Spiritual Leadership (part 1)

Bethlehem Bible Church

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Our Father, we thank you as the giver of all good gifts, that you give us not only a place to meet, but rain, change of seasons, reminders that you are sovereign, that you're in control of all things.

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Father, we thank you for the word, for the things that it shows us about you, about ourselves, about the things it teaches that we should aspire to be, the things that we failed to be.

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Father, every day we thank you that by your power, by your Holy Spirit, we are being shaped and molded into the image of Christ, even if sometimes it's imperceptible to us.

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Father, we count it a privilege to be your children and to be gathered here today.

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And bless each one here, we pray in Jesus' name, amen. Well, so we're talking about spiritual leadership and I wanna preface it with a couple things this morning.

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First of all, I'm going to be giving some bad examples. There's an old song that says,

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I'm Mr. Bad Example. I don't wanna be the bad example, but I'm going to give some bad examples. And one of the reasons you give bad examples is so that people understand what is wrong, but also so they appreciate what is correct and everything else.

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And I have to ask this question. Does anybody know who Benny Hinn is? Okay, would anybody like to give me a brief explanation of who he is?

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Prosperity preacher is correct. A healer, right?

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What's he best known for? Fake healing is one. My favorite, my personal favorite is there's a video with a song superimposed over it.

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It's one of those speed metal songs that I don't listen to, but it's called Watch the Bodies Hit the

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Floor, right? And he's whipping his jacket around. I mean, I wish we could do stuff like that in here.

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Actually, I don't because it'd be a major distraction, but he's whipping his jacket around and people are just falling all around him.

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And what's he doing? He's slaying them in the spirits, right?

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That's the idea. And when you hear that, or when you see that, slaying in the spirits, and people falling down, what do you think it is?

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Satan? I agree, but I mean, even if you put the best possible spin on it, what's he actually supposed to be doing?

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I mean, if I throw this at you, what happens? Nothing, but if I throw, say, a 90 mile an hour fastball at you, then what?

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You respond, maybe you even fall over. So the idea is, he's throwing around some kind of force, and that force would be the

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Holy Spirit. So, I mean, at best, it's heretical.

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He would tell you that the Holy Spirit is a person, but they treat the Holy Spirit as if he is a force.

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With that as a preface, how many of you are familiar with Coastie Hen?

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One, two, three, four, five, six. And Coastie Hen is the nephew of Benny Hen.

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So, I took this from the September, 2019 issue of Table Talk Magazine, from Ligonier Ministries.

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It's an interview with Coastie Hen, Benny Hen's nephew. He says, what was it like, this is a question, or what was it like growing up in the prosperity gospel movement as a nephew of one of its most prominent leaders and teachers, they're referring to Benny Hen.

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And he says, this is Coastie, he says, it was as lavish as anyone would imagine. But to me, it was normal.

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Every car we drove was nothing short of luxury. We drove Mercedes Benzes, Bentleys, Maseratis, and BMWs.

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My car of choice was an H2 on 22 inch rims. At one point, we had a

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Ferrari F430. I don't even know what that is. It sounds like either a lawnmower or an airplane or something,

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I don't know. But I don't follow Ferrari enough to know what an F430 is, but I think it must be expensive.

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Says we had an F430 from a business deal with Ministry Associates, okay.

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I'll never forget driving it around with my friends around Orange County while my dad was away, and that would be

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Benny Hen's brother, on a trip. It was like those movies in which the rich, spoiled kids do whatever they want while their parents are, or because their parents are powerful.

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The problem was that I was the son of a preacher, and our lives were an embarrassment to the gospel.

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Every hotel suite was prime minister, presidential, or royal.

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We flew on private Gulfstream jets that were paid for by ministry donations, lived in multiple million dollar homes, ate at the best restaurants, and went on shopping sprees to the finest stores around.

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Perhaps the best illustration of what life was like would be to say that even my undershirts were

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Versace. Okay, the only other question

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I'm gonna read, and then we'll get into this here. What prompted you to leave the prosperity gospel movement?

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After growing up and enjoying the benefits of it through my father and uncle, I worked in the center of it and started preaching it, started preaching the prosperity gospel.

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A series of events over the course of four years, and faithful people planting seeds in my life put cracks in the dam of my theology.

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I do not recall having questions throughout my teenage years, but I stayed silent, or I do recall having questions through my teen years, but I stayed silent for fear of God's judgment.

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Now listen to this. We are always taught to never touch the

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Lord's anointed. And that's something we're gonna hear more about in a second.

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And that means no questions and no criticism. In other words, there's a leader, can't question him, can't criticize him.

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He says, if something like a false prophecy was grossly inaccurate, or the behavior of a leader perversely sinful, you said nothing.

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Eventually I entered ministry as a pastor at a church plant and one day I was studying for a sermon on John 5, 1 to 17, the healing at the pool of Bethesda.

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The senior pastor of the church gave me a John MacArthur commentary. And in the midst of my study,

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I broke down in tears, repenting of my sin and committing to preach the true gospel. In that study,

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I suddenly realized that God is sovereign and Jesus healing ministry could not be twisted into some formula for gain.

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While he healed the man at Bethesda, he did so of his own volition. The man had no prior faith, gave no special offering and didn't even know who

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Jesus was. In other words, he's saying, listen, the normal formula for a faith teacher is, you have to believe, you have to give, you have to start something.

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And then if your faith is sufficient, then the healer can act on your faith and bring it to fruition.

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And the idea of the prosperity gospel or the healing ministry is that God is obligated by what you do.

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If you plant a seed, God is obligated to then harvest that seed.

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So he goes on to say, many other false doctrines felt like dominoes after that moment.

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I soon entered seminary, began discipleship with trusted mentors and was completely overtaken by the doctrines of grace.

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The rest is a long story. Read about it in my book, it's 1995, Simon and Schuster. Okay, so now the next month,

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Table Talk, which has a lot of good stuff in it, by the way. Table Talk magazine ran this article from Dr.

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Lopez from Brazil. He says, there are many passages in the

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Bible where expressions similar or identical to the one in the title of this article, which is, touch not the

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Lord's anointed, appear, including 1 Chronicles 16. Okay, the most well -known passage dealing with not touching the

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Lord's anointed may be the one in which David, pressured by his men to seize the opportunity to kill

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Saul, answered, the Lord forbid that I should do this thing to my

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Lord. The Lord's anointed to put out my hand against him, seeing he is the

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Lord's anointed. In other words, he wasn't gonna touch the Lord's anointed. The doctor goes on to say, he says,

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David's reluctance to kill Saul because Saul was the Lord's anointed has been interpreted by many evangelicals and many false teachers as a biblical principle that applies to pastors of modern day churches.

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To them, once the pastors are the Lord's anointed, one cannot raise a hand against them. And by the way, please don't raise your hand against us.

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That would be, you can criticize us or do other things, but don't raise your hand against us. That is, they cannot be contradicted, questioned or criticized.

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God's anointing works as a kind of protection. It's a bubble. It's an immunity given by God to his anointed.

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To go against them would be to go against God himself, but is that really what the Bible teaches? He says, the expression the

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Lord's anointed refers to how kings of Israel were officially chosen and designated by God to occupy the role through the anointing done by a judge or prophets.

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David didn't wanna kill Saul because he recognized that Saul, although unworthy, occupied a role designated by God.

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David did not want to be guilty of killing the one who had received the royal anointing. However, what cannot be ignored in this case in this respect for the life of the king, or what cannot be ignored is that this respect for the life of the king did not stop

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David from confronting Saul and accusing him of injustice and perversity in persecuting him,

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David, without cause. David was not going to kill him, but he invoked God as judge against Saul in front of the whole army of Israel and openly asked

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God to punish Saul. David also told his allies that God himself in due time would kill

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Saul for his sins, but David did not want to be the one to kill him.

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So, last little bit here, men of God, those anointed by him for pastoral work, don't reply to disagreements, criticisms, and questionings by shutting the mouths of the sheep with, don't touch the

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Lord's anointed, but with work arguments, truth, and sincerity. Don't touch the

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Lord's anointed is the reply of those who do not have an argument or an example to give as an answer.

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So, here's what spiritual leadership is not.

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First of all, it's not the same as worldly leadership. It's not the same as worldly leadership. Why would that be?

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When we think of worldly leadership, what do we think of? And please don't say, you know,

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President Trump. What do we think of when we think of worldly leadership? Power.

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I mean, let's put it this way. What's the difference between a CEO of a corporation and a pastor of a church? Okay, money is one, but what,

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I mean, really, what are the differences? Yes, I mean, I could tell you this, that Mike doesn't have a multimillion dollar parachute if he gets fired.

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I do, but he doesn't. Charlie, okay. So, another way to look at this situation then is what is success, right?

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Is business success different than church success? Okay, and the reason is because Jesus never said,

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I'm going to build my business and no one will prevent me, you know, not even the power of hell will stop me from doing that.

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Is it possible for a, say, a business leader to lie to advance his business?

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What would we, yeah, what would we say about a pastor who lied to, you know, grow the church or, you know, that kind of, so in many ways,

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I mean, there are some similarities. I think we could argue there are some similarities, but I think when people, and there are whole books written about this, about how to take business principles and run your church, right, like it's a business.

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And the problem with that is it doesn't generally line up with what the Bible says. So would it be right to say, well, if somebody's successful in business, they automatically should be, say, an elder?

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No. If somebody's a good elder, would they necessarily make a good businessman?

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And I think the answer again would be no. They could, but they, not necessarily.

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Talking about spiritual leadership and what it's not, it's not a place of unquestionable authority.

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And, you know, whether we're talking about a church or at home, in both places, the leadership is accountable.

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And to whom is the leadership accountable? The Lord.

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We know that, you know, pastors are going to face strict judgment, but so are husbands and fathers, right?

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They're accountable. They're the head of the family and they're going to be held accountable. Let's turn to Matthew 23, and I wanna, you know, sometimes people have a problem with the calling out of specific names and, you know, holding people accountable in that way.

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And I wanna turn to what Jesus said in Matthew 23.

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And I don't know if even people talk about Beth Moore quite like this on the internet.

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So Beth Moore, some time ago, she's a female teacher, woman teacher, who sometimes teaches men and says things that she ought not to say.

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And she's been criticized here lately. In fact, somebody famously said, you know,

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Beth Moore should go home. And someone else who's a little bit closer, his office is just over here, asked the question, where's

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Beth Moore's husband, right? Which is a good question. Where is her husband? In the kitchen making dinner,

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I think. Okay, so Matthew 23, and I'm gonna read verses one to 12. Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples, the scribes and the

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Pharisees sit on Moses's seats, the symbol of power here.

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So do and observe whatever they tell you, but not the works they do, for they preach, but do not practice.

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They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people's shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger.

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They do all their deeds to be seen by others, for they make their phylacteries broad and their fringes long.

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And they love the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces and being called rabbi by others.

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But you are not to be called rabbi, for you have one teacher and you are all brothers and called no man your father on earth, for you have one father who is in heaven.

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Neither be called instructors, for you have one instructor, the Christ. The greatest among you shall be your servants.

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Whoever exalts himself will be humbled and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.

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Now, when you read that and you think about these Pharisees and Jesus warm remarks about them.

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Okay, I'm being facetious. But can you summarize what he's saying about them?

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I have a few words that I took to summarize what he's saying like here, your ideas. What is he actually saying about these people?

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They're hypocrites. They're self -righteous. They look for honor.

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I mean, these are mostly the ones I had. I had hypocrites. I put their frauds, right?

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They do all their deeds to be seen by others. They're selfish, they want honor.

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They're proud. But the one I liked maybe the most that I came up with. Tyrants, why?

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Because it says they tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear and lay them on people's shoulders. What does that mean?

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More laws. Let me give you some more rules. You can only walk this far on the Sabbath. You can only do this.

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You can only do that. You cannot do this. You will do this. You teach the commandments of men as if they were, you know, from God.

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And that's exactly right. They teach these made -up commandments and make them laws.

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They put them, you know, again, all these heavy burdens on people. Now, real -life scenarios.

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What would you say about a church which has excommunicated 40 % of its members over a two -year period?

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Most of them are charged with factiousness. 40%, almost half of the church.

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What's that? Factiousness. A smaller church, that'd be true.

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Now, there could be good reasons for it, right? But how about this? How about if most of them were excommunicated and charged with factiousness after they left the church?

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What's that? Sounds like they're hiding something. And most of the people who left, almost all of them left without saying a word.

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They just sent a letter to the elders saying, these are the reasons why we're leaving. That's it. Essentially, interesting because I listened to one of their meetings after a family left and they got together on a weeknight to excommunicate this family.

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And each of the people who stood up to talk said how much they regretted the family leaving and how wrong the family was, but it was the right thing to excommunicate them.

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Now, does that sound like it's in keeping with Matthew 18? In other words, if the idea is restoration, the idea is repentance, and they leave the church and they say, these are the reasons we're leaving.

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We're not out to make a fuss or anything like that. We're just out of here. Then you bring it up in front of the church and you say, we're gonna punish them for leaving, which is what they do.

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Same church. Practice Sunday night pulpit confession of sins.

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Everybody gets up, confesses some sin. Some of which, without getting into detail, are really unfit for people of the opposite gender to hear.

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Not things that we should be talking about, I don't think. What if I told you that the pastor of this church meets alone with women, both married and single, meets alone with them?

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What if I told you that the pastor, when he meets alone with these married women, asks them about their physical relationship with their husband?

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What if I told you that that pastor teaches that to own a gun is to commit murder? Because after all, why else would you have a gun unless you intended to shoot somebody?

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What if I told you that he said it's a sin to stand for the national anthem because you're worshiping the flag?

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It's a sin to celebrate Christmas because that's idolatry. What if I told you that that pastor said that there is almost nothing in your lives, right, as a church, that the elders can't be involved in if they wanna be?

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Sounds like a cult, and I would agree with that. Why does that sound like a cult?

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There's zero room for grace. I mean, the irony is grace is in their name, but grace shouldn't be in their name because it should be graceless, right?

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The church at which you cannot be forgiven, that would be a good name for it. You cannot criticize leadership at all.

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You can't even, well, you can't talk to them, certainly, about things. Because if you do, guess what the response is?

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Touch not the Lord's anointed, right? Don't do that. Let's look at Luke 15 for a moment.

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Luke 15, I'm gonna read verses one to seven, one of the less referred to parables of Luke 15.

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I mean, the main one is the prodigal son, right? Luke 15, starting in verse one.

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Now, the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to him, to Jesus. And the

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Pharisees and scribes grumbled, saying, this man receives sinners and eats with them.

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So he told them this parable. What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the 99 in the open country and go after the one that is lost until he finds it?

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And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.

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Just so I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who need no repentance.

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And my question is, when you think about that church, what does it, you know, if you were to identify, let's just say the leadership of that church, would you say, who would you say that it most sounds like in this parable?

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The Pharisees. You know, I can't believe you would say such a thing.

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I can't believe you would do such a thing. I can't believe there was a time they've taught this. They've modified it over the years for reasons that I don't need to get into right now.

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But they used to say, don't let your daughters play sports. Don't let your daughters go to college.

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Why would they say that? Why do you need an education if you're gonna be in the kitchen?

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What does that have to do with being a good mother and a good wife? Chain those girls to the kitchen.

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That's what they need. That'll learn them. Interesting place.

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What should church leadership look like? What should it look like? Three -piece suits.

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Oh, wait, sorry. Let me read the London Baptist Confession of Faith, and then we'll get back into the word here for a moment.

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Just this, it doesn't say a whole lot about pastors, which I found a little surprising, but let me read this part.

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The work of pastors being constantly to attend the service of Christ in his churches, in the ministry of the word and prayer, with watching for their souls, as they must give an account to him, it is incumbent on the churches to whom they minister, not only to give them all due respect, but also to communicate to them of all their good things according to their ability so that they may have a comfortable supply without being themselves entangled in secular affairs.

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Which means what? They shouldn't have to work outside the church. It may also be capable of exercising hospitality toward others.

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And this is required by the law of nature and by the express order of our Lord Jesus, who hath ordained that they preach the gospel or that preach the gospel should live of the gospel.

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With that said, I wanna turn to 1 Peter chapter one, because I, or I'm sorry, 1

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Peter chapter five, verses one to three, 1 Peter chapter five. And I just think this is such a stark contrast to that church

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I was talking about. And if I told you, you know, who is there, some of you would know.

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If I told you some of the people that have taught there, one of the names would blow your mind. It's just interesting and sad.

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1 Peter chapter five, verses one to three. So I exhort the elders among you as a fellow elder.

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Notice the humility of Peter, right? Not the first Pope, just a fellow elder. I'm just a pastor like you guys.

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As a fellow elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the glory that is going to be revealed, shepherd the flock of God that is among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion, but willingly as God would have you.

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Not for shameful gain, but eagerly, not domineering over those in your charge, but being examples to the flock.

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Now, when we think about the other place, you know, where they're ruling with an iron fist effectively.

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Watch the video where the pastor said, you know, I can't go into your house and tell you what color sofa you ought to have, but basically nothing else ought to be out of my control or dominion.

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I don't like how you're spending your money. I don't like how you do this, the other, so absolute control, right?

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And that's not the picture we see here. They're shepherds exercising oversight.

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One man, Freiberg says, literally, as one who takes care of a group of animals, especially shepherding a flock.

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Listen, tend, feed, pastor, but metaphorically of administrative and protective activity in relation to a community of believers.

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Guide, care for, look after, right? That's the idea, not, you know,

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I mean, I'm going to run them with a rod of iron and, you know, smash them like, that's just not the idea at all.

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Let's go to the more obvious ones. 1

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Timothy, yeah, I see that hand, Cory, go ahead. That's a good question, and I didn't study that, but if I were to say, you know, if I were to guess, and I will guess because it's what

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I do, I would say we'd probably see the answer to that in 1

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Timothy, or at least an answer to it. So let's turn to 1 Timothy, nice segue.

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I like segues, segues are good. 1

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Timothy 3, I can always count on Cory for a nice segue. And it would be right in the beginning here.

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The saying is trustworthy if anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task.

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And I'll just stop there for a moment. You know, there may be people, there may be men who are qualified to be elders who don't want to be an elder, in which case, then what?

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They shouldn't be elders, and they shouldn't be compelled to be elders, right? Not under compulsion, they're not forced to do it.

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I mean, can you think of a reason why somebody wouldn't want to be an elder? Sit with me for an hour, and I'll get started on why you shouldn't want to be an elder.

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It's great, a lot of times. If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task.

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Therefore, an overseer must be above reproach. The husband of one wife, sober -minded, self -controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money.

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He must manage his own household well. And notice how those two things go together for a moment,

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I want to just pause there for a moment. Not a lover of money, he must manage his own household well.

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Household having to do with, it's the word from which we get economy, it's this whole, it has to do with your whole well -being kind of thing, and it includes finances.

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And if you're a lover of money, you don't know how to, and you, you know, and you get yourself into debt or something, you know, deeply into debt, this could be a problem.

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He must manage his own household well, with all dignity, keeping his children submissive.

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For if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God's church?

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Right, if you, if your children are known as the hooligans of the town, probably ministry is not for you.

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He must not be a recent convert, or he may become puffed up with conceit and fall into the condemnation of the devil.

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Moreover, he must be well thought of by outsiders so that he may not fall into disgrace into a snare of the devil.

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So those are the qualifications for elders. And when we see that again, and we just think about this other church and the kind of things they do,

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I mean, talk about puffed up with conceit and all these other things, you know, laying all these burdens on other people.

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But deacons, and I wanna read this and then just ask a couple questions. Deacons likewise must be dignified, not double tongued, not addicted to much wine, not greedy for dishonest gain.

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They must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience and let them also be tested first, then let them serve as deacons if they prove themselves blameless.

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Their wives must be dignified, not slanderers, but sober minded, faithful in all things.

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Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well.

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For those who serve well as deacons gain a good standing for themselves and also a great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus.

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Now, most of you know this, what's the main difference between a deacon and a teacher? And an elder, sorry.

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They must be able to teach. Oh, thank you. They must be a teacher. Gave it away, it's like, all right, sorry, sorry,

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I stepped on my own. It's not really a punchline though, is it? No, not really. Now, reading through all of that, you know, was there something where you just thought, you know, as a male or even as the wife of somebody, is there something there you just thought, that is a goal that's just too high.

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You know, I should never attain to that or my husband should never even shoot for that. You know, here's what it doesn't say.

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An elder must walk on water. You know, an elder must be perfect.

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A deacon must be able to hover. I mean, we don't see things like this.

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What's that? Bob was just talking about the time he did hover. Oh, sorry. He was blown away by hovering deacons.

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Okay. I think those were angels actually, Bob, but.

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But I mean, we, you know, sometimes these are just things.

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I mean, this is kind of like, if we were to distill Christian living into, what is that?

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13 verses. I mean, this would be pretty close to it, right?

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What's a Christian male supposed to look like? What's a Christian woman supposed to look like? We could get all the principles right out of there.

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Now, let's go to another passage and we'll maybe, well,

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I want to go to John chapter 10. I'll just, while you're turning there,

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I'll just kind of Titus one, the main point of Titus one for me, as you know, as a differentiator, me,

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I should just look at it. So I just don't totally, but the main thing is there, he does talk about elders needing to be able to exhort and sound doctrine and refute those who contradict sound doctrine.

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And the reason that that's important, of course, is because that's a lot of what we do, right? We have to be able to,

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I mean, mostly the same kind of thing, trustworthy, et cetera, exhort and able to give instruction, sound doctrine and rebuke those who contradicted.

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Very important because the church is the pillar and ground of the truth, right?

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It has to be the, it has to be faithful. The word has to be faithfully taught here. If it's not, that's an issue.

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And that's why elders have to be able to do that. Now, John 10, and I just want to, again, illustrate what the difference between proper shepherding and improper shepherding is by just using the

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Lord Jesus as the ultimate example. John 10 verses one to 16. Truly, truly,

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I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold of the door or by the door, but climbs in by another way, that man is a thief and a robber.

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But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him, the gatekeeper opens.

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The sheep hear his voice and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.

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When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them and the sheep follow him for they know his voice.

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A stranger they will not follow, but they will flee from him for they do not know the voice of strangers.

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This figure of speech, Jesus used with them, but they did not understand what he was saying to them. So Jesus again said to them, truly, truly,

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I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who came before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them.

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Now let me just pause there for a moment. Who is he talking about? All who came before me were thieves and robbers.

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Okay, people who said they were the Christ and they weren't. The Pharisees, the scribes, right?

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The religious leaders who were supposed to shepherd the flock and did not.

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Certainly there were false Christ popping up, especially around that time, but it was the

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Pharisees and the scribes who were really bent on leading the people astray and getting the people to follow them.

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They had the power. Okay, the sheep did not listen to them, to the false ones, right?

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The false Christ, but also the true sheep, that is the elect, don't listen to the false teachers.

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I am the door. If anyone enters by me, he will be saved and will go in and out and find pasture.

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The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.

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I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He who is a hired hand and not a shepherd who does not own the sheep sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees and the wolf snatches them and scatters them.

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He flees because he is a hired hand and cares nothing for the sheep. I am the good shepherd.

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I know my own and my own know me. Just as the father knows me and I know the father and I lay down my life for the sheep.

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I have other sheep that are not of this fold and I must bring them also. And they will listen to my voice.

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So there will be one flock, one shepherd and one flock, one shepherd. And you know, anytime we're talking about sheep, flock, church, who do those people belong to?

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I mean, they belong to Christ, right? So the idea that someone would exercise kind of dominion over these people when they're not his, right?

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They don't belong to, this isn't the church of Steve. We didn't, you know, when they hired Mike, they didn't change the church name to the church of Mike because it's not

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Mike's church. It's not Scott's church or Pradeep's church. You don't belong to us, you belong to the

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Lord. And that idea, referring back to 1

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Peter 3 where he talks about exercising oversight, 1

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Peter 5. Now it is interesting because that word does mean kind of ruling over.

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It's the word from which we get Episcopalian and all that stuff, Episcopal. It does mean, you know, like a hierarchy and that kind of thing, ruling over.

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But the idea, the picture is more of guiding the sheep, right?

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Exercising oversight isn't going into their house and telling them how to live. It's helping them when they're straying.

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It's pointing them in the right direction. It's seeing when they're about to run off a cliff and stopping them because sheep do stupid things.

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Sometimes even we do stupid things. And when it says there in 1

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Peter 5, not for shameful gain, what does that mean?

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Well, I think it means what Costi was talking about, right? Flying Gulfstream jets, picking the best cars, you know, going to the

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Maserati dealer and going F330, not good enough. I want the F430, you know, that F430.

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I still don't know what that is. Not domineering over the flock.

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Dictionary defines it this way, as exercising dominion for one's own advantage. Lord it over, rule over, domineer over.

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And I read that and I'm like, that's what that church does. Ruling over, domineering over.

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You can't question us. You can't even come to us with Bible questions because we'll shut you down.

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Also says in 1 Peter 5, there to be examples of the flock, meaning that there to be the embodiment of biblical characteristics.

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Doesn't mean they're going to be perfect. It just means that, you know, Paul said this.

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He said, follow me as I, or imitate me as I imitate

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Christ, right? That's the idea. I like picking on Mike since he's not in the room.

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It, you know, there are many things that are admirable about if it's

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Pastor Bob or Pradeep or Scott or Mike, you know, you say, well, I want to be more like Mike in this area.

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I want to be more like Pradeep in this area. Those are good things, right? And that's the idea, to just be somebody that other people can learn from.

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Last, I'll do this. Mark chapter 10. Mark chapter 10, verses 42 to 45.

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And Jesus called to him and said to them, you know that those who are considered rulers of the

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Gentiles, Lord it over them. And there are great ones exercise authority over them, but it shall not be so among you.

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But whoever would be great among you must be your servants. And whoever would be first among you must be slave of all.

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For even the son of man came not to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many, which is basically the theme verse of this book.

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And you think, okay, if we as pastors, as elders are supposed to imitate

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Christ, right? And be an example for the flock, here's what he did.

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And, you know, obviously none of us are even close to that.

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But the idea here is whoever would be great must be your servants. There's a humility that has to attend leadership.

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You know, you talk about what maybe is the greatest difference between business leaders and church leaders.

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And I would say it's probably humility. Church leaders need to understand that they have circumscribed authority.

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There are boundaries to their authority. There are lines over which they may not cross.

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A business leader may say, well, you know what? I understand what you're saying, but it's my business.

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So we have a different rule book. And I can't say to somebody, you know, there's no verse that tells me this, but you must do that.

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I can say what? There's no verse that tells me this, but I think it's wise for you to do this.

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But what happens if you don't follow my wisdom? Right foot of fellowship.

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No, I just go, well, okay, you didn't listen to me.

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Let's see how it goes. You know, and when you, you know, unlike what my dad used to say, you know, don't come crying back to me.

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You can come crying back to me. It's okay, because it was only wisdom anyway. And I could have been wrong.

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I'll say it. Becky's never experienced me being wrong. So I can understand your question.

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That's fine. Maybe, you know,

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I'll think for a while. Maybe I'll come up with an example for you. It'll help. But there are limits.

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And if we ever say to you, you know, well, I think you should do da, da, da, you can always say this.

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Is that a biblical command? Is there a verse that goes with that?

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In other words, or is that just wisdom, right? It's fine. I think there are some times where, you know, and I don't want to go down this whole rabbit hole of wisdom versus command, but let me just say this, that there are times, you know, are there implications from biblical texts?

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Let me give you an example. Is there a verse that says, listen carefully, is there a verse that says, believers shall not marry unbelievers?

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Not specifically. But are there verses that would make it clear that that's not a good idea?

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So, you know, if somebody comes to me and says, I want to marry an unbeliever pastor, and I say, okay, let's look through these verses and see what it says.

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And you go, well, it doesn't say I can't marry an unbeliever. So, okay, I, you know,

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I won't marry you. You can go to the justice of the peace or find some pagan, you know, who's going to have you jump over a broom.

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I was listening to some odd ceremony the other day. Yeah, that was

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Trey. Trey didn't get married at a weird thing, by the way. Deacons hovering over the, but the point is there are, there's wisdom that comes almost as a direct implication from some verses and not just on marriage, but on a variety of things.

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You know, when it comes to, I mean, there are commands with regard to money. There are a lot of things, right?

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So there's wisdom. And if you want to just disregard wisdom and do whatever you want, I can't stop you.

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What I will do and what the other elders will do is when you come running, crying to us, we'll say, okay, not

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I told you so, because that's easy, right? But okay, here's what we do now.

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You know, here's the next step. Let's try it again, right?

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And that's shepherding. Lording it over is just saying, you did it,

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I can't believe you did that. Well, more next week, let's close in prayer.

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Father, thank you for your word. Thank you for what it says about what we should expect, what we should want, and what we should not want.

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Think about friends, loved ones who are either involved in false cults, false religions, no religion at all, or even involved in so -called churches that all they want to do is lord their authority over people, make their lives more difficult, just put burden upon burden upon burden upon people, distorting the gospel, making it unrecognizable because of all the rules and regulations they promulgate.

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Father, keep us constrained by your word, keep us faithful to the gospel, the simple gospel week in and week out, just preaching the gospel, watching the

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Holy Spirit transform lives through the preaching of your word. We pray in Jesus' name.