This is a message by Pastor Mark Fox of Antioch Community Church in Burlington, North Carolina. For other sermons from Antioch, you can visit the church website at antiochchurch.cc. Now let's turn our hearts to the Word of God. Let's all stand and let's read First Timothy chapter three. Verses one through seven, we will. Pick up where we left off last week, but I want you to see the whole context, First Timothy three, one through seven, I'm reading from the New King James Version, look on with someone if you don't have a Bible, please, if you can see this in your in black and white. This is a faithful saying, if a man desires the position of a bishop, he desires a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, temperate, sober-minded, of good behavior, hospitable, able to teach, not given to wine, not violent, not greedy for money, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetous. One who rules his own house well, having his children in submission with all reverence. For if a man does not know how to rule his own house, how will he take care of the Church of God? Not a novice, lest being puffed up with pride, he fall into the same condemnation as the devil. Moreover, he must have a good testimony among those who are outside, lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil. Amen. May the Lord bless us as we study this word. You may be seated. Last week, we began our study of this section of Paul's letter to Timothy, and I made the statement that the church cannot rise above the level of its leadership. And I thought about that this morning as we were saying our goodbyes or our see you later to the aerials at Nate. is one of the reasons why I think Antioch is a good church, a church of integrity, a church that demonstrates the qualities that God desires to for families to display families and singles. It's because of his commitment to the word of God and to truth. Because of that, I want to spend more time in this section today, not because of Nate, but because of the fact that a church can only aspire to the level of its leadership can only rise to that level. I want to spend some time today and next Sunday examining the qualifications for elders. As I said to you last week, these qualifications are not only for elders. But as Jeremy just reminded, they are for all of us, all of us. There's no one here who is not called forth in this passage of scripture. There is not a member of Christ's body anywhere who should not desire to be the type of person that Paul is describing. And more than that, more than just desiring to be that person, it is the standard every Christian should aspire to. Every member of the church, as I said last week, should have these qualifications. Every elder, and I'll do like my brother yesterday, must have them. We listened to a guy yesterday preaching. How many times did he clap Bamer's voice? Anybody know? Three hundred times in a in a one hour message, he clapped. He would say every elder must have the qualifications that Paul described in first Timothy three. And then he would say. Check out your attention. Maybe I should do that. Every member should have them. Every elder must have them. They must be the qualifications that mark him out. The church's spiritual health depends on it. The reputation of the gospel depends on it. As Alexander Stroup writes in biblical eldership, elders cannot teach and defend the gospel if their lives discredit the gospel. Now, you may have noticed, as we read through this text today and last week, that the qualifications for elder are divided into positives and negatives. I don't think that Paul threw this together haphazardly. I don't think Paul ever did anything haphazardly. I believe the Holy Spirit inspired him to write this list in just such a way. You may have noticed that there are eight qualities which the elders must have. There are six qualities which the elders must not have. And then there's one quality that we'll talk about next week, which kind of is a mixture of this is a positive and there's a negative attached if you don't have this. Now, there's a plan to how this fits together. Last week, we looked at the first set of seven, all positives. Today, I'd like for us to look at the list of five negatives in verse three. Next Sunday, Lord willing, we will commit the study of an elder's qualifications. Look at verse three again with me. I want to say that one more time. He's not given to wine. He's not violent, he's not greedy for money, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetous. Alistair Begg has a great illustration that I'm going to co-op and use for my own. I'll change it just a little bit. But he said, just imagine a guy says, hey, to his friend, hey, do you know George Brown? He says, oh, you mean George Brown that hangs out down at the bar, the wine bar? He says, yeah, yeah, I know him. He said he comes into the bar every day at five o'clock and he sits at the same table right in front of the screen where he can watch the stock ticker at the bottom. He is consumed with watching the stock ticker because he has money invested in some of these stocks. And so when the when it scrolls by and he sees this stock went up that day, he is grateful. He is glad. He's joyful. He orders another glass of wine or a beer. And he says, you can't get him away from the screen and you can't get him away from his wine unless you get him into an argument. An argument? Oh, yeah. He loves to argue. George will argue about anything. And in fact, if you get him on the right topics, his face gets all red and his neck gets red and he gets tense and he pounds the table and he claps his hands. And then I've known him to pick up people and throw them across the bar so their head hits the table on the other side. Why do you ask about George Brown? Oh, well, we were. Thinking of making him an elder in the church, maybe that seems a bit far fetched to hear a story like that to illustrate this, but is it? Is it far fetched, not according to Paul, were there men in the church in Ephesus who might have been just like George Brown? Apparently, so, according to the qualifications that Paul listed out here, there were other men in the churches in Burlington and Elon and wherever you're from, who would fit this qualification or this description? Are there men in leadership who would fit this description? Yes. He must be a man, in fact. Let me just make the point that Paul would not have said he should not be these things if, in fact, there were not men in the church who were these very things. And Paul is saying, Timothy, Timothy, it is better to have no elders. And I believe this with all my heart. It is better to have no elders than the wrong elders. So let's talk about these, then he must be a man, first of all, who is not given to wine. This tells us that there were men in the church who were given to wine and these men must be avoided, Paul said, when selecting men to serve the church's elders. In fact, we know this was a problem in the church in Corinth. Some of you are falling asleep. You've been up early this morning in the church in Corinth. What were people doing? They were showing up at communion and getting drunk. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 11, some of the men are drinking to the point of getting drunk. Some are showing up and there's no food because you gluttons have eaten it all. He said this should not be. So if it was a problem in Ephesus and it was a problem in Corinth, is it a problem in Burlington? Is it a problem in Elon? Do we have a problem with substance abuse in our community? I heard recently about one of the current fads among high school students. Friend of mine is good friends with some of the local finest police officers and sheriff's deputies, and I'm sure Dan could corroborate this. Sadly, this fad has made it from California, where most of this foolishness starts, across to our little burg of Burlington. It happens like this. High school students get together at someone's house with a handful of pills that they've taken from their parents' medicine cabinets. They don't know what these pills are. They just bring a handful of pills from the medicine cabinet and they're all put in a bowl in the center of the room and all these high school students walk by the bowl and grab a handful of pills and then they take them. Not knowing what they're taking, not knowing what the combination will do to them, are some of you horrified at the prospect or some of you horrified that that this could happen to our own teenagers if they get caught up in such foolishness? But the thing is, none of us can be horrified at that taking place if, in fact, we are doing it ourselves, if, in fact, we are controlled by any substance. Anyone who is addicted to alcohol or any other substance has nothing to say to these high school students playing their foolish party game. We don't have integrity from which to speak. An elder we saw last week is a man who has the fruit of the spirit of self-control in his life. Drunkenness is clearly identified as a sin in the scriptures. Ephesians 518. Be not controlled by or filled with wine, which is dissipation, but be filled with the spirit. The thought there was whatever fills you controls you. But it's not just alcohol, Darren Patrick is a speaker. or was a speaker at this past year's Sovereign Grace Church planting conference, and Darren Patrick apparently has helped hundreds of men plant churches around the world. He said he translates this phrase not as not given to wine, but not controlled by any substance or addiction. Then he went on to say in this conference, to these pastors. He said, you would not believe how many church planting pastors are addicted to prescription drugs. I think we could also say that food is a substance that could fit Paul's profile here for elders as well. If you eat, as we said last week, if you eat to live and you're using food in the way which God intended. But if you live to eat, you're using food in a way that's idolatrous and gluttonous and therefore disqualifies you for ministry. That's why Paul said in first Corinthians nine. I said this again last week. He said, I beat my body. I don't buffet. He said, I buffet it. So that after I preach I will not be disqualified myself I remember in college and some of you heard this story. I was I went to a Methodist Church in Chapel Hill I didn't know I mean I've grown up bad just so I thought I'd cross the track, you know Try the dark go to the dark side So I went to a Methodist Church because I'd heard the guy there can really preach the word and he could he was amazing. I But after church, I happen to notice he's standing outside. First of all, he weighed probably 350 pounds and he was about my height and he lit up a cigarette and he was talking to people. So he was grossly overweight and smoking cigarettes. And even though I wasn't really walking with the Lord at that time, there was something about that that said, I can't sit under this man's authority. He had disqualified himself, at least in my mind at that time. Paul said, oh, I'm not going to let that happen. I will discipline myself and I will not be, he said, I will not be mastered. He said, many things are lawful for me, but not all things are profitable for me. He said, I will not be mastered by anything. Anything. So when Paul says he's not given to wine, this runs the gamut of any substance which we can become addicted to him. Why would he say this is necessary for elders? Remember, I said last week, elders live in the curve, wrecks outside of their house, men who have shipwrecked their faith because of these substances, because of addictions. How can the elder pull the man out of the ditch if he's down in the ditch with him? Galatians 6 1, if anyone is caught in the trespass, you who are spiritual, you who are godly. Restore such a one, be careful, lest you yourself also be tempted. And so. He says, we we must not be that kind of man who is given to substances No matter what those are. And then he says, he's not a man who is violent. Some translations here would say pugnacious or striker. The word means that this is a man who handles conflicts with his fist. Henderson said this fitting that this would follow the substance abuse problem. Isn't it? Let me quote Henderson. Between the immoderate use of wine and the eagerness to engage someone in combat, there is but a small step. How many men do you have to put handcuffs on? Because it started with alcohol and it ended with a fight. And of course, it ends in the. in the jail. This is an article that I clipped out several years ago. I still can't believe this, but this is something that happened in the world. And I'll tell you a story that happened in church in North Carolina. This happened in Tennessee. where a man saw a deputy sheriff whom he thought was speeding. So this man, 23 years old, Lawrence Champion, great name, Champion decides he's going to do a citizen's arrest. I guess he'd seen that issue, you know, of Barney. And so he thought, I'm going to pull this off. So he pulled in behind Deputy Lieutenant Stan Hillis across from the jail and told Hillis, you violated the speed limit. Well, Hillis didn't take too kindly. By the end of that conversation, Champion was in custody, charged with disorderly conduct, resisting arrest, and evading arrest. Now it gets worse. Champion called his mother, Janice Champion, 48, who arrived with her 17-year-old son. The teen allegedly slapped the hand of the deputy who was gesturing for them to leave the area. If you strike an officer, you're going to jail 100% of the time, said Sheriff Jackie Bethany. Mrs. Champion was then taken into custody, charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. Her husband, Hal Champion, the leader of this pack, the man who has his mark upon the family. Remember, the man marks out the family just like the elders mark out the church. The elders, the church, will take on the personality and the character of its leadership. The family will take on the personality and the leadership, the character of its leaders. And here comes Hal, Champion 47. He was shot with a deputy's taser, finally, and taken into custody on similar charges. Now, that happened in the world. We can kind of expect people in the world to act like that. But just last February, this year, 2011, at the greater, where is that? The greater New Zion Baptist Church in Fletcher, which is 90 miles west of Charlotte, 30 police officers from five agencies had to be called in to break up a fight. We are all people of faith, one man screamed as he punched a fellow parishioner in the face. Church members were divided over the recent ouster of the Reverend Livonia Ray as pastor. The fight apparently began over whether a vote should be held to reinstate him. One church goer stated, the last man standing got to decide, so we thought we would do it MMA style, in an octagon style free for all. Then the godless cops showed up and stopped God's magic from working. Seriously? Guys, the point here that Paul is making is that a man in the church, in leadership, must have matured to the place where he knows how to handle conflict without his fists getting involved. Because remember, elders are lightning rods. They draw conflict. They are out front. And they will have to learn how to deal with it in a healthy manner since they attract it. Now, the counterpoint to this is that he's not a man given to violence, but he's gentle. I like the way the ESV reads here. The way it lines it up is he's not a drunkard, he's not violent, but gentle. In other words, gentle comes in right behind not violent. I like that reading better. It makes sense that Paul would commend the quality of gentleness as a counterpart to the man who uses violence to get his way. Alexander Strike routes, gentleness is one of the most attractive and needed virtues required of an elder. No English word adequately conveys the fullness of this word's beauty and richness. Forbearing, kind, magnanimous, equitable and gracious all help capture the full range of its meaning. We know that gentleness is a fruit of the Holy Spirit and it speaks of a willingness to yield. Wrong way. It speaks of a willingness to yield. And that speaks of Jesus. Remember, Jesus talked about his own character and he says, I am lowly, I am gentle. The only time that Jesus really talked about his character is when he said those words, I believe it was in Matthew 11. He said, I am lowly and gentle. He was gentle as a lamb with those who came to him by faith. And even those who rejected him did not receive wrath or defensiveness from Jesus, but a gentle rebuke. It says the Lord Jesus looked on the rich young ruler when Jesus said, you lack one thing, go and sell all that you have and give it to the poor. And then you can come and follow me, because he saw into that young man's heart that his God was his money. And the young man walked away sadly because he was very rich. And the Lord looked at him with love and compassion. He was gentle in the same way, shepherds of the people of God. must shepherd with gentleness, even when those we shepherd are unwilling to yield. We love them with the gentleness of Christ while holding on to the principles of God's word without compromise. Next, he says, not quarrelsome. This can also be translated, not contentious. This is the word that means peaceful, not eager to fight. Not contentious would mean you're not eager to have a fight. Now, remember before, not violent has to do with your fists. This one has to do with your mouth. It refers not to a person who is quick to fight with his fist, but to the person who has to win every argument and is quick to fight with his tongue. Young people, if your first response to your parents is to argue, Then you are developing a spirit of contentiousness. If your parents say to you, this is what I believe or this is what I think or this is what I want you to do. And your first response is to show them how ignorant they really are by displaying your wealth of wisdom and knowledge, by disagreeing with them. That is a spirit of contentiousness. And until that's broken, until that's put away, then you're not qualified to be a leader. So let me encourage you as one who has had to learn this the hard way, and I'm still learning this, that it can be put away. And by God's grace, you can learn not to fight with your tongue. The number one reason why people are fired from a job in this country is not because they don't have the skills. It's because of the way they handle or mishandle authority. And the way they respond when they are corrected, they drift from one job to another and last just long enough at that job to blow up at someone and let them have it. And so MacArthur writes, to have a contentious person in leadership will result in disunity and disharmony, seriously hindering the effectiveness of the leadership team. All of us have learned this, that we can't argue our way into a man's heart, haven't we? We've learned that you can't persuade somebody into the kingdom, because if you can persuade them into the kingdom, what else can happen? Somebody can come along and persuade them right out. And so we're not going to win them through our wealth of debating skills. We're not going to win them through our sharp tongue. We're going to win them through the love of Jesus Christ. Paul said in his second letter to Timothy, second Timothy, 224, a servant of the Lord must not quarrel, but be gentle to all. And then he said he must be a man who is not greedy for money or covetous or I like this definition better or this translation better. He's not a lover of money. We know from Paul's writings to Titus that false teachers are usually motivated by greed. Turn over to Titus chapter one and verse 11. Let's begin with verse 10, Titus one, just two books to your right. For there are many insubordinate, chapter 1, verse 10, for there are many insubordinate, both idle talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision whose mouths must be stopped, who subvert whole households, teaching things which they are not for the sake of dishonest gain. Paul, also Peter, also warned that shepherds are not to serve for dishonest gain. Same phrase, but eagerly. And that's in First Peter, chapter five, verse two. Jesus leveled some of his harshest rebuke on the Pharisees when he said that they would devour or when Luke tells us that they were lovers of money. Luke 16, 14, the Pharisees. were lovers of money. Jesus said in Mark 1240, he said that the Pharisees would devour widows houses. In fact, what was the besetting sin of Judas Iscariot, Jesus' disciple who betrayed him? What was the sin that marked Judas out? What was the distinguishing characteristic of this disciple? Jesus or John tells us he was a thief and John Chapter 12 and verse six, Judas was a thief and he had the money box and he used to take what was put in it. If the reputation of the person who aspires to the to the eldership is one who can't break away from the bar or can't break away from the stock ticker. Or the person who doesn't pay his bills on time. Remember, he used to have a friend. He's still a friend, but I haven't seen him in a long time. He was a mover and a shaker, man. He was a go-getter. He was a money guy. And he was going to make a buck, and he was going to do it quick. Anytime your desire is to make a quick buck, know automatically that's a red flag. The Holy Spirit is saying, caution, caution, pit ahead. You're going to be in it. But this guy, he kept pursuing those angles. But it got to be a joke almost because every year, you know how in the newspaper they put the list of the people who haven't paid their taxes? You see those lists? It's like a whole page in an alphabetical order. And so every year I would open it up and say, I wonder if he's in there? Yep, there he is. Well, if that's the characteristic that marks a man's life out, he can be an elder. He can be a leader. If that's the example, is that he's always Trying to get under, trying to get over, trying to get around his responsibilities when it comes to his finances, then he doesn't qualify. Look elsewhere. And it probably means that he's a lover of money, Alexander Strauch says, like a powerful drug, the love of money can delude the judgment of even the best man. Dave Ramsey likes to say money is a wonderful tool, but it's a horrible taskmaster. If your money is used to serve you and the body of Christ and the Lord, it's a wonderful thing to have it. And there's no sin in making lots of money. I believe it's gone. Wesley said, make as much as you can, save as much as you can and give as much as you can. But beware. Beware, because those who desire to be rich, the Bible tells us they will not might. They will fall into temptation and worse. Look over at First Timothy, chapter six, and we'll get to this in a few months. First Timothy six, nine. First Timothy six, nine, but those. And Paul has just just gotten through saying godliness with contentment is great gain for we brought nothing into this world, it's certain we can carry nothing out. That just reminds me, I've got to be a pallbearer for my uncle Dallas this past Monday. And I sat there and wept in the funeral because one person after another, well, his family members had given something for the pastor to read. And everything they read about my uncle was how he gave and how he served. And the pastor said, you know, I don't know how many dishes Dallas Blakely washed in this church. But after every meal, every Wednesday night meal, every funeral meal, every meal that the church has a church of 500 people in Winston-Salem, he said he was the one you could count on to be in the kitchen washing those dishes until they were all washed and put away. And his grandchildren talked about how their uncle, their grandfather never missed a game, never missed a recital. He was there. But the whole thing was he was a servant. He had godliness with contentment. He didn't care about stuff. He didn't care about money. He cared about being a faithful lover of his children and his grandchildren and his wife. And so Paul says godliness with contentment is great gain. We brought nothing into this world and certain we can carry nothing out. There was nothing in that coffin except for the shell of Dallas Blakely and he'd gone on to be with the Lord. And having food and clothing, with these we shall be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare and into many foolish and harmful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. Ask Dennis said this. He said, If a man is drunk with wine, you'll throw him out. But if he's drunk on money, you'll make him a deacon. Isn't that true? It's so many churches. So many churches, we bought into the lie in this culture that if a man is rich, it's because he's blessed of God, got to be blessed of God. Not only that, it's because he's wise. He's got lots of wisdom. If he's made lots of money and three, he must be a good manager, not only money, but of people. He must have good people skills. Well, all of those things may be true. And none of them may be true. So the qualification for elder here is not that he has no money or that he has money, the qualification is that he must not be a lover of money. If a man's made a lot of money, he can still qualify to be an elder. If a man is a lover of money, whether he's made a lot or whether he's hardly has two pennies to rub together, and there are people who have two pennies to rub together and they are lovers of money. He's not qualified to be a leader in the church. Well, there are the five things which men who serve as elders must not be. And maybe you feel kind of beat up this morning. I know I do. Whenever I look at this passage, hold that mirror up against my own life and I shudder to think of how I fall short. So often and in so many ways, let me just encourage you as we close, if you feel beat up this morning, I want to offer you what the Lord offers you, and that is the grace of God. Because we serve a gracious and a powerful God who is able to make all things new. He is able to do a new work in you. That's what the story of the gospel is all about, is that God gave his righteousness in exchange for our unrighteousness. He gave his perfect sacrifice so that we who deserve to die on the cross and who deserve hell and death could be Redeemed, bought back, born again, purchased with the blood of Jesus, and then made new. God is in the process of making us new. And part of what we're studying here today and last week, and what we'll look at again next week, is this whole process of God taking away, helping us to put off the things that are of the flesh, put off the things that don't reflect Jesus, and put on the qualities and the qualifications that Jesus embodies perfectly. Remember, an elder is blameless. It doesn't mean he is sinless. It means that there is nothing in his life that somebody can point to and say, there it is, willful, unconfessed sin that has been confronted and he refuses to do anything about. No, he is blameless because there's none of that. And that should be the desire of every man and every woman and every young person, every child in here. That God would be able to point to us like he pointed to Job and say, see him? He's a righteous man. See her? She's a righteous woman because of the grace that I've given that is at work in their lives. And they are receiving. The only way we can grow is to put off and to put on. May we do that today by God's grace. Let's pray. Let me ask you to hold up the mirror of this passage to your own life. And if there is any disqualifying characteristic that we just talked about, you've seen in the Scripture, would you ask the Lord to give you the grace, the strength, Courage that Jeremy talked about earlier. To walk by faith. And not according to the flesh any longer. There may be people in here today that have been convicted because you are addicted to a substance. You are given to wine. Or to a drug of some kind. And as Paul said, The cry of your heart is, oh God, I don't want to be mastered any longer by that substance. Or I don't want to be mastered any longer by that desire to eat until I can hardly eat another bite. Or maybe the characteristic that marks your life is your anger. You've learned, even as a child, If you use anger at just the right time and just the right way, you can make things happen. You can get your way. You can control the situation. You can manipulate the circumstances. You can manipulate the people around you because they're afraid of your anger. Or maybe you're like that man who sits in front of the screen watching the stocks. Maybe your thing is not stocks, maybe it's something else, but the motivation in your life, if you were honest with yourself and God this morning, you'd have to say, what I really want is to have money and stuff. And I don't want to be limited. I want to be able to go out and buy when I want to buy and go where I want to go and travel and and seek the pleasure that I've been denied up to this point. And God's Word to all of us today is these are characteristics that do not qualify us for leadership and ministry. And they would mark us out as those who walk in such a way that is not pleasing to the Lord. And so today, Father, we want to lay them at your feet. Help us not to be like the rich young ruler who walked away, but help us to run into your arms this morning and say, God, please take this. I confess it and I renounce it. Please, from this day forward, help me to be a new man, a new woman. God, we pray that. Prayer for ourselves. We're tempted to pray it for others right now, but Lord, right now we pray it for ourselves. As the old song says, it's me, it's me, oh Lord, standing in the need of prayer, standing in the need of your sovereign mercy and grace working in my heart. What a joy, Lord, it will be as we look down the road and we see a church filled with people who qualify Under these characteristics, first Timothy three. Walking in such a way that's pleasing to you, that's blameless. Do it, Lord, not for us, but for your glory, for your sake, for the gospel sake, we pray in Jesus name. Amen. Thank you for listening to this message by Pastor Mark Foss of Antioch Community Church in Burlington, North Carolina. You can download other messages by Pastor Foss at www.aneochurch.cc. You can also learn how to order his book entitled, Family Integrated Church, or his men's devotional, Real Life Moments. Again, that website is www.aneochurch.cc. May God bless you.