Ordination Examination Of Pastor Steve Cooley

Ordination and the Charge to Test Elders Carefully

If you have your Bibles, turn to 1 Timothy chapter 5. I don't want to preach a sermon tonight, but I want to just frame what we're doing tonight. How many people have been to an ordination examination before?

Okay, good. How many have not? Many. All right, great. I'm so glad you came out tonight. What a thrill this is to be a part of it. 1 Timothy chapter 5 is a pastoral epistle, and it tells us, as elders, what to do in a church.

And let me just read verses 17 through 22, and then make a couple comments about ordination. What is it, and why are we doing this tonight? Paul said, under the inspiration of the Spirit of God, in 1 Timothy 5 verse 17, The elders who rule well are to be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who work hard at preaching and teaching.

For the Scripture says, You shall not muzzle the ox while he is threshing, and the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not receive an accusation against an elder except on the basis of two or three witnesses.

Those who continue in sin rebuke in the presence of all, so that the rest also will be fearful of sinning. I solemnly charge you, in the presence of God, even of Christ Jesus and of His chosen angels, to maintain these principles without bias, doing nothing in a spirit of partiality.

And then verse 22 for tonight, Do not lay hands, Timothy, upon anyone too hastily, and thereby share responsibility for the sins of others. Keep yourself free from sin. Tonight we have the privilege of examining Steve Cooley.

And what we have done tonight is we have asked several men to examine him, his life, doctrine, devotion, three particular categories, theology, methodology, and doxology. That is to say, what Steve believes, how he puts that belief into practice, and then how that relates to the praise and glory of God.

As I call the panelists, if you'd just come and sit in this order of examination, tonight we first have Dr. Ted Bigelow from Calvary Church. You used to be at Calvary Church? From Grace Church, excuse me.

I still like the name Calvary. It's a good one. And Ted is here from Connecticut. We've had the privilege of serving with Ted and serving Ted. We have Pastor Dave Jeffries, one of our own. Dave, if you could come.

Dr. Joe Cardamone from Lancaster. Where is Joe today? Good. Elder Louis Brown. And then myself. I'll sit down in just a minute. Each one of these men tonight will be given 15 minutes of questions for Steve Cooley.

And Steve will stand here and he'll respond to the questions. If he knows the answer, he'll give his answer. If he doesn't know the answer, then he should say, I don't know that answer. And you can learn a lot about a man by what he doesn't say, right?

And what we want to do is we want to test him. Steve has already served here faithfully in the church for two years. And then after about a two-year time period, we like to then publicly examine that man with outside elders and pastors.

And we want to be careful to do what the Scripture tells us to do. In this particular case, not to do. In verse 22, do not lay hands on anyone too hastily. When you are charged in the gospel ministry, it is a very serious commission.

And we want to test Steve not only here at the church for the last two years, as you have received his shepherding and teaching, but also now we want to examine him in theology, methodology and doxology because it is important for us to have preachers and teachers who teach sound doctrine.

Yes? Could there be anything more important? So tonight these men will examine Steve. And then afterwards we'll excuse ourselves and we'll vote and decide whether we'd like to ordain Steve or send him back to California.

Sometimes I throw in a little comic relief. It is a very stressful time. I remember when I was ordained, it was hard to sleep. I wanted to honor the Lord. Tonight is not about, by the way, how much Steve knows and how eloquent he can be and how he can give every answer with alliteration.

It is about what God can do in the life of someone. Isn't it? Steve, born and raised a Mormon blasphemer, and he can give you his own testimony. And then God, because of his grace and mercy, a mercy and grace that were abundant, as Paul would talk about to Timothy, to save sinners and then commission them for kingdom work, for the gospel work, is an absolutely amazing thing to see someone get saved, learn and grow.

And for me, it's a special privilege. I did not save Steve. I have not sanctified Steve. But I've known Steve from when he was a very new Christian to now see him serve alongside of me and serve you at the pastor's heart.

It's really neat tonight. And so it's Mother's Day, I know. And so, in a sense, I don't feel like Steve's mother. But as a mother would be proud of their children, I so, too, am proud of Steve for what he has done and his ministry to serve the Lord.

So, without anything else said, tonight is for the panelists alone to ask questions. You can ask Steve a question later. But please don't raise your hand. At 15 minutes, I'll go ahead and stop each of the men.

There will be some time for cross-examination, if they'd like that. And we'll just keep moving at a clip, 15, 15, 15, 15. And then we'll excuse ourselves after I have a few wrap questions. And then we'll come back and have a special time of prayer for Steve.

And then we'll have some desserts afterwards. And as we sit as a congregation, one of the things that we prayed for, even as an elder board with the other men on the ordination panel, that you congregational members would worship God tonight and see what he has done in the life of a man.

That you would say to yourself, if Steve Cooley can know the Bible like that, I'd like to know the Bible better. And so, with that, Steve, would you please come up? And, Ted, you may begin.

Steve Cooley's Testimony and Call to Ministry

I'm not really ready to go back to California.

Excuse me, Ted, before we begin, let's, Steve, have a short testimony and call to the ministry, please. About six or seven minutes max.

As Mike said, I was raised in a Mormon home. I think my first awareness of sin was probably about age 12 when I was selected to go to the temple, the Mormon temple, and be baptized for the dead. And we were supposed to be sinless.

And I just remember really kind of struggling with that. But I said whatever I needed to say to go. I think it was several years later, I was probably about 17. And, again, that kind of awareness of sin, it just kind of pervaded my life.

And I remember talking to one of my friends and just saying, you know, Mark, I don't know, I don't think I'm ever going to become God. Because that's what they teach. I said I can't see myself ever stopping sinning.

I just, no matter what I do, I can't seem to stop. And he just looked at me and he said, well, don't worry about it, you'll be all right. You know, we'll get there. And I think it was maybe about 10 years after that, I was now a deputy sheriff.

Sheriff Janet and I were married. And I was struggling with marriage. I was struggling with life. And I had begun seeing a psychiatrist with the sheriff's department. And he had recommended a lot of things.

But, you know, when you see a psychologist, is what he was, when you see one of those, they just kind of reinforce what you're thinking. And it eventually led me to leave my wife, leave my kids, to move out on my own.

And I wound up one night in a 12-step meeting. And the people, the subject that night was turning your life over to higher power. And people were describing their higher power. And one person said, my higher power is God.

And I thought, okay. One person said, my higher power is Jesus. My higher power is this group. I thought, that's pretty lame. And then one person said, my higher power is a part of my brain that I've set aside to be my higher power.

Well, you're not allowed to make any comments. You're not allowed to laugh. So I was just like this, just blurring my lip, not saying anything. But I just thought, I left that meeting that night thinking, I know there's a God.

And the only reason I knew there was a God is because in my mind as a police officer, I'd seen a lot of things. And I just wanted to believe that somewhere out there, there was justice for the people who did bad things.

Not like me. But the people who did really bad things, there needed to be a God to straighten those things out. I had a friend at work who was a professing Christian, seemed to believe what he said. And so I went to him and I asked him, I said, you know, you guys say that you have a, or you've said before that you have a Bible study.

I'd like to go to that Bible study. And he looked at me, because of my easygoing, serious nature, he said, what's the punchline? And I said, no. And I explained the whole thing to him. And I just said, I know that there's a God.

I just want to know who he is, and I don't know. I know he's not the God of Mormonism, and I just want to know who he is. So he backtracked. I got invited to the Bible study. But it was really the quintessential pooling of ignorance.

Nobody knew what was going on. And we had everything from Calvinist to Charismatics, and it was just a big mash. But it was a few years later I was studying Isaiah. And I came across the prophecy in Isaiah 9 where it is said of Jesus that he will be called Mighty God, Wonderful Counselor.

And I just thought about the concept of counselor, because that's what I was familiar with, were counselors, going to see them. And I thought, now here's a counselor who knows everything about me and loves me anyway.

And that thought was just overwhelming to me. I still wasn't saved because I couldn't grasp the Trinity. It took me a while to come to that. But as I began to go to, I did a little church shopping, but as I came to Grace Community Church and I sat in there and I listened and I learned and I began to grow, and I can't tell you the date that I was saved, I just know that God saved me.

He reconciled Janet and I. Janet, neither one of us were Christians. We both got saved during this period. We reconciled. In fact, it was during this period that I met Ted. Ted was kind of a bystander in one of the sessions I had at Grace Community Church, counseling sessions there.

But God brought us back together. And we started attending Mike's Bible study. And I just remember thinking, man, that guy knows a lot about the Bible. Where does he pick up all this stuff? How does he do that?

And he asked me, a bunch of us were going on a couples retreat, he asked me and the other guys who were going to see if this sounds familiar, he wanted all the guys to teach something that weekend. And I had never done any teaching.

And he said, just five minutes on love, just go through the concordance, pull out all the verses, and it was horrible. And I never had any desire. I was petrified of standing up in front of people. The idea of standing in front of people and talking about something was terrifying to me.

And through a series of circumstances at my job, I wound up every day standing in front of groups of people and talking to them. And after a while, you start to figure out it's not so bad if you actually know what you're talking about.

So that practice, I did that for two years, every day getting up in front of a group of people who initially hated me. They were inmates. And I was a deputy. They hated me. And when they heard what I had to say, they were like, oh, he's on our side.

Because I was trying to convince them that they needed to get on house arrest program and go home. Anyway, it was one Sunday morning. I was giving my testimony in our fellowship group. And the guy who got up and led music in the morning said, Steve needs to be in seminary.

He should be in full-time ministry. And I thought, boy, that sounds pretty neat, but I don't know if I could do that. Anyway, fast forward. I mean, I was just growing. I wanted to read. I read theology.

I found it all quite interesting. And I really liked it, just learning and growing. And I actually, sometime later, I applied for the seminary. And they initially sent me a letter telling me when I needed to show up to register for classes.

Well, there were a few things that were fuzzy. So I called the school. And I said, okay. And I asked my questions. And they said, no, we're going to have to call you back. So the admissions director called me back.

And he said, you got that letter by accident. You're not actually accepted at the school. So then what happened was I told the people that had been praying for me and were so happy when I got into the seminary.

I told the chaplains at the jail. And I told my pastor at Grace Community Church and the other elder who had been working with me. And they were all disappointed. And basically they started a campaign to get me in the school.

So several months later, the admissions director called me back. And he said, you really started quite a ruckus. And I said, well, actually, I didn't do anything. You know, those guys did it. And he says, well, you get to start.

And I was super thankful. I just remember sitting there the first morning in seminary and Hebrew at 730 in the morning after staying up all night at work. But Hebrew and having the professor up there taking prayer requests.

And I thought, I have never been in a class like this where they actually take prayer requests. So from then, it was just teaching, teaching fundamentals of faith, teaching a Bible study, seeing people occasionally come to Christ.

It was just exciting to me to learn, to grow. I mean, I remember the first fundamentals of the faith class I taught, I thought it was horrible. I don't know why anybody came back. But gradually practice grace of God.

You learn more. You learn how to deal with different situations. And God has been very gracious to me. So that's kind of it. And that's true. Yes, I can. Yes, sir. Good. Good question. What scriptures would I go to?

The Trinity, the Deity of Christ, and the Holy Spirit

Well, if I want to prove the deity of Christ, I go to Colossians 1. I would never try to prove the deity of God the Father. That's just something that the Trinity. Okay. I'll start by explaining the Trinity.

The Trinity is God. God in three persons, Father, Son, and Spirit. All three co-equal. All three of the same substance. Having the same attributes. Each one separately God. In other words, God the Father is God.

God the Son. Jesus Christ, second person of the Trinity is God. And God the Holy Spirit is God. And yet there is only one God. Deuteronomy 6 -4 tells us the Shema of Israel says that there is only one God.

The Lord your God is one. As for places that I would go, I would go to Isaiah. I believe it's 46 -18 where it talks about, and I may have transposed something there, but Jesus, the second person of the Trinity, and it's probably 48 -16.

There it is. He says, come near to me, listen to this. From the first I have not spoken in secret. From the time it took place, I was there. And now the Lord God has sent me and his Spirit. So there we would see the Trinity.

We'd also see the Trinity at Jesus' baptism. We'd see the Trinity in creation in Genesis 1 where God creates the heavens and the earth and the Holy Spirit is there. We'd see Christ's creative power certainly in Colossians 1, as I mentioned earlier.

Well, as it says here, he sent the Son. Beginning the Son, Psalm 2 often quoted in the New Testament, God the Father, just to be clear because I don't want to wind up in an Arian type heresy, God the Father did not create God the Son.

There was never a time when Jesus Christ did not exist. To make that a positive statement, Jesus Christ has always existed and has always been God. But he begets him in the sense that he sent him forth and in the sense that in a creative act, God, I guess I would say, I want to be careful here, but Christ takes on a new nature and that is at the direction of the Father.

He takes on a human nature. So, yes, he was always the second person in the Trinity. He always had the place of Son, the Son. So he was eternally the Son, eternally the second person by both. Jesus promised to send the Comforter and he did that.

And again, Isaiah 48, 16 says that the Father sent him teaching, preaching. And I think along with those gifts, you have to be discerning. I think this might sound somewhat strange, but I think God has just given me a great compassion for people.

And I think that basically would stem from my own background, my own kind of sense of lostness. I mean, I can remember times where my whole life just seemed a wreck. So being able to relate to people in bad situations, preaching, teaching, discernment.

Well, I mean, I think I can answer that somewhat in what role they don't play. I don't believe that we have, for example, speaking tongues or the so-called charismatic gifts. I believe that we do have preaching, teaching, serving, and those sorts of gifts, the non-charismatic gifts today.

Well, the wrath of God was being poured out upon him. He was, at that point, made sin. 2 Corinthians 5 .21 would tell us that God made him who knew no sin, Christ, to be sin on our behalf that we might become the righteousness of God in him.

And what happened was the full wrath of God was poured out upon Christ on the cross such that Christ suffered the penalty that believers deserved. Well, I believe that it would be elder rule, elder led by virtue of things, passages that would tell us to submit to our elders, that we should obey our church leaders as those who would give an account.

So those sorts of instructions, I can tell you. Well, he used the word of God because the challenge was, much like the challenge was in the Garden of Eden, the challenge was that Satan was trying to undermine the things that God had said.

So why specifically Deuteronomy? That I couldn't tell you. Well, again, that's the deity of Christ, isn't it? Okay. Absalom, Absalom. Son of David. Balaam, somebody who had a donkey talk to him. Yeah, I think that'll work.

Chief priest or high priest. Good. Demas. Bad. My first, he did, I think he was one of those characters who did harm to Paul. Elihu. I'm going to get him confused. Cornelius. Centurion. What about him?

Believer, converted. First Gentile convert. Okay. Simon Magus. Magician.

Anything else? So is David Blaine, by the way. Okay. All right, Steve, on God's holiness here. Would you regard that as a communicable attribute or an incommunicable attribute? Incommunicable attribute.

Because God's holiness, I think I mentioned something about this last week, so just bear with me. But for those who were here, God's holiness is so much more than what we attribute it or how we think about it.

I think our tendency is to think about his sinlessness in terms of his holiness. But in Isaiah 6, the angels covered their faces, and they had no sin. Right. So it wasn't due to that. It's because it's just his holiness, his separateness, not only from sin, but his holiness and his separateness from his creation is something that is just difficult for us to grasp.

Hebrews 12, 11 says this. All discipline for the moment seems to be not joyful but sorrowful, yet to those who have been trained by it. Oops, wrong verse. Verse 12. Verse 10. I'm talking about our fathers.

They disciplined us for a short time, it seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good so that we may share his holiness. Would that suggest to you that it's rather than incommunicable, something that's communicable?

Not in the fullest sense.

I think we can share in his holiness. I mean, this verse says that. I just don't think that we can share in his holiness as in his transcendence. We're not going to be holy, holy, holy, as Isaiah 6 says.

We can strive for holiness. Right. But it's the same with love, right?

Because God is pure love. We'll never be pure love unless we're glorified. Right. But love would be a communicable? Yes. Okay. All right, Steve. Just one last question for you here because I've probably gone over my time.

Give me the theme of the book of Zechariah.

Is that future judgment of the planet? It's either Zechariah or Zephaniah. I was going through all those cards. I might mess that up.

All right. I've got some tennis balls, but I'm going to trust the other guys are going to get to those things. Thank you, Steve. All right.

Calling and Commissioning in the Ministry

Steve, the Apostle Paul says in 1 Timothy 1 and verse 12 that God put him in the ministry. Could you explain to us, are you confident that God has called you, that God's hand is upon you, that he has prepared you for and enabled you and put you in the ministry?

And maybe just give us, I know you did touch on this, but just maybe touch on that a bit.

Well, I'm as confident as a human being can be. I think back, I mean, it's kind of like contemplating your own death. I thought about these things all this week, and I thought about how God so many times, on so many different occasions when things could have gone one way and they went the other, a small example, still unsaved, I was involved in a one-vehicle traffic accident.

And as most of you know, a one-vehicle traffic accident means it was your fault. And just spun out of control. And on one side was a concrete ditch, and the other side was about a 40-foot drop. And the car stayed on the road even though I was doing 60 miles an hour.

But there are any number of circumstances, and I know it's always dangerous to judge circumstances, but circumstances where things could have gone a different way and they didn't. But then I also just see the results.

And not because of me. I mean, so many times I've done a lot of dumb things. But God has consistently been gracious to me and has used me in various ways beyond anything that I deserve.

My second question, there is definitely confusion today as to exactly what the gospel is. The word is bantered about, but people do not know what it means. Outside in the world of all the different churches, could you please tell us what biblically the gospel is, how it has gripped you, and about your passion to see it proclaimed?

Okay.

The gospel is simply this. It has to start with the bad news. If people don't grasp the bad news, they cannot possibly accept the good news, which is what the gospel is. But you have to give them the bad news.

And the bad news is that God is holy, that God cannot abide sin, that God is going to judge sin. Habakkuk says that his eyes are too pure to approve evil. Nothing unholy is going to get into heaven. Jesus said, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisees and scribes, you will not enter into the kingdom of heaven.

One sin, James tells us, if you break one part of the law, you've broken the whole law. So people have, generally speaking, I would say most people have a very low view of what it takes to get into heaven.

And the Bible says it's a very high standard. And the bad news is that we're all sinners. Every single person has failed to meet that perfection that God demands. We're born with a sin nature. We cannot possibly, of our own volition, of our own will, we cannot be right with God.

And so every single one of us stands condemned before a righteous and holy God who would be right to send us all immediately into hell. The good news is that God did not want that. He didn't want everybody to go to hell.

He sent his son, Jesus Christ, into the world to save sinners. That's Matthew 121. Christ came to save sinners. And he did that by living a perfect life. He never sinned. He obeyed his parents all the time.

He loved the Lord as God with all his heart, soul, mind, and strength. He did everything that he was supposed to, never did anything that he wasn't supposed to. And when he went to that cross, he did so as the innocent God man.

He was always God, came and took on a human form, went to the cross willingly, and died so that those who believe might be justified before God. He was raised on the third day, according to the scriptures, and God declared that, in Romans 1, we find out that God declared him to be the Son of God by virtue of his resurrection.

He raised him from the dead. And it is by believing, by confessing Jesus Christ as Lord, and believing in our hearts that God raised him from the dead that we can be saved. My passion is to teach that, to see that come to fruition in people's lives.

I've been blessed over the years to see a number of my good friends come to faith in Christ, and it is very, very exciting. I mean, it's one thing to, I remember a couple years ago I was teaching a class about evangelism, and one of the young women in that class had been in my FOF class a couple years before.

And so we're going around kind of getting to know everybody, and how did you get saved, how long have you been coming to the church, and she says, I got saved in your FOF class. I didn't even know that.

So it is just a thrill to see people come to faith, to watch people grow in Christ, to be able to shepherd them, to teach them along the way. Thank you.

Priorities of Pastoral Ministry and a Shepherd's Heart

When you drive to this building and you're going to perform your duties as a pastor here at BBC and serve in ministry, could you just outline what you would, if you had to pare it all down, what are the priorities of pastoral ministry?

What should be your focus?

Well, the word of God, prayer, and how do we implement that? How do we implement the Bible into what we do here? I think we're always looking for ways to encourage and to exhort and to equip the saints for ministry.

I mean, that's what we do in terms of Ephesians 4. We need to be as elders, as pastors. That's why we're here, is not to do everything ourselves but to equip the people for ministry. And so that's what I try to do.

I guess I'm kind of losing my way here in the question. I don't know if there's water in here, but let's find out.

And kind of just a follow-up to that, you had alluded to earlier in one of your answers about your heart. And to be an elder, to be a pastor, to shepherd the flock, it definitely involves a change in the man's life.

Of course, he needs to be a saved man, a God-called man. But you talked about having a love for people. Could you just speak to that? Do you believe that it is necessary? And could you testify how God has given you what some people might call a pastor's heart or a shepherd's heart?

Well, I think you absolutely, if you don't love people, you can't be in this job. The difference between this job and my last job is you could be in that job and not really love people. It would be a bad thing, but you could do it.

In this job, if you don't love people, if you don't care about their souls, you absolutely cannot do it. I just think, as an example, some men in the past would like to marry their own children, perform the ceremony.

And my kids know I can never do that. And it's because I'm basically a softie. I can't do that. And I ache when people come into my office for counsel. I ache with their problems. I identify. I understand what they're going through.

I want to encourage them, exhort them, tell them what the Bible says. And as I said last week, I think the most painful thing is to see people make a wreck of their lives because they won't do what God commands them to do.

God has given me just empathy and a desire to help people.

The Church, Christ's Lordship, and a Willingness to Die for the Truth

Okay. Steve, what is the church, and do you love it, and why?

The church is the, I mean, for example, I would say that the church here, Bethlehem Bible Church, is the visible gathering of believers. There's also the universal church, the invisible gathering of believers.

And I love both of them. I love the invisible group because what that means is I can go virtually anywhere in the world, gather together with other believers, and know that we love the same Lord, and we're right away on the same page.

I love the local body because it's just a joy to be able to get together and to, I mean, I feel like in two years that we've just gotten to know so many people. And, I mean, frankly, I can't imagine being anywhere else, depending on how things go, you know.

Steve, in the book of Philippians chapter 1, the apostle Paul said, for me to live is Christ, to die is gain. The first phrase there, the first part of that phrase, for me to live is Christ, what does that mean to you, and has that truth gripped you, and can you testify to that in your life?

Well, not to put words in the apostle's mouth, but there is no reason for us to be here if we're not proclaiming and trying to glorify Christ in all that we do. To die is gain means obviously it's better to be with God than to be here, but as long as I'm here, my intent, my purpose, my goal is to glorify Christ in all that I do, to serve him, to proclaim him, and to serve his people.

Amen. My last question, Steve, what is it that you are willing to die for?

Well, I've thought about that some. I mean, obviously at one point in my life I had to be willing to die for other things, but I would absolutely be willing to die. My family, obviously, and I would, I wonder sometimes if we're heading for this world, but I would be, for this and the world, but I would be ready to die for the truth.

I think it's that important. I don't think we can, just reading about Athanasius, being ready to give everything that we have on account of the truth, and if that's our lives, then that's our lives. The church has, for 2 ,000 years, not been, it hasn't grown by means of going out and forcing people to believe.

It's been standing for the truth, and even if that meant their lives, and that propagated the truth. So I think it's important to stand for that, and if that's life, then that's life. Amen. Thank you, brother.

Philosophy of Ministry, Preaching, and Gender in the Church

Steve, I've always been impressed by the quality and caliber of men that the Master's Seminary sends out. So being a native New Englander, I want to welcome you to come and work in this difficult part of the country, and I want to know what it's really like to work with Pastor Mike.

Senator, I'll take the fifth on that. Would you offer to us your philosophy of ministry? As I said earlier, maybe I'll just build on this a little bit. My philosophy of ministry is that we exist here to equip the saints for the work of ministry.

What we want to do as an elder board, what we want to do as a pastoral staff, is we want to give people the tools, the training, the exhortation they need to go out and do the work. We would love to have about 200 evangelists walking around here.

We would love to have 200 trained theologians. We would love to have a body that just serves and loves one another and reflects Christ. So that's what we want to do. In terms of how do we accomplish that, we want to preach the word.

We're not interested in I had somebody call me this week and ask me if I wanted some video presentations that we could use on Sunday morning for PowerPoint and things like that. It's not about technology.

It's about faithfulness to Christ. It's about seeing him exalted on Sunday morning. It's about hearing his word, teaching his word, and those things. We're not interested in building the numbers. We're interested in building the depth of our ministry.

Let me bounce a little with my questions that follow up on your answers. What is the role of heralding, caruso, proclaiming, for today's pastor, and is it exclusive to male leadership in the church? The answer to the second part is within the confines of the church body, church meetings, yes.