized as the heavy laying of human hands on God’s holy body of believers. However, after about thirty years of existence, this “reformation movement” (as it often has been known) had begun to feel the pain of insisting on virtually no human organization being allowed in its own life. It had begun to permit small appearances of organization, but only as need appeared to make necessary. The Spirit of God was to remain in control of constituting, energizing, and directing the life of the church.  

By the 1930s Anderson College, the movement’s first institution of higher education, had developed the practice of graduating ministerial students and then having a separate ceremony to also ordain select ones to ministry in the Church of God. The authority to oversee ministerial preparation and credentialing was as yet not clearly determined. After 1938 such functions slowly moved to the state level as regional assemblies developed— again, only as need appeared to make necessary. Inevitably, standards and procedures for ministerial preparation, ordination, and accountability were not formalized or uniform.  

The General Ministerial Assembly of the movement, functioning since 1917 as the church’s central voice, made clear in 1948 that the problems associated with such informality and disparity of standards and procedures had become unacceptable. This needed to be recognized and addressed. Accordingly, that 1948 GMA authorized the creating of a ministerial credentials manual, an initial attempt at a regularization of standards and procedures of ministerial life in the movement. While the need had become clear, progress in addressing it would be slow indeed.  

The first Congress on Credentials of the Church of God finally met in 1986, nearly four decades later, resulting in the 1986 edition of a Credentials Manual for ministers and congregations. Additional Congresses followed in 1996, 2003, 2006, and 2010, resulting in new Manual editions, with Barry L. Callen acting as Editor of each edition. Why the multiple editions? The church kept growing, maturing, changing, and finding itself and its leadership in a rapidly evolving culture with fresh challenges, professional expectations, and legal requirements and threats. Thus, perceived need kept driving the ongoing development of the Credentials Manual.  

Responsibility has required of the church fresh visioning, cautious but increased structuring, and now a longer and more carefully crafted set of ministerial and congregational standards and procedures. The prevailing paradox of the history of the Church of God remains what the 2011 Manual edition reports of itself. It “attempts to reflect the proper balance between legitimate autonomy and needed authority in the church’s life.” This balancing continues to be an important, delicate, and necessary matter for a properly prepared, formally recognized, and appropriately functioning ministry.  

The 2015 General Assembly of the Church of God was another milestone in this ongoing process of needed and enlightened structuring of ministerial preparation, 4   credentialing, and conduct. That Assembly empowered a “Select Committee on Credentials,” with twenty-four members from the United States and Canada, to establish the most desirable contents of a revised 2021 edition of the Credentials Manual. One key component of this Committee’s crucial work was to consult with a new Credentials Congress, seeking broad perspective and ownership of the eventual results of its work. Two sessions of this Congress were convened, one in 2016 and the other in 2017.  

All content of this edition of the Credentials Manual is authorized by the General Assembly of the Church of God, enacted through its standing Committee on Credentials, with implementation and future revision of the Manual to be determined by that Committee. This 2023 edition of the Credentials Manual was released by authorization of the standing Committee on Credentials of the General Assembly in coordination with the Executive Director of U.S. Strategy of Church of God Ministries, Inc.