Church Live Re-Visited: Session Four - Part 2 — Ron Bailey

Spiritual Renewal as an Ongoing Process

OK, I'm going to look just a little bit at this question of when Paul writes to the Colossians, this is why I'm keen to kind of use the words that have to do with process. When he writes to the Colossians, and he's telling people how they ought to live, in Colossians chapter 3, he says this in verse, chapter 3 in verse 9, he says, do not lie to one another since you have put off the old man with his deeds and have put on the new man who is renewed in knowledge according to the image of him who created him.

And Paul says something very similar when he writes to the Ephesians. In the Ephesians, you've got two things which are done absolutely and finally, and you've got another thing which is a continuing process.

In Ephesians, you've got the old man that's put off and the new man that's put on. And in between those two statements in Ephesians, you've got the statement, and being renewed in the spirit of your mind.

So you've got two crises, two events, two things that happen. You can say, yes, it's happened, it happened then, it happened then, but you've got another thing in the middle where you can't say it happened then, but where you have to say it is continuing to happen.

So the old man is put off, that's a one-off. The new man is put on, that's a one-off. But this being renewed in the spirit of your mind is a continuing process. And when Paul uses this same idea in Colossians, he uses it here and he says it's the new man who is being renewed.

Read it again so that we get it right. Verse 9, do not lie to one another since you have put off the old man with his deeds and have put on the new man who is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of him who created him.

So you've got this, the new man is constantly being renewed. Actually the old man, according to Ephesians, was constantly being made old. The old man was constantly being corrupted and the new man is constantly being renewed.

Renewal, Regeneration, and Spiritual Discernment

So these are both processes which stem from definite events that have taken place. So you're to be renewed in the spirit of your mind. That's to say that this is a process that goes on and on and on. The way I sometimes have illustrated in the past, and this is getting a bit old-fashioned now and I need a new illustration.

But for those of you who've still got the old-fashioned televisions and not LCDs but you're still working with cathode ray tubes, the way, roughly, the people here can tell you properly, but roughly the way a cathode ray tube works is this.

You've got a kind of a chemical that's painted onto a piece of glass and you've got the cathode ray tube which kind of shoots out an image and what happens is that the chemical which is on the screen holds the image momentarily and then it goes, and it goes back and does all the same thing again and again and again.

And in the old days, when they were talking about monitors and things, they would talk about what they called refresh rates. And what they meant is that the faster that that image was being refreshed, you get the steadier picture.

If it's only refreshed every now and again, you get a very junky kind of picture twitching, you'll see the gaps in it. But if it's being constantly refreshed all the time, it'll be rock steady. Now, we have a relationship with Jesus Christ which is made possible to us in regeneration.

Which makes it possible for us to have this constant renewing of the image. So that all the time that the image can be rock steady, all the time, but it has to be an ongoing process that's going on all the time.

And we are learning and we have to be open to recognizing the fact that we can make mistakes. There are two things really that affect the way that we make judgments. One is the data that we get, the information.

And inevitably, all the information we have will always be incomplete. We know in part, says Paul. So there's always going to be some bit of information you don't know. And there's also the possibility not only that the data is incomplete, but also that actually the way we're interpreting it is wrong.

And this is the key thing. We interpret it wrong if our disposition is wrong, if our attitude is wrong, if we are judgmental in our spirit, if we are censorious, if we are narrow-minded, if we have this perfect little world that we've created in our things and we're defending this against all attackers.

These are the things which will inevitably affect the way we interpret the data that we receive. Does this make any sense? This is how we make judgments. We've got data and then we interpret it. But we interpret it from our own particular standpoints, from the things that we understand, from our own disposition, which is why we need to have a new disposition and then we've got a chance of interpreting the data properly.

But even then we need to realize that we only know in part, so that all our judgments are, in a sense, all our assessments are actually kind of a work in progress. It's only God who can actually finally say, this is the judgment, this is it, this is the final thing.

And that comes by revelation. OK, I want to talk about that kind of gift of the spirit discernment. And I want to talk about the authority that God has put in the church. This is the judgment of spiritual authority.

Hebrews 13 and the Nature of Church Authority

This is a reference I've just read to you from Hebrews chapter 4. But I want to go on to another passage in Hebrews, later on in Hebrews chapter 13. And I think this is such a key passage of scripture to help us in understanding the whole pattern of church life and the way that it's supposed to work.

I'll read it first of all as we have it in the authorised version. It's Hebrews chapter 13, verse 17 and 18. There are three occasions in chapter 13 where the writer refers to some people who in verse 7 as one, remember them, it says in my authorised version, that have the rule over you.

Then again in verse 17, obey them that have the rule over you. And then again in verse 24, salute them that have the rule over you. Now that is a really bad translation. It's a really bad translation.

And it's one of the times when the political life that was going on when the King James Version was being translated has had a real impact upon our Bible. You had King James VI of Scotland who had become James I of England and he was trying to establish his authority and he wanted everything to be done in a certain way and he wanted a clear hierarchy.

He wanted things in absolute pattern. And that comes through all the time in the King James Version and it's not there in the original. It's not there in the original. Over 40 times in the King James Version you've got a little reference to something where it will say something like the office of.

So it will speak about the office of the elders or the office of the deacons or of the Old Testament. It will speak about the office of the priests or the office of the baker or the office of the butler.

It will even speak about the office of the midwives in Exodus chapter 1. And in none of those 40 instances is there any justification for the word office. This officialdom, this official way of looking at things this idea of having everything nicely placed into boxes where you've got an organisation charted they call them all charted, all carefully connected and everyone knows who they are accountable to and everyone knows who is above one and who is beneath the other one.

There is no trace of that in the Bible. No trace of it. So when we come to try to understand authority in the church we've got a bit of a struggle on our hands because we've actually got a hostile witness that we're turning to all the time.

This word rule really ought to have been translated the ones, it isn't even your leaders it's the ones who are leading you. So he says three things. He says remember the ones who are leading you. He says obey, we'll come back to that word in a minute.

Obey the ones who are leading you and he says salute, it really means greet and embrace them, those who are leading you. I've actually created my own, I do this very occasionally I've created my own paraphrase of this verse here.

So I'm looking at Hebrews chapter 13, 17 and 18. Listen to it, this is what it ought to say. Trust those who are leading you and submit yourselves to them for it is they who are keeping watch over your souls being those who will be rendering an account so that they may do this with joy and not with grief.

Pray for us, we trust we have a good conscience willing to live honestly in all things and maybe you've noticed that in my version I've used the word trust twice because in Hebrews 13 and verse 17 and the word that is translated in verse 17 obey, the first word in verse 18 my sixth word is translated trust.

Is it so in yours? Chapter 13 and verse 18 Pray for us for we trust. Okay, we've got the word trust that's exactly the same word that's translated obey in the first word of chapter 17 and verse 17 and trust is a far better word.

This is not talking about blind obedience this is talking about confidence. This is talking about learning to trust people that God has given as leaders and who are exercising oversight and by oversight I don't mean something kind of harsh and official I just mean that they are keeping watch over their sheep by night like the shepherds did.

In other words they were caring for them. There is an authority that God has put in the church and it's a genuine spiritual authority and it's something that God has put there because there are times when we need an authority that's greater than what is just coming from one person and it's the reason why I often talk about the oversight rather than an elder or the elders because the oversight is a corporate group it's a function it's something which God has welded together in his own particular way.

Corporate Oversight and Trusting Spiritual Leaders

In our church here we have four men and the four men together are the oversight. I believe with all my heart that God has given these men the responsibility of watching over us, watching for ourselves.

The consequence is that our instinct ought to be that we trust them, that we have confidence in them that it should not be hard work for them to persuade us if they feel they have the word of God or if they feel they recognise the word of God coming through some other source.

Our instinct ought to be that we trust them. It's our instinct. It ought to be the exception whenever we say well hang on a minute brothers can we just kind of think about this. Our instinct ought to be trust those trust those who are leading you who are watching over yourselves and those who are going to give an account.

It's a very, very awesome, onerous responsibility to be part of the oversight. It really is. They will give an account. And God only holds people accountable that he has given responsibility to. And with responsibility God gives gifts and there are times when I've been in oversight and I'm not now so I can say this fairly easily there are times when you're in oversight when you know things which if you could reveal them it would change everything but you can't reveal them because some of the things you know as a result of confidences that have been shared in you some you know as a result of revelation that God has given to you and you share this with the other brothers in the oversight so that there is accountability so that there's other you're not just kind of going off half cocked and saying well this is what I think but that the thing is being assessed in the safety of this oversight.

But there are times when it's necessary for an oversight to say to the church brothers and sisters please trust us on this one there are times when that's necessary because there are times when the oversight will have information that they can't possibly share and there's a really gentle balance in authority in the New Testament that is genuine spiritual authority it's real authority it's accountability it's responsibility you've heard me say before in management terms they say if you give somebody responsibility without giving them authority you've actually only given them blameability.

That's to say you've actually given a name that can actually be blamed if everything goes wrong. But if you haven't given them the genuine authority you haven't actually given them responsibility. No, God doesn't do that God gives genuine authority.

God gives gifts. God gives the tool necessary for the job and he gives to those that he has recognised. And that are processes by which we can see how that works in church. And I think these are one of the safety nets that God has put into these things that we're not at the mercy of everyone's impression we're not at the mercy of what this person says and what that person says by all means listen to these things.

Listen to them. Take them before the Lord. And if you can't come to clarity in your own mind then bring them to the elders bring them to the oversight and ask them to pray with you over these things. I feel very strongly about these things because I think there's a beautiful pattern that God has set in the church and it is so finely balanced that if you interfere with any part of this you end up either with an authoritarian situation or you end up with a situation in which there's no authority at all in which everyone does what's right in their own eyes.

And both of those are misuses. But the correct remedy for the misuse of authority is not non-use but right use. And the correct remedy for misuse of impressions or gifts, whatever they are is not non-use but right use.

And I do believe that God has set the solitary in families. I believe God cuts things together into a family so that we're not vulnerable. Do you remember how Paul says we have the mind of Christ. Did you know how he said that?

Did you know he didn't say I have the mind of Christ. He didn't say that he said we have the mind of Christ. And when John writes in his epistle he says we have an anointing which teaches us notice. He doesn't say I have an anointing.

He says we or you. It's always plural. There's always a plurality in this. There's safety in the multitude of counsels it says in the Proverbs. And this is such a delicate value that I feel you see one of the books I want to write one day about the true nature of biblical authority.

Because it is real authority but it's moral authority. It functions because people are trusted. And these three admonitions that are given to the people in Hebrews. I think I've gone way off my course now.

Remembering, Trusting, and Embracing Leaders

But I'm going to just say this and then stop these three things. Let me preach to you instead of teaching you. The first thing he says is remember me chapter 13 verse 7. Remember those who are leading you.

It's present tense this. It's not leaders in the sense of a label that's been slapped on someone. Remember those who are leading you who have spoken to you the word of God whose faith followed considering the end of their conversation.

Another thing you haven't noticed. You know chapter 13 of verse 8. You all know verse 8. Very very well. Have you ever wondered what connection verse 8 has with verse 7 of verse 6. Because it's a great verse but it doesn't seem to have any connection with everything that's gone before it.

This is the verse, verse 8. Jesus Christ is saying yesterday, today and forever. You say well yeah sure. But what's that got to do with what we've just said. Well what it's got to do with is that he's just been speaking about the quality of life and the leaders he's just been saying whose faith followed considering the end of their way of life.

In other words the goal of their direction. What he's saying is look at these people. Look at the way that they're going. See where they're heading. And you'll know if they're heading in the right direction because there's some things that never change.

Jesus Christ is saying yesterday, today and forever. He is the goal. He is the goal of their lives. He is the goal of the churches that they are representing and that they're directing. If it's anything else then maybe you've got some cause to ask some questions.

But remember and he says here that I speak to you the word of God and remember often in the scriptures has lots of senses in it. It has the sense of praying for them. It has the sense of honouring them.

Later on in Timothy when he says he talks about remembering people he's often talking about making material provision for them. That might be money, that might be cutting their lawn if they're very busy.

It just means kind of giving them respect recognising that what they're doing is they are spending and being spent. And they will not have the time that many other people have to do other parts of life.

They may not have sufficient time even to earn their own living. And they're to be recognised for this. They're to be remembered, they're to be kept in our prayers. That's what we're being told here. Remember them and remember.

This is the pattern of their lives. It's Jesus Christ they are setting before you Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever. Then he goes on to the next thing which is this trust have confidence in them.

And then the last one in verse 24 I think is in many ways the sweetest of all salute them. It says in my All In Peace Version. What does it say in the New King James Version? Greet them, ok. Well that's a bit better.

I guess a salute. Really you can imagine them standing to attention on that. But greeting them is better. There are different words for greet as well in the bible and this particular one actually means to kind of gather them in.

It's almost the equivalent of hug them embrace them. It's greet them affectionately. You're not greeting them with fear and kind of trepidation because they're bishops or archbishops or because they've got a fancy title or because they have certain powers that people have given them in the church.

It doesn't work like that. You are to embrace them. You are to love them. There's real affection in this word. And I sometimes say your brothers who are here tonight can queue up after this. I think we should hug our elders constantly.

Give them a big kiss. Give them a big kiss. Do it constantly because they need to keep on being embraced. If you like back into the family and not put on pedestals. They can only be targets if you put them on pedestals.

But if you keep embracing them and gathering back into your arms there's a wonderful pattern that God has given here. And we've gone miles up where we're supposed to be going but I think we'll just stop.

I won't try and kind of hurry on through these things. I've got to talk a little bit about rewards and labours but I'll just say this. There's a constant theme a couple of constant themes in the New Testament.

Stewardship, Labor, and Rewards

One is that we are we're responsible for what God has given us. We're not responsible for what God hasn't given us. It actually says this in 2nd Corinthians when it's talking about offering you've made your decision now carry them through.

It says understanding this that it's accounted with God not according to what a man doesn't have but what he does have. So God doesn't assess us. God does not determine future rewards based on your gifts.

He bases future rewards on what you have done for your gifts. So you may have someone who has five talents and you'll have no rewards and you'll have someone who will have one talent and because they used it they will have lots of rewards on that day.

It has nothing at all to do with expertise or gifts. It has everything to do with our stewardship what we are doing with the things that God has given to us. I've been looking through a book that I've got and I still can't find the piece I'm looking for.

There was a lady who lived in High Wycombe. I mentioned this lady before in her book. She was a Methodist contemporary of John Wesley. She was one of the leaders there one of the pillars in the church at High Wycombe although obviously not a minister or a preacher or anything like that but she was a very godly woman and there's quite a correspondence that went backwards and forwards.

She was almost like the secretary for the class meetings at High Wycombe and she kept a diary and one of the things she says in her diary and I wish I could have found it so that I could bring it to you properly.

But the Methodists constantly talked about improving the graces that God had given to us and what they meant was that when God gives you something you are responsible for improving it. You are responsible for trading with it.

You are responsible for using it and making sure that it increases. You are responsible and in fact if you don't make it increase you will be held accountable for the increase that didn't happen. So if you are given one talent and you ought to have made it into two talents, you will be held accountable for having stolen the one talent that you didn't cause it to increase into.

You understand kind of part of the pattern there, what Jesus was saying were those things, wicked and unprofitable servant and you know that there are several things he talks about servants in the Gospels, I'll say this about rewards because I need to say something just a little bit maybe about the other side of rewards.

Warnings About Judgment and Perseverance

There are some very very solemn warnings in the New Testament. There are very solemn warnings in the book of Hebrews about the possibility that we may find ourselves in a place beyond God's ultimate retrieval and that beyond that place there is only the only thing to look for is certain judgement and fiery indignation of God.

And the reason I'm saying this and this year you'll see that I'm not kind of very Calvinistic at all really Jesus spoke a lot about hell in the Gospels and most of it is in Matthew's Gospel and most of it is actually in discourses that's to say in statements he was actually making to his disciples the most solemn warnings about the dangers of hell are actually addressed to the disciples and you've got this statement do you remember in Luke chapter 12 that talks about being beaten with fewer strokes and being beaten with many strokes.

Remember that kind of passage in Scripture and one of the things it says for the person who was beaten with many strokes who knew what he ought to have done and didn't do it, it actually says he will have his portion with the unbelievers now that's Jesus saying that not me, that's Jesus saying that there's a possibility that believers will actually end up in ultimate judgement and separation from him, obviously they ceased to be believers and there's a constant warning through the New Testament the need that we need to keep on these things are true if we hold fast, these things are true if we hold on, if we continue if we persevere that's not to make it so that we get to heaven by our labours, it's not that at all but there is this truth that comes up all the way through that God expects us to use our lives for him and that our lives are being given to us in order to serve him, in order to glorify him and our lives will be measured one day, we shall all stand before the Lord, the just and the unjust and we shall give an account of the things that we did in our bodies and this isn't to frighten you into activity but it's just to encourage us to understand that there are rewards for labours, there are crowns of righteousness and of glory, there are things that those who have laboured for the Lord, laboured I'll say it again, not people who had great gifts people who brought great energies, great labours people who gave their farthings or their mites people who, she didn't have much did she, the widow no great gifts there but her story is constantly being told because she gave 100 of what she got and it has everything to do with percentages and nothing at all to do with absolute things so there is this whole aspect of rewards and labours are a key part of the New Testament and they come in and one of the things, the reason they come in strongly through 1st Corinthians and they come in 2nd Corinthians as well, where Paul has a lot to say about the ministry is because the Corinthians were making this fatal mistake they thought it was all for them they thought that the whole purpose of their Christian life their whole universe revolved around them it was me and my, every one of you, says Paul at the beginning, says I.

The Body of Christ and Ministry for God's Glory

I'm a Paul, I'm a Paulist, I'm a Kephas, everyone thought it was for their own benefit, everyone was polishing their own shining whiteness, everyone was trimming their own gift, everyone was taking the opportunity to display the gifts and the powers that they had and no one was discerning the body no one was recognising the purpose from which God had baptised them all in one spirit into one body and it was so that Jesus Christ could be glorified as it says in this amazing statement here that we read and it talked about all the world.

1st Corinthians, this is chapter 3 verse 21. Therefore let no one glory in men, for all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Kephas or the world, or life or death, all things present all things to come, all are yours and you and Christ.

Prayer for Faithfulness and Accountability

Do you want to ask any questions or shall I just pray? This hasn't gone.

In the direction I thought it would go and I thought it's but I think you've guided us and I do pray Lord that whatever you want to say to us tonight we should hear it Lord we don't. We're not trying to exalt or glorify ECF or this pattern or to say we've got it right or those things.

There's a million things we haven't got right we're sure of it. But we want to hold fast Lord to the things that you've pressed it to us. We want to cherish the Lord, we want to discern the Lord's body.

We want to be grateful Lord for the blessings that you have poured upon us. We shall be held accountable for these Lord in a way perhaps that some other churches won't be. We as individuals will be held accountable for precious things that were trusted to us.

I do pray Lord that you will help us to be vigilant that you'll help us to be diligent that you'll help us to stay awake that you'll help us Lord to spend and be spent and to give our souls to you and to the saints for the glory of Jesus and his church.

Amen. If you've got any questions.