Practical Instructions for Biblical Eldership

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Please enjoy the following sermon. I don't like to start a sermon on a negative note, but sometimes it's appropriate.

I think that maybe today would be an appropriate occasion to start on a negative note.

And I want to begin by pointing something out, that if you were to carefully examine the way that modern

Christianity views much of pastoral ministry today, especially in the practical matters, it would not be long before you would be forced to admit that many in the church today have a messed up, backwards, and broken view of pastoral leadership.

I want to give you a couple of case studies. When it comes to the material support of the elders, how we remunerate or compensate the elders, you would have to agree with me that there seems to be either a feast or famine kind of attitude.

On one side of the spectrum you have men who will openly announce that they intend with the people, the money of God's people, to buy yachts and airplanes and mansions.

And without having to look very hard, even private airports.

And in the name of Jesus, you wouldn't have to look very hard to see that there are throngs of professing

Christians who are prepared to line up to fund that very thing. While at the same time, if you were to visit other churches, you would see that they've adopted somewhat of an austere philosophy that can best be encapsulated in a pithy maxim that has become popularized because it is popular that to keep the pastor poor enables

God to keep him humble. When it comes to the integrity of elders in the church, we find the same extremes.

In some cases, we will find many who are willing to overlook glaring sins in the lives of their pastors when they show a unique giftedness in their public ministry, their forward -facing ministry.

In some cases, men who are greedy or violent or even sexually abusive are covered for by their elders and members of their congregation because their larger -than -life public ministries draw large crowds and even bigger donations.

While at other churches, and I have seen this firsthand, faithful men who labor diligently to preach and teach

God's Word in season and out of season are driven out because of petty squabbles or because they do not measure up to that congregation's idea of a faithful minister as painted by their favorite internet preacher.

Meanwhile, when it comes to appointing pastors, some churches are so desperate for elders that they will appoint anyone who is willing to serve regardless of whether or not they meet the biblical qualifications.

And you see it where so long as you have a pulse and a penchant for service, you can serve as an elder.

While at other churches, with their stringent and ironclad expectations, it is almost impossible to become an elder unless you have a doctoral degree or you know someone on the inside.

Or in the case of one church that I heard about, where the pastoral interns were required to produce two converts per week in order to stay in the internship program.

And when someone asked the question, what happens when the pastoral interns don't produce two converts per week, the senior pastor said,

I just replace them with men who can and who will. I said it at the beginning.

You don't have to go far. Go into the highways and byways of mainstream

Christianity, even in our city. And you'll find that far too many professing

Christians and not a few church leaders have a messed up view of pastoral ministry and the way that we administrate the pastoral ministry in the local church.

I know you hear me say it quite often, and I say it because it is true, and because we need to stay as far away from this as possible.

That we live in a time and in a place of inexcusable biblical illiteracy, where we have more resources, more

Bibles, access to more true knowledge, more truth than ever before. And yet so little apprehension, possession of it.

We live in a time of unbridled pragmatism and in a place of unapologetic disinterest in applying

God's Word to the life and organization of God's church. It's a negative note to start on, but I need to start here because it is true.

It is the Christian air that we breathe, the Christian ethos in which we exist.

What our passage shows us today in 1st Timothy 5 is that instead of leaving it up to pragmatism or leaving it up to the flavor of the day,

God actually has great concern for the practical ordering of his church.

And he has in particular spoken on these matters, especially in particularly, or in particular, in relation to the eldership of the church.

We've already seen as we have studied through 1st Timothy, we saw in chapter three that God concerns himself with the qualifications of an elder.

We saw in chapter four that he has made clear that his design for the priorities of the elders.

And now as we get to the conclusion of 1st Timothy chapter five, we will see that he is even concerned for the seemingly small and insignificant things like the support that the elders receive, the accountability of the elders, and even the appointing of elders.

And this is because God in his wisdom knows something that most churches have lost sight of, that a truly healthy, well -ordered, and well shepherded church only comes by a healthy, well -ordered, and biblically informed eldership in the big things and in the small things.

So today we're going to make an investment in the health and well -being of our church by getting into the particulars of biblical eldership.

In verses 17 through 25, what I want to do is look at these under three headings.

And we'll start in verses 17 and 18 with what I am calling, under the first heading, the elders provision.

So let's look together at verses 17 and 18. Paul writes, let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in teaching and preaching.

For the scripture says, you shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain, and the laborer deserves his wages.

Now as Paul begins this section, I know it's been a few weeks since we were in First Timothy, he's transitioning from his instructions related to honoring widows.

You might recall that from the first half of the chapter. And he moves now to the organizational matters of the local church, particularly the eldership of the local church.

And I agree with one observer who, looking at this passage, said the following. He says that this next section is a series of the most practical regulations for the life and administration of the church.

And we don't have to look long before we see this exact thing. That as Paul enters into it, he deals with the practical task of supporting or of compensating the elders.

In verse 17, he tells us that elders who rule well are to be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching.

Now our Presbyterian brothers, and we have one today, we welcome you brother. Our Presbyterian brothers and sisters have used this text at times to make a case for a distinction between the lay ruling elders and the ordained teaching elders.

And while I can appreciate how they got there, I do not think that this passage teaches that or warrants that kind of formal division.

But rather it reflects the diversity of roles that you'd expect to find within any healthy eldership that is characterized by plurality, meaning we have a plurality, a multiplicity of elders, and parity or equality within that eldership.

In a healthy eldership, it is just natural that some you might find are preaching and teaching more because of their unique giftings, while others are more involved in discipling or counseling or other shepherding tasks according to their gifts.

And as we look here, these words really do teach us something about the authoritative function of the elders.

In the words of MacArthur, John MacArthur, he says, elders are the spiritual rulers in the church.

And while this doesn't strip away the important role of the congregation, what it does reflect is the fact that elders possess a very real authority under Christ to lead and feed and protect and care for Christ's bride.

It is what the Puritans used to call the aristocracy of the eldership.

It is the rule of the eldership under Christ, what we might call a Christocracy.

And for those who rule well, we're told that they're worthy of double honor. What does that mean? Well, we saw that word honor in first Timothy chapter five and verse three, if we look there together, where it says, honor widows who are truly widows.

And this is speaking about more than simply paying our respects to those widows, but it had something to do with providing material support for those who were in need.

And that's what Paul has in mind here, that the elders should receive some kind of support to free them up for the work of their ministry of preaching and teaching.

But the next question that we must ask is this, what is double honor? If we're to honor widows, what does it mean that we are to pay double honor to elders?

Does it mean that elders should receive twice as much support as the widows do?

So that if the widows receive three meals a day, the elders receive six meals a day. Does it mean that the elders should receive so much support and in such a generous fashion that you come to my home and I say, well, actually my address has changed.

I'm in the estates now, south of Sherwood Park, and I'll just send a helicopter to come pick you up.

Is that what Paul has in mind? Not at all. But instead, when scholars have looked at this idea of double honor, what seems to be communicated here is that there are two forms of honor.

And this expression has been used often to speak of this double honor of respect and of remuneration, meaning those who rule well as elders are worthy of the esteem of the congregation.

But more than that, those who give themselves, who labor in preaching and teaching also are to be supported through the generous contributions of the congregation.

And in verse 18, Paul backs this up with two proofs from divine revelation.

Here, Paul first quotes in verse 18 from Deuteronomy chapter 25 and verse 4, where he says, you shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain.

Now, what Paul has in mind here is the ancient practice of threshing wheat. And what would happen is typically it would be a round threshing floor.

The agricultural worker, whether it was the master or one of the servants, would lay out the sheaves upon the ground.

There would be a post in the center of the threshing floor. You would tie your oxen or team of oxen to that post.

And then what would you do? But you would drive them around and around and around the post until they eventually worked out the grain.

And then you were able to separate the wheat from the chaff. Sometimes they would pull a big threshing sledge, this weighty piece of machinery that would come and rub against the kernels of wheat and break them open so that you could separate them.

And it was only right, according to God's law, that these oxen labored, who labored for hours and hours, sometimes for days on end, to feed others, that they were enabled to sustain themselves from eating the kernels of wheat that were at their feet.

Right? Don't put a muzzle on them and starve them while they are working hard to feed you. So Paul builds upon Deuteronomy 25, but then he takes us somewhere else.

And he says the scriptures also teach that the laborer deserves his wages. Now you have to remember that as Paul is writing this, he is not writing in the time of the

New Testament. And so whenever Paul speaks traditionally about scriptures, he is speaking about the

Old Testament scriptures. And I ask you the question, where in the Old Testament do we find that teaching, the laborer deserves his wages?

And we don't. It is not in the law. It is not in the prophets. It is not in the writings.

Then where is it? We actually find it in Luke chapter 10 and verse 7.

And what is fascinating here is that Paul is now looking at the teaching of Christ as he taught his disciples about what they were to do when they were going town to town to town.

He says, remain in the same house, Luke 10, 7, eating and drinking what they provide for the laborer deserves his wages.

Do not go from house to house. And so here what we see is something fascinating.

And I alluded to this. I don't think I even alluded to it. I think I stated it plainly at the beginning of our study in this letter, that we see something very interesting in first and second

Timothy. And that is this, that while it is a very practical letter, it is not a theological.

But every once in a while, as we see the practical instruction that Paul is laying out, it's like we can peek underneath and see this foundation that is under the practical instruction.

And what we see is this, that first, according to Paul's theology, the old covenant law or the

Old Testament civil law is not irrelevant to the Christian. But it has what we would call a general equity application.

And what this means is that while we're not bound to those Old Testament laws like the Israelites were when they were establishing the nation, it does teach that these laws still find application by showing us how to wisely apply the moral law today.

That's why, and if you go there with me to first Corinthians chapter nine and verse nine, as Paul is dealing with the very same issue of compensating, supporting, caring for the elders, he brings up the very same passage.

In first Corinthians 9 .9, he says, for it is written in the law of Moses, you shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain.

And then he does something very surprising. He says, is it for oxen that God is concerned?

Is that really why God gave this law principally? He says, it was written for our sake.

Or does he not certainly speak for our sake? It was written for our sake because the plowman should plow in hope and the thresher thresh in hope of sharing in the crop.

If we have sown spiritual things among you, is it not too much to reap material things from you?

And so what he's getting at here is he's saying that while God put that in Israel for a very specific civil application as that nation was becoming a nation in the promised land, its true fulfillment is the general equity application that if we would not force an oxen to tread grain for hours without allowing it to eat from the produce, then why would we allow even our elders, those whom we love and care about to labor and labor and go on and so forth and say, and you can find your own food somewhere else.

But we see something else here in Paul. That Paul, as he looks to Luke chapter 10 in the

New Testament, as he quotes from the teaching of Jesus, he regards it as Scripture, as what it really is, the

Word of God. He's showing us that the apostles and the early Christians in the

New Testament had what many theologians would call a canonical consciousness.

Meaning they understood that when Jesus came, he ushered in a period of new revelation that was going to require new inscripturation, and therefore we would be receiving new scriptures in addition to the old scriptures.

And this is a remarkable thing. Anytime anyone ever says to you, well the reason why we have the

New Testament is because some councils met and they declared what books were what, and they will go on about how the authority of the

New Testament, or at least the canonicity of the New Testament, is found not within itself, but it's found within the church and its councils and its witness, and you say false.

In 1 Timothy 5, we see the apostles in Scripture pointing back to the teachings of Jesus and saying, this is

Scripture. And while Paul is doing this about the words of Christ, Peter is doing it over here about the words of Paul, and that we have internal evidence, not external evidence.

We're not dependent upon the Roman magisterium for our Bibles, but we have the internal evidence to support the existence of our

New Testament canon. Now that was a bit of an aside. Let's try to get back here to 1

Timothy 5. Next thing that we need to ask is, what is the purpose of financially supporting elders?

So we have elders who rule. Well, we have elders who are preaching and teaching. What is the purpose? I think we see it when

Paul writes, especially those who labor in preaching and in teaching.

Now you know, if you know me well, you know I like the granular things. I know that I like the details that we find in words.

I want to show you one of my favorite words, favorite Greek words in the New Testament. It is this word behind the word labor.

It's the Greek word kapiao. And it is remarkable, because it doesn't describe an elder as having a haphazard interest in their work.

An elder who is casually interested in preaching and teaching, that's not what kapiao means.

It's not a take it or leave it kind of mindset. But this word labor, it means an all -in, all -encompassing, laborious, striving, working, literally toiling to exhaustion kind of effort.

It speaks to the elder, not who is casually engaged in the work, but who throws himself into the work so that it is all -consuming as he engages in it.

And it's interesting, Paul shows us what this looks like in practice in Colossians chapter 1.

In verse 28 he speaks about this. Just a few verses earlier he said that he was there amongst the

Colossians. One of his desires as he was ministering was to make the word of God fully known.

Now that is a great ambition for someone in eldership to say, I don't know how long the Lord is going to put me in this church, but one thing

I know for sure, I'm going to labor. So that if anyone comes in, the next guy who comes in, he's going to say, the word of God is fully known in the midst of this people.

That they have received, maybe not in every possible dimension, all the depth that could be discovered, but the whole counsel of God is familiar to these people.

And what he says in verse 28 is remarkable. He uses a bunch of different synonymous language.

He says, him we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone.

So this is broad, with all wisdom that we may present everyone, mature in Christ.

And then he says, for this I toil, kapia 'o. For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me.

That is what we should find the elders doing. So that when church, when you evaluate the elders of this church, and when we think about what it means to support biblical elders, those elders that receive the support of the church, they are engaged in this toiling and striving to make the word of God known.

This is what Paul had in mind, no doubt, when he said in first Timothy four, in verse 13, to Timothy, he says, until I come, devote yourself to public reading, the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation and to teaching.

And some have looked at this whole passage, and maybe you can appreciate this. I had a good laugh about it as I thought about it.

But it's not very flattering to compare the pastoral, the shepherding elders, the pastors of the church to oxen.

It's not very flattering to compare them to first century laborers, right?

They're almost slavish in the type of work that they do. But the reason

I think why we see this is because it emphasizes the hard work that is required to preach and teach

God's word. That oxen tied to the post. And if you find any man who has ministered long in the word of God, I know my children will hear it outside my door.

Shouts of excitement or laughter. I sound maybe like a hyena at times, I'm not sure. But while there is all the excitement, there is also just a discipline of being there and working your way through the text that you might know it better, and better, and better, and explain it better, and better, and better for the sake of God's people.

I remember when I used to think, and maybe you know for my new preacher brothers, for those of you who are preaching on Thursday evenings,

I want you to get this, take this, and let the Lord plant it deep in you to shape and fashion you in his likeness, for his glory.

I remember when I used to think that the mark of a capable preacher was that they were able to preach and speak without much study.

That they could just get into the pulpit and unleash them. And I will tell you now that that is the mark of a lazy and irresponsible preacher.

I think of one brother who speaks about not preparing so much. I've heard

Paul Washer say it, that he doesn't so much prepare for sermons, but he would be the first to tell you that he spends most of his time studying

God's Word. And then what you get in the pulpit is the overflow of that study. I went back into the annals of history to look at this.

If you can think about this, John Calvin used to preach 10 times per week.

I remember reading one of his quotations. I can't remember if he had preached eight times that month or 10 times that month.

And he said, I feel as if I am an unprofitable servant. I'm just useless this month. He used to study past midnight often, usually five to eight hours a day, in addition to those 10 sermons that he would preach in the week.

Jonathan Edwards was known for being in his study up to 16 hours per week.

The great prince of preachers, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, while he preached almost every day, he read almost a book every single day, six days a week.

John MacArthur, for those of you who are familiar with him, when he was alive and preaching, he would often say that it took more than 30 hours each week to prepare a given sermon.

And I would venture to guess that if you find your favorite preachers in the world, and you were to inquire with them what their preparation looks like, you would be amazed that it does not come simply oozing out of them naturally as an overflow purely, but that it is the result of the diligent study of Scripture.

And then if there is an overflow, it's the overflow of that, not the overflow of their personalities. That is the reality, is that solid expository preaching takes an incredible amount of time and effort.

So one of the wisest things, this is what Paul is getting at. I know this has been a long point, but one of the wisest things that a church can do for itself is to support an elder, or two, or three, as it is able, as it is appropriate, to free them up that they might labor diligently to teach and preach

God's Word to God's church. We need to understand this when we meet together for our members meetings, and we look at the budgets.

And I recall our brother Sam saying at one point, you know, it's expensive to have you.

It is not a ministry, and this is not a correction of my brother, but it is not a ministry expense.

It is not a drain on the church's financial resources. It is an investment in the health of the church, and in the health of its eldership.

And that is what Paul was after. It is an investment in the prospering of the ministry of the

Word in the midst of the church. Our church has a little bit of a story behind us having a vocational elder.

And for those of you who have been long enough to know this, you'll know part of this story that when we first met in this room, and this room is really an evidence of God's providence to us.

Our brother Steve, you will remember that when the first summer that we met, where did we meet? We met outdoors.

And Steve has a little, it's not a pup tent. It's one of those pop -up tents you'd see at the fair when the radio station is nearby, and we would rain.

The few of us that were there would all get under the tent, and it would rain. We'd wait it out, and then we would meet and sing and pray and praise.

So when we got this room, it was a remarkable thing. But one of the things that happened was this.

We lived in perpetual fear that at any point the brothers and sisters down the hall were going to say, okay, you've been here long enough, pack it up and move.

And we were going to be back under the stars. And so what we said is we're going to have a facility fund. And that's what we're going to invest our money in.

We're going to save our money and build a facility fund. And then I remember a brother coming to me one day and saying,

I understand you want to have a facility, but is it not more biblical that we have a vocational elder?

And I remember thinking, well that is certainly wise, but I don't want to be self -serving. Here I am as the lone elder of the church.

I don't want to say to the church, please compensate me. And then

I remember reading Galatians chapter 6 one day. And some of you have heard me share this before.

But if you turn there with me to Galatians 6 and verse 6. In verse 7 we often hear this quoted.

Do not be deceived. God is not mocked. For whatever one sows, that will he also reap.

And we often quote that out of context. But what does the context say in verse 6?

Galatians 6 .6. Let the one who is taught the word share all good things with the one who teaches.

Do not be deceived. God is not mocked. For whatever one sows, that will he also reap.

This is not a passage about sowing and reaping for prosperity.

This is a passage about a church that understands that when they share all good things with the one who teaches the word, they will reap more of the word.

So that when we make investments in the ministry of the word, we get more of the word.

And what a word it is. What a word it is that when the preacher comes up to preach

God's word, we are hearing the very living and active word of God coming to your ears in the assembly that God himself has ordained for us to be here and to hear from him.

What an investment it is. Because what a word it is. There's a story

I think that demonstrates this about an English preacher, a man named Robert Bruce, who was a preacher in England in the 1600s.

And one day he found himself preaching before King James. We heard the King James being read today.

And the same king who authorized that version of the Bible. And despite King James seeking or authorizing that translation, he was a fairly immoral man and known widely so for it.

I won't get into some of the vices that he is known for. But as Robert Bruce was preaching the word to him, he would come to places that were particularly powerful, that were even convicting.

And King James would do something. When the conviction started to come on, he would turn to his servant and begin speaking to his servant.

Just having a conversation with his servant as the sermon went on. And Robert Bruce noticed this.

And eventually they came to another moment where King James began speaking to his stopped and paused.

As if to say non -verbally, I want you to hear the sermon. And so if you're going to speak,

I will wait until you're finished speaking. And so he waited and the king stopped. And then

Robert Bruce went on and the king began to speak again. And then Robert Bruce said one of the most fantastic things.

As my son and I were listening to this biographical sketch together this week,

I laughed out loud. And I said, you have to listen to this again. Listen to what he said to the king.

Robert Bruce there looks at King James the first, one of the most powerful men in the world.

And he says this, it is said to have been an expression of the wisest of kings that when lions roar, all the beasts of the field are to be quiet.

Well, the lion of the tribe of Judah is roaring in his gospel and it becomes all kings to be silent.

And I like what our brother Mac Tomlinson quipped about this scene. He said, me think there was silence the rest of the sermon.

But valuing God's word is more than remaining silent when it is being preached. It is investing in it.

And the principal way that we invest in the ministry of the word of God is through the material support of the elders.

And I'm not saying this to enrich myself. I'm saying this to enrich all of you. And the question is, do we believe it?

My next two points are much quicker. We'll look at the elders accountability in verse 19.

In verse 19, Paul transitions to how we are to ensure that the elders are kept accountable without entertaining false accusations against them.

In verse 19, he writes, do not admit a charge against an elder except on the evidence of two or three witnesses.

I'll do verses 20 and 21 as well. As for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all so that the rest may stand in fear.

In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus and of the elect angels, I charge you to keep these rules without prejudging, doing nothing from partiality.

So do not admit a charge against an elder except on the evidence of two or three witnesses.

Why would Paul have to write this? There is a saying amongst old

Dutch divines that he who stands in the front is kicked in the rear.

Now I think there is truth in that, that those who end up in the leadership at the front of the pack, it's very easy to just give him a kick once in a while because you go, he's not leading us in the right direction, not at the right pace, whatever it might be.

Now that might sound kind of cute, but it is in fact very sinister when it happens in the church.

There's a quote from John Calvin on this passage that I think we would do well to pay attention to.

He says, none are more liable to slander than godly teachers. Think about that the next time you hear criticism leveled against any man in ministry who at least at face value appears to be faithful.

None are more liable to slander than godly teachers. Although they perform their duty correctly, they never escape a thousand censures.

The more earnestly any pastor strives to advance the kingdom of Christ, so much more is he loaded with envy and so much the fiercer are the assaults made on him.

And listen to what Calvin emphasizes here. He says, this is the craftiness of Satan to draw away the hearts of men from their ministers that their instruction may gradually fall into contempt.

So translation. If God, sorry, translation.

If Satan can't keep you from being a miserly people and choking out the word by sowing sparingly, he's going to undermine the word by false accusations against the preacher.

Right? If he can't deal in his first approach, he will deal in his second.

And again what's interesting is Paul makes another general equity application of the Old Testament civil law, this time from Deuteronomy 19 .15,

where we read that a single witness is not suffice, but two or three witnesses are necessary to prove an accusation.

We saw our Lord Jesus, he did this as well in Matthew 18 speaking about church discipline. What do we do?

We go to a person one -on -one. Then how many do we take? Then two or three come together.

And if they do not listen to them, then you take them to the church. And if they do not listen to the church, then you treat them as a

Gentile and a tax collector. And so what this is implemented for is to protect innocent parties from false accusations.

To protect, in this case, elders from malicious or frivolous accusations that come by the craftiness of Satan.

And we need to understand that this will take place. And we're used to living in the court of public opinion where one person makes a claim, the rest get on board, and we cancel whoever it is who's the subject of that claim.

And while it's tempting to live in that world and to do that very thing, we must not.

But we must be measured. When we hear a charge against an elder, we ask the question, where are the witnesses?

Do we have witnesses? If we don't, then we don't have sufficient evidence to continue with the charge.

But if there are witnesses, then their testimony needs to be seriously considered.

And Paul gives us recourse when these testimonies of pastoral wrongdoing are found to be true.

What do we read in verse 20? As for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all, that the rest may stand in fear.

Now what this passage is not teaching is the sinless perfection of the elders.

If we had to require that the elders be sinless, we would just never have elders.

I will stand at the front of the line and tell you, I am a saint in Christ. But if you get close enough to me, you will see that I sin.

And that is true of every elder. That's true of every Christian. So what

Paul has in mind here then is cases of ongoing, habitual, unrepentant, or disqualifying sin that violates the instructions regarding the character qualifications of an elder.

And when we have cases of disqualifying sin and of habitual, ongoing, and unrepentant sin, then the path forward is laid out clearly for us.

That we cannot tolerate repeated, unrepentant, and disqualifying sin in our elders.

But the sin must be identified, confirmed by witnesses, and then the guilty elder is to be rebuked openly for the good of the church and for the good of that elder's soul.

It's one of the things that you've heard me say in a members class, if you've taken a members class, that we will love you, we love you so much, and we will love you so much in this church, that we will not tolerate self -destructive sin.

And we will love you so much that we will put you out of the church if necessary to communicate the devastating consequences of that sin.

And the desire the whole way will be your restoration. And the agreement that we enter into, brothers and sisters, is that as a congregation and as your elders, we understand the other aspect of that, that you will love us so much, that better is an open rebuke than hidden love, right?

That faithful are the wounds of a friend, while the kisses of the enemy are profuse.

That you will love us well enough that when you see unrepentant and disqualifying sin in our lives, you will say, we cannot tolerate it in you either.

So that it works both ways. And I know that some of you have come from difficult church backgrounds.

I know that some of you have been injured by unchecked sins of men in ministry.

And I can almost guarantee you that in those cases, this process was not followed.

And if you have experienced such things, you know the hurt that results from the neglect of this passage.

So I might look at this and go, you know, couldn't we get a more Christ -centered message today? It doesn't get more

Christ -centered than this. That Christ died for me, I trust. And that you will protect me and look out for me.

And you will look out for the church if I go awry. But observe

God's great wisdom and care for his people. It does not say that we should make exceptions for the man who has a seemingly successful public ministry.

Isn't that what we see in every major internet preacher, even from our tribe that falls?

We hear there was warning signs, and warning signs, and this, and there were all these backdoor conversations.

And then one day the whole thing implodes. It does not matter how successful your public ministry appears.

If your soul is rotten and corrupted, it's a facade. It does not say, and I will address my own circumstance here, that allowances should be made if the man was one of the founding elders of the church.

You know, if I ever say, you can't kick me out, I planted this church.

You'll say, you have been blinded by your own sin. Any elder who persists in unrepentant sin, any elder who is guilty of disqualifying sin is to be openly rebuked, is to be called to repentance, is to be, if necessary, removed from the office.

It is necessary at times even to be removed from the church. This is not a rebuke in the presence of the elders.

It's a rebuke in the presence of the whole church. It's a local church office.

It's a local church rebuke. And the express goal is that all would be warned about the gravity of sin and the destructiveness of its consequences, and as Paul says, stand in fear of God.

And anyone who has participated in this kind of discipline, whether an elder or an individual church member, knows firsthand what

Paul is talking about, don't you? Don't we? That there is a sense in which when we meet together about someone who is engaged in unrepentant sin, and we pray for them, and we fast for them, and we reason with them, and we visit with them, and then as a church we come together and we put them out.

Isn't it true there is just a sense of the weight? May none of us fall into sin like this, such a deceptive sin, that we would fall away like brother so -and -so, or sister so -and -so.

And if you come to our prayer meetings you will still hear the names of some of those people prayed for, because sin is deceitful above all things.

In verse 21 Paul adds to the force of this by invoking the presence of God, and of Christ Jesus, and of the elect angels.

It is a picture of the future judgment, where the Father is there, and the

Son is there, and the elect angels are looking on. We see it in Revelation 14 .10.

Don't turn there, but maybe write it down. When we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, and in the presence of that God, carry out these rules without prejudging, without partiality.

That word prejudging, it's a hapax legomena, meaning it's used only once in Scripture.

It's actually a term we would expect to hear in a courtroom in first century Rome. It evokes the picture of Lady Justice.

You might remember Lady Justice holding up the scales in her hand. Or sister, you've been in the courtroom.

What is covering the eyes of Lady Justice? A blindfold without prejudging, without partiality, means it doesn't matter if you're a member of this church.

It doesn't matter if you're an elder in this church. If you persist in sin, we will do exactly what

Scripture requires, and we engage in this kind of unprejudiced and impartial treatment of sins, because it reflects the character of our

God. Don't you see this? That when, and for those of you who have been hurt in churches where this has not been done well, that it actually, whether you realize it or not, mars the image of God as you do this.

Because we see in Scripture, Romans 2 in verse 11, we read, for God shows no partiality.

But when we see partiality in the church, it clouds our minds. Acts 10 in verse 34.

So Peter opened his mouth and said, truly I understand that God shows no partiality.

Sin is deadly serious and we must treat it as such, even with the elders.

With love, with mercy, yes, but without exception. And then we see

Paul go on to the third heading, the elders appointment in verses 22 and 25.

In verse 22, this is what we read. Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands.

You might understand what we've looked at already, why Paul would say this. Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands, nor take part in the sins of others.

Keep yourself pure. No longer drink only water, but use a little wine for the sake of your stomach and your frequent ailments.

The sins of some people are conspicuous, going before them to judgment, but the sins of others appear later.

So also good works are conspicuous, and even those that are not, cannot remain hidden.

Now as Paul writes about in verse 22 to Timothy, he says, do not be hasty in the laying on of hands.

And I had a difficult time reading some of the interpretations of this passage without some laughter in my study.

Because it's interesting, there are some groups of people who have interpreted this to speak of disciplining false teachers.

So they understand this idea of laying on of hands, what we used to use in my previous world of law enforcement, of going hands on.

Meaning, you know, you take a hold of that man and shake him up and throw him down and whatever it is.

And he's saying, you know, don't be hasty in doing that. That's what some have interpreted it to say. And while that might have been a temptation.

I could see it being a temptation perhaps in the right settings. That's not what Paul has in mind.

Rather it speaks to the fact that we should never be quick to lay hands on a man to appoint him to eldership.

It's a caution against premature appointment of men to the pastoral office.

And sadly, I would say that probably most of us are not strangers to such a scenario.

And if we've learned anything about these situations, it is to apply the same caution that Paul is talking about here.

That we are to be very, very, very, very careful before we appoint any man to the office of elder or to the office of deacon.

If we're going to err, we should err on the side of being patient and long -suffering as we appoint elders.

It should be a complaint, if there is a complaint leveled in our church, that the men would say,

I want to serve as an elder. And yet the elders are saying, let's continue to work through this for the next six months or the next 12 months.

As opposed to, they appointed so and so as an elder already? Hasn't he been here for like two weeks?

Didn't he just become a member of this church? And I want to put this into perspective for us.

I've talked a little bit about this before. It's worth revisiting again. But I remember being at my daughter's jiu -jitsu class and looking at these people as they're seeking to become black belts in jiu -jitsu.

And they're in the little kids classes for three to five years. And then they're in the teen classes for another five years while they're teaching other kids.

And then they're teaching teenagers, and then they're teaching adults. And to become a black belt in jiu -jitsu takes at the bare minimum 10 years to get your black belt.

And I thought, what a rigorous process and all of that to teach eight -year -olds how to wrestle on a mat on a

Tuesday evening. To get into a little bit more severity, it takes, if you want to be a family doctor, not a surgeon, not a specialist, not in the

ER, you want to be a GP, it takes 10 to 12 years to become a family doctor.

If you want to be a commercial pilot, it's going to take hundreds of hours as a private pilot, thousands of hours.

Then you're going to become a flight instructor and then do what one of my former youth group kids did, flying over pipelines for years, examining pipelines from an airplane.

Eventually you get onto a private charter jet service or something like that, and it's seven, ten, or more years to fly an

Air Canada plane. Our culture recognizes that serious callings require serious preparation.

But does the church recognize this today? That the shepherd elder is what the old divines, the

Puritans used to call the physician of the soul. You know, I can go to my family doctor and have them look at a wart on my foot.

You come to your elders and say, I have a question about the eternal welfare of my undying soul.

In many churches men are appointed to eldership within a few short years after their conversion.

And this is what happens. We see that man, he is on fire. He loves reading

God's Word. He even likes studying God's Word a little bit. He has that that glimmer in his eye.

And so we assume this man is called to ministry. And we lay hands on suddenly.

And if you don't think it's true, it is. In my studies this week, I went down a bit of a rabbit hole.

I was telling our brethren on Thursday about this. I was discovering story after story after story of people who were appointed to eldership in their teen years.

I read of one young man in Atlanta, Georgia. I was just there. That place actually exists, where they appointed a 16 -year -old boy to the role of associate pastor in his church.

Now to his credit, he had years of experience because he began preaching in his church at the age of five.

And he received his former, his formal license at the age of eight.

And all of this in a Baptist church. Now you tell me that our world does not have a messed up view of pastoral ministry.

And if you think that that story is too exaggerated, I'll tell you this, that the

Lord saved me at the age of 21. How old do you think I was before I was an elder in that first church?

I was 22 years old. I was so young in the faith, I had no idea that it was even wrong.

And I praised God that he brought me out of that church, plugged me into a biblical church, and I immediately repented of my eldership.

So as Paul is talking about laying on of hands, it is not to be sudden. We know that laying on of hands speaks of, some might call it ordination or installation.

I like the word appointment. We see that in Acts chapter 14, where they appointed elders.

And to do so hastily, Paul tells us, is to partake in the sins of others.

If the elders lay hands on too suddenly and appoint an unqualified man, they will not only endure the pain and heartache of serving alongside that unqualified elder, that is coming, no doubt, but they actually incur guilt in the process because it represents a tacit approval of that man's sin, and so a participation in it.

Now it's interesting, if you're reading out of the ESV, verse 23 comes in a parentheses. I'm going to deal with it as a parenthetical thought.

I don't have much time. Water, because of bad hygiene, water was unsafe to drink.

Whereas bacteria and other dangerous microorganisms could not live through the process of fermentation with that acidic and alcoholic environment.

And so it was a medicinal thing to drink wine. Right? You can't always, it's like my friend told me when we went to Indonesia.

If you don't trust the water, drink a Coke, nothing can live in Coke. Right? And so it is with wine.

So he says, take a little wine for the sake of your stomach. And then we see, he returns to the main idea.

We see why we have to be so careful. Because the sins of some are obvious and others not so much.

And the good works of some are obvious and the good works of others not so much.

And so this calls for the greatest of prudence. John MacArthur says, the whole emphasis in this instruction regarding choosing elders is to be patient, fair, impartial, and pure.

Such an approach will yield the right choices. And so brothers and sisters, we are in a season of life.

I hope we're in the season of life now forever, where we will be appointing deacons and elders, and then more deacons and more elders, and then by God's grace, more deacons and more elders, and missionaries and church planters, and the rest.

So it is perfectly timed, especially after Joel's sermon last week, that we appoint good and righteous and fair and wise men to the office of elder and to the office of deacon.

That we approach it like we read in Acts 14, before they appointed elders, that it was accompanied with prayer and fasting.

That we have times of testing, like we see spoken of in the deacons, even times of public examination.

And when you see the wonder of it, that the men who become elders one day might be supported by the church, and as a vital part of their ministry, bring the

Word of God to his people. We see why it is so important that we be patient, and that we wait, and that we test, and that we go through all of the rigorous processes needed to protect that person, and to protect the church from that person.

And men who aspire to eldership, the wait, the process,

I assure you it is all worth it. I'm in a group with a bunch of heart cry guys, and we talk once a month, and what's fascinating about all of those guys, save one of them, is that for all of us we waited and prayed for years, and years, and years to be elders.

And we look back now and we say God was perfectly wise to make us wait those years.

I remember going to my pastor at the age of 21, maybe

I was 20, no I was 21 still, saying I want to be a pastor.

I thought that in two or three years time I was going to be a pastor. I waited 14 years, and the wait was worth it.

And I hope that it's worth it for the church. God cares about the practical aspects of pastoral ministry, because he cares about his glory, and because he cares about the good of his people.

To the degree that under shepherds of the church function according to the precepts of scripture, they point to the chief shepherd.

God cares about eldership because he cares about the name and fame of his son, the chief shepherd, the

Lord Jesus Christ. And wouldn't you join me in praising

God for that good shepherd, the chief shepherd, and for praying for more faithful shepherds in this church.

Let's pray. Thank you for listening to another sermon from Grace Fellowship Church.

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