Stavanger Lectures: The Office of Pastor Lecture 1/2

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The first of two lectures given in Stavanger in October of 2024

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I would like to thank you all for coming. We've traveled a long way to come to Norway.
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This is my second time in Stavanger. I taught here, was it nine years ago? Nine years ago at one of the camp meetings, or something like that.
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And so the topic that we're going to be working from today has to do with the proper understanding of the priesthood of all believers.
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And unfortunately, there is great misunderstanding of what the priesthood of all believers is. And so what we're going to do is we're going to clear that up.
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But we're going to do it over the course of two lectures, tonight and tomorrow night.
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And tonight we're going to be working from the idea that there is a warning in the
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New Testament related to something in the Old Testament. It has to do with how
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God orders things within society, within the church. And so a good way to think of it is this.
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As an American, I struggle with understanding constitutional monarchies of our day.
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As an American, the President of the United States, he can say things. He's political.
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He has opinions. And he does things. And then when I look at the constitutional monarchies of Europe, my question is, what do they do?
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What does the king do? If you're familiar with the
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Netflix series called The Crown, they give you a behind -the -scenes look of what happens with the monarchy in the
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United Kingdom. And the monarch gets a box every day, and they have meetings once a week with the prime minister.
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But the monarch is expected to not be political, to not say, to not weigh in.
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That's for people to do in the parliament. But the king is not supposed to do things. And in fact, we know from European history, kings who become political, their monarchies disappear.
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They evaporate. And that's what happened in Spain in the 20th century.
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And so my question then is this. The church itself is a kingdom.
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But the king of the church, Christ, is not like the constitutional monarchs of Europe.
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He sets policy. He says things. He demands things.
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And to disobey him, there are consequences. And so what we're going to do tonight is we're going to look at a warning in Scripture that has everything to do with a proper understanding of what it is that King Jesus has established in the church, and the warning that he has given through one of the epistles of the
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New Testament. So I always like to teach things in context, and so you have the ability to follow along with me.
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But here's what Jude writes. Beloved, although I was very eager to write to you about our common salvation,
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I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints.
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And so we can see here this famous verse. It's often quoted by apologists, people like me.
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In fact, my YouTube channel, my podcast, is called Fighting for the
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Faith, and it comes from this verse. And so there's a way in which we are to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints.
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The idea then behind the once for all aspect of it is that Christianity doesn't change.
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The message doesn't get better. It's at its best iteration when it is first spoken.
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And so you'll note that the faithfulness that we are called to as Christians always hearkens us back to Christianity in its inception, in its beginnings.
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It doesn't mature. It's not like my operating system on my iPhone. My iPhone gets better and better every year, and I'm happy that it does.
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But Christianity doesn't need improving. It's the faith once for all delivered to the saints.
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And then he notes this. For certain people, they have crept in. They've gotten into the church.
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They are unnoticed, who long ago were designated for this condemnation, and they are described here as ungodly people who pervert the grace of our
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God into sensuality, and they deny our only master and Lord Jesus Christ.
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So Jude continues. I want to remind you that although you once fully knew it, that Jesus who saved a people out of the land of Egypt afterward destroyed those who did not believe.
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And I would note that this translation, that Jesus saved a people out of Egypt, this used to say that the
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Lord saved a people out of Egypt, but we've found older manuscripts, older fragments of the
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New Testament that testify that in the earliest copies of the
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Epistle of Jude, it didn't say Lord, it said Jesus. And so consider the implications then, that Jesus is the
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Lord who saved the people out of Egypt, but afterwards he destroyed those who did not believe.
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And the angels who did not stay within their position of authority but left their proper dwelling, he has kept in eternal chains under gloomy darkness until the judgment of the great day.
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Just as Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding cities, which likewise indulged in sexual immorality and pursued unnatural desire, they serve as an example by undergoing a punishment of eternal fire.
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Now a little bit of a side note here. Sometimes I get asked, why doesn't
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God punish those who are engaging in sins such as sodomy and the homosexual things like this?
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And the answer is given here is that God doesn't need to right now because Sodom and Gomorrah, if you would, are a foretaste of God's wrath that will come in the future.
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And so they serve as an example for us. God basically says, if somebody says, well, why aren't you punishing this?
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God says, I will, but I already have in the past, and if you want to know what's coming, then you look back into the
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Old Testament and you see that they serve as an example of God's wrath.
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So then talking about false teachers, in like manner, these people, these false teachers, they also rely on their dreams rather than the word of God.
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They defile the flesh, and here's kind of our focus here. They reject authority.
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Now, in the Christian church, a false teacher doesn't merely reject authority in general.
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They reject the authority of Christ and what he has established, and we'll talk about this.
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And they blaspheme the glorious ones. But when the archangel
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Michael, contending with the devil, was disputing about the body of Moses, he did not presume to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but he said, the
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Lord rebuke you. But these people, these false teachers, they blaspheme all that they do not understand.
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They are destroyed by all that they, like unreasoning animals, understand instinctively, and woe to them.
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Now, a little bit of a note here. So false teachers are then described as people who are like unreasoning animals.
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They think that what they believe instinctively is the truth and that that's the standard that should be taught in Christ's church.
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But Jude here says, woe to them. And woe is this very strong way of basically saying that they are cursed.
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And then he then lays out kind of three major archetypes of false teachers.
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And here they are. For they, these false teachers, they have walked in the way of Cain, they have abandoned themselves for the sake of gain to Balaam's error, and they have perished in Korah's rebellion.
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So three different types of false teacher. And if we were to consider them in order,
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Cain, think back to Cain and Abel. What is
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Jude getting at here? Well, you'll remember Cain, he had religious activity.
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But we learn from the book of Hebrews that Cain did not have faith. Abel had faith.
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And as it says in Hebrews, without faith it's impossible to please God. So Cain is the type of false teacher who basically says, come and light the candle.
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Make sure to put your money in the basket. Say the prayer, do the thing, and you will merit
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God's favor, God's grace, God's blessings. And that is a type of false teacher.
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Now the second type is the type I deal with on my video podcast very often, and that's the false prophet.
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Balaam was a prophet for profit. He would be willing to curse anybody in the name of any deity if the price was the correct price.
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So send in your seed offering to Balaam, and he'll make sure that somebody will get cursed for you.
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But we remember the story from Balaam that God put a tight leash on him and didn't allow him to curse the people of Israel because they were truly blessed.
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But the last one is one that relates then to the question of the priesthood of all believers.
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And it has to do with the mention here of Korah's rebellion.
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Korah's rebellion exists today. It doesn't exist in the exact same form that it existed in the
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Old Testament, but it is a rebellion against the offices that God has established within his church.
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It is a rebellion against the order that God has set up within his church, and as a result of it, it is not a rebellion against church.
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It is a rebellion against Christ. And so we're going to spend a little bit of groundwork today taking a look at the
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Old Testament account of Korah's rebellion and a similar text to it as it relates to God punishing
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King Uzziah. And we'll note then that this will have implications as we unpack this topic, especially when we get into what is the priesthood of all believers and what is the pastoral office and things like this, and note that Christ is the one who's established these things.
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So you'll note, coming back, Cain, Balaam, Korah, three major archetypes of false teacher and in our day, sometimes you get a little bit of mixing, sometimes you get a little bit of Cain with Korah, sometimes you get a little
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Balaam with Korah, and sometimes you might even get all three. But the idea here is by paying attention to these archetypes from the
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Old Testament, we then learn that God here is warning us through Jude's epistle in the time of the
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New Testament to not participate in Korah's rebellion. So the question is, what does it look like?
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The text in question is found in Numbers 16. Now, for a little bit of context's sake, it's important for us to recognize something here, is that in Numbers 16, we're not given the exact timeline as to when
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Korah's rebellion took place. It's in an unspecified time. More than likely, the biblical scholars tell us, that this was after God had
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Moses ordain Aaron and his sons into the priesthood.
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And if you remember, that it was only the Levites who were permitted to be priests, and not every
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Levite could be a priest. And so when we take a look at some of the details as it related to the uniform that God created for the high priest, you can see how then this might have had an annoying effect on people when they misunderstood what was happening.
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So let me back up a little bit in the context. Here's what it says in Exodus chapter 28.
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God said, bring near to you Aaron, his brother, and his sons with him from among the people of Israel to serve me as priests.
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Aaron and Aaron's sons, Nadab and Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar, and you shall make holy garments for Aaron, your brother, for glory and for beauty.
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You shall speak to all the skillful whom I have filled with a spirit of skill that they may make
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Aaron's garment to consecrate him for my priesthood. These are the garments that they shall make, a breastpiece, an ephod, a robe, a coat of checkerwork, a turban, a sash.
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They shall make holy garments for Aaron, your brother, and his sons to serve me as priests.
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They shall receive gold, blue, and purple, and scarlet yarns, and fine twine linen.
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Does this sound like an expensive uniform? That was kind of the point.
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But here's the thing. Think about human nature for a minute. When somebody gets to put on something this spectacular, we human beings oftentimes become jealous.
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And we lash out against such things because this person is getting all the attention.
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They are being treated like they're special, whereas me, well, no, I'm just, I'm chopped liver.
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I must not be important. And so this creates problems. So here's then note that Aaron has most likely been ordained, has already received this very elaborate and expensive and beautiful uniform that God put him into the office of high priest in.
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And some of the other Levites were not happy about it. Not just any
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Levites, but the heads of the different clans within the tribe of Levi. They were very upset.
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And here's how the text reads. Korah, the son of Ishar, the son of Koah, the son of Levi, and Dathan and Abram, the sons of Eliab and On, the son of Peleth, the sons of Reuben, took men and they rose up before Moses with a number of the people of Israel, 250 chiefs of the congregation.
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So these are all the leaders of these clans. Chosen from the assembly, well -known men.
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This is a who's who among the Levites. They assembled themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and they said to them, you have gone too far.
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Isn't that an interesting claim? And then watch what happens next. For all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and Yahweh is among them.
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Why do you exalt yourselves above the assembly of Yahweh?
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This sounds like an early form of the tall poppy thing, right? They were accusing
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Aaron and his sons of being tall poppies. And they were accusing them of exalting themselves.
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But if you know your Bible, they did nothing of the sort. They didn't exalt themselves.
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God placed them into the offices that God had established for the worship and for the sacrifices in God's church, and God chose the uniform.
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God created the office. God created the requirements for people to fill that office and also came up with limitations as to what they can do in that office and how old they can be before they had to vacate that office.
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God put all of that in the Old Testament. So the charge, via the question, why then do you exalt yourselves, this is slander.
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This is a breaking of the Eighth Commandment. You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
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But the question then is who? Who were these men really rebelling against?
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Well, when Moses heard this, he fell on his face and he said to Korah and all of his company, in the morning
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Yahweh will show who is his and who is holy and will bring him near to him.
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The one whom he chooses, he will bring near to him.
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So note, what Korah said is that everybody's holy. Why are you making yourself holier than the rest of us?
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But that's not what was going on. So at this point, they're behaving in an ungodly way.
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The one whom God chooses, he will bring near to him. So do this, take the censers, Korah and all of his company, put fire in them and put incense on them before Yahweh tomorrow and the man whom
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Yahweh chooses shall be the holy one. You have gone too far, you sons of Levi.
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And Moses said to Korah, hear now you sons of Levi, is it too small a thing for you that the
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God of Israel has separated you from the congregation of Israel to bring you near to himself to do service in the tabernacle of Yahweh and to stand before the congregation to minister to them and that he has brought you near to him and all your brothers, the sons of Levi, with you and would you seek the priesthood also?
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So note, God has already given to the Levites an office, has already given to them tasks and duties and they were seeking even more.
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They wanted, if you would, the high priesthood for themselves as well.
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And so you'll note, they were out of their depth. They were seeking for something that God had not given to them and worse, they were claiming that Aaron had irrigated that office to himself, that he was the one who invented it, right?
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Therefore, it is against Yahweh that you and all of your company have gathered together. What is
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Aaron? That you grumble against him. And there's the rub. And this is exactly what
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Jude was talking about in his epistle about those who reject authority, is that those who reject the biblical pastoral offices of presbyter as bishop, that in doing so and equating that with the priesthood of all believers, they're not rejecting the authority of an ecclesiastical body like the
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Roman Catholic Church or the Lutheran Church. They're rejecting what God has established and their complaint is actually against God.
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They're rejecting His authority. We continue. How does the story resolve?
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So Moses sent to call Dathan and Abram, the sons of Eliab, and they said, we will not come.
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Is it a small thing that you have brought us up out of the land flowing with milk and honey to kill us in the wilderness, that you must also make yourself a prince over us?
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There it is with that tall poppy syndrome again, right? And wow, what a claim.
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And you'll note that everything in their way of thinking is backwards. When they were in slavery in Egypt, was
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Egypt the land flowing with milk and honey? Not even close. People would say they're gaslighting at this point.
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This is how bad the lies are. And then to claim that Moses had made himself a prince over the people of Israel is even more ludicrous.
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Scripture says very clearly that Moses was a very, very humble man. Moreover, you have not brought us into a land with milk and honey, nor given us inheritance of fields and vineyards.
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Will you put out the eyes of these men? We will not come up. And Moses was very angry and said to Yahweh, do not respect their offering.
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I have not taken one donkey from them, and I have not harmed one of them.
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So Moses said to Korah, be present, you and all of your company before Yahweh, you and they and Aaron tomorrow, and let every one of you take his censer and put incense on it, and every one of you bring before Yahweh his censer, 250 censers, you also and Aaron each his censer.
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So every man took his censer, put fire in them, laid incense on them, and stood at the entrance of the tent of meeting with Moses and Aaron.
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Then Korah assembled all the congregation against them at the entrance of the tent of meeting, and the glory of Yahweh appeared to all the congregation.
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And Yahweh spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, separate yourselves from among this congregation, that I may consume them in a moment.
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And they fell on their faces and said, O God, the God of the spirits of all flesh, shall one man sin and you be angry with all the congregation?
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And Yahweh spoke to Moses, saying, say to the congregation, get away from the dwelling of Korah, Dathan, and Abram.
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And then Moses rose and went to Dathan and Abram, and the elders of Israel followed him.
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And he spoke to the congregation, saying, depart, please, from the tents of these wicked men, and touch nothing of theirs, lest you be swept away with all of their sins.
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So they got away from the dwelling of Korah, Dathan, and Abram.
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And Dathan and Abram came out and stood at the door of their tents together with their wives, their sons, and their little ones.
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And Moses said, hereby you shall know that Yahweh has sent me to do all these works, and that it has not been of my own accord.
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If these men die as all men die, or if they are visited by the fate of all mankind, then
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Yahweh has not sent me. But if Yahweh creates something new, and the ground opens its mouth and swallows them up with all that belongs to them, and they go down alive into Sheol, then you shall know that these men have despised
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Yahweh. And as soon as he had finished speaking all these words, the ground under them split apart, the earth opened its mouth and swallowed them up with their households and all the people who belonged to Korah and all their goods, so that they and all that belonged to them went down alive into Sheol.
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And the earth closed over them, and they perished from the midst of the assembly. And then all of Israel, who were around them, fled at their cry, for they said,
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Bless the earth, swallow us up. And fire came out from Yahweh and consumed the 250 men offering the incense.
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And then the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, Tell Eliezer, the son of Aaron, the priest, to take up the censers out of the blaze and scatter the fire afar and wide, for they have become holy.
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And as for the censers of these men who have sinned at the cost of their lives, let them be made into hammered plates as a covering for the altar, for they offered them before Yahweh, and they became holy.
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Thus they shall be assigned to the people of Israel. Note, these unholy men perished, the censers remained, and the fire of God, then the fire that consumed these men made their censers holy, so they had to be consecrated properly because of it.
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So Eliezer the priest took the bronze censers, which those who were burned had offered, and they were hammered out as a covering for the altar to be a reminder to the people of Israel so that no outsider who is not of the descendants of Aaron should draw near to burn incense before Yahweh, lest he become like Korah and his company, as Yahweh said to him through Moses.
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But on the next day, all of the congregation, and they have still a lesson to learn here, all of the congregation of the people of Israel, they grumbled against Moses and Aaron and saying, you have killed the people of Yahweh.
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Man, these are thick -headed people. But aren't we all, right? And you'll note that now they're blaming
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Moses for what happened. I love Ambrose of Milan's comments on this passage. He noted, he thought it was very appropriate that the earth would swallow up Korah and those in the rebellion with him because their teaching, their doctrines, their ideas were of the earth rather than of God and of heaven.
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And so it was very appropriate that the earth swallowed them up. And I would note, Moses didn't have anything to do with how they died.
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They died because God chose to have them die in this way, but yet they're blaming Moses.
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So when the congregation assembled against Moses, they said, so they grumbled saying, you have killed the people of Yahweh.
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And when the congregation had assembled against Moses and against Aaron, they turned toward the tent of meeting and behold, the cloud covered it and the glory of Yahweh appeared.
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And Moses and Aaron came to the front of the tent of meeting. The Lord spoke to Moses saying, get away from the midst of this congregation so that I might consume them in a moment.
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God is getting ready to kill them all for the rebellion. And they fell on their faces.
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And Moses said to Aaron, take your censer, put fire on it from off of the altar, lay incense on it and carry it quickly to the congregation and make atonement for them.
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For wrath has gone out from Yahweh. The plague has begun. And so what is it that saves the people?
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Aaron in his office. God is having Aaron in his office, do the duties of the high priest.
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And by so doing, have them be atoned for in the rebellion against God.
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So Aaron took it as Moses said, ran into the midst of the assembly and behold, the plague had already begun among the people.
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And he put on the incense and made atonement for the people. And he stood between the dead and the living and the plague was stopped.
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Now those who died in the plague were 14 ,700 besides those who died in the affair of Korah.
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And Aaron returned to Moses at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting when the plague was stopped.
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So, that's the Old Testament story that's referenced in Jude.
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And Jude, warning us about false teachers, says that they walk in the way of Cain, they abandon themselves for the sake of gain, that's money, to Balaam's error, and they perished in Korah's rebellion.
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And Jude here is not referring to merely Korah in the past.
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He is warning that to contend for the faith once for all delivered to the saints is to recognize in our day those who are participating in Korah's rebellion, who are rejecting the authority of Christ and taking for themselves authority that they do not have regardless of whether their rhetoric seems plausible or not.
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I would note, false teachers more than often sound very plausible.
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They'll say things like, we don't need somebody to go to seminary and to study the
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Bible because when that person goes and comes back they think they're better than we are. And they're not better than we are.
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We believe in the priesthood of all believers. And they'll say things like this, right? But that's a failure to make a distinction.
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It is true that all Christians are priests. But it is not true to talk about pastors as being priests.
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I know that's going to sound weird. We're going to have to talk about that because where does the term priest come from?
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I always find it weird when I travel to other countries and they'll talk about pastors as being priests.
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Well, there's a reason for it. And it's not what it appears on the surface. It's because of the Greek. We'll talk more about that as we go.
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Now, let me show you a similar cross -reference to this. And that is the story of King Uzziah.
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King Uzziah, we learn in 2 Chronicles 26, was a good king in Israel.
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And he started off young. But here's the thing. Do members of the tribe of Judah have the right to offer sacrifices in the temple of God?
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The answer is no, they don't. They do not because God has made it very clear the only people who are permitted to offer sacrifices in the temple of God are the sons of Levi.
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And of the sons of Judah, that's a different tribe altogether.
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And so you'll note that in the book of Hebrews when it describes Jesus as our great high priest,
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He is not a high priest in the order of the sons of Levi. He is a high priest in the order of Melchizedek.
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So that is very important that you make these distinctions. So Uzziah, who is the rightly anointed king of Israel of the tribe of Judah, does not have the authority to do the priestly duties that God has reserved only for the
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Levites. This also serves as an example for us. And you'll note then, today, really heavy on the law.
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But when we talk about the pastoral office, that's where the gospel's gonna come into play.
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And there's a hint at it we saw in the story of Korah, but here's how it goes in 2 Chronicles.
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I'm not gonna read all of this, but I want you to get the basics. All of the people of Judah, they took
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Uzziah, who was 16 years old, and they made him king instead of his father, Amaziah.
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He built Eilath and restored it to Judah. And after the king slept with his father,
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Uzziah was 16 years old when he began to reign, and he reigned for 52 years in Jerusalem.
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His mother's name was Jechaliah of Jerusalem, and he did what was right in the eyes of Yahweh according to all that his father
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Amaziah had done. He set himself to seek God in the days of Zechariah, who instructed him in the fear of God, and as long as he sought
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Yahweh, God made him prosper. These are good words, and you'll note that the kings of Judah, many of them were scoundrels.
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Many of them departed from the ways of God and did not follow in the ways of David at all.
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They followed in the ways of the pagans and those who worshipped idols. And so this sounds like a good thing, and you'll note that he was receiving instruction from Zechariah.
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This is a good pedigree. But the story continues and ends quite tragically for Uzziah.
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When Uzziah was strong, 2 Chronicles 26 .16 tells us, he grew proud and to his destruction, for he was unfaithful to Yahweh his
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God, and he entered the temple of Yahweh to burn incense on the altar of incense.
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But Azariah the priest went in after him with 80 priests of Yahweh who were men of valor.
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So you can see what's going on here. Uzziah is figuring, I love
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God. I worship God. Why can't I offer incense to Yahweh in the temple?
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Answer, because you're not of the tribe of Levi, and God has made it very clear only, only the sons of Levi are permitted to do this.
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So the priest Azariah, he's now put into the awkward position of having to rebuke the monarch.
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And you'll note the text describes Azariah and the 80 priests who were there that day as men of valor because they had the courage to rebuke
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Uzziah. So they withstood King Uzziah, and they said to him, it is not for you
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Uzziah to burn incense to Yahweh, but for the priests, the sons of Aaron who are consecrated to burn incense.
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You go out of the sanctuary for you have done wrong, and it will bring you no honor from Yahweh Elohim.
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So then Uzziah was angry, and he had a censer in his hand to burn incense.
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This sounds like the sons of Korah, right? And when he became angry with the priests, leprosy broke out on his forehead in the presence of the priests in the house of Yahweh by the altar of incense.
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And Azariah, the chief priest, and all the priests looked at him, and behold, he was leprous in his forehead.
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And they rushed him out quickly, and he himself hurried to go out because Yahweh had struck him.
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And King Uzziah was a leper to the day of his death, and being a leper lived in a separate house, for he was excluded from the house of Yahweh.
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And Jotham his son was over the king's household, governing the people of the land.
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You'll note that God was merciful to Uzziah by not killing him the way he did
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Korah, but you'll note also, because God struck him with leprosy, he was considered unclean for the rest of his life.
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He was separated from the worship community of Israel as long as he was alive. And that was his punishment for believing that he had the right to do something in an office he had not been placed in.
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God establishes offices within the church. God established the offices of the
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Old Testament, and Christ has established the offices of the New. And you'll note that stories like this are written for our instruction.
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They are written so that we can learn from their mistakes, so that we can take these things to heart.
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The Apostle Paul makes this very clear in his epistles, that these things were written for our instruction.
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And the fact that Jude in the New Testament invokes the story of Korah is important, and this is a related story.
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So the idea then is that King Jesus, in his kingdom, in his church, has set up particular rules.
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He's set up particular offices. He's the one who gets to call the shots, not me, not you, not anybody else.
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And we as Christians dare not reject Christ's authority.
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To do so, we have bad examples in the Scripture of Korah and of Uzziah, of men who've rejected this authority of God and have done so to their own demise.
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And so we need to keep that in mind. And you'll note that we've all, in many ways, sinned against God.
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And so you'll note that when these things come at us and we sit there and we go, oh, I've done wrong by thinking this way, that's a good way to think.
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Of course you have. I've done that, you've done that. And so what do we do then as Christians? First, we repent.
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We cry out to God to have mercy on us. We pray daily as Christ has taught us to pray.
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Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. And then we hear the words of the
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Gospel that Christ has died even for these sins and he offers us his forgiveness, his pardon, his peace, his grace, all as a gift because of what he's won for us on the cross.
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And so then what is called for in the question of what is the priesthood of all believers?
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This is a careful look at Scripture. What then is it that Christ has established within the church to build up the body of Christ, to strengthen the faith of the saints, to care for them, to watch over their souls, that Christ has established particular things.
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And you're going to note then that this doesn't make pastors or presbyters better than us because only
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Christians are priests. All Christians are priests, the Scriptures teach, but not everybody is called to be an overseer or a shepherd or a presbyter or a bishop.
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Those are things that are established by Christ for the purpose of equipping and caring for the priests.
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But that being the case, only certain people are qualified to do so.
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And so we must pay attention to the details of Scripture as to how that lays out. And so I think a good place to then start here is with the text then that relates to the concept of the priesthood of all believers.
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In 1 Peter 2, the Apostle Peter writes, but you, y 'all, all of you,
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Christians, you are a chosen race, genos, and a royal priesthood.
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You are a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.
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Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people. Once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
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So when you look at this statement in its context, there's so much more that Peter is saying than merely that we are all priests.
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He's pointing out to the fact that we have been called out of darkness, and being called out of darkness, out of Satan's dominion, we have been brought in then as a chosen race, as chosen ethnos.
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And this is where it's important that we recognize what Paul writes in this regard, and that is that everybody who is in Christ, who has the same faith as Abraham, whether they be
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Norwegian, or Americans, or Swedes, or Germans, or they're from sub -Saharan
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Africa, everybody who has the same faith as Abraham is counted as Abraham's children.
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And if somebody is a genetic descendant of Abraham, but they do not have
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Abraham's faith, God does not reckon them as children of Abraham. In Galatians, they are reckoned as children of Hagar, children of the slave woman.
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So that being the case, you'll note then that all of us, we have been grafted into Israel. We do not replace
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Israel. We are all grafted in, as Paul says in the book of Romans. And so that is how we are then a chosen ethnos, a chosen nation, and together then, all
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Christians comprise what is called the royal priesthood. We are all priests, and then you'll note then that every
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Christian, as a priest, is called to proclaim the excellencies of Christ, the one who has called us out of darkness into his marvelous light.
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This is not reserved only for those who hold the pastoral office.
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All Christians share the good news. All Christians can tell their neighbors of the love of Christ.
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All Christians are called to proclaim Christ's excellencies and to tell their neighbors of the good things that Christ has done for them and to call them to repentance that they may have faith as well.
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But that does not mean that all Christians have the right, given by Christ, to then deliver a sermon when the church gathers together.
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And if you just take this passage by itself and say, well, we're all priests, that misses the rest of the story.
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A good way to think about it is this, is that in the United States, and I'm sure here in Norway and other countries as well, there is a growing number of church bodies that are ordaining women to the pastoral office.
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And the issue here is one of what does the Scripture say? Are women qualified to be in the pastoral office or not?
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And they will quote a passage from the book of Galatians that says, well, in Christ there is neither
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Jew nor Greek. There is neither slave nor free. And there is neither male nor female, so we can have female priests.
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We can have female pastors. But the issue is this, is that that text is not addressing who's qualified to be a pastor.
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Who Christ, you know, it doesn't tell us who's qualified or disqualified. That is merely telling us that God is not partial.
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He doesn't play favorites. He doesn't sit there and go, the men I like, the women not so much, right?
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The Jews I really like, but the Greeks, nah, nah. They're okay. They're lesser citizens in the kingdom.
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The point that Paul was making in Galatians is that we are all equal in the eyes of God.
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But that doesn't mean that we all hold equal offices. A good way to put it is this, is that,
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I'm assuming that you guys have a government here in Norway, right? And you elect people to go to your capital and represent you, right?
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Are your elected officials, the people you send to your parliament, are they more
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Norwegian than you are? No. They're just as Norwegian as you.
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Are they more, do they enjoy more liberty, more freedom, more protection under the law than you do?
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No. They're equally protected under the law, right? But you can't just show up in your capital and go to the parliament and say,
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I'm gonna vote today, you know, because we're all equal. That's not how it works, right? You elected the person that then represents you in your parliament, and that person has filled that office for this area.
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We have a similar thing in the United States. We have senators. We get two of them for every one of our states.
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And then we have different congressmen. In the state of North Dakota where I live, we only get one congressman.
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We have two senators, but only one congressman. There's like 900 ,000 people in the state of North Dakota for the whole state.
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And so we don't have enough for a second congressman. But here's the thing. If I were to show up in Washington, D .C.
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and say, well, he's not better than I am, and so I'm gonna vote today, and he can sit out, they would arrest me.
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And the reason being is because I'd lost my marbles, right? So the idea then is this, is that to sit here and say that the priesthood of all believers makes us all equal to deliver sermons, all equal to administer the sacraments, all equal to equip the saints, that is a category error.
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It is true that we are all priests. Undeniable. And every
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Christian has the right and the responsibility to proclaim the excellencies of Christ, but that doesn't mean that every
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Christian can then fill the pastoral office. It has a very specific function and a purpose.
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And then we are warned in the New Testament against Korah's rebellion.
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And so to despise the offices that God has set up is to despise Christ himself.
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This is how we understand this, okay? So it is true. We are all members of the priesthood of all believers.
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This is most certainly true. That doesn't mean that we're all pastors. Now, I'm going to show you something here.
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In the history of the book of Acts, and this is an important passage, we learn something about how the apostles acted and what they did.
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In the book of Acts, chapter 14, the Apostle Paul is in the city of Lystra.
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And here's what it says. Jews came from Antioch and Iconium. Having persuaded the crowds, they stoned
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Paul, dragged him out of the city, supposing that he was dead. So the Apostle Paul, you'll note that he had a rough life.
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He did not have his best life now. And despite his decreeing and declaring to the opposite, he ended up suffering terribly.
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And I have to admit that being stoned to the point where people thought you were dead had to be an unpleasant experience, right?
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So the disciples, they gathered around him. He rose up. He entered the city. On the next day, he went on with Barnabas to Derbe.
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And when they had preached the gospel to that city and made many disciples, they returned to Lystra and to Iconium and to Antioch, strengthening the souls of the disciples, encouraging them to continue in the faith, and saying that through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.
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And when they had appointed elders for them in every church with prayer and fasting, they committed them to the
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Lord in whom they had believed. This is not a very well -known passage, but this text specifically says that for the building up of these congregations that the
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Apostle Paul planted through his preaching of the gospel, what they ended up doing was appointing elders.
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And here you have one of the first occurrences in the New Testament of the word presbyteros, right?
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And this, I have it on really good authority, is the reason why many pastors are called priests.
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It comes from presbyteroi. That's where this comes from. And so these are elders in the church.
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Now, a little bit of a note on this word here in the Greek. Let me pull this one up, because this was an interesting one.
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Kerataneo, okay? Notice it says to elect or choose for definitive office or tasks.
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And so the kerataneo has as its implication the idea that they didn't merely just say, all right, we need somebody to be a pastor here, we need somebody to be an elder, you over here, come on up, you're gonna be a pastor, and you over there, you're gonna be a pastor.
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The idea here behind the Greek verb kerataneo is that they appointed them by having an election.
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They appointed them through the voting of the peoples in the congregation.
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They found men that they thought would fulfill these offices, and then those congregations knew who these men were, knew whether they were true
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Christians, they bore the fruit of the Spirit and things like this. And so the idea here, it's not merely an appointing by selecting, they're elected to the offices.
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There's a suffraging going on here. And so that's one of the implications of this particular verb, and that's a very good way to think about it.
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Now, the reason I bring this up then is that when you read the church's history and the writings of the church fathers, you study patristics, what we find is that contrary to the practices of Rome today, bishops and presbyters were chosen differently than they're chosen today by Rome.
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And here's what the church's practice was. So somebody would go and preach the gospel. They would preach the gospel in this area, and God, through the preaching of the
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Word, would make Christians. And then there was a congregation. It may have been a small congregation, but then the idea then is that they would then put people into the pastoral office.
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And so the idea then is they would make an elder or they would make a bishop. If there was nobody else, the guy would be the bishop, and he would have to plant other churches, and he would be like the guy in charge.
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And what was the common practice then is that in different cities you had different congregations, but you had one particular congregation that became known as the seat of the bishop.
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And this is where the bishop was also the presbyter. He served the congregation through preaching and administering the sacraments, and then he oversaw the other congregations and their pastors, and he would send people to them.
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But here's what would then happen. When the bishop died in that particular area, then all the congregations would come together, and they would send their delegates, maybe a pastor and a delegate of the lay people, and they would then elect the next bishop.
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This is very different than the way Rome does it today. The Roman pontiff basically says that he's the one who gets to choose these things.
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But the congregations always chose them. The congregations were the ones who said, we want this fellow to be our bishop.
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And so by appointing him as the bishop, he would then in turn, he would be the one who would send pastors to the different congregations, the presbyteroi.
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He would send them, and so there was this wonderful cycle. The congregations would elect the bishop, the bishop would send the pastors, and then together they would all hold everybody accountable.
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There was no papacy. There was no prime bishop who had authority over everybody.
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And when you read the writings of the church councils, there were plenty of church councils where the bishop of Rome wasn't even present.
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And so this is how this worked. And so here we got that verb again.
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They appointed elders, elected is probably the better reading of it.
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And so the apostles, they appointed, they elected elders for them in every church with prayer and fasting, and then they committed these men to the
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Lord in whom they had believed. And so we can see here something interesting going on.
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The question then is that why, if the church is full of all priests, of the priesthood of all believers, why didn't they just open up the pulpit to everybody?
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The reason why they didn't is because that's not how Christ set it up. The way the apostles set it up is exactly the way
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Christ wanted it set up. And so this is where we have to pay attention to one thing.
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In our day and age, we have what's called the New Apostolic Reformation. And the New Apostolic Reformation is in the
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Charismatic and the Pentecostal churches. And their claim is that in the early 2000s, so about 20 years ago now,
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God restored apostles on the earth. This is their claim. And in the late 80s,
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God apparently restored prophets to the church as well. And so now we have modern -day apostles and modern -day prophets and things like this.
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But this is silly. This is nonsense on its face.
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Because in order to be an apostle, and we're gonna know of a specific type, an apostle of Jesus Christ, Christ himself had to choose you.
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And apostles back in Jesus' day, the apostles that Jesus chose, had the authority to speak for Christ.
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They spoke with his authority. They were sent as Christ's emissaries with his authority, and they can give commands on behalf of Christ.
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Let me give you a text that kind of bears this out. It's a very unpopular text today, but it's an important one.
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In 1 Corinthians 14, the apostle Paul is correcting the disorderly conduct and worship taking place in the church at Corinth.
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And they're misusing the gifts of the Spirit, and there's all kinds of problems, and you can read about it.
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But here's what the apostle Paul's solution was to the disorderly worship at the church of Corinth.
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He put order in place. He put order there. So here's what he says.
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So what then, brothers? When you come together, and this is coming together then as the church, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation.
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Let all things be done for building up. If any speak in a tongue, let there be only two, or at the most three, each in turn, and let somebody interpret.
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I would note that as an English speaker here in Norway, at the beginning of our time tonight, you were all speaking in tongues.
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The Norwegian one, for sure. And I must confess,
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I do not know any Norwegian. So everything you were singing and saying, as beautiful as it sounded,
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I didn't understand it at all. And so the idea then is that when the church gathers together for the divine service, when it gathers together as the church, where two or more gathered
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Christ is present, then the idea is that everything has to be done in a way to build up the church.
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If there is no one to interpret then, each one of them is to keep silent in church, and this is not a church service, we're just meeting tonight to discuss things, and speak to himself and to God.
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So let two or three prophets speak and let others weigh what is said. If a revelation is made to another sitting there, let the first be silent, for you can all prophesy one by one, so that all may learn and be encouraged, and the spirits of the prophets are subject to the prophets, for God is not a
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God of confusion but of peace. But here's the next part of this, and I want you to consider this. The Apostle Paul was an apostle of Jesus Christ.
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He can and did speak with Jesus' authority and made it very clear that some of the things that he was saying, he wanted to emphasize, this is not me commanding this, this is
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Christ himself, and here's where it comes next. As in all the churches of the saints, the women should keep silent in the churches.
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They are not permitted to speak. They should be in submission, as the law also says.
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If there is anything they desire to learn, let them ask their husbands at home for it is shameful for a woman to speak in church.
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Now, a lot of people, this is as far as they go, and then they give an argument that goes something like this. Well, the Apostle Paul, he hated women.
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He was one of these people who just had a problem with women. This is a cultural thing.
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We don't need to obey this. We can just ignore Paul, they say. But I say, keep reading.
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There's more. You'll note the next word is or.
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That's a conjunction. That means it's connected to what came before it.
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Or, was it from you that the word of God came? Or, are you the only ones it has reached?
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And then he says this. If anyone thinks that he is a prophet, or spiritual, he should acknowledge that the things
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I am writing to you are a command of the Lord. If anyone does not recognize this, he is not recognized.
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So the Apostle Paul makes it very clear that the prohibition that is in place that prohibits women from preaching in the church is not because the
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Apostle Paul hates women. It's a command of Jesus, which means the
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Apostle Paul is making it clear that Christ calls the shots as to how things are done in his church.
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And that means that every single woman that is a
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Christian, that is a member of the priesthood of all believers, is forbidden by Christ to preach in the church.
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That rules out the priesthood of all believers, then basic saying, we can have anybody preach. No, we can't.
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We can't because Jesus says no. Not Paul. Jesus says no.
01:00:02
And so already, we can see that in practice then, the idea that, well, the priesthood of all believers means that anybody can preach, male or female.
01:00:12
It doesn't matter. If they're brand new to the faith, or they've been a Christian for decades, it doesn't matter.
01:00:18
All can preach. All can share the gospel and preach among us. No, they can't.
01:00:26
Half the congregation is forbidden by Jesus from preaching.
01:00:32
And I would note, when we look at the rest of the Scripture in this regard tomorrow night, we're going to see that the only people that are permitted to preach in Christ's church is a small number, not a big number.
01:00:46
And already we've eliminated half. And this is not Paul's bigotry.
01:00:53
This is Christ's command. And so we come back then to the main point for tonight.
01:01:00
Jesus is king. And he, unlike the monarchs of Europe, speaks.
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He gives commands. And the church is required and beholdened to recognize
01:01:15
Jesus' authority in the church. And we dare not challenge his authority because we have great examples in the
01:01:24
Scriptures of those who have challenged God's authority with their plausible sounding arguments that sound a lot like people saying, well, the priesthood of all believers and God acting in judgment against them.
01:01:37
And so we need to repent of any ideas like that and bend the knee to King Jesus.
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And where we haven't, ask him to forgive. And he will because he's bled and died for all of these sins.
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And that's where we'll end off tonight and we'll open it up for questions. Any questions?
01:02:13
Okay. Then Lord willing, we'll reconvene for the rest of the teaching on this tomorrow night.
01:02:21
Okay, sure. Ingvar, please.
01:03:22
So how would you respond to that? So I would note it's a misappropriation if you were to sit there and say, well, it's different now because we're in the
01:03:30
New Testament. And I would sit there and say, yes, it's different. The offices are different. The principle of not rejecting
01:03:37
God's authority is the same. To reject God's authority is to break the first commandment.
01:03:45
And you'll note that, I would note it's very common when it comes to people who are engaging in Korah's rebellion to not only break the first commandment, you shall have no other gods.
01:03:56
They are asserting their own authority over God's authority and impugning to God that you don't have a right to do this to us.
01:04:04
But they oftentimes break the eighth commandment along the way as well and bearing false witness against neighbors.
01:04:10
And we saw that in spades in Korah's rebellion. And I would note, I've seen this play out in real life, that those who are engaging in today's modern day version of Korah's rebellion oftentimes speak slanderously of the men whom
01:04:24
Christ has called into the pastoral office. So you'll note today we dealt with the negative side of this.
01:04:30
But I would note tomorrow night when we get to the positive side of this, I would sit there and go,
01:04:37
I just said women cannot be part of the pastoral office. And there's a really good reason for that.
01:04:44
And that is because in Christ's way of looking at authority in the church, those who are given offices of authority are to be at the bottom, not the top.
01:04:56
But the thing is is that we, in our sinful nature, we think the top is the top when in reality, the way the world thinks of power, the top is the bottom.
01:05:06
And in Christ's kingdom, the bottom is really the top. Everything's backwards and upside down.
01:05:11
And so one of the things I tell women at Kongsvinger is that, listen,
01:05:18
I'm here as your slave and I would never ask you to be mine because Christ wants me to serve you.
01:05:25
And when we talk about the different symbols of the pastoral office, like the clerical collar,
01:05:31
I wear this particular type and I always instruct my congregation that the reason why
01:05:37
I wear this particular type of clerical collar, it's a visual reminder that this is a slave shackle and I'm the water boy of the church.
01:05:47
Okay, I'm the servant of the congregation. I'm not the Lord of it. And so when we look at the positive side of this tomorrow and how this all works out and the way
01:05:57
Christ has set things up, then we will recognize that this office is there to serve the church, to equip the church, to comfort the church, and that these restrictions that Christ has put on the pastoral office are for our comfort not to be lorded over.
01:06:16
Any pastor who lords himself over others is abusing his authority and needs to be run out of the office.
01:06:23
I would note that, but we'll get more into that tomorrow night. Good question. Did I answer it, by the way?
01:06:28
Okay, good. What was that? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
01:06:36
Indeed. Indeed. Yep. All right. Bishop Mastry.