2023 Laborers' Conference- Session 7 The Church

We are live.

Good morning.

Welcome to the 2023.

We had just talked about hiccups and here we are creating our own hiccups.

I was not prepared and it's okay.

We're not going to show them.

We won't show the intro.

We won't show the intro.

Happy Lord's Day, Claude.

Happy Lord's Day, Rob.

Praise the Lord for his life, death, and resurrection.

We get to celebrate it every day.

Every day.

And we gather together on the Lord's Day to worship him.

Praise him together.

And the Lord has allowed us to do that this weekend together

with you guys who came from Tennessee, New York, South Carolina, Colorado Springs.

It's been a blessing.

It has been a great blessing.

It's amazing.

I feel like I've known you all along.

So it has been truly a blessing.

It has been a blessing.

And this is, like I said, this is a 2023 Laborers Conference born

out of the Laborers Podcast, which we collaborate together on Thursday

evenings at 830.

So please join us.

And the Laborers Podcast comes from the Lord bringing other

podcasters together.

And I just want to give out a shout out to all the guys that are active in our group.

Most of them have podcasts.

Jesse Gomez, aka the Chicano Knox.

He has the Bible Theory Podcast.

We would encourage you to go check him out.

Brother Claude Ramsey.

He has the Here I Stand Theology Podcast.

Please go check him out.

Dan Self.

He is with me on the Truth and Love Podcast.

Deontay Walters.

He can't make it to the podcast.

He was on with us early, early on.

Him and Jesse Bland.

They were on with us early, early on at the beginning of all this.

Back around 2020 when our country was going through some rough spells,

they joined us and helped us walk through some of those difficult times theologically.

That's awesome.

Yeah.

They don't have podcasts.

Deontay preaches at New Beginnings Church in California.

So check him out.

Jay Antello.

He's new.

The Reformed Rican.

That's right.

He's a good dude.

That's right.

Jeremy Hull.

He doesn't have a podcast, but he's a pastor in Myrtle Beach area, South Carolina.

Faith Reformed.

Yep.

Baptist Church.

John Jones.

Real Talk with Big John.

Check him out.

Jonathan Foster, who's the pastor here at Vertical Life Church in Newton, North Carolina.

We are grateful.

Yes.

By the way, we should most certainly give a shout out to every member that has

so contributed, showing grace and kindness here to us because they have truly shown

godly hospitality to us here.

So thank the Lord for them.

Yes, they've been very gracious to us.

Joshua Burns, he does not join us on the podcast.

However, he is our official

garb.

Would you call it garb or wares?

1689design .com.

That's 1689design .com.

Go buy some Christian hats, shirts, cups, mugs, water bottles, whatever you

can think of.

That's right. That's right.

Matt Breeding.

Yes, our brother.

That's right.

Matt Breeding.

He's in Tennessee as well.

Yes, sir.

And he joins us when he can.

He's a contributor to the Labors podcast, and we really appreciate him.

And last, but certainly not least, Brother Tyler Noe.

Oh, yes.

Tyler is the brains of our operation.

No offense, Rob.

Rob's the founder and the organizer, but Tyler is, in the very best sense of

the word, he's the big head.

He's the big, giant head of the Labors.

No, truly, he is a blessing.

I mean, his knowledge, his humility, his grace.

He really is a blessing.

That's right.

You're right, and I take no offense to that.

I wish I had a quarter of his brain.

He's 24 years old, and as the old saying goes, he knows more

than we've forgotten.

Is that how the saying goes?

He would remember.

He would tell us.

So, let me ask you this.

I'm going to take us to a modern evangelical Bible study.

So, Claude, the 2023 Labors Conference, how has that made you

feel?

Well, yellow makes me feel sad.

Well, to be honest, there are feelings involved in theology

and in doctrine, in sound preaching and teaching.

There are feelings involved in that, and it has made me feel secure in the faith.

It's made me assured of the love of God.

It has renewed my confidence in

brothers and sisters in Christ that are not necessarily in the same locale, right?

Because there's faithful men and women of God in South Carolina, North

Carolina, in New York, in Colorado, in South Carolina.

I said South Carolina, though, didn't I?

Right?

Knoxville.

Jay is in Miami.

Jay Antello is in Miami.

Deontay and them is in California.

I mean, they're all over the place.

And we hope the Lord will allow us to grow.

Yes, we do.

We're like -minded in the foundations, in the core tenets of the faith.

But also, Claude, I think we're also similar in our demeanors,

in our character and our attitude, because there's a

compassion.

There's a kindness toward one another, and not everybody carries that.

That's right.

And we want to example that.

The best part of our core desire is to example that,

because there's so much hostility, not just in the world, but in the Christian community online.

You're right.

And we want to example unity.

There's differences, and there should be separations at some times.

Scripture speaks about that.

But there also, I mean, Jesus prayed for unity, that we would be one as He and the Father are

one.

And in those ways, we want to be one, and we want to exalt Christ and glorify

God in that.

Amen. Yeah.

I had something in mind that I wanted to say.

I forgot to wear my phone.

I mean, my phone, my watch.

And so I need to keep track of time.

My computer has a little clock down at the bottom.

Mine says 1022.

What's your phone say?

1025.

1025, yeah.

So let's go by the phones.

Okay, we got about five more minutes.

Let's see.

What was a highlight for the weekend for you?

I would say the highlight of the weekend for me, honestly,

was the, and again, if you folks

watch the show, you know, and I don't mean nothing by it, but I

don't know.

I don't know why that Tyler's teaching and preaching is so,

that I'm so drawn to it, but he's just so straightforward, so eloquent, so plain.

So I would say for me, the highlight of the weekend would have been your sermon, the kickoff

sermon, and Tyler's sermon and his breakout.

That was for me.

Those were the three.

Well, you know, during the question and answer session.

Yeah.

And he said it was on the fly because we had a very difficult question.

Yeah.

That was posed to us and we were trying to answer it with grace, but with truth.

And Tyler was looking at the passage and he was examining the text and he

laid out a word picture that the text itself

brings out.

And it was just so beautifully brought out by Tyler.

Yeah.

And those word pictures helped me.

Those people who are not as analytical, academic, those word pictures really help.

Exactly.

To visualize it, to understand what's going on.

Yeah.

And he brought that out and I thought it was helpful for me.

It was wonderful.

And you, I think the opening sermon, this is, you know, I think

at a conference, the first preacher, I'm going to refer, because I speak country,

speakers, you can call them speakers, but I'm going to call them preachers, right?

You had the opening sermon of the conference, which

is a challenge because really you set the tone, you set the pattern

for the remainder of the conference.

And the bottom line is this.

If you were here, you got it.

Guess what?

If you wasn't here, you missed it.

But you can catch up online.

That's right.

So the podcast or all the sermons are going to be, they are recorded,

transmitted, set up on YouTube right now and on the Truth and Love Network, correct?

In the process.

In the process, so they will be sometime in the next couple of weeks.

Yeah.

We'll give you probably a couple of weeks to recuperate.

Hopefully sooner than later.

While it's fresh on everybody's mind, I wanted to get them out there and I'm glad you brought that up.

I wanted to say this before we leave too.

We did something unique.

Like we're doing currently right now.

We were podcasting prior to the service and

the intent was, and some of them did, they come back in here and they podcasted, if we can use

that as a verb, after the service to kind of give you a warm up, a little

conversation before, and then a recap after the service.

And touching on some of the highlights from the sermon.

That was a fantastic idea.

We had some hiccups, but I think it worked out really well.

It was really unique to the conference setting.

Yep.

And I enjoyed it.

I think it worked out well.

And so what I'm doing, I'm cutting out the sermons and they will be posted individually.

Some of them have already been posted and we're working on getting the rest of them.

But I would encourage you, if you have time, and even if you can just listen to it going down the road,

check out the content prior to the service and after the service, because the guys come in here and

faithfully gave some good conversation, some good content,

reflecting on the conference and what's going on here and what was said.

So check out the individual sermons and also check out the entirety of the

podcast.

Yep.

So Rob, to wrap us up here, what's happening today?

So what's happening today?

This is session seven.

Our final speaker is going to be Jesse Gomez, the Chicano Knox.

He is going to be speaking on Jesus' authority over the church.

The theme of the conference was all authority in heaven on earth, the supremacy of Christ, Jesus' authority over

everything and how we live in light of that truth.

And so the final session, the final sermon is going to be on the church.

And I'm looking forward so much to that.

And we talked about how folks come in here after post service.

We're not going to do that this morning because this morning part of the session is going to be Q &A session.

So we're going to remain out there with the guys to be included in the Q &A

session.

So if you have there'll be folks monitoring.

If you have any if you have any questions, post them, you know, make a

comment, post them online.

And so the folks out there can see them and they can be asked in the service.

But there will be no post service podcast.

We'll be out in the sanctuary.

So this will be our goodbye.

Yeah.

It's going to be the the the first the Friday night Q &A was awesome.

But today it's going to be a little bit intimidating because we're going to have a full church.

So there will likely be some good questions.

So we look forward to that.

But that puts us back in our element because what it was what it was like Friday night.

And I'm certain what it'll be like tonight today in the Q &A is it'll be it's

basically just the same thing as we do on Thursday nights.

But there'll be a lot more comments and questions coming at us.

So pray for us that the Holy Spirit will speak to us.

He'll give us clarity of mind.

Recall good, solid, biblical answers and continue to pray for us throughout the year.

We're going to have a video and announcement about next year's conference.

Lord willing.

And we'll we'll announce that at the very end.

So that wraps up the 2023 Labor's Conference podcast

portion.

And Brother Claude, I love you.

I was glad to meet you.

And hopefully we have many, many more.

Amen. All right. Amen.

So enjoy the service.

And we're thankful that you are worshiping with us today.

To

see

everybody this morning.

Today is going to be a little bit of a different format.

Just so you know, this weekend, if you haven't paid attention, we had the Labor's Conference this weekend.

It went really well.

We were those of us that were able to persevere through that were very, very blessed and very thankful for all

that the Lord allowed us to do.

And so we're very thankful for many of you who volunteered snacks

and kept coffee going and kept the green room going back there for the guys to hang out.

Just just a ton of volunteers.

Garrett Carter gets the bronze star.

He put a bunch of overtime in.

OK, like behind the scenes earlier in the week and those kind of stuff.

Maybe it's a gold star.

Garrett Bronze is like we give you the gold star, buddy.

So but he did a ton of behind the scenes work helping us get our technology working

and all those kind of stuff.

And so if you weren't able to attend, we will have the sessions online.

Content was excellent.

The guys did a tremendous job preaching the word and bringing truth.

And so we're just very, very thankful for them today.

If you are part of the laborers group, I'd like for you to stand right now, if that's OK.

All right.

Can you stand?

We got so we got to do some real quick.

We got Jesse right over here.

Jesse's from Colorado, from Colorado Springs.

Right.

Yep.

Colorado Springs, Colorado.

All right.

So make Jesse feel welcome.

All right.

Big John Jones.

He is all the way from Lincoln to North Carolina.

All right.

Good.

Tyler.

No.

Tyler is from the eastern part of North Carolina.

Claude Ramsey is from Knoxville, Tennessee.

And Brother Robert.

Good night.

He is right about two blocks away from First Baptist or we call him from Lincoln to North Carolina, too.

Right. Good. All right.

Thank you.

So today's order of service, like I said, is going to be a little bit different.

We have our opening song.

We have a few announcements here.

We're going to take up our offering.

So for Vertical Lifers, this is our normal offering.

We're going to do one more song.

Then Jesse's going to preach.

Then after he preaches, then we'll have a Q &A time.

We're going to have the laborers come up, sit on the stage, and you can fire questions

at them.

So I want you to, like, dig deep in the Bible, get the most obscure question you can possibly think of

and ask them.

OK.

Especially Claude and Tyler.

OK.

They're like brainiacs.

All right.

So, no, in all seriousness, if there's been something that's been burning on your heart, you've been in your Bible reading.

Here at Vertical Life, we've been going through the Bible plan.

We've been doing the McShane Bible plan, and you're getting a lot of Old Testament and New Testament.

And if you've been reading and something's like there's a question on your heart, we're not going to say we have all the answers at all.

But maybe we can help guide you.

We can help think through some things together systematically.

And there is a lot of knowledge and a lot of years of experience when we're all together.

And so we want to—our goal is to labor with the body of Christ to help encourage you

and to equip you.

And then, like I said, if we don't have an answer, what will we say, Claude?

I don't know.

I don't know.

Let's go research.

You know, we'll get back to you on that one.

Right?

Make sense?

And so it's going to be a little bit of a special time today.

At the end of the service, we are going to take up a love offering.

We want to bless these guys that's traveled from out of town.

And we did take care of their expenses with their place to stay and things like that.

And so we are going to take up a love offering at the end.

So this first offering will be just our normal tithing offering.

And at the end of the service, we're going to do a love offering for the laborer guys.

I do have one other announcement that's just a little bit exciting.

So Vertical Life, you know that we have been in search mode for property

and some permanent facilities.

And just praying that God give us His vision, His direction.

Our dream is like a ministry center, a community center where people come all the time.

Where it's not just church activity, but it's community activity.

In the midst of that, we're making disciples and reaching people.

We've got a pretty big dream.

Okay?

So this week, we had a $100 ,000 gift this week for God's

vision.

So it's getting real.

It's getting real.

And so that's a challenge to all of us.

To pray to what God would have us do as families.

To invest and to do what God has called us to do.

We want to reach this city.

I want to remind you that of all cities in North Carolina, this is the 60th

most lost city.

And there are several hundred cities in the state of North Carolina.

66 % of the population in Newton, North Carolina do not have a relationship with Jesus Christ.

66%.

You start doing the math of the Newton Conover area, that's between 60 and 75 ,000 people.

Population total.

And then you deduct that down.

We're talking a population of 40 to 50 ,000 people that do not have a relationship with Jesus

Christ.

We've got a lot of work to do, church.

And I just don't want us to miss that.

I just don't want us to miss what God has called us to do.

Not just us, but linking arm -in -arms with other gospel -centered churches around our region.

There are people that do not know the joy of the Lord today.

They're entrapped.

And God has told us, stay here, because I still got many more people in this city.

Remember he told Paul, Paul wanted to leave and head out?

He told him, said, no, no, no, no, stay here.

I got many more coming.

But listen, we believe many more's coming, amen?

And we want to have tools.

We don't worship buildings.

We don't worship facilities.

But they are good tools in our tool belt to reach this city and reach this nation.

So it starts where you live, work, and play.

We're not dismissing that right there in your neighborhood, right there where you go to work, where you go to the ball field on the weekends.

Wherever you're at where you live, work, and play, it starts right there.

We're not dismissing that.

And then we want to have tools that as we bring people in, we're reaching this city, this community,

this region.

Amen?

Can you agree with me on that?

Amen.

Let's stand and let's pray together.

John, would you come on up?

And I'm just going to ask John, John did our session on evangelism, and I just want him

to pray over our city, pray over Lincolnton, pray over where the Lord leads you that we'll reach that, and then just

bless our offering.

Father, we come to you in Jesus' name.

Lord, I ask you that you take this time and set aside in this day,

and you teach us how to become better soul winners for you, how that we might be better equipped

to see your kingdom expand on this earth.

God, I pray that you bless this place, that you bless these brothers and sisters, that you bless those that have to give and those that don't have to give,

God.

God, I pray that you move in their lives as individuals, that you might

be able to move in their communities, that you might be able to move in their cities, move in their counties and their state.

Lord, until we see every new being and every tongue confess that you're Lord, we'll praise you because you're

worthy.

We'll love you because you loved us first.

It's in Jesus' name we pray and all God's people said.

It is the name of Jesus.

We praise

your name

this

morning.

We thank you for the power in your name, that at your name demons flee,

that graves open and people walk.

We are thankful that because of your work, we live.

Because of the finished work of Jesus, we have life.

We have freedom of will.

We are no longer condemned to death.

We have life through Christ.

We praise you and we thank you for that.

God, I pray that we would not walk in fear in this life because of your name.

You go before us, you lead the way, and you surround us in and you

cover our backside too because you are with us always.

You are mighty and we praise you and thank you.

For your goodness to us, for your mercy you've shown to us, your tremendous grace that you give us all.

We thank you for Jesus Christ.

It's in his name that we pray.

Church says.

You may be seated.

I think this thing is on.

It is?

All right.

All right.

Greetings.

How are you guys doing?

I am Jesse.

My name is Jesse.

I come from the great state of Colorado.

I'm holding it down.

I'm holding it down.

I love North Carolina.

You guys are very hospitable.

Very green.

Very green.

I've never seen so much consistency of green lawns.

I'm kind of jealous.

But God has blessed the state, right?

So, you know, I cover this one topic.

I cover this one topic, the church.

In theology, we call it ecclesiology.

And it's the study of the church.

And I've been studying the church since 2015.

I've been obsessed with it.

It's been my number one thought since 2015.

And I felt like I was on, like, an epiphany where it was like,

I was in your seat at my church.

And it was like, man, I wonder what God is doing around the world with other churches.

So that's how it kind of started.

And so I started, like, doing a podcast and, you know, from my basement, my room.

And all of a sudden, it's like in 38 countries, interviewing missionaries,

theologians, book authors, people who are experts or have hands -on knowledge

about the church.

And I won't stop and I can't stop thinking about it.

So today I have the privilege of, you know, expounding on this one verse

about the church.

So take it as one little piece of a giant puzzle

called the church.

If you ever had the privilege to study in the church, I encourage you to.

Usually in theology, if you open up theological, systematic books, the

church, ecclesiology, is usually one of the last things.

And that's one of the things that I have, like, I'm bummed out about.

I'm like, oh, man, it should be like one of the first, man.

Because the church is such a God idea.

It's such a God idea that it is so big.

So if you have your Bibles with me, with you, let's go ahead and open up to the gospel of

the letter, the gospel of Matthew, chapter 16, verse 18.

I don't know if I'll go ahead.

I'll try my best to get through it.

But let's go ahead and see if we can get through it.

Jesus says this.

And I tell you, you are Peter.

And on this rock I will build my church.

And the gates of hell cannot prevail against it.

Amen.

So the grass withers and the flowers fade, but the word of God endures forever.

Let's go ahead and pray.

Lord Jesus, thank you so much for your word that is true.

It endures forever.

Whether in Colorado or North Carolina, where the rain and seasons change, your word, Lord, stays

the same.

And your word is changing things, changing worlds, changing hearts right now as we speak.

So I pray that you would speak through me to speak your word,

Father, to those people here who need to hear this message about the church.

And I pray this in your name, Jesus, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

Amen.

So recorded here in Matthew 16, 18, you have several things.

And hopefully I'll cover some of them.

This is actually, you know, if you read the Puritans, this is actually one of the main verses that the

Puritans use as they traverse the Atlantic Ocean.

And I don't think I'll have the privilege to go through.

Every single word here in this verse.

So I would like to focus most of my time in the first part.

Of this verse.

And if you read it, this first part of the verse, it's a confirmation

of Peter.

And the second half of this verse is a prophecy.

So if you want to look at it from two parts, you've got the confirmation of Peter,

then you've got the prophecy.

So let's quickly talk about this confirmation of Peter real quick because I think you really do have to

look at Peter here.

You can't just read this verse.

One of the problems when we read the Bible, it's kind of like the same problem

that people have when they eat steak or meat.

They don't chew their food.

And I tell my son and my kids, make sure you chew your food because I don't want you to get a stomachache.

And sometimes when you read the Bible and you open it up and read such passages like this one,

we don't read it slowly enough.

We don't chew on it long enough.

How about you chew on it for the next five years and see how it changes your life?

Because I bet you it will.

So this is how I think when we approach the Bible in hermeneutics.

How I was taught is slow down, slow down.

So let's go ahead and slow down and look at this first part here.

Peter, the confirmation of Peter.

So let me ask you, have you ever thought about Peter,.

Like who he was and what he was?

He's a very interesting guy.

And Peter, you know his name wasn't originally Peter, right?

His real name was Simon, not Peter.

And you know Jesus changed his name, right, later on in the text.

And his real name in Aramaic is Kepa, Kepa.

And that means stone or little rock.

So imagine your real name is Little Rock.

Yeah, so imagine, you know, hey, how's your name?

My name is Little Rock, Simon.

So Peter, like many of you will probably relate, Peter was a fisherman.

So I know many of you were like, yeah.

So he was a fisherman by trade, and guess what?

He was also married.

So I know the Bible doesn't speak much about that, but from biblical records and other texts, it hints that he was

married.

In fact, some of the apostles were married.

And guess what?

One of the most famous things that we see on Peter's resume is that Peter denied Jesus three times,

also recorded for us in the Gospel.

So imagine having that in your testimony.

Hi, I'm Peter.

I'm a fisherman.

I'm married.

And I denied Jesus three times.

Nice to meet you.

You're like, whoa, that's a pretty heavy load right there, right?

But later on, we know that Jesus forgave him.

Like, imagine the weight that he must have felt for Jesus to say, Peter, I

forgive you.

I love you. I'm with you.

Imagine that forgiveness, that feeling.

And we know something very interesting about Peter.

We know a lot.

There's books upon books about Peter.

And here's one of the facts that I found out that I didn't know before about Peter.

Peter was not a fast runner.

He didn't run a 4 .3.

He was a slow runner.

And we know this detail because in the book of John, John says in chapter 20,

verse 4, both were running and the other disciple, which was John,

outran Peter and reached the tomb first.

Like, I was like, okay, so it's like in heaven, you know, John

gets to heaven and I can imagine Peter just waiting, you know, to see John with his arms

crossed and saying, did you really have to write that in, that you outran me?

Like, was that really necessary?

It's like, what?

Like, you ran slow.

Like, I could imagine that.

But yes, Peter was a fisherman.

He was married.

Peter denied Jesus three times, but he was restored by Jesus, forgiven.

And he also ran slow.

And later on in church history, we get the record of St. Jerome, who also wrote a

great deal about Peter.

He said in very great detail that Peter also died a martyr's

death in Rome.

So much so that he died upside down, was crucified upside down.

In fact, he requested the Roman soldiers to crucify him upside down because he

did not feel worthy to die in the same like image as his master, Jesus.

So imagine the Roman soldiers who do crucifixion from nine to five.

And you get this strange request.

Can I get crucified upside down while you're at it?

Oh, oh, wow.

Okay, let's go ahead.

We've never done that before.

So that's Peter.

This is the same Peter that Jesus is talking to in this verse.

Like, we got to slow down before we get to the exciting part of, I will build my church.

Like, he's talking to a person here.

He's having a conversation.

He's confirming the faith of Peter here.

Those are some of the facts that I think we need to get to know this person,.

Peter.

Jesus confirms, in this verse, you see that Jesus confirms Peter to be part of the

elect.

And if you read the entire chapter, just verse four, how do we know that?

He confesses Jesus to be the Christ.

That faith is connected to a confession.

It's not just an abstract idea.

Faith is not just an imaginary thing, like a

shadow.

It's based on, there's content, and there's meat inside these words.

That's why Jesus says, you, Peter, you are with me, basically.

And what's going on here, at the same time, when you read this verse, it's not just a name change.

It's not just a name change.

It's like, hey, Peter, Little Rock, you're no longer Little Rock.

You're Peter.

So it's not just that.

Yes, there's a physical name change, so Peter probably had to get a new ID, but it's a status change.

It's a status change.

It's an identity change.

It follows you forever.

If you think about it, your name follows you forever.

Everybody called him Little Rock growing up.

Now everybody has to call him Peter, so that's kind of weird.

So imagine changing your name in the middle of your life.

At 55 years old, everybody's like, hey, John, I'm not John no more.

I'm Josh.

What?

That's Peter.

He had to remind everybody, hey, don't call me that.

Call me Peter.

I'm a new man.

I'm a new creation.

It's a new identity that Christ is essentially giving here.

And if you look at the whole scope of Scripture, God does this only a number of times,

like physical name changes.

So God is like in the business of changing your name, changing your identity, changing your

person forever.

And if you look at it, there's like a pattern here.

You know, you look in the book of Genesis, God changed Abram, right, to Abraham,

and then he changes his wife Sarai to Sarah.

Then he changes Jacob into Israel.

And then here he changes Simon into Peter.

It's kind of like a pattern.

God is in the business of changing your soul, changing your name, changing who

you are.

And to one sense, Paul the Apostle kind of echoes this, doesn't he, in his testimony.

And his testimony used to be called, like his old name was Saul, right?

And then Jesus changed him so much that he no longer refers to himself to a Saul.

He's like, I don't go by that name.

I don't go by that character of who I used to be.

I go by Paul.

So ever since then, he refers to himself to a Paul.

So here in this verse, you have to say that Jesus confirms Peter as a believer.

It fits into a unique pattern of God's character, doesn't it?

God changes your identity.

He changes your person.

He changes who you were and changes you into something different.

If you give yourself a new name, it will probably not be as great.

You know, I met people who changed their names before because I used to work in financial places and

change their names in their accounts.

You know, it's very hideous.

And it's like, what's your name?

It's like there's generated names from AI or something.

And it's like, oh, wow.

Like, is that the best you can come up with?

So anyways, however, when you look at this verse, this verse has

been abused before, hasn't it?

Like all Bible verses, there's always room for abuse.

And specifically this verse, when it comes to the church, this verse is

famous for abuse.

It has a long history of abuse.

And you know who I'm talking about, the RCC.

I like to call them the RCC.

It's the Roman Catholic Church.

The Roman Catholic Church, they love to take this verse.

In fact, they plant their flag on this one verse.

They take this one verse, and they say, yes, it's about the confirmation of Peter.

And you're like, OK, yes, yes, that's it.

And they say, yes, it's about the election of somebody, about Peter becoming part of the church.

And you're like, OK, well, yes.

But that's not all they say.

That's not how they abuse the verse, actually.

We agree with them up to that point.

But it's how they manufacture what's coming next.

They say, no, this is actually a proof that Jesus himself

appointed Peter to be the head representative of the church on earth.

This is proof, they say, that Jesus actually appointed the first pope.

It's kind of like King Arthur.

That's how legendary this verse is to the Roman Catholics.

The next time you see a Roman Catholic person or a friend, you're like, wow, you see

Peter like a King Arthur.

That's how legendary this is.

Yeah, he's the first pope.

That's so great.

You're just like, man, let's look at that.

Let's look at that.

Because when you want to break down this verse, you have to look at that.

You have to look at the good and the bad and the ugly.

So was Peter the first pope?

Is there evidence in the Bible that suggests that this verse is actually talking that the church should

submit to one person on earth?

I don't think so.

That's my opinion.

I believe, I stick to the Bible.

They believe, they stick to the Bible.

But let's look it up.

They say this verse proves it.

They go on to Acts chapter 15, and they say that text proves it.

See, he spoke the most.

He spoke up.

And he carried the respect in Acts 15.

Look at how they respect Peter throughout the whole book of Acts.

John even allows him to speak most of the time.

It's like, well, I'm not sure if that really proves he's the pope.

Maybe John was an introvert.

What about that?

Maybe John didn't.

Really, he was the youngest one, so he let the elders speak.

What about that?

No, no.

These verses is the proof, they say, that he is the first pope.

And I would argue that I think they're getting their conclusions

partially from the biblical text, because they're using Acts 15, and they're quoting some Bible verses.

But I think they're leaning heavily on Roman Catholic tradition.

They have to be.

And probably using some imagination along, you know, somewhere in there.

You cannot have Disney without imagination.

You cannot have the Roman Catholic Church without some tradition and imagination in there.

But if you just stick with this one verse, if you just stick with the Bible, you will find no

such evidence that Peter was not the first pope.

You can't.

There's no such office.

First, you have to start with the office.

Like, let me go look up this office in Paul's letter.

Oh, there's not.

There's not an office in Paul's letter.

Okay, let me go look up some biblical references that Peter went to Rome and planted the

church in Rome.

Let me go look in the Book of Romans, the Letter of Romans, let me find that reference.

Oh, I don't.

We don't.

He doesn't.

Here are some questions about this issue that all Christians are kind of

unsure about.

Both reformed, non -reformed, Catholic, non -Catholic, right?

Capital C.

Catholic, right?

So, like, how did Peter ever get to Rome?

Because St. Jerome, in most of church history, says that he died in Rome.

How did he get there?

How did he get there?

We are unsure.

Catholic historians, Protestant historians, are not really sure of the

method, how he got there.

We don't know.

Did he take, like, a 737?

You know, we don't know.

Was he a slave?

Did he got there as a slave?

We don't know.

What did Peter do, by the way, when he got there?

Did he go to jail right away?

Did he get beat up?

Did he, like, escape?

You know what I mean?

So, like, some Christians, some Roman Christians were like, let's do a heist.

Let's get Peter out of jail, right?

A jailbreak.

Did that happen?

We don't know.

Did Peter ever get a chance to preach the gospel for sure to Caesar?

For sure, do we know this?

Is that the minutes of the meeting recorded in church history or secular history?

Once again, we are unsure.

Did Paul ever know that Peter was the Pope?

That's a biggie.

Because when I read the Book of Romans, I'm like, Paul doesn't ever reference Peter as being a

big guy.

In fact, Peter is not really mentioned in the Book of Romans.

So these are some of the questions you've got to ask yourself, some of the investigative questions.

And by the way, when you read any text of scripture, it's a good habit to have a journal next to you, a

blank piece of paper to write questions down.

Because when you write questions, it helps you dissect and digest the text better.

And then you don't read it quickly, do you, when you think it like that, right?

You're actually like, wow, that's a great question.

Let me write that down.

I'm driving my kids to school and I'm still thinking about it.

I'm still chewing on it.

There's that chewing aspect.

So the RCC loves to play these historical games.

There's no fact -checking for them.

They assume, they have to assume all these questions as a yes.

Yes, Peter got there this way.

Peter did this and this is what happened.

And yes, he climbed to the church.

Paul didn't know about it.

There's no way he even...

They just assume these historical events.

They have to.

When they read the same Bible verse that we're reading today, it's like they

don't need a fact -check.

They don't want a fact -check, actually.

They actually don't like...

That's what makes us Protestant.

If you think about it, why are you not a Catholic?

There's probably like a Brazilian reason.

But one of the reasons is that you stick to the Bible, that you read the Bible, that you actually ask

questions about the Bible.

Yes, some traditions are good.

That's fine.

But you know what?

Those things don't trump our Bible.

That's what makes a Protestant a Protestant.

So about this Pope thing.

Listen to what Thomas Watson has to say about Peter being the first Pope.

These words, as in the words of a young generational young kid, they are

lit.

The Pope succeeds Peter only in his denial of Christ.

Wow. Those are fighting words.

And if you think about the...

Don't get scared about Latin words, okay?

They're only Latin words.

Worth about 25 cents.

Okay?

So the first Latin word, you look at it, the word Pope.

It's just a Latin word.

It means father.

Just like Simon means Little Rock, right?

So it's just a little word.

Pope.

You're calling someone father.

Now, kids, I wouldn't recommend you call your father Pope.

It doesn't sound right.

So I wouldn't recommend that for kids.

But that word does mean father.

Now, here's another word in Latin that's a little bit more serious, right?

And these words are worth about 50 cents in the market.

So if you look at these words, Vicarious Christi.

I'm sure you heard those.

The more serious Latin words.

If you look up any translation in the Bible, you don't find those words in the exact

combination.

And those pronunciations.

Vicarious Christi in the translation.

That is very telling.

It should have been here.

Jesus should have said, you, Peter, Vicarious Christi.

The debate should have been over with Jesus pronouncing the King Arthur of the Bible,

Vicarious Christi.

They're not even found in the translation to the Bible.

Not even in the Latin Vulgate.

And, you know, just because some words are not found in the Bible, I'm not arguing, well, we shouldn't use these words, right?

Like the word hot dog is not in the Bible.

And the word National Football League is not in the Bible.

So can we use those?

Come on, don't be silly.

Of course not.

We could use those.

We could use those words.

And they like to play those games, by the way.

No, no. Let's just stick to the Bible.

So what I'm saying is, yes, we could use Latin words, but let's just be careful

not to use certain Latin words to the apostles.

Because that's what they're doing.

They're taking the Latin words and they're applying it to the apostles.

Historically, when you read this verse, it doesn't prove that Peter was the Pope.

You look at translation, this verse doesn't prove that Jesus was confirming that Peter was the

first father.

And you look outside of the Bible, you look at history, when Peter was gone, when Paul was gone, and John

after 90 AD, or 99 some people say, he was gone.

When you look after all the apostles, none of the early church fathers from the 1st, 2nd,

3rd, 4th century called Rome as the capital of the whole church.

The church, you look at the writings, they didn't believe that the Roman church was the center of the solar

system.

There's no evidence that Rome became the capital of Christianity in the first three

centuries.

Actually, just quickly going through these things, you have to say, man, like the burden

is on them, isn't it?

The burden is on them.

How would they read this verse?

I, you, Peter, I will build this church on you.

That's what they're saying.

You're the main man.

You're the CEO from here on out.

The burden is on our neighbors, Roman Catholic neighbors, our Roman Catholic friends,

right?

To prove this to us consistently with the Bible, with history, with the

translation, all of that.

The burden is on them.

The Pope actually didn't even start using the Vicar of Christ until like the 5th century, until the end of the

5th century.

Why is that?

Well, there's much more history into that.

In summary, I think in this one verse, if you look at it, Jesus is merely confirming that

Peter professed his faith in him.

I think it's simple as that.

Like, why do we have to play Latin Kung Fu with this?

Why?

He's just a man.

We look at the man, we look who Peter was, right?

Peter is just confessing his faith to Jesus.

That what?

Jesus was the Christ.

Jesus doesn't make Peter the first pope of the church.

Jesus is merely changing his identity, which is also falls into a certain pattern in history, like he did to

Abraham.

He doesn't really, and plus, if you read this verse, it shows you who really has

authority over the church, doesn't it?

Jesus.

He changed his identity.

Peter didn't say, well, I'm going to call myself Peter from now on.

Is that okay, Jesus?

Will you call me Peter from now on?

Like, no, Jesus changes Peter, not Peter changes Jesus.

Now, because of time, let's go ahead and move forward in this verse.

The second part of this is a prophecy of God.

But let me dissect this into a couple of sub -particles.

The promise of God.

Jesus says, I will build my church.

One of the most encouraging things you should hear this morning is that Jesus is building his

church.

One of the greatest things that I do on my podcast is that I interview people, yes, but I

get to, for one hour, get to look into the window of what God is

actually doing in that part of the world.

I talked to Mohamed Farhidi, underground church builder in Iran.

Perhaps the top 10 most wanted person in Iran.

He's a Christian, lives in Colorado Springs, so I have the privilege of meeting with him.

He built 38 churches underground, all illegal, every pastor's wanted.

Thousand people each.

New converts, right?

Church houses, another thousand church houses after that.

Every one of those churches and every one of those Christians, they don't have the privileges like us.

Many of those Christians don't have Bibles.

Many of those Christians don't have Psalms or Psalter or hymns to sing or Christian radios to turn on the radio to sing.

They don't have none of that.

They don't have the money.

They don't have the resources.

They don't have none of that.

And guess what?

Under the threat of death and betrayal, those Christians in Iran

are basically, to use football language, blitzing

the gates of hell.

And if that doesn't excite you, you need to reexamine your heart.

It could be that your heart is so cold, so focused around your center here, that you don't

understand what God is doing in Iran.

It's great.

The evil regime in Iran is evil and it is detrimental.

They killed many Christians.

But guess what?

Their days are numbered.

Their days are shortened.

They are outnumbered by Christians.

It's only a matter of time that Iran collapses in the form of

revolution, however God brings it, and the Christian government, predominant

government, takes over the country of Iran.

It's only a matter of time.

Jesus said, I will build my church.

Now, I don't have the time to get into the larger portion of this second house like I would love to,

but let me just say this to all the naysayers, the Christians who are pure spiritualists, to

this verse.

And they say, you know what?

No, Jesus is not building a church like that, like kingdom building and world building, none of that.

It's like kingdoms all in heaven, not on earth kind of thing.

Well, part of that is true.

But let me bring it down to earth into a more Reformed perspective for you.

If you look at this one verse, Psalms 33, chapter 4,

you have to look at this one verse to connect it with Matthew.

What does Jesus say?

I will build my church.

Why?

How do we know?

Because Psalms 33, verse 4, says that the word of the Lord is upright,

and all his work is done in faithfulness.

That's how we know.

So in the course of history, God has been faithful to his promise because his words are true.

His words never come back empty, right?

So God's providence, some people call this providence.

God's providence is always done according to his will, according to his timing.

And if you look at most of the historical Reformed confessions, if you want to further study it,

they do great explanations of it.

I don't have that time to get into it.

Yeah, but Jesse, it doesn't feel like God is building his church because look at North Korea, man.

Well, yes, North Korea is the evil empire right now.

And in the current moment, it's a nightmare.

It's a nightmare for Christians.

So how is Jesus building his church there?

I would say God is faithful.

God is faithful.

Well, why would you say that, man?

That's not very mean.

Well, not to under guard, not to

diminish the pressure points of people, right, that are there.

But did you know that there's a massive underground network of churches in North Korea?

The churches is not dead.

I also interviewed somebody about that.

That's why they created the labor camp, Camp 13, the biggest labor camp in North

Korea.

It's the size of Los Angeles.

They're not for political dissenters only.

Oh, no.

That's where all the religious dissenters go.

That's why they had to build the biggest camp

in North Korea, the size of Los Angeles.

And everybody there is pretty much a religious dissenter.

And many North Korean Christians are born in labor camps because it's a

generational thing.

You go against us, your whole generation is cursed.

Your mom, your cousins, like everybody goes to jail, not just you, not just the father, not just the pastor.

Like all his church and all their family, family, family.

Everybody goes to the labor camp if you're a Christian.

What I'm trying to say is that the church is sometimes more visible in history and then

sometimes it's less visible in history.

Like places like Iran and Afghanistan, Yemen, those are places where the

church might be less visible.

Here in North Carolina, I think the church is really visible.

So in both places, in history, God is faithful.

Right?

God is faithful.

And if you want to just take a look at history, and I know a lot of my wolf friends would say,.

History is not perfect and blah, blah.

The church is not perfect.

Well, yeah, the history is not perfect, but look, the devil is not winning.

History proves it.

Just look at the pattern here.

Look at the pattern.

Let me see how fast I can go through this.

The church suffers, right?

But God, he used the Greeks to invade the world, introducing the Greek

language into Israel as a result.

And in that, the translation of the Hebrew Old Testament is translated into the Greek.

The same translation that Paul used and many Christians used after that as a bad result a long

time ago.

God built his church there using that one beautiful product as a result of

Alexander's conquest of the world.

The church suffers again, but God uses the incarnation, the death, and the resurrection of

Christ and the coming of the Holy Spirit through Pentecost to fulfill the covenants of the Old Testament

and the Abrahamic covenant to bless every single nation out of that.

Isn't God faithful?

Oh, well, the church suffers.

Yes, but God uses the conversion of someone named Paul, and the results were amazing.

He's like the perfect messenger to go into the Gentiles.

He understands Greek thought, probably has a double PhD.

He says that's dumb.

And then he goes and calls himself a Roman citizen to buy himself some time and preaches

the gospel to Caesar.

The church suffers, but God uses something horrible for something amazing.

He destroys the temple.

He destroys the temple of Israel and scatters his people out into the world.

No more centralization of religion.

No more priesthood.

No more temple.

Ichabod of all that.

Jesus fulfills the ceremonial laws and the priestly laws.

The church suffers again in the form of martyrs.

But guess what?

Like one church father said, that the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church.

Christianity is spreading no matter what.

But the church suffers again.

But God converts the Roman emperor into a Christian.

What in the world?

He converts him.

However that is, it's not perfect like I said.

But he comes and brings a law of toleration.

Now Christianity for the first time has the potential to grow in a pro

-visible Christian environment.

Unlike before.

The church suffers again.

But God calls Athanasius to go against the whole world.

To tell, to bring what kind of message?

Not only the gospel, but to bring something precious to us.

That God is a trinity.

That there's a father, there's a son, and there's a holy ghost.

He holds back the tide.

Like to use football language again.

Saint Athanasius is the best offensive line.

And they try to sack Jesus and he didn't let them.

Amazing isn't it?

God, the church suffers.

But God uses Saint Columba to travel to the furthest part of the Roman

empire.

To convert the Scots.

The last people group in the empire that are unreachable.

For you Scottish people out there.

Amen.

You're here if you're Scottish background.

Because if somebody had the audacity like Columba.

To pass that, to cross over the Jumper Wall.

To preach and reach a people group that are savages.

And if you're here because of Scottish background.

Thank God for Saint Columba.

The church suffers again.

And there's a massive people of invaders called the Vikings.

And I'm sorry if your background is a Viking.

They are a terror to Christianity.

Killing, pillaging not only the pagans and Christians alike.

But especially the Christians.

They bring, guess what?

The gospel brings those Vikings to Christ.

The worst people group that the church has ever faced.

But the church suffers and God brings the reformation to Europe.

Bringing the gospel.

Planting the seeds of the United States.

The church suffers again and brings the first great awakening to the United States.

Reviving it.

The church suffers.

But God uses many Christians.

To bring an end to an evil institution called slavery.

And the church suffers again.

But God, and I'll leave that blank there for you.

Get that?

But God, and I'll leave that blank for you to fill out.

Because where do you fit in?

Right?

You're like man.

We're suffering man.

Look at Colorado.

Look at California.

Yeah.

The pattern.

But God is faithful.

Jesus is faithful.

He's building his church.

He's keeping his promise.

And it's not done.

With America or without America.

God doesn't need America.

If he wants to use America, that's cool.

If he doesn't want to use it, that's cool.

Look at the Canaanites.

Look at Pharaoh.

He didn't need them.

He doesn't need us to accomplish his faithfulness.

It's like you Vikings tearing up everybody.

I'm converting you.

Why not?

You guys make church security guards anyway.

So if you're a Viking background, thank God that Christians preach the gospel to some of those guys.

And some of you who are coming from Viking backgrounds, thank God that God was faithful to bring your people heritage

to Christ.

Right?

Otherwise you wouldn't be here.

Some of you.

So in summary, we talked about how Jesus appointed Peter and the church is not losing.

And the church is on the winning end.

And there's moments in history that the church is less visible than others.

But God is faithful.

And this leads to the second part, to the third part.

You know, church structure.

This does talk about church structure here in Matthew.

The congregation, the church structure.

Questions.

Remember, I told you to write questions.

When you study the Bible, chew it slowly.

Write questions.

It'll change your devotion life.

Trust me.

Does the church have authority?

Huh?

First of all, an elder and a deacon, are they little monarchs?

Or are they limited in power?

Huh?

Question.

Oh, how should the church be run?

What are the standards, if there are any standards?

Right?

Questions. Questions. Many questions.

Like I said in the beginning, I don't have the time.

And I don't have the time to get into the structures of Anglicanism, all the fun stuff, and Presbyterianism, and all the fun

stuff.

Instead, I want to devote this last piece of time to the need for structure, actually.

The need for church structure.

And you know why?

Here's my first point.

No matter the structure, people are prone to error.

You know, and let me piggyback on that.

There's no hope outside of the church.

It's like a rock being stuck between a rock and a hard place, right?

People are prone to error in any structure.

But there's no hope outside of that.

It's the best we've got.

Christians can be wrong.

Christians can be wrong.

Just because a Christian may be wrong, though, hold on, doesn't make Christianity a fault, does it?

So the answer is, yeah, of course not.

Jesus is faithful to build his church.

But he didn't promise.

Notice what he did not promise.

He did not promise to make the church infallible.

He's like, I'm going to promise to make the church bulletproof no matter what.

No.

We live in a fallen world, even when Jesus is making promises and keeping them.

Like in the face, just look at this.

In the face of Jesus in the flesh, his disciples are arguing.

We are prone to error.

And look, listen to how Jesus responds to this argument.

Instead, whoever wants to become great among you, you must be servant.

And whoever wants to be first, you must be a slave.

Like isn't this a slap to our pride?

Servanthood, Jesus?

Yes.

Because Christians are prone to error.

We are prone to abuse.

People use this as an argument all the time, right, in the colleges.

And in the universities, and in the media, and in movies.

They love to make the Christian the hypocrite in every single movie, don't they?

Yes, the church is not perfect, but that doesn't mean you need to abandon the church.

Because the church is not at fault.

Jesus never promised a perfect church like that.

We are hypocrites.

We are progressing more and more to be like Jesus, right?

But that doesn't mean there's hope outside of the church, okay?

There is no hope.

Let us not abandon hope.

So instead of arguing for a weak system, instead of arguing that the system needs to

be burned down and rebuilt, let's argue for

a better unity.

More love with one another.

More servants with one another.

Let's not give in to this free society.

No rules, no standards, no creeds, no bylaws, no confessions, no history, no church history.

It is only the church.

Like, what else?

Free -ranging chickens.

Like, this verse is as high as Pike Peak when it comes to the structure of

the church.

Like, this argument actually doesn't disprove the structure or the need.

It actually cries out for the need of it, actually.

Like, I'm not here to disprove those disagreements, but just to move quickly here, the nature of man

compels that the church has to have a structure.

Natural law argues that the world and creation is very orderly, isn't it?

The sun commands the eight or nine planets, whatever decade you're from.

Gravity dictates man cannot fly.

Mothers dictate the newborn's survival.

Children must obey their parents.

The Bible tells us to pray and obey the king.

The Bible tells us to obey church leaders.

Isn't this, like, natural law?

Just the way things are?

Everything has a structure.

This is some of the stuff that the Greek philosophers got close to Christianity because they discerned, like, hey,

the sun never moves as it likes.

This isn't like, this is order, isn't it?

So everything has a structure.

The church has no exception to this structure.

What did the apostle Paul, you know, what did the apostles do after the Gentiles came

to faith in the New Testament?

You notice that?

The apostle Paul, for example, goes back, brings the gospel, right, as the churches, and what does he do right after that?

He goes back and he's like, man, they all need leaders.

Man, they all need structure.

We need to go back and establish organization, don't we?

Hey, Titus, why don't you stay in Crete?

Timothy, when I'm dead, I'm going to write you a letter, and I'm going to pass you the baton, okay?

And your ministry is simple, all right?

It's an ordinary ministry.

Preaching?

Here it is.

Are you excited, Timothy?

Yes.

Preaching and discipline.

It's like, what?

That's it?

Flashing lights?

No, no, no.

Rap music?

Nothing like that?

Nope.

Look what Acts 14 .23 says.

Paul and Barnabas appointed elders for them in each church, praying and fasting as they entrusted them to the

Lord.

In whom he had believed.

But church people sometimes aren't content, are we, sometimes?

We like our potlucks or casseroles or hot dishes.

What do you guys call them?

Casseroles.

Shout out to Minnesota.

They've got a big beef.

Oh, no, hot dish.

Okay, so why would Paul spend so much time and energy begging the church to get along with

one another, pushing for uniformity and conformity instead of disorder.

And just do what you want?

Paul and the apostles, all of them had the concept that there is no salvation

outside of the church.

And if you read the book of Hebrews, there's a huge, huge verse on it.

Real quick.

Listen to this third century father.

He says, He can no longer have God his father who has not

his church as his.

Mother.

You're like, I don't like that.

He's Roman Catholic.

Well, he's not Roman Catholic, but if you don't like that, let me bring it more to home.

My friend, a reformed Baptist and elder, says a Christian without a church is in trouble.

So Paul and the apostles understood this very clearly, that when it comes to the church, the church

has a delegated power, a spiritual power.

It's not the same kind of power like Caesar.

So Paul understands these concepts very clearly, that a church without order

is a church not from God.

And in fact, if the church is left to our own natures, the church would have consumed

itself.

We are prone to error.

We are prone to sin.

This is our human nature by design.

We are fallen ever since the garden.

We're prone to this.

But that doesn't mean we need to abandon the church, because there's no hope outside of the church.

This is the best you've got.

If you ever find a perfect church, the Virgin said, don't join it, because you'll mess it up.

So authority and structure is assumed by the mere virtue of church discipline as well.

Imagine if you and your wife came for salsa dancing lessons, right, or like dancing lessons, and then all

of a sudden, you just don't listen to the instructor.

You just did what you did.

Just do whatever you want, right?

Would you be great dancers at the end of that?

You probably wouldn't be great dancers, in fact.

So the same principle can be found in the church and her structure.

If you want to be disciples of Jesus, the New Testament says, then you must be trained like disciples

in the disciplines of Jesus, just like salsa dancing.

Take the salsa discipline seriously, I guess, Latinos represent.

If you want to make it to heaven, guess what?

You don't need to be a good pastor to get there.

You know what is needed for you to get to heaven?

You just need to be forgiven.

You just need your sins forgiven from Jesus.

That's it.

In fact, the word disciple and discipline are kind of related,.

Huh?

It's paramount for the church to understand this, that both instruction and correction are needed for growth.

Let's see if you can detect this conversation.

Jesus says to you, all authority on heaven and on earth has been given to me.

Like, okay, well, that's cool, Jesus, but I have a problem with my church brother.

Yeah, big problem.

Okay?

Jesus says, well, if they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church.

And if they refuse to listen even to the church, then treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector.

Pagan, I just put the word Viking in there.

Sorry about that.

Okay, well, Jesus, I've done that.

My brother's a Viking and worse than a tax collector now.

He doesn't listen to me.

But I feel good about myself, Jesus.

I want to become a teacher.

I feel good about myself.

I want to help others.

And then Paul would say, okay, this is a trustworthy saying.

If anybody aspires to the office of overseer, he seeks a noble task.

But St. James would be like, let me piggyback on that, Paul.

Not many of you should be teachers, by the way, my brothers, for you know that whoever teaches will be judged with

greater strictness.

So both Peter and John, any apostle you want to name,.

They're not here to hold our hands, are they?

Like, where's John?

John, where you at?

Apostle John, where are you?

In the physical flesh, he's not here.

They knew they were not going to be here.

So they left basic instructions before leaving earth.

That's a little catechism.

But the church has powers, delegated powers, declarative

powers, not powers of the sword.

See, a well -structured church is an orderly church that practices both instructions and discipline.

We talk about that a lot in the conference.

That's one of the marks of a healthy church, by the way.

Let me see if I can make this quicker.

So the church is most structured when it obeys.

And follows the word of God.

Remember that country song?

Jesus, or Jesus take the wheel.

Remember that one song?

See, that's kind of halfway there.

Jesus doesn't only take the wheel.

Jesus invented the wheel.

Like, imagine the stress of all these people coming out in the modern day

trying to reinvent the wheel for church.

Like, Jesus entrusted the church, you know, to us.

He entrusted us with the gospel.

The Godhead invited you to preach the gospel to the world.

Isn't that a privilege?

That's like getting invited to a Navy warship for the 4th of July.

How cool is that, right?

Well, the Godhead invites you into his kingdom to preach the gospel to the world, which is way cooler than going

on a warship in the Navy on the 4th of July.

So this is one of the church's missions, yes.

But he does not call you to be initiators for new directions of the church to reinvent the wheel.

He doesn't call you to be Pope.

He calls you to be servant.

That's why he say, like, it must be a burden for those guys to try to reinvent something every Sunday,

like something new, something hype.

If that's you, take that burden off you.

You don't need that.

The church also assumes a church structure because Christians will

need to be faithful stewards to God's prior decisions.

So, like, whatever it's done before, we need to trust that that is the organization that God decided for us.

Like, who are you to recategorize the church?

Like, really, who are we?

To say, we no longer need elders, we no longer need this and that.

We need Pope.

We need new apostles, actually.

No.

That's out with the old, in with the new stuff.

It's very dangerous.

Just read once again in truth on how Paul gave an ordinary ministry

to Timothy.

There is no Pope.

Can't force people to believe this.

I'm going to have to skip a bunch of stuff.

So, the source of the church's power comes from Jesus alone.

The church elects officers.

The church has liberty to create creeds, confessions, bring influence to new spheres,

assemble, and bring a new ruling on an issue.

Like, hey, none of this, you know, transism.

I won't say it, but transism.

You know, the church is coming together in North Carolina.

As the church in North Carolina, all of us agree that this is bad.

The church has liberty there to do that.

If your board of directors, or I don't know how you call them here, the session in my church, the elders, they could come

together and vote on something.

And then the church could participate in that vote.

So, there's liberty there.

Jesus gave his liberty for some of these structures.

And if the church carries away with it,.

You know, drifts off to the end, then it becomes not really from Jesus, it becomes like man

-made, man authority.

And lastly, the church is structured, the church structure assumes sola scriptura, doesn't

it?

The concept that scripture alone is one of the main principles of the Reformation.

And there would be no Reformation without this principle.

And you're like, well, what is the sola scriptura?

Well, John McArthur defines it like this.

Sola scriptura simply means that all the truths necessary for our

salvation and spiritual life is taught either explicitly or implicitly in the scripture.

You're like, really?

Yeah.

No secret sauce?

No.

No.

So, even the J -Dubs, that's what I call them, the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Mormons and all

these new structures of churches, right?

Even the Roman Catholics, they love and they all have a form of church discipline and instructions, do they?

But guess what?

All of them create a new structure.

Outside of the norms of sola scriptura there.

Like, if you just read John McArthur's quote, you'd be like, okay, we only need the Bible to create the structure.

We're free to play with it a little bit, right?

To work it out.

But we're not free to be initiators to call people popes and to create a whole new wheel.

That's what they're doing.

They have reinvented the wheel.

They have said sola scriptura is create, but we like to have something else that's like a new shiny wheel.

So, in summary, in closing, a church is more structured when it simply trusts and obeys Jesus.

Being organized is simply how Jesus' promises are kept and made

and fulfilled.

He cannot keep his promise of this orderly church.

The Holy Spirit working in the church brings order, not disorder.

And yes, Christians can still have disagreements over the liberty style of church, or prone, whatever, prone to error, right?

But Peter was a great example in this verse because look how Jesus kind of just quotes it.

The fact remains that the evidence is in, right?

Those who seek to be great in the kingdom of God must first be

servants, Jesus says.

So it doesn't matter what you're subscribed to.

If you're Syrian Baptist or, you know, non -denom, whatever,.

Jesus says you must be a great servant, like me, if you want to be great.

Not quote, not initiated, amen?

Go ahead and pray real quick.

Father God, thank you so much for your church.

And how you're growing it.

You keep your promises, Lord.

This is why we're here.

Just an inside look, Father, of what you have done, an inside look, a quick look of what you're

doing to your church here as well in North Carolina.

We should be excited, Father.

We should be thrilled to be a part of this endeavor of yours that we are servants.

So use us, Lord.

We are yours.

Use us.

We all want to be great.

But, Father, humble us to be servants first.

And I pray this in your name, Jesus, in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost.

Amen.

Thank you.

God bless you.

God help me out.

This is the time, buddy.

I'm

sure

you

know

what

you

were

just

singing.

Day and night, night and day, let incense arise.

Well, we don't have any incense in here, do we?

The Bible says this, 2 Corinthians 2, verse 15.

We were just preaching about the church, right?

For we, for we are a sweet

fragrance of Christ unto God among

those who are being saved.

We are the incense.

We are the, before they burned incense in the temple, the veil was rent.

We sang about that just earlier too, right?

And now we are that sweet -smelling fragrance.

I hope you know that, church.

Day and night, night and day, let incense arise.

You're charged to be the church today.

You're charged that God's at work.

Amen. Amen.

So we're going to take about a two -minute break, okay?

We're going to reset the stage.

I know some came and whispered to me that they already had to slide out and they had some obligations.

But we'd love for you to stay with us.

We're not going to stay all day.

Probably another 30 minutes or so.

Have some Q &A time together, some discipleship time together.

Let these other guys have an opportunity to speak to you.

So I'd encourage you to do that.

We're going to, like I said, reformat the stage just a little bit.

And then we'll have our Q &A time, okay?

God bless you, church.

Hang out.

We'll be starting just in a few minutes.

Yeah, hey, Ryan.

I was going to tell you, John's an electric guru too.

Oh, yeah.

He's rocking it out.

They can pass this one too.

I grabbed Rob's, you know.

Huh?

Yeah, I mean.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's what I'm saying.

He can use those too.

I'm just saying if it gets a little cumbersome with the wires, you know, we've got an extra.

Grab a seat.

Hold the mic.

All right, guys, let's get started.

Come on in and find your seat real quick.

Again, I know this is something you're going to enjoy.

We've already got a couple of good questions, laborers.

Already got a couple of good questions.

So Jesse gave us a challenge today to ask questions, right?

We should ask questions.

I was always raised up, ask questions, ask questions.

Sometimes it got me in trouble, but it was good, right, to ask questions.

And so, guys, let me find my.

There it is, right there.

Okay.

You ready?

I'm going to moderate, so y 'all get in there close together.

If I need to ask a question, I will.

If I need to answer, I'll jump in.

All right.

So, brothers.

If you'll turn your Bibles to Matthew chapter 12, verse 31 through 32.

Matthew chapter 12, verse 31 through 32.

Mentions that the unforgivable sin is blasphemy against the

Holy Spirit.

Can you clarify what that means?

And can a genuine believer commit this sin?

Not all at once.

Smash that button on the side.

Hello?

All right.

Now we got the other wireless tube here.

Is it not working?

Check one, two.

Check one, two.

Okay. It died.

Yeah.

Check, check.

Hello.

That's better.

So as to the subject matter with blaspheming the Holy Spirit, if we back up a few

verses to verse 22, a demon -possessed man who was blind and unable to speak was brought to him, being Christ.

And he healed him so that the man could both speak and see.

And all the crowds were astounded and said, could this be the son of David?

I wonder.

When the Pharisees heard this, they said, this man drives out demons only by Beelzebul, by the ruler

of the demons.

Knowing their thoughts, he said, he told them every kingdom divided against itself is headed for destruction and

no city or house divided against itself will stand.

If Satan drives out Satan, he is divided against himself.

How will this kingdom stand?

And if I drive out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your sons drive them out?

For this reason, they will be your judges.

If I drive out demons by the spirit of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you.

How can someone enter a strong man's house and steal his possessions unless he first ties up a strong man?

Then he can plunder his house.

Anyone who is not with me is against me.

And anyone who does not gather with me scatters.

Therefore, I tell you, people will be forgiven every sin and blasphemy, but the blasphemy against the spirit will not be

forgiven.

Whoever speaks a word against the son of man, it will be forgiven him.

But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it will not be forgiven him either in this age or the age to come.

So with the context, we have the context being that Christ was casting out demons, that he

was healing the sick, and that this was discredited by the Pharisees, that this

is the work of Satan.

So I would say that to blaspheme the Holy Spirit fits in that context of denying the work of the spirit

as part of the triune God.

I don't believe that a believer can blaspheme the spirit in this way, because no one speaking by the spirit ever

says Jesus is accursed, and no one can say Jesus is Lord except in the Holy Spirit.

That's 1 Corinthians 12.

Pretty solid.

Any follow -up questions or any rebuttal?

It's okay, we do this together, right?

Any additions for you guys too?

We like Tyler.

Any modern day examples of blaspheming the Holy Spirit?

Well, I've come across people that say the Holy Spirit is like the force from Star Wars, and that he's not actually a person that can be

known, that he's not part of the trinity, he's just like the wind.

Check, check.

Yes. Great.

Unfortunately, there's tons of examples.

There's many pastors that are preaching, and they

not only misunderstand the attributes of God, or confuse the

Godhead, but they actually blaspheme the Holy Spirit by

uttering and just saying a bunch of nonsense that I won't repeat.

So, you know, pastors, like, for example, I would say, I would throw in, here's one for you,

I would throw in Pastor Andy Stanley as a modern example of someone who

blasphemes the Holy Spirit, Mike Todd, a lot of the prosperity gospels, a

lot of the nontraditional Christians, should I say, that are

blaspheming the Holy Spirit a lot, like every Sunday, that are saying things that are

contrary to God.

And unfortunately, they are protected by the law.

And unfortunately, many churches don't speak out against them enough by calling them to repentance,

as they should.

And that is detrimental to the church, because they have millions of followers, you know, they have

massive influence, they write books, these guys travel on pinstripe jets, some

of them.

And so, yes, there's many examples of blasphemy of the Holy Spirit

within the so -called church.

I think the grievousness of blaspheming the Holy Spirit is as grievous because it comes up

against the Trinity, it eats away at the very nature and character of God, does it not?

Just to clarify, too, blasphemy is not the same as disobedience.

Claude, would you speak to that real quick?

Could you define blasphemy?

And I think we all know what disobedience is.

We've committed that, right?

It's simply disobeying, knowing what you ought to do and do it not to Him.

That is sin, right?

That's disobedience.

What's the difference between disobedience and blasphemy?

Disobedience is not doing what God commands, which is done two ways, omission and commission, right?

By not doing what you're supposed to or doing what you're not supposed

to.

Yeah, exactly.

But blasphemy is attributing to God the works of Satan.

This is exactly what the scribes and Pharisees were doing there, Jonathan.

They were attributing what God was doing.

Jesus, the Son of God, they were attributing what He was doing to Satan.

And there is a converse to that blasphemy as well, attributing to God something that God is not doing.

That's right.

Does that make sense to everybody?

So if God's not doing it, you should attribute it to God, right?

I think that the latter part of what Brother Claude said is

dangerous.

How many times have you heard somebody say, God told me this?

I think that you had better be extremely careful whenever you start using that kind of language because

now you're saying that the Almighty has said something.

And that should be and is the same as Scripture.

If God's speaking, it is Scripture.

All right, Dick.

I've had that question asked me several times.

The question was, if I'm worried that I've committed blasphemy of the Holy

Spirit, then that's evidence that I haven't committed blasphemy of the Holy Spirit.

Did I frame the question correctly?

I would say that I believe that to be a true statement because that would show

to me and through Scripture that your heart is at least still supple and it hasn't been

calloused to the point where the fear of God is not in you.

These people that were attributing the works of Jesus and the Holy Spirit to Satan

had no fear of God anymore.

Even though they claimed to be the priests of God, anybody who would for a second consider

that God in the flesh is standing in front of them wouldn't have jerked them by the beard and smacked them in the face and said,

you tell me right quick if you're really God or not, right?

So there's no fear of God in them for starters to even treat one of their countrymen that way, let alone

somebody who they think there's a chance is divine.

Does that answer your question, brother?

Yeah, I would just echo that.

I think when we get to the issue of blasphemy to kind of demystify it,

I think a lot of times we're worried that we're going to slip up and blaspheme the

Holy Spirit.

Just make no mistake.

According to Scripture, this is no slip up.

This is no like, oops, I blaspheme the Holy Spirit and I'm going to hell for all eternity.

That's not what this is.

This is deliberate rebellion against the works of God.

This is Romans 1 that they knew God, but they did not honor him as God, so therefore then God turned them over.

And that turning over is a punitive judgment in Romans 1.

So a lot of times this is used in the manipulative Scripture to kind of create

fear in people, and especially in the hyper holiness movements and those kind of things of that nature.

It was like, you better worry what you say and how you dress and what you watch and what you do.

You might just accidentally blaspheme the Holy Spirit and then, whoops, it's too late for you.

We believe in a sovereign God who in 1 Peter 1 is able to keep you standing.

And that's why we would say that an authentic, regenerate person would not ever commit this

because God is able to keep them from committing that.

Does that make sense?

I mean, I like what Jesse said, ooh, Vikings, I'm going to save them.

You know, okay.

You know what I mean?

Like, he does.

That's what he does.

And so just make sure you know this is not like an oops moment.

This is a deliberate rebellion.

These guys deliberately, in this text that Tyler read us, they were deliberately rebelling against the

teachings and the work of Christ.

They were deliberately rebelling against the teachings and the works of God and rejecting the

rejection of the drawing and the working of the Holy Spirit.

There was an outright rejection and denial of that.

And so, therefore, that is blasphemy.

And there is a place, then, the Bible says that the Spirit of God will not always strive with man.

He saw salt repentance with tears and bitterness, and there was none to be found.

So there is this place where, like, there is judgment.

There is punitive judgment where God has a right to say, you know, but, again, it's not an

oops moment.

Does that make sense to everybody?

All right.

Let me move this.

Go ahead, Robert.

You want to take one more?

Go ahead.

As quickly as I can.

I'll just coattail just a little bit on that.

I wouldn't finish wrestling with God until he's given you some kind of assurance.

But the very fact that you care what God has to say is a very good sign.

I mean, the Scripture does say make your calling and election sure.

Is God asking us to question our salvation?

Well, really only a Christian is going to take that advice anyway because they care about what God has

to say.

So you're in a good position if you care what God thinks.

And so, yeah.

Well, one last thing.

What is the work of God in the modern day?

You say, oh, what are the works of God?

The fact that there are not massive demonic possessions everywhere, that is a work of God that

is pretty much already done.

Obviously, there are some very rare occasions, very rare, but not normal.

One of the works of God that is here for sure is the Bible.

The Bible was translated and preserved for thousands of years.

This Bible is true and inspired.

So that is a work of God.

That right there is a work of God.

What we have on our phones and our hands, like six copies at home, right?

The average American, that is a work of God.

So if somebody is coming against God and you want to be like, well, what is the work of God?

Well, one of the works of God is the Bible that you have in your hand at home.

So if they're going against God, God's word, like pastors, this one pastor said, you need to

unhitch from the Bible.

We're too married to the Bible.

And it's like, what?

No.

That's Andy Stanley, by the way.

Exactly, exactly.

So if they're going against the word, the word of God, that's like clear red flag number one.

Easy.

Okay, we'll move to our next question.

If you do have a question, I will be glad to come to you or you can text it to me.

These are questions that have been texted to me.

So you, those of you that have my number, you feel free to text me.

I can read it from here or I'll come to you and you can ask it personally.

So question number two, Ephesians chapter two.

Ephesians one or two are a couple of my favorite chapters in the whole Bible.

So Ephesians chapter two, verses one through six, this person says, they

mentioned that you were dead, that you were dead in our sin or we were dead in the

transgressions of our sin.

But Christ made us alive.

Does this regeneration, so the question is really not whether regeneration happens or not.

Does this regeneration take place before or after justification?

Go ahead.

Okay.

Let me check the mic.

Roll Tide.

Where are you at, dude?

Okay. Okay.

So this goes to the theological term of the Ordo Salutis.

Okay.

So the order of faith.

Jesse talked about Latin terms, right?

Ordo Salutis is the order of faith.

There are two views of the order of faith.

One view says faith comes before regeneration.

And the reform view holds to the idea that regeneration

precedes faith, that it comes first.

So when we think about this idea, this theological

concept, I mean, whether it's in just plain logical

terms, for example, it's a bad example.

Nonetheless, it is an example.

Have any of you ever poked a dead person with a needle?

The answer is probably no.

And if it's yes, something's wrong with you.

Well, yes, yes, yes.

But my point is this.

A dead person does not and cannot respond to external stimuli, right?

That's what this text is talking about, that we are dead in our sins, incapable of

responding to God by faith unless God first gives

us life.

And that is what the term regeneration means.

It is the term for the new birth, giving of new life.

So when we are made alive, according to the text here in Romans chapter 2 or Ephesians chapter 2,

then we are able to respond.

And as the text moves forward, just to read the continuation of that text,

you were dead in trespasses and sins in which you once walked

following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of

disobedience, among whom we also once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the

desires of the body and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind.

But God, being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us,

even when we were dead in our trespasses, he made us alive together with

Christ.

By grace are you saved.

And he has raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in

Christ so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his

grace and kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

And then we have that familiar text that everybody has memorized.

For by grace are you saved through faith.

And we stop there.

But wait, there's more.

By grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves.

We don't produce faith within ourselves.

For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves.

It, in reference to faith, it is the gift of God.

Faith itself is a gift of God.

And not a result of works, right?

It's not something that we do.

It's not something we muster up within ourselves.

Not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

Because the tendency for Christians is for us to boast in

what we have done.

What have we done?

It was quoted yesterday by somebody.

The only thing that we contribute

to the work of salvation is the sin that made it necessary.

Right?

That's it.

So, by grace are you saved through faith.

So, regeneration in the order of salutis precedes, comes before faith as a

necessary consequence.

All right.

Ms. Noeli?

The question of predestination comes up often, and working with young

people, it's really hard to get them to see, but what scripture can we

use when they say, well, if that's the case, then God has created man to

fall.

So then, how much free will is in that, and etc.?

But what scriptures, or how do you guys attack that when that gets presented?

Not just by young people, but even adults, right?

Like, how do you do that?

So, she's a teacher, and teaches at the Christian school, so she gets a lot of those questions.

So, to frame it just a little bit, how do we address double predestination?

I think that's the first part of the question.

So, does God predestine people to go to hell, and predestine some to go to heaven?

That's a light one.

Come on, man.

Correct.

Now, while they're thinking, we'll give them a second to think about that, I do want to make that clear.

We don't all believe exactly the same thing.

When it comes to open -handed issues.

I didn't say that very clearly.

Jesse, you're the second.

Dan was the first.

Jesse is the second, and I didn't tell everybody this earlier, Presbyterian, to preach in this

pulpit now.

Okay?

Alright?

Been on and on that, right?

Y 'all didn't know.

That's right.

You didn't know.

There's a third in there somewhere.

Well, that's right.

And Tyler.

But Tyler, you're going to Non -Denom church, though, so you're kind of in that mix right now.

Yep.

They got drummed at their church.

So, we say that joyfully and lovingly that

these issues are serious issues.

They're not heaven and hell issues.

They're open -handed issues, and we have disagreement in those things.

But man, what a reunion it has been for us.

I don't know if you've enjoyed the conference, but while they're still thinking on this, we have enjoyed just

getting to see each other in person.

We've been doing this podcast thing for, I don't know, a couple of years now, some of you, and for me, a little over a

year now and stuff, and it's like we see each other on the screen.

We've never hugged each other as brothers.

We've never shook hands.

And just to get to be together as a fellowship has been very enriching for our souls.

And so, again, we don't all agree on some of these open -handed issues.

So even on this one specific question, there may be a difference of answers if we were to ask every

person or every person gives an answer.

So just know that.

That doesn't mean we're in disagreement with the gospel.

Right?

We're not.

We actually have statements of faith that we say that are the non -negotiables that we

agree upon.

We will go to task.

We will go to war together over these things.

And then in other things, we'll jab each other about, like, I can't believe you baptized babies, bro.

What's up with that?

You know?

She's a sprinkle.

You know?

So, no, we will.

We'll jab each other on those things.

And it gets a little, you know, so it's fun.

We actually had a debate about that, Plato baptism versus Credo baptism.

Here, I don't know, it was maybe a month or two ago, something like that.

So we're not hiding from those issues.

And we're not hiding that there's differences, but we hope that we're demonstrating that even amongst differences in the body

of Christ, there are absolutely rock solid, close -handed biblical issues that you must

believe in order to really be considered a Christian.

And then there's others that's like, you know what?

That sounds weird to me, but let's talk about it.

Or there's like, well, you sound weird.

John, you sound like a country boy.

You know?

You know?

But it all works out.

All right, so who wants to try to tackle a little of that?

So let's go one question at a time.

Sure.

You phrased it, right?

So the first question.

So I would say dealing with predestination, and you help me make sure if I'm making that right, okay?

So she gets the question a lot about predestination.

And basically, do we believe or do is the reality of double

predestination?

What is your perspective on double predestination?

Double predestination means from the eternity past, God predestined peace,

some for hell and some for heaven.

So to the theological concept of double

predestination, logically, there are two sides to a coin,

right?

So when we consider the term predestination, and we're going to read a text from Ephesians as well, but when we

consider the term predestination, it means to mark out beforehand.

So when we read the term predestination in the scriptures, it means to mark