Missions Part 3

Well, we've looked at missions from a couple of different angles. We started with looking at the kind of biblical theological perspective missions through the Bible, looking at what the Old Testament had to say about this concept of mission and our God who is on mission and all about mission. We saw that it wasn't just a New Testament concept. It's not something that just came about. And then on last week we looked at that sort of quintessential text of scripture. We looked at the Great Commission in Matthew chapter twenty eight and looked at sort of unfolded all the things that that said to us about missions. And on this week, what we're going to do is we're going to look at the message of two Timothy, which gives us kind of a very particular and very specific application to this idea of mission. So if you have your Bibles, go ahead and open to the Book of two Timothy. The message of the Book of two Timothy is really sort of summed up in these three words preserve, proclaim, endure, And we'll see that as we go through and look at this pattern. In this pattern, you see these two main ideas that Paul communicates to Timothy. One, to preserve and proclaim the gospel that is given by the apostles. That's the first prong, preserve and proclaim the gospel that is given by the apostles. And the second prong is to endure the hardship that inevitably will follow. And you see these two things in every chapter of Tewod Timothy. These two things are repeated again and again and again throughout two Timothy. The idea of preserve and proclaim first in chapter one, verse eight, Therefore, to not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner. Chapter one, verse thirteen and fourteen. Follow the pattern of sound words that you have heard from me. In the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus, by the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you. Again, this is the idea of preserving and proclaiming the Gospel. You have to remember the context. You have to remember that this is burgeoning Christianity. You have to remember that there is persecution. Not only is their persecution, but there is also apostasy. And so it's very important that the gospel is preserved, that the nature of the gospel is preserved so that it doesn't become heretical, and it's also important that it's proclaimed so that it spreads abroad. Chapter two, verses one and two. You, then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus and what you have heard from me, in the presence of many witnesses. In trust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also preserve proclaim Chapter three, verses thirteen to sixteen. But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed. There is the preservation, knowing from whom you learned it, and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. Chapter four, verses one through four. I charge you, in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and by his kingdom, preach the word. Be ready in season and out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with complete patience and teaching, for the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths. This is incredibly important on a number of levels. Note here that there is this call for young Timothy to preach the word, and to do it in this word in season, out of season, you chiros achiros. There's two types of time in the rendering in the Greek language. There there's kronos, that's we get our word chronological, right, kronos, what time is it? And then there's chiros, which is seasons or opportunities. And so when he says here, you chiros achiros, whether it's a good season for it or a bad season for it, what's meant here is that, regardless of what it seems to be doing, preaching is always what we do. Regardless of whether people like preaching or not, preaching is what we do. And so, for example, when we're in the midst of you know, the Great Awakening, and people like Whitfield are our preaching, and tens of thousands of people would come and gather in a field to hear him preach, just because that's what people did. That was a great time for preaching, right, That was a great time for preaching. Now not so much. Now we use phrases like don't preach to me, or that sounds preaching. In many seminaries, for example, over the last generation, preachers have been taught to shorten their sermons. The idea is that, you know, the attention spand is shortened today. Television understands this because for the most part, television gives you short bursts and then they give you commercials. Right, because we don't have much of an attention span. There's a show on yesterday. I don't remember even what it was, or where it was or wherever. We don't watch, you know, a whole lot of television. But during this season especially, you know, you got like the Thanksgiving Day parade and all these things that we'd just like to watch, you know. And I noticed a new thing that they're doing. First of all, they have the symbol of the station down at the bottom. I get that. You know, people are changing through and they got one hundred and something channels. You want to know what your channel is when they flip through. You see the little thing down at the bottom that I get that. And they had this deal up at the top that said, you know, the next show is the premiere of so and so, and it was a countdown like this bothering me get that off? Can get Can I get that off? There's nothing you can do to get that off. That All that is about people's attention spans, you know, And so the idea in the last generation was that preachers need to knowledge this shortened attention span and several things need to happen. Number one, you need to not preach as long. So the idea is that you would preached for twenty minutes. Okay, twenty minutes. That's some of my training was in that regard. So I've kind of ignored that, as you know. The other thing was that, you know, now preaching is you know, you've got to have all of these other things with your preaching. And so now there's preaching, and there's the video clips that are added to sermons and all this sort of stuff because it has to be multisensory in nature. Ironically, God has given us a multisensory experience through the Lord's Supper. We won't do that, but we'll do movie clips during our sermon to get multisensory. Anyway, don't get me started on that. Four. Why why is he telling Timothy he has to commit to this. You've got to commit to this because the time is coming when people will not do sound teaching. They won't endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth and will wander off in the myths. Interestingly enough, there are a lot of people who look at false teachers today, or who look at people, you know, who preach something other than the gospel today, and they say, why is it that these people are the ones who are growing churches so large and so fast? Why is it that this is happening as though we're doing something wrong? You know, listen, this is what Paul said was going to happen. People are not going to endure sound doctrine. So the tendency is going to be to back off of sound doctrine so that people can be appeased. And then the next thing, you know, you're preaching anything but sound doctrine, and it becomes pop psychology from the pulpit, self help, so on, and so forth, anything but sound doctrine. Because people will not endure sound doctrine. The second half of this is endure hardship. So first the idea of preserve and proclaim, and we see that that's in every chapter. The second half of this is endure hardship. Chapter one, verse eight. Therefore, to not be ashamed of the testimony about the Lord, nor me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the Gospel by the power of God. Isn't that interesting? There are those who would argue that if you're suffering, you need the power of God in your life so that you don't suffer anymore. Paul says, you're suffering by the power of God. You're not suffering because God's not present. You're not suffering because God's not powerful. You're suffering and enduring the suffering because God is present and powerful. So those who are arguing that, you know people who are having suffering, you got suffering in your life. You just don't have enough faith. You have suffering in your life. You're just not believing enough. If you just believed enough and you held on it. No, that's the opposite of what Paul teaches is true one verses eleven and twelve, for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher. Which is why I suffer as I do. Paul doesn't say he suffers because of a lack of faith. He says he suffers because of his appointment by God. This is why I suffer as I do. Again, this just completely explodes the Prosperity Gospel. Chapter two, verses three and four, Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ. Jesus no soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. So he said, share and suffering. This is what he's calling young Timothy to do verses eight nine of chapter two. Remember Jesus Christ risen from the dead, the offspring of David, as preached in My Gospel, for which I am suffering, bound with chains as a criminal. He's suffering because he preaches the gospel. Chapter three, verses ten to thirteen. This to me, this is the pinnacle of his explanation, and it's also the pinnacle of the refutation of the prosperity Gospel. You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my practice, my love, my steadfastness, my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra. You know what's interesting, people say, we suffer. Why we suffer because we don't have enough faith? We suffer because we don't whatever. Notice he says, his conduct, his aim, his faith, his patience, his love, his steadfastness, he has all of these things. The apostle has all of these things that characterize his life, and he has suffering that characterizes his life, which persecutions I endured. Yet from them all the Lord rescued me. Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted. When people are naming and claiming things from the Bible, half the stuff they're naming and claiming actually belongs to Israel as a nation. Right we love, for example, Second Chronicles seven fourteen. If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray turning for that wicked way, you know, we love that right national day of prayer. We're all over that. We don't even acknowledge the fact that God says he will hear the prayers offered in this place. What's this placed? The temple in Jerusalem Second Chronicles seven fourteen is about prayers offered in the well in Jerusalem by the Jews, and so we rip that kicking and screaming out of context, apply it to America as though America is the new Israel of God. That's horrible. It's horrible. When you got promises like this that are just ours, we can go grab them. You can claim your persecution anytime you want to in Jesus' name. But we don't want to do that, right, We want to find other things. But he says, all those who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus shall be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. Why is the prosperity gospel prospering? Why are these false teachers getting you know such? It's right here, it's right here. This is why. Also says there must be divisions among you, why so that you can know who's genuine. Chapter four ask for you always be sober minded, indure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. So you see in every chapter there is preserve and proclaim, and in every chapter there is endure hardship. This is the central message of this letter, and it's very important, especially when you understand from the beginning that Timothy is a young man who suffers with weakness and fear, and Paul is essentially about to be put to death for preaching the Gospel. And he writes a letter to young Timothy, who struggles with timidity and weakness and fear, and he says, essentially, they're about to kill me for preaching the gospel. And when they do, I want you to take my place and do the very thing for which they're putting me to death. I want you to suffer with me. That's what he's saying. That's why he says to him, God has not given us a spirit of fear that doesn't come from God. Reject that it doesn't come from God? Well, what about the content to be preserved and proclaimed? This is important, and again understand how this fits into our concept of missions, because what are we doing in missions. What we're doing is we're preserving and proclaiming and enduring the suffering that inevitably will follow. This is what this is the mission Paul is giving Timothy. The mission. The mission is that we preserve the Gospel. We preserve of its essence. We preserve what the apostles have taught. The mission is that we proclaim it, that we spread it abroad. Okay, whatever you have heard from me and the presence of faithful men, and trust and trust this to others who will be able to teach it. Also, I just butchered that completely. I don't know why, all right. What's the content being committed to Apostolic teaching. It's a common Pauline theme, it's a common New Testament theme, and confessionalism is a guard and a guide for this. Committed to Apostolic teaching looks verse one, Chapter one, Verse one paul an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God, according to the promise of the life that is in Christ Jesus. To whom is he writing this? Second Timothy? First chapter one, first one. He's writing it to Timothy. Thank you, all right, Timothy? Right, he's writing. Everybody's sitting there like this is a trick. I know it's a trick. No, it's not a trick. It's not a trick. He's writing this to Timothy. Does he know Timothy or does he not know Timothy? He knows him well. He knows him well. They've endured much together. You know, you know all my persecutions, you know my sufferings, he says, you know, they they've shared tears together. He knows him very well. So does Timothy know or not know that Paul is an apostle? And yet he introduces this letter Paul and Apostle of Jesus Christ. Not Paul your father in the but Paul an Apostle of Jesus Christ. Why because he is. What he is writing is based on his apostolic authority. It's not based on his relationship with Timothy. It's based on his apostolic authority. Okay, he's not calling Timothy to do this because they have love for one another. He's calling Timothy to do this because it's his job as an apostle. And he's calling Timothy to obey not because of his respect for Paul as a person, because of his but because of his respect for Paul's office as an apostle. This is important Chapter one, verse eleven, for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher. He reminds him again right there in the first chapter, I am an apostle I'm an apostle. This is a common Pauline thing, tewond Thessalonians, Chapter two, verse fifteen. So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the tradition that you the traditions that you were taught by us, either by our spoken word or by our letter. You know, it's interesting the word preaching is a negative word in our culture and among Christians, especially younger Christians, the word preaching is a negative word. Okay, you don't do a sermon, you do a talk or a message, right, we don't. We just it's just it's a negative idea. The word religion is a negative idea, you know. Well, you know, Christianity is not a religion. It's a relationship. Really, tell that to James. Okay, tell that to James who talks about true religion. And another idea that we hate is the idea of tradition. Tradition and traditionalism. Right again, there are empty, dead traditions. But here's here's what we've come to. We've come to there's a word, you know, we've come to applaud contemporaneity. In other words, the idea that something is better if it's newer, it's better if it's newer. It's got to be the best, newest, shiniest thing, because newer is always better. And so what we value is whatever is new, whatever is contemporary. So it's one thing where Jesus talks about dead tradition, right and he lamb based the Pharisees because of their dead and empty traditions, right and rightfully so, because dead, empty tradition is just that it's dead, it's empty, it's not profitable. However, Jesus kept all of the traditions of the Jews. We're going through right now, you know, Exodus chapter eleven through thirteen and looking at the Passover, and on last week I made the point that if the Jews had not kept that tradition, we would not have been able to understand the gospel. Christ's death, burial, and resurrection would make no sense without these traditions being upheld. And so what we've done is, you know, in the spirit of contemporaneity, everything that's new and contemporary is automatically better. Everything that is traditional is automatically worse, and it's automatically empty. So we're always trying to innovate, We're always trying to have a newer fresher experience, because newer and fresher is better. But the apostle says, hold on to the traditions that I taught you. Why because he's an apostle, and these traditions are just as important as the traditions that were given to the Jews. Without those traditions that were given to the Jews, we would not understand redemption. Without the traditions that were given by the Apostles, we would not maintain the faith. Okay, Chapter one, verse nine about Titus one nine, I'm sorry. The elder must hold firm the trustworthy word as taught so that he may be able to give instruction and sound doctrine and also rebuke those who contradict it. Again, what is he holding on to. He's holding on too Apostolic teaching. He's holding firmly to Apostolic teaching, not the spirit of the Age. Acts Chapter two, verses forty two to forty three. They devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and to the fellowship. The breaking of bread and the prayers, and awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the Apostles. They held on to the apostles teaching. We hold on to the apostles tea we have to. Confessionalism is a guide and a guard for this Tewod tivoty One nine and ten. Listen to this who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works, but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our savior, Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the Gospel two verses eight through thirteen. Remember Jesus Christ risen from the dead, the offspring of David, as preached in my Gospel, for which I am suffering bound with change as a criminal. But the Word of God is not bound. Therefore I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. The saying is trustworthy, for if we have died with him, we will also live with him. If we endure, we will also reign with him. If we deny him, he will also deny us. If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for he cannot deny himself. That last phrase is in poetic form. When Paul talks about according to my Gospel, according to my teaching, when he talks about the pattern of sound words, what he's talking about is the idea of confessionalism, the idea that there are things that the Apostles repeated over and over and over again. There are things in the form of early hymns, and we know that they are early hymns because we know what early songs were like and how they were written, and in our Bibles they are often, you know, put off in a poetic form so that you can see that they are hymns, that they are New Testament, New Testament canonical hymns. These are the ways that these things were passed on, okay, And so confessions are not something foreign to the teaching of the New Testament. Confessions are something that are very much in keeping with the New Testament. The idea that we codify these words, this pattern of sound words to which we hold. So we have hymnity, which is important in this regard. We have creeds, confessions, and catechisms. Why are creeds, confessions and catechisms important they connect us with the historical church. They connect us with the historical church. We don't have to figure out everything on our own all over again every generation. Amen. Amen. And we don't do this anywhere else, right, we don't do this anywhere else. This is why we preserve knowledge in academies and things of this nature. Clarifies our doctrine. It clarifies our doctrine. What is that pattern of sound words to which we hold it's a guide for discipling children and new converts. Catechisms and confessions are guides for discipling children and new converts. If you don't use catechisms and confessions for discipling children, for discipling new converts, we're just sort of stuck out there, and everybody's trying to figure out, you know, how do we disciple people? You know, what does your church use for discipleship? You know, what are you doing for discipleship of men? What are you doing for discipleship of ladies? What are you doing for discipleship with teenagers? What are you doing? Well? I found this great stuff and and generally those discipleship materials go a little bit like this, Okay, they go, you know, Phase one is kind of all right, here's here's what it means, you know, to be a Christian. These are kind of the points of the gospel. Phase two, here's how you have a quiet time. Phase three, here's how you find your spiritual gifts, you know. Phase four, you know, here's how you go do something? Is that? Is it? It? Is it all? And most of the time when we talk about discipleship, it's just a few weeks, right, just a few weeks of discipleship. But if you look at historic creeds, confessions and catechisms, what you see is that people were being discipled into Apostolic teaching. You don't have to sit around going yeah, what do we use for discipleship and grab you a catechism. You'll have more than you can say, grace over. You'll have years worth of material to take someone through year's worth of material. And whether it's a new believer who's an adult or a child who's being raised in our home, taking them through the catechisms and taking them through our confessions is rooting and grounding them in Apostolic teaching. And it blows the doors off of anything else that we're calling discipleship today. It exposes and guards against cults. Yeah. I again, I'm always amazed, especially among our brother and I can talk about Southern Baptists because I are one, you know, and there are always those people who are like, you know, we're we're we're not a creedle people. We have no creed but Christ. The Bible is my confession. That sounds great, doesn't it. It sounds pious. But someone who says, no creed but Christ, guess what that's not in the Bible, which means it's a creed. Do you follow me, no creed but Christ. That's your creed? So you do believe in creeds. And the person who says, well, the Bible, the Bible is my confession. Oh really, So you're gonna let Mormons in, You're gonna let Jehovah's witnesses in, You're gonna let whoa whoa whoa. Now wait a minute, now, you're gonna let Roman Catholics in. Whoa whoa, whoa, who whoa whoa. Huhuh, Well why not? Because because they could make that same they could hold up the same Bible you hold up and say, my confession is what's right in here? Yeah, but they don't believe the same thing. They are wrong about Jesus. They're wrong about this. They're like, oh, wait a minute, you just got confessional. The moment you start explaining the difference between you and the cults, you became confessional. Okay, So it's nonsense when people say that they're not creedal or they're not confessional. We absolutely are. If we're not, we open the door to anything and everything and we destroy our unity. Okay, the bringing to the concept of missions. So now we're going and we're doing missions. Right, you go somewhere and you're going to establish a church in a place and a culture that doesn't have the church. They don't know anything, they don't know come from sickam. Right, what do you do? Where do you start? Creeds, confessions, catechisms, that's what you do. That's where you start. And cultures that don't know anything about anything. You start with creeds, confessions and catechisms. That's where you begin. It's corporate proclamation. You've heard this in the presence of many, right, that what you've heard from me in the presence of others. Our preaching should be doctrinal. Our preaching should be doctrinal. We don't just preach self help. Okay, we don't just preach spirit of the age. We don't just preach for entertainment. We don't just preach for inspiration. Our preaching should be doctrinal. It should be fortified by our creeds, confessions, and catechisms. Secondly, our preaching should be expository. This is why we do expository preaching. What parts of the Bible do people need all of it? All of it? So what parts of the Bible should we preach all of it? All of it? This is why we go back and forth between Old Testament New Testament. And this is why even when we go back and forth, we go to different types and genres of literature. Okay, so now we're an Old Testament, you know, pentitud law. Next time we'll go back to the New Testament. And then we come back to the Old Testament, and we've just done law before that, we did profits, so we'll probably go back to wisdom or the writings again, so that we can have a variety and preach the whole Council of God. Okay, that's why our preaching should be exhaustive. Why because we are trying to develop, We're trying to build a body of discipled believers, and so we need creeds, catechisms, confessions. We encourage these things to be happening in homes so that people are being built up right. And then we preach sermons that are doctrinal in nature. They're expository and exhaustive, and that we're handling the whole council of God. You sit under this over a period of years, and it changes the very way you read the Bible. You're not just lost when you open the Bible, but you sit under Spirit of the Age preaching. You sit under pop psychology preaching five ways to have a happy life, ten ways to reduce stress, four ways to grow healthy, happy kids. YadA, YadA, YadA. That doesn't give you anything because when the sermon is over, it hasn't expounded on the text, so you can't figure out how it came out of there, right, But you sit under exposition for a while, and eventually you see how it is that we're interpreting scripture, and you become better at interpreting and handling the scriptures, and you hear preaching from variety of texts from different parts of the Bible. You begin to get a more full orb understanding of the Bible as a whole. It's personal instruction, folks. Personal instruction is time consuming and it's risky. And this is why in most places it's not done. This is why in most places people would just assume trust the academy. Right, somebody feels a sense of calling from God, send them to seminary, send them away. We don't have time for that, and it's risky. Tewod Tivoty one two through seven. To Timothy, my beloved child, Grace, mercy and peace from God the Father, and from Christ Jesus our Lord. I thank God, whom I serve as my ancestors did, with a clear conscience. As I remember you constantly in my night and day, as I remember your tears, I longed to see you that I may be filled with joy. I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lewis and in your mother Eunice, and now I am sure dwells in you as well. For this reason, I remind you to fan and to flame the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of my hands. For God gave us a spirit not of fear, but of power. And of love and of self control. Folks, Paul knew Timothy. He knew his strengths and he knew his weaknesses. He was Timothy's pastor. He wasn't just Timothy's professor. He was Timothy's pastor. He prayed for Timothy because they had a personal relationship. Paul knew Timothy's family, he knew his family background, he knew where this guy came from. Paul and Timothy served together. This wasn't a theoretic in nature. They serve together. This young man served alongside the apostle, and Paul and Timothy cried together. This is a real relationship. This is what that personal instruction looks like. When pastors and elders take young men under their wing and teach them. And it is risky because you're making an investment and you don't know that that investment's gonna pay off. You don't know that that investment's gonna pan out, and in many instances it doesn't. Many instances, you pour your life into young men and they end up going and doing something else, and they don't serve in the ministry, or they end up going in another direction, or they end up whatever. But you can't not do this. We can't not do this. We have to do this. We're called to do this. This is the pattern. This is how the mission advances. What is the commission to entrust the faithful? Men? Must be intentional and purposeful, and it must be selective. This is not just everyone. This is not just everyone. Pastors and elders don't give equal time to all men. You don't. There are some to whom you give more time. Why because they're faithful men to whom we need to entrust these truths. Because God is calling them to entrust these truths to others selective called men, called men. There are a lot of men who say, you know, hey, I'd love to go through the leadership training because I'd love to have more knowledge. Wrong answer, wrong answer. This is not just because you want to know more stuff. Has God called you? Is there burning in your bosom? Can you say, like Paul, woe to me if I do not preach the gospel? I will die if I don't preach the gospel? Is there a calling? Is there a passion? Is there a yearning? Is there fire in your belly? That's the question, not I'd really like to have more information. Well, so would I right? Is there calling gifted men? Gifted men? Anybody can say, you know, I believe I'm called to do this, But gifted men, you can say, I believe God's called me to play in the NBA. But if you're under six feet tall and can't dribble with your left he's probably wrong. Okay, Just gonna go out on a limb here and say you're not gonna make it all right? Are you gifted? Do you have these gifts? Do you have these gifts? Because again, the ministry, the mission is not just about men you know who who like information and who can acquire information. This is about men who are gifted. Are you gifted? Do you have those gifts? Qualified men? Do you meet the biblical qualifications? Okay? Tested and proven men? Have you been tested and proven? So you're you have gifts, talent, abilities, and desires in the life of a qualified men whose life is scrutinized by the leadership of the church and its members, who's tested and tried and trained, who's then unleashed to do his thing. This is how the mission is perpetuated. Okay. And this is not every man. This has to be selective, okay, and This is hard. It's really hard. It's really hard. It's hard for us as elders especially, you know, because sometimes you have guys who've got all the passion in the world. They're not called or gifted, but they got all the passion in the world. They love the Lord, they love the Church, and they're like, here, man, I'm here, come on, let's do this thing. You know it's great, but no, no, it's all of these things. It's all of these things. Does that mean there's no place for you to serve. Nope, it doesn't mean that at all. It's intentional. We must seek to provoke called men. We must seek to provoke called men. There is a sense in which there are some men who are called and gifted, but they'll just sit there unless they're provoked. Different men have to be provoked in different ways. Some men just have to be asked and they go, wow, really, I never thought about that, but now that you say it, you know, sometimes it happens like that. Some men have to be challenged. Some men have to be challenged. Sometimes you have to come to mend and say, here, you are a called and gifted man. You have elders and deacons who are carrying weight on their backs that is about to break them like twigs. And you sit there and suck up and give nothing. How dare you? With all the gifts that you have? How dare you? Sometimes that's what it takes. And as elders, you gotta understand the difference between the guy who needs the carrot and the guy who needs the stick. Right, and it becomes even more were frustrating for the guy who needs the stick, because you got the guy over here who doesn't have the calling and the gifting and he's going oooo. And you got the guy over here who's a first round draft choice and he's going So we must seek to equip called men. We got to have quip called men. We got to give our lives to them. We must seek to evaluate called men. All these things have to happen, and I'm grateful. I am grateful for the way that this happens here and has happened here at GFBC, and the way that you guys have allowed us to do this. We're gonna have another group starting in January. God has sent us what four or five young gifted men who are ready to start the leadership program. We haven't done it. For a couple of years because we just haven't had a pool. You know. Now He've got a pool. God has sent us, you know, five or six young, energetic, intelligent, articulate, gifted, passionate, ministry minded men. And so in January, we're going to start again and we'll see what we get. We'll see what we get continuity who will be able to teach others. Also, that's the goal, because this is the mission, right, it has to continue on. So we have to get into individuals who are able to teach others. Also, listen to this from John Calvin. He again shows how earnestly desirous he is to transmit sound doctrine to posterity, and he exhorts Timothy not only to preserve its shape and features as he formerly did, but likewise to hand it down to godly teachers, that being widely spread, it may take root in the hearts of many. For he saw that it would quickly perish if it were not soon scattered by the ministry of many persons. And indeed we see that Satan did not long after the death of the Apostles, For just as if preaching had been buried for some centuries, he brought in innumerable reveries, which, by their monstrous absurdity, surpassed the superstitions of all the Heathens. We need not wonder therefore, if Paul, in order to guard against an evil of such a nature and of such magnitude, earnestly desires that his doctrines shall be committed to all godly ministers who shall be qualified to teach it. In a very short time. In a very short time, heresy and apostasy abounded. In fact, you look at the cults today and you can trace them back to first century heresies. In almost every case, these are not things that are new. These are things that happened almost immediately. And this is where this almost desperation came from. This is why missions are important, and this is why we do it in this fashion, and this is why every local church ought to see itself as a sending entity. This is why church planting is not something you know, that's for certain churches who are out there, you know, on the elite green beret side of things. But it's just who we are and what we do. Again, in our culture, we have a mentality that says we need to grow and expand. Right here, you know, we need to do everything that we can to grow and expand right here. We need to build bigger barns so that we can meet, you know, more people in bigger barns. You know, that's just what we need to do. And you know, we have churches here. I told you I've served on a church staff that had dozens, dozens of ministers, dozens of preachers in one church on one church staff. Mind boggling, Absolutely mind boggling. But that's the mentality here, as opposed to the mentality being we need to raise people up, we need to send people out, we need to planned. And again, I'm not against the idea of church is growing. I don't think there's a certain size beyond which a church becomes sinful in its growth. Necessarily, if that was the case the first the first, you know, several gatherings and meetings were sinful. They're in acts, So not arguing that that's the case at all. But we have to have this idea and this mentality that says we are going to raise up, we are going to train, we are going to evaluate, and then we are going to send out these gifted men. That's not easy to do, folks. I promise you. It's not easy to do. It hurts, it really does. An interesting thing happens when you plant churches, when you send people out, it's sort of like I have heard this and now I can say yes and amen, sort of like when you have a child who grow up and get married. You know, the child grows up and gets married and you're like, yes, this is what we raised them for, this is what's supposed to happen. This is good, this is healthy, this is God honoring. Amen. And then you walk up to their room and it's empty, and you should want to cry, you know, and you've got to remind yourself, no, this is a good thing, this is a right thing. There's more that's going to come from this that's good that would not have come from this had it not happened. And the same thing happens when you plant churches. You know, we have gifted men, and there have been gifted men who've come and who trained and everything else, and other people who we love and who are our friends. And then you go when you plant a church and you walk into church and there's not as many people here as there were before, and psychologically, there's something that happens to you. It doesn't matter that it was a good thing. It doesn't matter that it was for a good reason. If you walk in here one day and there's three hundred people, and then a week later there's two hundred people, something on the inside of you goes, something's wrong. This is not good. When you walk in and there's people that you know and love who are not here anymore and they're meeting somewhere else, something on the inside of you goes, something's wrong. This is not good. I so appreciate those of you who, out of your love and care for me and Stephen, you know, have been over the last several months just kind of shaking your head, going what are you guys gonna do? We appreciate that. We appreciate that you recognize that it's hard, you know, for two guys to do the things that we're called to do, and it there's a lot of stuff that we can't get to. We appreciate that you recognize that. But at the same time, we have to recognize that we don't have the right to hold on to gifted men for the sake of our convenience. We don't have the right to do that, and so we pray that God will continue to reinvigorate and to send gifted men. We pray that His church will continue to grow not only in the number of the people that are reached through the ministry of this church, but also in the number of people who step up and become engaged in the ministry of this church, and who expand the ministry of this church through launching out in ministry from this church. Okay, this is that process. This is what it looks like, and it's the normal natural process of being the church. Okay, all right. Questions Yes as churches, Yeah, good question. Question is am I saying that it's not the seminary's role to trained pastors and equip elders, but it's the church's role. Yes and no. Yes, I'm saying that that's the role of the church. I'm not saying that seminaries can't be helpful in that regard. But Christ didn't establish seminaries. He established churches. Churches are responsible for raising, training, evaluating ministers. And I think there's something very unhealthy that has happened to the church, especially in this culture, because of the nature of seminary training. And so now we look at instead of looking at ministry as a vocation and a calling. We now look at it as a profession. And so guys you know, grow up and are raised up in their churches, oftentimes not even having served or done anything to be evaluated by their church. They go off to seminary and get a degree. The seminary doesn't know them, really, the seminary is not really evaluating them as ministers. They now have a degree, they have credentials, they pass the test, and they go start pastoring a church. Well, there's several steps missing there that are of vital importance from a New Testament perspective, and that is having this individual be mentored and discipled and evaluated by people who know him and people with whom he's serving side by side. So can a seminary be a useful and helpful partner in that process? Yes? Is this a process given to the seminary? Absolutely not, absolutely not, And good seminaries will tell you that. Yes. The different different difference between an apostle and a preacher. I uh. The apostles are people who are sent particularly and specifically by Christ. The The best way to understand that is there in Acts Chapter one, when there was uh the decision to replace Judas, and Matthias was brought in to replace Judas. The requirements for Matthias was that he had seen the resurrected Christ, that he had been there for all of the instruction, and so on and so forth. The these are the requirements for an apostle. That's an apostle. Anyone who preaches the Gospel is a preacher. But there are only s very s specific and limited men who were apostles. Yes, modern day apart poscils. That's a heretical concept. There are no modern day apostles. And anybody who calls himself an apostle is a deceiver or he's being deceived or both, because there are no modern day apostles. Ephesians chapter two makes it clear that the apostles and the prophets are the foundation upon which the church is built. Right, you lay a foundation and now you build on top of it. You don't do more foundations, right, So we don't have we don't have people who are parts of the foundation today. We have people who are parts of the superstructure today. So we don't have apostles today. Yes, why we see increasing we see people the right way. What we think is true. The question is, you know, when we see people going away from from what we see as true and right, why do we think it's bad? We're wired that way, and it is bad, right because we want people to we want people to know and worship and serve Christ, and so in that sense, it is bad. We don't want that. We want people to know the truth. We want people to come to repentance and faith. We're passionate about that happening in the lives of people. So there's a sense in which we're supposed to see it as bad in that regard. But what's wrong is to see it as a statement about us being bad or wrong. You know, there's a difference between the two. So we want to be passionate people who are not satisfied with that, but we don't want to allow that to bleed over into us being people who are willing to compromise and do anything in everything possible to make See that's the secret sensitive movement, right, We want to design this place for people who hate God to feel comfortable here. So no, that's not the answer, you know. So there has to be a balance between us having a passion and a desire for all people everywhere to come to repentance and know the truth and at the same time to recognize that there are people who will not endure sound doctrine and that that's going to happen. But we continue to fight nonetheless because we're not willing to just sit down and accept that. That's the balance that we have to strike. Yes else, Yes, for the leadership training, do you have to have a degree in something? No? No, you don't have to have a degree in in something in order to be part of the leadership training. That's just something that you sort of reply with the elders and and then we you know, sort of make an evaluation and and move forward with those things. But that that's just something you talk to the elders about. But no, there there there are no prerequisites for that. You see say again, Oh okay, so Alexander saying it sounds like the goal is that we get these people and we evaluate'em and the goal is to scent into the world. But what about the process for the people who serving inside the church. It's the same, It it's the same. See, not all these people. Remember last week we talked about you know, Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, the remotest parts of the world. Most of the people didn't go beyond Jerusalem, Judea right. Not everybody who goes through our training is gonna be a church planner. There's a very small percentage of people who who have calling and gifting skills necessary to do that, very a very small number of people. So a lot of the people who go through that process end up serving right where they're, right where they're trained, or or close to where they're trained. You know, not not all of them are going to go to the remotest parts of the world, you know. But we train them and then God sends them wherever they need to be. You know. That has to be our stance. Our stance is we're equipment and we're preparing people. We don't equip people and prepare them and go. You know, we're equipping you and preparing you. You know, you had to stay here though. We can't. We can't. We can't do that, Yes, like God, Yes, well he wouldn't that all? Yeah? Good. Question talked about the difference between the guy who needs a stick and the guy who needs a carrot, and the question is if he needs a stick, would that be evidence that he doesn't have a calling, not necessarily because here's here's a couple let me give you a couple of examples. And this goes back to Jusa's question. Today, we've turned ministry into a profession. So some of those people who need a stick, they're sitting there and they're saying, well, I'm not qualified for this because I don't have a seminary degree. And everybody knows you've got to have a seminary degree in order to be a legitimate minister, right, And so the stick may be to disabuse him of that notion. Right. That's one thing that's pretty common today because there are people who are sitting there and they're gifted and called here's the irony. These same people who in America would go, yeah, you know, you've got to have a similary degree. You take them to a third world country, you know, where the gospel is preached and people are saved, and it's a burgeoning church, and you know, you've got guys who are barely literate, but it's obvious that the hand of God is on them, and they'll go, yeah, this guy, this guy needs to be a minister here. But then they come here and it's like, no, you have to have a seminary degree and you have to have a right there's this double standard because of what we've turned the ministry into here in our culture. It's helped us in some regards and that we have very well equipped men serving here and that's an incredible blessing, but it's hurt us in some other regards, and that there are some individuals who, because of various circumstances in their life, haven't had the opportunity to be able to go and get some of those you know, different types of training, but they're still called and gifted men who need to be serving. So no needing to stick is not automatically evidenced that you're you're not called. It could be evidence that you're just looking at the wrong thing. Yes, yeah, don't needed to stick. Interestingly, he was already call, he was already called and serving, and he still needed a stick. Yeah, sometimes I need a stick, Yes, Yes. Why do you recognize gifts? Great question? How do you recognize gifted men within the church? A number of things, partly through the conversations that we have with men. We have conversations with men, and we there's certain things we listen for in conversations with men, certain things we look for in the way men interact with other people, certain ways that we look for men to be ministering to other people. And so we talk about that and we see that, and then beyond that, when you see it, you have more purposeful conversations with these men, and then we may look for opportunities for them to serve in ways that may be a little bit more you know, public. Maybe maybe maybe you lead a discussion on You've noticed that some of our guys in their training, they're in the monthly men's meeting, they may leave discussions on you know, the book that we're going through and stuff like that, things that are things that are safer, you know. And now we have this platform and you know, you'll have guys who will you know, teach during during this time, just ways that we can look and see in their personal life and then in their public execution of duties. Yeah, there's a lot of ways that we do it, but we're always doing it, always doing it. Yeah, yes at all. You mentioned of second, I'm sorry that's aliens, and he said, hold on to these traditions. But when I look at like traditions helping you typically run across they they did. It's something that you first, right and in spite of if you read the bottom, but with these thought traditions whatever, the apostolic traditions, Yeah, that was the whole. That's the whole. Heading is there apostolic traditions that are passed on. This is what we have in the epistles. This is why we have the epistles. And so interestingly enough for people will always say, well, we need to go back to the church and acts, right, you hear this all the time, right, Well, the church and acts was filled with problems. That's why you have the epistles. We need to be more like a first century church like Corinth. They were a mess, right, that's why we have the epistles. You see the acts of the apostles, they just show us what happened. The epistles give us guidelines for what's supposed to be normative. Okay, So go back to the regulative principle. When we talk about the regulative principle, how do we worship God? How do we set up the church? You worship God, and you set up the church in accordance with what you find in the epistles. What you find in the scriptures. That's the way you do it. So those are the Apostolic traditions. That's why you have the reading of scriptures, right, This is why you have the prayers. This is why you have preaching. This is why you have the Lord's Supper. This is why you have the singing of psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. You know. This is why you have these various elements confession, you know, the the amen, the affirmation, the see. This is why our worship service looks like it looks because we're holding to Apostolic tradition as opposed to just going with the spirit of the age, you see. And so there are these elements that we find that are part of those Apostolic traditions. Those are the things that we hold to. And so a lot of times when people are looking at, for example, a church service, they'll say, well, you know, we like this more than that, as opposed to saying this is in keeping with Apostolic tradition. That's not in keeping with Apostolic tradition. Okay, there are a lot of things that I like, but we don't make determinations about what we do in worship based solely upon what we like when we gather in this place. This is not about my opinions, your opinions, my preferences, his preferences. That's not what this is about. When we gather in this place, we are about what the Apostles have handed down to us and about doing those things that they say are essential. Say, that's the difference. Now, if there are things that we just do that we hold on to, you know, Okay, sorry, it was coming, It was coming, but it didn't. If there are things that we hold on to, you know, just because well, you know, there are things that we've known. Well, well, now we got a problem, you know, because now we're not Now now we're not talking about whether or not we're holding to the Apostolic traditions. We're talking about whether we're holding to the traditions of men, right yeah, robes on choirs, right right, Well we needed we got to do that. Well, why well, because because that's what we do. You know, there's a great story that I often tell, you know, we talking about tradition. First Baptist Church of Houston back in the This is back in the eighteen hundreds, and I think it may be written on the story of one of the pastors, you know, you go down that hallway and you see all the former pastors of First Baptists, you know, and guys from different eras or whatever. And that's an old, old church. And there was one pastor who is very controversial because the things that he tried to bring in to the church. And one thing that he tried to bring into the church, this contemporary thing he tried to bring into the church costs quite a star. And eventually the people took it out of the church and it was found floating in Buffalo by you. It was an organ. You see, there was a time and that was just considered completely out of line and too contemporary. Right nowadays we think of it as being old and traditional. Right, So do we need to have an organ? Do we need to not have an organ? That's not what we're talking about when we talk about Apostolic tradition, That's not what we mean. We need to sing together psalms Him spiritual songs. It's biblical to have musical instruments to help you sing those songs, hymn and spiritual songs. What kind of musical instruments? What has he given us right now? He's given us some folks who play the piano, who play the cello, who play the violin. You know, we're grateful to that, and it helps us to sing without drowning. You know, the building in sound great praise the Lord love that. You know. I wish you'd send us a viola, but he hasn't done it. You know. I wish we had somebody who cranked that thing up back there, but he hasn't done it, you know. And so we we you know, we we do what we have and we take on a character based on, you know, sort of what He's given us. So that's that. Does that Does that make sense? Does that answer your question? Okay? Yeah, yeah, yes, sir, it is ah okay. And he talks about preaching. Does there have to be a specific time in minutes or whatever for preaching. No, no, they didn't. Doesn't have to be a specific time in in terms of minutes or things like that. But you you're right in talking about the centrality of preaching. I mean, this is one of the hallmarks of the Reformation, is that the proclamation of the Gospel becomes central to what we do and that everything else is subservient to that. I mean that that's what we're that's what we're here for. You know that that's one of those ordinary means of grace that we're just we're just not going to do without it. And it's going to be central because of its nature, because of what it gives us that other things cannot. So it's going to be central. How much time it's given that, you know, that'll change. That changed that sometimes, that'll change from week to week. You know,