So let's go to the Lord in prayer and ask for His blessing on us as we study and talk about our studies. Father, we thank You for this time. We worship You. We praise You. You are the King of all. Lord, as Your Word says, though the nations are raging, though people or plotting vain things, you laugh, and as your word says in Psalm 115, the Lord is in the heavens, he does as he pleases. Everything that happens is what you choose to have happen, what you choose to do, and we worship you that we worship a sovereign God, and an all-wise God, and a good God, loving, and compassionate in all your ways, but also a God of holiness and justice. righteous wrath. So we come tonight praising you, asking you that you would help us understand more about how you've ordained the church or set up the church to fulfill your purposes in the world. That you would help us to be more enthralled and captivated in our hearts with the things that thrill you and that we would love what you're doing in the body of Christ. and just devote ourselves more faithfully to it. For the glory of our savior, we pray all of this in his name, amen. All right, so chapter four, section one, this is leadership, understanding biblical church leadership. and the title of the lesson this time is Leadership 101. So, goals of the study, again, to help every person deepen his or her understanding of what it means to be a member of a local church, including the value we place on the church, responsibilities we all have to the Lord and one another, how leadership functions within the church to make us fruitful and effective. And the second major goal is to equip every person to be a more effective witness for Christ and builder of his church. by doing those four things, growing in knowledge of scripture, theology, developing godly character, and cultivating faithfulness in the spiritual disciplines. So the schedule again, first to third Wednesdays, teaching large group, 60 minutes Q&A for 15, all in a large group. We're in the first Wednesday, so that means we also are good each month. It goes like this. So if you miss a week, you can know where we are based on what Wednesday it is of the month. And so, first Wednesday's always understanding biblical church leadership, that's section one of each chapter. The second Wednesday, section two, the first part of section two, deepening knowledge for church leadership, Bible survey. Wednesday, deepening knowledge for church leadership, systematic theology, along with section three, cultivating character for biblical church leadership. The fourth Wednesday, mentor groups, memory work. So that's the plan, and then so tonight, Understanding Biblical Church Leadership, Leadership 101. That's what we're looking at tonight. And so you've got a handout. I did a handout again. I haven't done it for a while, but to me, the first section is always a little, maybe it lends itself, I think, to a handout, section one of each one. Maybe not all the others do, because when you're going through the book studies and stuff, that kind of thing. I probably won't do one next week, but I did one. If you didn't get it, it's in the back. And so there's three main points, and the third main point has the three key points that we're gonna really dig in on that third point. But the first two points are also important. And the first point is the biblical pattern for leadership, or the biblical pattern for church leadership. You have in the Bible, in the Old Testament and the New Testament, you think about just looking at scripture and kind of stepping back from it. You see that God works through leaders. He just does this in the Old Testament and in the New Testament. In the Old Testament, you know, when he begins to set apart a people for himself, particularly with his decisive act of the Exodus, that's when he's really taking that nation for himself, right? Out of Canaan, I mean, out of Egypt to Canaan. Well, he sends Moses as the leader. And then he appoints Aaron as a high priest. And then you have the elders that Moses puts over the various people. Remember, so there's structure, there's leadership there in the very beginning. And you see that pattern continue. Moses, when he dies, hands off the leadership mantle to Joshua. And then you're gonna see that, though it's not clear exactly, there's not a handoff directly after Joshua. You see God working through judges, and then you see Him setting up, well, before this, setting up the priesthood, the high priest. He works through prophets, He works through priests, He works through kings later, and He works through elders in the Old Testament. They all have function. And so this, the Lord is governing his church and he's doing it through leaders. And so the idea is that we need leadership. We all need leadership. And then you step back from it even more and you look at life and God works through leadership in life. I mean, you come into the world, if your family's intact, you have a mom and a dad, there's our authority structure there. The Bible says, obey your parents in the Lord, honor your father and your mother. So God starts off with this, we have authority, we have governance. You have government, you have church authority. So what happens in the Old Testament, you see you have these others. You have family authority, you have authority in the people of God, and that's government. There's an overlap in Israel, government and kind of church authority of the same thing in a sense, right? Because they're the people of God. But in the New Testament, you see the pattern still continued. Even though every believer has the Holy Spirit, every believer is gifted and equipped for ministry. Every believer has everything that's necessary for life and godliness. Yet, and there's a sense in which John can say in 1 John, you have no need of teachers because you have an anointing. from the Father, right? He says that. And the idea is you can test the teaching that you're given. You can recognize John's telling, and look, there's false teaching out there, but the Lord has given you an anointing, the Spirit. So there's this tension. Yeah, we're all able to do that, and yet, but when he sets up the church, he still, in the New Testament, he sets it up with leaders. You see this as the church is formed, you know, right away, the 12 are leading and making, kind of leading the congregation to make decisions. They're teaching, they're shepherding. When the problem comes with the, remember in Acts 6, there's this problem that the Greek widows, that is the Greek-speaking widows that are Jewish, they're all Jewish. I mean at this point the church is almost all Jews, it's people that got converted. On the day of Pentecost, all these Jews from all over the world came to Jerusalem for the feast. Spirits poured out and so all of these Jewish people now have become followers of Jesus, the Jewish Messiah. Well, you have a lot of Greek-speaking ladies there too that are widows that had come for the feast, as well as some of them just live there, and the Greek-speaking widows feel like they're being neglected in favor of the Aramaic or Hebrew-speaking widows. And they're like, hey, we feel like we're not being looked after. And a division arises, and the apostles say, choose for yourselves. Seven men will point over this, and they will wait the tables. And basically, I think that's the beginning of the office of deacon. Some people take a different view of that, but I really think it's just clear. The diakonos is not used there as deacon, it's not a formal term, but the idea of diakoneo is there, you're serving tables, you're waiting tables. And it's the beginning of it, it's showing that, hey, there needs to be two offices in the church. And then as you go into the epistles, particularly 1 Timothy and Titus, now think about this, there's three epistles that are pastoral epistles, right? They're letters that were written to pastors, not to churches. That's why they're called the pastoral epistles. And so you can tell, first and second, Timothy written to Timothy, a pastor, Titus written to Titus, a pastor. So those are the three pastoral epistles. Well, two of those three epistles emphasize the necessity of leadership. 1 Timothy 3, Paul talks about elders, he talks about overseers, we know overseers and elders are equal when we look at all the scripture says, but he talks about overseers and he talks about deacons and he says this is how the church needs to be set up. Verse Timothy 3, 13, or 14, he says, I've written to you so that you may know how to conduct yourself in the household of God. And he says that right after he said, this is what elders should be like, this is what deacons should be like. So the church needs leadership. And Titus chapter one, when he's talking to Titus, listen Titus, what do you do? The churches that you're overseeing, you're planting, appoint elders, plural, in every church, singular. and every city. Okay, so you have that, Acts 14, 23, when Paul and Barnabas went, they were always appointing plural elders in every church, singular. So you have this pattern of leadership. So the church needs leadership. And then in reality, we all, in a sense, need each other. So it's not just leaders in office, it's that we all need to be discipling and being discipled We all need to shepherd one another, the other commands that we're supposed to admonish one another, teach one another, say to one another, follow me as I follow Christ. And really when the church is healthy, there's a sense in which there's a mutuality about this going on as well, but there also is leadership. So we're talking about understanding biblical church leadership, to understand the church rightly, God has called the church to have leadership. And this book is about us all learning how to be better leaders ourselves for that one-anothering, but also how to understand the importance of leadership in the church. Okay? So that's kind of the big point here, this first one, the biblical pattern for leadership. Point number two, these are things that aren't really in the first two. Well, the first one's really kind of something I added to it. The second point is in the lesson you read, the fundamental essence of leadership. What is leadership really? And he makes the point in the beginning of the chapter that leadership, if you distill it down, is essentially, he uses the word influence. It's the ability to influence other people. And I like MacArthur's quote that he has on, in the men's study on page 70, women's probably 74. Is it 74, MacArthur? 77? Okay, whatever y'all said, I can't hear. 76. This is why it was so bad last week. I was listening to those kids talking and I'm like, I got no idea what they're saying. So anyway, Patty was like, she sat over here. I said, sit up front so you can help me when I do the game. So she sits up there and I promptly go all the way over here because all the kids were over there and I didn't even think about it. And I'm like, why didn't you help me? And she's like, I sat there to help you anyway, so. Okay, so the MacArthur quote, he says, to put it simply, leadership is influence. The ideal leader is someone whose life and character motivate people to follow. The best kind of leadership derives its authority first from the force of a righteous example and not merely from the power of prestige, personality, or position. By contrast, much of the world's leadership is nothing but manipulation of people by threats and rewards. That is not true leadership. It's exploitation. Real leadership seeks to motivate people from the inside by an appeal to the heart, not by external pressure and coercion. That's a really excellent sentence right there. I mean, the whole thing was good, but real leadership seeks to motivate people from the inside by an appeal to the heart, not by external pressure and coercion. God always wants to work through the heart. And so what is leadership then look like if people are gonna influence others from the heart to want to follow them as they follow Christ? What does that look like? He asked the question at the end of the paragraph before characters, the first main point, how does a godly, faithful church leader influence others? And so how does that happen? What is it that we need to see in our lives so that we can influence others to want to follow us? And as leaders, as we look for leaders in the church, what should we look for? So that's the fundamental essence of leadership. The third major point is the three essential components of leadership. And this is really the outline of the chapter. He's really talking about three essential components of leadership. Three things that make a person have that kind of influence that people want to follow from the heart. And the first, the first is character. Character. You see this in a number of places. I mentioned when 1 Timothy, when Paul's telling Timothy how to structure the church, he says, well, you need elders or you need overseers, you need deacons. But what does he say? What he tells him is the kind of character that these men must have. You know, I believe it's 15 qualifications for Elder in 1 Timothy 3, and 14 of them are character. You know, it's husband of one wife, it's above reproach, husband of one wife, temperate, prudent, respectable, all of these things, character things, able to run it, rules on how so well, which is still character, it's skill and character mixed together. And then you have able to teach is the one other skill. 14 of them really major on character. And the same thing with deacons. The qualifications for deacon are given and it's all about character as well. Same thing with Titus 1, 5-9. In fact, let's just look at that passage. Paul writes in Titus 1.5, for this reason I left you in Crete that you would set in order what remains and appoint elders in every city as I directed you. Namely, if any man is above reproach, the husband of one wife, having children who believe, not accused of dissipation or rebellion, for the overseer must be above reproach as God's steward, not self-willed, not quick-tempered, not addicted to wine, not pugnacious, not fond of sordid gain, but hospitable, loving what is good, sensible, just, devout, self-controlled, holding fast to the faithful word which is in accordance with the teaching so that he will be able to both to exhort in sound teaching and refute those who contradict. I count 19 qualifications there, and you can argue 18 of them are character. So, it's about spiritual maturity and growth and holiness. These are things that are essential for leaders, and it makes sense because If you want to be an example to others to follow, then we've got to be pursuing holiness, right? We've got to be able to say, follow me as I follow Christ. I'm really following Jesus. I'm trying to become more holy. Yeah, we're all sinners, but we're growing in grace. And so character is essential. I love how he also talks about the contrast between Saul and David. in the chapter. You know, God looks on the heart is another way of saying he looks at the character, isn't it? They were looking, we look naturally at the externals, but God looks on the heart. And so that's what he says to Samuel about David and to Saul as well. through Samuel, because that first quote is Samuel speaking to Saul, but now your kingdom shall not endure. The Lord has sought out for himself a man after his own heart. That's when Saul has disobeyed God's command and Samuel says, you have disobeyed the Lord's command, your heart is not right, he's basically saying. God has sought out a man whose heart is after God. And it's what makes a heart after God? Well, you can argue from the text even, look at that verse, he says, the Lord has sought out for himself a man after his own heart, and the Lord has appointed him as ruler over his people, because you have not kept what the Lord commanded you. I think what he's saying is that what sets David apart from Saul is David has great regard for the commands of God, Saul does not. Saul's not concerned about what the Lord has said or what the Lord has commanded the way David is. This is what makes you a man after God's heart or a woman after the heart of God is that you're passionate about what's, I wanna please the Lord. And so this at the essence of character is really that heart motivation that, well, all that matters is pleasing God. Like 2 Corinthians 5, 9 says, you know, whether at home or absent, talking about at home in the body or absent, we make it our ambition to be pleasing to Him. Our ambition is to please the Lord. Whether we live or die, And so this is really at the essence of what leadership is. It starts with character. And you see beautifully how David reveres the commands of God. That's such a contrast. You have Saul who, you know, at first offers a sacrifice too quickly. That's what he's being rebuked for here. He didn't wait on Samuel to offer the sacrifice. People are getting edgy. And so he caves to the pressure and he offers a sacrifice. In the second time, after this even, he's gonna again rebel against God. Remember, he's supposed to kill all the Amalekites and all of the animals, not to take any of the spoil. It's all devoted to destruction. The Lord has given this clear command. Every animal killed, and every Amalekite killed, but he keeps one Amalekite alive, only one, the king, but he has sheep. and some, maybe some of the other, I can't remember if it was just sheep, but some of the animals. And Samuel gets there and Saul says, hey, Samuel, you know, blessed to the Lord, whatever, I've obeyed the Lord's command. And Samuel says, well, what is the bleeding of sheep that I hear? You guys didn't bring any sheep out when you came. Why am I hearing sheep? you haven't obeyed the Lord's command. And then sure enough, he had Agag, the king of the Amalekites, was still alive too. Saul thinking, and you know, it says Samuel did, he took a sword and he hacked Agag to pieces. It's a gruesome picture, but the word of God had been, all of them are to die. That's a hard word, but do you revere the word of God or not, right? This is where, as Christians looking, thankfully, we don't have to worry about that. That's not gonna be a command that you or I ever have to do. In this place in redemptive history, on this side of the cross, you're not gonna, unless you're trying to defend yourself or something, but you're not gonna be commanded, hack that person to death. And I'm grateful for that. But if we were there, listen, if we were there, In Samuel's place, it should be our heart to want to obey the Lord, even if it meant that. Right? Because God had good reasons. He always has good reasons. We don't go into that tonight, it takes a while, but the Amalekites were under the wrath of God, deserved to be judged, and he had given that clear command. So David though, David fears the Lord so much that he won't even harm Saul because he won't touch the Lord's anointed. And the scripture had said, do not touch the Lord's anointed, so he will not lay a hand on the one who has been anointed by God to be king. That's the reverence. You see that difference? So that's the essence of what we should be seeking in our own hearts. And it's hard when you come to hard passages like that. And you have to just labor over them and pray through it. And sometimes it's a conversation like Habakkuk is having with the Lord. Lord, why? Why is this? But you do it with reverence and willingness to submit. And once you understand clearly what God has said, even though you don't feel comfortable and you don't understand it, you do what the Lord has commanded. That's what we're called to do. That's the key to character. So the first essential component of leadership is character. The second, he says is capability. Capability. The second paragraph here, leaders influence others by their character, but they are also to guide others with skill and wisdom." So it's not just character, it's also capability, skill and wisdom. He says, the men chosen to lead in the serving of widows in Acts 6 were not simply men of character, but they were also men of wisdom. They said, choose for yourselves, man filled with the Holy Spirit and wisdom. So they need to be full of wisdom. So what is wisdom? And this is what he says next. This is not the wisdom of the world. It is not skill in marketing or oratory, rather it is biblical wisdom. And here he defines it. It's the ability to apply biblical truth to the various aspects of life, including relationships with others. So wisdom is the ability to apply biblical truth to life, to the various issues in life. That's wisdom. So it's not just knowledge, right? Knowledge that's applied with skill. So it's knowing how to apply knowledge to life, to the questions and issues of life. So think about then, leaders, you have to help the people that you're leading apply knowledge to life. This is what it means to be a shepherd and leading others. And this is what leaders in the church are supposed to be. Elders and deacons are supposed to have wisdom like this. But we all as Christians are to be cultivating this kind of a heart, this kind of skill so that we can help others. We can apply the Word of God to life. you think about the various ways that this, what this looks like. And this is something that we've been thinking about a lot as elders, we've looked at the becoming a biblical leader training. In fact, be in prayer for us. Three of us are going up next week. We'll be here Wednesday night, but Thursday afternoon, we're going to Tennessee for a conference, an Excel conference. Todd and myself and my dad are the only three can be there this time, but we're gonna go to a conference with XL Ministries at a church in Tennessee that's really implementing so many of these various programs that they have there. Looking forward to that, so pray for us. But one of the things that we've realized as elders is that, hey, we need to grow ourselves and we need to grow in our ability, in wisdom, how to handle the word and apply it to life. I mean, all of our guys are at certain places we've grown, but we want to keep growing in that area. And so, and we want the church to be that way. We're all growing in wisdom so that we can, you know, you meet people and they have a problem and you know how to help them. And it's not something, you know, worldly, it's the word of God. Have you thought about the scripture says this, This is the way that we should interpret that. In relationships, helping somebody that's having trouble with their kid because they're letting their child run everything because they think that's what you're supposed to do, because they're reading gentle parenting or something. That's not the worst, but it's in the same direction. But all these various worldly things coming into people's lives and how to, well, reason with your two-year-old. No, don't reason with your two-year-old. The Bible says that what you need to do is spank your two-year-old. Now, you don't just start out with that. You know, hey, you just need to spank that kid. That's the most direct approach. They're not gonna listen to that one though, right? So skill, like, hey, I can see you're having some challenges, tough. Is it two-year-old? Yeah, you know, my child, you could talk about that, right? And commiserate a little bit. Because it's not easy being a parent, it's hard. But then to try to turn the conversation and talk about, you know, God has a lot of things to say about parenting. Have you read the Bible? And, you know, this helped me so much. So you just start a conversation and maybe they're, hey, yeah, I'm desperate, help me. And then you're able to say, well, you start teaching the principles like, well, the Bible says we are supposed to discipline our child and we got to think how to do that. But it means that you're not trying to tell them why they don't do it. You're just at two years old, you just tell them, don't do it. I don't have to tell you why, the why is I said so. I am your parent. You see what I'm saying? So, it's things like that. Applying practical wisdom. Now, that's relationship problems. You know, difficulties in a marriage. You know, how do you apply the Word of God in that situation? All kinds of ways we can help people. Conflict resolution. What do you do when someone has offended you? How do you handle it? Somebody at work, you can say, well, you know, Scripture gives a good plan for how to deal with this. You go and you talk to them first, one-on-one. Let's talk about how you could do that. And so you're helping people, even unbelievers, you're leading, you see, if you were thinking like this. So wisdom. All right. We'll move on to the third point, the central component. It's not just capability, but also courage, character, capability, and courage. And here, he quotes Joshua chapter one, which we talked about a little bit when we talked about Joshua, but it's worth looking at again, this passage. Because it's not enough to have character and capability. It has to also be courage. Why is that? Well, first of all, the Bible teaches it here clearly in Joshua 1. I mentioned that you have this pattern of leadership and Moses is the first great leader of God's people. And then Joshua is the one who is his successor, right? Kind of hands the baton to Joshua. And when he does, Joshua has got the enormous responsibility of taking the nation across the Jordan River into Canaan. And to conquer and divide the land. I mean, it's kind of like, I could see where Joshua was like, hey, I thought Moses had it bad. I think this is a harder work, Lord. Why, you know, I mean, you really can't compare. Moses had to put up with them for 40 years and all of that. But Joshua, I could see where he could feel that. We gotta go in the land and conquer the land? I don't feel adequate to do it. So the Lord, in this passage, three times tells him to be strong and courageous. Verse six. Well, first of all, in verse five, he says, no one will be able to stand before you all the days of your life. And this is key, just as I have been with Moses, I will be with you. I will not fail you or forsake you. And here, the first command, be strong and courageous. For you shall give this people possession of the land which I swore to their fathers to give them. Only be strong and very courageous. Second time. Then he says, be careful to do according to all the law which Moses my servant commanded you. Do not turn from it to the right or to the left so that you may have success wherever you go. This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. He's talking about the heart of God, I mean, heart after God, just like David. Joshua was called to have this. So that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it, for then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have success. Have I not commanded you, be strong and courageous? Third time. taking it to the superlative level, three times he tells him he cannot emphasize it any more than that. And then he says after that, third, be strong and courageous. Do not tremble or be dismayed for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. So the Lord makes this emphatically clear. And I love how then at the end of all of that, after Joshua talks to the people, the people tell him at the end of verse 18, hey, we're gonna do what you say. And they end up with the last words of verse of 18, only be strong and courageous. The people themselves saying the same thing God had said to him. It's like, have you gotten the message, Joshua? You are going to need to be strong and courageous. Only you will succeed in this mission is you need to be courageous. strong and courageous. So you need courage. Why is it that leaders need courage? Just think about that. I mean, in his situation, they're going in, it's a military campaign, isn't it? He's leading the people on a military campaign against all these enemies, so he's gonna have to have courage. And if you think about it, is not leadership in the church like that, if we could see the unseen world visibly, right? We talked about this, the visible world, the invisible world, faith sees the invisible world. Well, the invisible world, what's going on in the invisible world? There's a spiritual war going on, right? Be strong in the Lord in the strength of His might. Take up the full armor of God that you may be able to stand against the wiles of the enemy. You know, it's a spiritual war. There is a warfare. We are Visibly, we see people who may be opponents of ours, but spiritually, we don't see the invisible demons and enemies of God that are working in and around and through people. So it's spiritual warfare. So if you're going into warfare, you have to have courage. You've gotta have the willingness to, and leaders are out front. So think about that. You're heading into warfare and you're out front. Who's gonna get shot first? the people that are out front. So you have, that's part of what it means to be a leader. You have to be willing to take the arrows, to take the risks. And not only is it a sense in which you have to be willing to take the risks out in front, but we see in, as we look in the Bible throughout the scriptures, Go back to Moses. You have to be willing to take the arrows that come from behind you when you're out front. Sometimes you get shot from inside the camp. Right? We saw that with Moses, right? I mean, it's interesting. You track what happens in his ministry. A couple of different times, the people are ready to turn on him and kill him. It's really astonishing, isn't it? I mean, just think about that. This man comes down and says, I've come to deliver you. And I can understand the middle skeptical. He could just be a wacko. Like, hey, you know, tell us who are you? What's the name of this God that you say you've been sent by? Yahweh, I am who I am. The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And to show you that I've come from him, he told me to do these signs and throws the, The stick down on the ground turns into a snake, puts his hand in, turns into leprosy, puts it back in. All this, okay, it looks like the Lord is doing something here. But remember, it goes from bad right away. He goes to Pharaoh, and Pharaoh just turns the screws on them and says, you guys are lazy. What you need to do is you need to work harder. So I'm not even gonna give you straw to make bricks. You still have to make the same amount of bricks, but you gotta go gather your own straw. we already were at our wit's end, what's happening? So they're always questioning the leader. And then when they get out of the land, when they don't have food, why have you taken us out here to kill us? They saw the Red Sea open, and then after that, they could say, why did you bring us out here to kill us? Two different times they're ready to kill him. They pick up stones to stone him, and he and Aaron fall on their faces, and the Lord's glory appears in the tabernacle to stop them from killing Moses. The people are gonna kill Moses. And yet, not only have that, then you also have his own brother and sister turn on him. Remember that? Aaron and Miriam. They're like, hey, you're not the only person God speaks to. He speaks to all of us. And so the Lord didn't like that, because he had put Moses in a position that Moses was in, and they were to respect that position. They were trying to be equal to that position. So the Lord deals with Miriam, gives her leprosy, just to go outside the camp. And then after that, a couple of chapters after that, Korah's rebellion, where all of the elders basically say, we think we too have the spirit of God, basically. and you got no business leading, and Moses like, he falls on his face for them, praise the Lord, have mercy on him, because he knows God's going to be angry with this. Of course, they don't even, they don't even interpret that correctly. They should know when Moses falls down like that, we are in trouble. He's interceding for us, but they don't even know that. They're kind of like, get up off the ground. Let's have this contest. Because Moses, okay, the Lord will show who he's listening to. And remember, he clearly affirms his and Aaron's leadership and to emphasize how bad it was, all the guys that rebelled against him and stayed rebelled against him, they swallowed up, the earth swallowed them up. They all went into death alive, buried alive. I mean, terrifying. But the reality is though, even though that God's hand was so clearly on Moses, In leadership, there's gonna be challenges. So the idea is it's gonna be hard. So as we try to lead others, we're going to have to experience that. And this is true even in the microcosm. Think about this. When you invest in another person, you're leading them. Say you spend time having coffee with somebody over a period of six months, discipling them, and you're helping them with a sin problem, or you're helping them with a relationship issue. You're pouring your life into them, serving them. And some of you already know this. Sometimes what'll happen is the people that you invest in, sometimes the most, will sometimes hurt you the most deeply. And you're just kind of baffled by that. How'd this happen? Well, we're all sinners. And so folks mess up and there's sin on both sides sometimes. And so I'm not trying to unpack it all, but just to say that when you invest in others and you give yourself to them, it makes you vulnerable. So leadership, you have to have courage. You have to be willing to take risks and get hurt. and then not harden yourself and insulate yourself from others, but continue to be willing to be vulnerable to lead. Jesus is the unbelievable perfect example of this, right? I mean, he's always loving. always, I mean, forceful in his words, but tender and compassionate. And yet, because he is leading like he is the good shepherd, he gets hurt. I mean, sheep bite. I was talking to somebody, I forget who this was, was telling me about a shepherd, a guy that raised the sheep. It's in America. I cannot remember, I hate this. Anyway, was telling me about raising sheep. This pastor friend had a friend who raised sheep. And the guy was like, hey, you know, I've raised sheep my whole life. Sheep, and he talked about, yeah, they do some dumb things, but you know what? Sheep will just bite you. You're the person taking care of them. You're the person leading them, providing for them. I mean, they would be dead if it wasn't for the shepherd so often, right? Because sheep have a way of just sort of committing suicide accidentally. stop eating, drink the wrong stuff, you know, stray away from the flock if they could, eat poison, whatever. And so the shepherds like trying to keep them alive, you know, they say, you got to feel of the sheep to see if they're eating enough. Sometimes they just won't eat. Like, why not? I forgot. I forgot to eat for three weeks and I died. So you gotta check them out. So he was saying that, so you're caring for the sheep, you're giving. And one of the ways you care for them, he said, when you get the bites generally, it's like when they take them into those dips, where they take them into something like to get the insects off of them and all of that. And they hate that. And so it's like, you're protecting the sheep and they're biting you the whole way as you're pushing, I'm trying to bite at you, the whole way as you push them into the dip. And he's like, this is just what it, this is what it takes to raise sheep. You can be wise about that, right? You gotta learn how to kind of kick them and push them a little bit like that, not get bit so much, but it's just part of, it's part for the course. In the body of Christ, the Lord calls us all to lead other people at times and to be willing to suffer for the good of others. And to be like Jesus, who was willing to take upon himself the form of a servant. and to look not for his own interests, but for the interests of his people. So leadership takes courage. It takes courage because you're gonna be attacked more by the enemy, but it takes courage because you're even gonna be attacked more sometimes by the people you're trying to lead. It's just the way it is. And God works through all of that to make us all more like Christ. That's the beauty of it. Even those bites are expressions of God's love for us. Isn't that amazing? I get more and more amazed at the sovereignty of God and the wisdom of God that everything that happens, every single thing that happens in your life, happens according to the will of God for your very best. even when you're sinning and it's disciplined. Okay, you might not have had to do that if you hadn't sinned like that, but even what God is doing in the discipline is the very best thing. And somehow that can end up redounding to his glory and to your greater good. It's just amazing. So we can rejoice in those things. So courage is essential. This is why Paul tells Timothy in 2 Timothy 1, hey, God has not given us a spirit of fear or timidity, but of power and love and discipline, or sound mind. Power and love and discipline. There are gonna be times where you're gonna be afraid. We're afraid to step out there. And he says, wait a minute, that's not the spirit that God has, God's given me the spirit, God's given us the spirit of power and love and a sound mind to see things as they really are. So that is the outline. So we got extra time for questions tonight. And we can take questions on the material we've covered for a while, and if we run out of that, we can do other stuff, okay? at the very beginning of our outline, there's missing the third goal, which I should know, but I don't. You know, you should, there is no third goal. That's a, thank you for catching that. I mean, we could probably come up with one, but I didn't intend to have one on there. That's actually, I was editing the form, you know, and you know how you do it, and you hit a return, and you don't see that it put a C there. And I saw it a moment ago, and thank you for reminding me. I meant to say something about that. Good question, Jane. Thank you for... Now everybody knows there's no third goal. So a lot of times I'll say there's three points and only cover two. And people are like, hey, wait a second. You never got to that third point. But this time there is no third point on that one. Pastor? Pastor Bailey, if you guys don't know George Bailey, pastor for many years, also Bible teacher at seminary, but you pastored that one church for 20 years, 18 years, what was it? 21 years. And so he said, is it appropriate for me to say amen to, I think what we know what you're talking about. It is. But the beauty of it is that, like I said, God works through those things, doesn't he? Yeah, in spite of us and because we need it. I guess we need to be bitten. So that's good, but thank you. He's going to give you a mic here. And I don't have to check, check, test. Is that better? Yeah. I don't have to yell. Just thinking of Joshua and then, like you mentioned, Titus going to each city. You walk into a room like this quote from Al Mohler, and you can cover 1,000 different issues. So when you come into a new arena, like in church planting, do you have a strategy in your head? I'm going to do these three things first, like the backbone, and then you start fleshing it out like a church plant. Maybe, like Todd, walk into a new church and you'd say, oh, I have to deal with this, this, and this. Or is there a certain mindset you have in any kind of setting that you might just have go-to building blocks you want to address as the backbone of leadership? Like, speaking of, again, Joshua, maybe you're figuratively, like, oh, I got to go cut that guy's head off or something. So your question is, if you were planting or church, or if you come in as a pastor, are there certain key things that are like backbones? Is that what you're getting at? I want to make sure I heard the question correctly. Again, shooting from the hip, but yeah, just what do you think of when you think of? Yeah, that's a really good question. In fact, I was talking to Nick White about that, that issue. Remember Nick took the church in Buffalo and whenever you go into a new church, even when you think it's a good fit, in many ways, this was a good fit. I think it really was, but there's always been challenges because the church has a culture and a way of doing things, way of thinking about everything, you know, the Bible, worship, expectations of what the church is about, ministry. You know, how do you go into that? Well, it's like Tom said, you have to pick what your key priorities are. And then on the front end, he did a good job of talking to them about it. Like, OK, you know, my main priority, I think, for a sound Bible teacher is that if you're going to be a pastor, your main priority is to preach the Bible and teach the Bible. And so that's the main purpose of the ministry. And so the most of the time that a pastor spends that way. So I think that's one thing that you would try to be one of those like lay down. The first thing is that the health of the congregation is going to depend on the feeding of the sheep. Jesus said, you know, if you love me, feed my sheep. I think that would always be the first thing. And that's something Nick did a good job of. He found that out before he got there, went over that. So that was all good. They said they want that. And then the next thing is kind of some essentials of basic theology. Are we on the same page doctrinally? Is the church at least open to reform theology? It's better if they already are there, but if sometimes they're not, they're not there because they haven't been taught, but are they open? So Reformed theology, Calvinism, I shouldn't use that term, just sovereignty of God in salvation, the doctrines of grace. Basically, to me, as I've tried to define Reformed theology, to people who don't understand it. And I think even for those who do, the essence of it is always reforming in the light of scripture. The Bible alone is the final authority. And if you really work that out, that means that no matter what the Bible says, if it clearly says it, I will submit to it and believe it, even if I don't like it. And that's really, if you get that point right, you really, that's the turning point. Because then you'll, well then you just gotta study the Bible and see what the Bible says. And it takes a while to work through various doctrines. Yes, it does. But if you get that, if you have the right orientation, the right heart, there's so much unity comes from just that commitment, shared commitment to whatever the Bible says. So I think this is like related to the first is like teach the Bible, but will we submit to the Bible? And a lot of times people theoretically agree. I mean, we all do this in some sense. We certainly want to, but then when it's the right thing, I'm not sure about that. I don't want to submit to that. But anyway, I think those are two things that are two sides of maybe one, maybe two sides of a coin, but two key things. And after that, I think the most important thing after that is a willingness to look at, okay, what's the church, what's biblical church structure and leadership ecclesiology look like? And if a church is not willing to consider elder leadership, I mean, if you're going into a church, back to Nick, they don't have elders yet, but they're open to it. and they actually want to pursue that. So he asked those questions, you know, are you willing to do that? To me, if you get those three things, you know, they're committed to follow scripture no matter what it says, as long as we're gonna work through it, clearly hash it out, is this really what it says? It takes time to do that. But if you do that, and then you have commitment to biblical church leadership and structure, To me, those are the key things. You would work really hard there. And then the other stuff is just like, it's gonna fall into place. If you get those things right, and you're expository preaching, and you're working through theology, and then you have right leadership, the church is gonna do well. Each church will be a little different, but it'll take time. So that's a good question, Tom. Anybody else have thoughts about that? or comments you wanna make even related to that question or others. Yeah, going back to the character, I like what Spurgeon said down here. He said, a man's life is always more forcible than his speech. When men take stock of him, they reckon his deeds as dollars and his words as pennies. If his life and doctrine disagree, the masts of onlookers accept his practice and reject his preaching. I think that speaks a lot to leaders. And you can look at that example all around, whether that's here at the church, which has been great, or our leaders in our government, leaders in our work, or wherever. Even in sports, you can look at their life and how they live. And I heard another quote that said, what you do speak so loudly that what you say I can't hear. So what you say is important, but what you do is also so important. So I went back to that quote quite a bit, because that speaks to me a lot. So I just think it's important for people to kind of go back to that and look at that over and over and over again. Excellent point. Yeah, thank you, Nick. Yeah, the Lord, we're to be doers of the word, right? So if we're not doing it, we need to repent and do it. And so, that's really so critical and important. And that is, like you said, I love how, yeah, what he talks about dollars and pennies. Spurgeon's such a great communicator. We take stock of him, they reckon his deeds as dollars, his words as pennies. That's a pretty big difference. And 101, wow. Todd. I wanted to say that the three characteristics of character, capability, and courage, the impressive part is that the last two are things that you can hone. They're things you can develop. Character's who you are. So churches looking for elders or deacons or what have you, they may have great capabilities, they may have great courage, but if that character's not there, That's a big no. The character is who you are, and I like that flow that the first one has to be in place, and then we work with the next, and the next. Those can be developed, but if the character's not there, that's not good. And strictly speaking, character can be developed, but it's a long-term thing. You're saying that you can develop the skills and stuff more quickly. So if you have the characters in place, great point. And it is so foundational, absolutely. So, agree. I just wanna offer and just ask, these are the characteristics of leadership, but And maybe it's later in the teaching, but the characteristics of followership, right? And so if leaders are called to be leaders, then followers are called to follow them. And I know every shepherd is a sheep, so I get that. There's a dual role there. Anyway, I was just opening the door if you had any comments, because One of the big ones that I'm just thinking about God's working with me on is just the fear of the Lord. I mean, those examples of Moses, those groups of people, they just did not apply their fear of the Lord to the fear of his leadership. And I'm not saying there's a blind following there, but it seems to me that there's a certain amount of appropriate fear. Don't bring a railing accusation, you get a little bit of that. But anyway, I just wanted to open the door and see if you had any characteristics of followership that really should be appropriate for Christian leaders. That's a good way to phrase that, Todd. I like that. You always have an insightful way of turning something around in a really helpful way. Followership. I think it's interesting that to be a leader, you need to be a good follower, which is maybe not intuitive. It may be a little counterintuitive. We kind of think a leader just needs to act like he's got it together, but really, A leader needs to be someone who is following Christ. And I always think it's instructive to me, the story of Jesus and the centurion. The centurion's servant, remember who's ill, Matthew chapter eight. And the centurion sends servants apparently, and then later follows after them. The servants are asking Jesus to come. Well, they're asking Jesus to heal. And then the centurion gets there and says, hey, listen, my servant's sick, but you don't need to even come to where he is. I don't want you to trouble yourself with that. The centurion is a God-fearing man. That is, he was a Roman. He had not become a Jew, Even as a Roman, you could do that by being circumcised and joining the synagogue. He hadn't done that, but he did attend synagogue. He heard the word preached. He was a God-fearing man. He goes to Jesus and he says, you don't need to trouble yourself with coming to my house. Because he also knows that as a God-fearing man, as a Jew, you can't come to my house without being unclean. So he's really just very thoughtful man, he's desperate, servant he loves deeply is near death. And so, but even in that, he's got this sense of decorum and just appropriate kind of respect. But he says to Jesus, don't even trouble yourself to come to my house, just say the word and I know my servant will be healed. It's amazing. This guy, he's a Roman centurion. Well, and he goes on to explain, you just say the word, and I love what he says, because I too am a man, and you think he would say, in authority, because I say to this man, go, and he goes, this man come, and he comes, but he didn't say that. He said, I too am a man under authority. Therefore I say to this man, go, and he goes. This man, come, and he comes." He's saying that I'm a Roman leader, and I'm able to order people to go do my bidding. I don't have to go do that. I can tell that person to go do it. Just like I can I see with the eyes of faith that you have Servants under you in he's recognizing you have angels. You've got you are a a a king of of God of the spiritual realm You are the Messiah. I mean he's thinking like that but the key thing though is he said I to a man am a man under authority not in authority And so what he's saying is that to be under authority is to be in authority. And to not be under authority is to not be in authority. So to be a leader, You have to be a person who is under authority, which gets at what you were talking about, Todd, about the fear of the Lord, right? So this is why it's at the heart of a leader is character, but it's like reverence for God, a heart for God, fear of the Lord, submission to God. So you have to be fully submitted to God so that you can lead others. And think about that, what it says for us as husbands and fathers and mothers, We want our children to listen to us and respect us. Now they should, we have to make them do it. I mean, you know, appropriate to age, appropriate and all that. But what difference it makes when a man is under authority, his wife has a freedom to submit knowing things are, there's such joy in that, the potential for real joy in that. Now she can have joy in it even if he's not. I'm not saying submit when he's telling you to do something evil. I'm saying he's not walking with God like he needs to, but what he's saying is not sin and you're supposed to submit to it. You can honor the Lord as a godly wife and a godly woman and glory in Christ and be triumphant in grace, even if your husband never is. You cannot justify not submitting because he's just not a godly enough man, no. But when we as men are submitted to the Lord like we should, it does make it a joy and just an excitement for our wives. It makes it easier for them. And we shouldn't wanna do that as men. But you also, there's a sense in which if you're not where you need to be, the Lord may be telling them to listen anyway, but you're fighting against it because you're not doing it right. It's like you're messing everything up. If you're not under authority, your authority is just, it's like it's grinding. The gears are grinding. So we need to be under authority. So we need to know how to follow God ourselves and follow Jesus, follow and be submitted to others. It's one of the things like, for instance, as leaders, one of the parts of being an elder is you're submitted to all the other elders. Deacons, you're submitted to the other deacons. You're willing to take their decision and place yourself under it and embrace it. and own it as your own. Unless they're sinning, then you have to like resign from the elder board, you know, in protest or whatever. But if they're not sinning, you submit. And if you're not willing to submit, you're not in authority. You've disqualified yourself. So it's really profound reality, isn't it? God does work through authority, and yet there's this sense in which Even those when we're under authority, we're to test the spirits, we're to test the teaching, we're to be Bereans. So there's this interplay that happens. We all have the Holy Spirit. We all have an anointing from God. We're to, you know what I'm saying? So there's this, it's a tension, but leadership is part of what God has created. And I think honestly, I mean, I believe, well, pick up something really controversial at 8.07, but I'll just go ahead and say it, and you can think about it. There's a debate out there about, is the subordination of the son to the father eternal? Okay? There's a theological debate. Some people say that the subordination of the son to the father, you know, when Jesus says, I came to do my father's will, he sent me, I live to do his will, whatever he says, the words you hear me saying are not my words, they're words the father has given me. The things you see me doing are not my own works, they're the deeds I see the father doing. So that Jesus saying, I came as a son of God and I've taken every cue from the father and I've only done what he wanted me to do. Okay? The question is, is the subordination of the Son, the submission of the Son to the Father, is it something that just happened as a part of maybe creation and redemption? Cause it seems that even in creation, God said, he sent the son, the son creates, you see, even Genesis one, God said, let there be light and there was light. And then John one says, the word, all things were created through the word. You see, I put those together. So there's the debate. Is the son eternally subordinate to the father? Is it something that's always been there? And we don't know, bottom line, we can't really know with certainty. But that said, now so you understand I said that, and I'm not, I'm just throwing this out for you to think about and pray about and work through and meditate on. But I really believe that the best answer to the question is, it appears so. that the Lord doesn't give us any light to show us anything different. That the Father seems to be, the Son seems to be in submission to the Father and the Spirit is sent by the Son and the Father. And so there seems to be an authority structure within the Trinity. We certainly see it. It's unquestioned that we see it in creation and redemption. You see what I'm saying? So we see it, the Bible shows that. The question is, and again, you got to be careful when you're asking theoretical questions that we don't have the answer to. The question is, before creation, was that already there? So strictly speaking, we don't know. We shouldn't spend that much time thinking about it. So... But it's not inappropriate to talk about some and wrestle with some, but you kind of realize it's like you take your shoes off because you're on holy ground here, you wanna be careful, okay? But even if we just leave that aside and we say, we don't know, isn't it astonishing that the son submits to the father the way he does to accomplish redemption? Isn't that breathtaking? that equal in power and glory, one person of the Godhead submits completely to another person of the Godhead. What does that say about God and his character? It's the meekness of God. And the fact, I think it definitely says authority is a good thing. Authority is part of who God is. So he set up the world with authority. Now, authority can be abused. And, you know, the things that every good gift can be twisted and distorted and just made evil and destructive, great things, I mean, great destruction can happen through the abuse of authority. But you don't throw out the baby with the bathwater. And I think when you look at that, we should be people who have respect for authority. Now go back and think about 1 Peter. 1 Peter, Paul's explaining, hey, remember it turns the corner in 2.12 and he says, we said the first chapter and to 2.11 is about your identity in Christ. And then chapter 2.12 to the end is about your responsibility in Christ. And where does he start with your responsibilities? When he says, hey, you know, keep your behavior excellent in the Gentiles, so they see your good behavior, glorify your father in heaven. And then that's what he's leading into. First thing he says is, obey every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake. Be submitted to government authority. Now, again, it's not the only thing he says. Other places tell you, if he's telling you to sin, No, you don't do it. And what does that look like in a representative democracy, a republic? It's different than it is when it's a king. Okay, you gotta, but the key is authority's good. And then what does he do after that? He says, now at work, slaves submit to your masters. That's the next thing he talks about. Then what did you talk about after that? Wives submit to your husbands. And then, he talks about love and everything else, and he comes back in chapter five and he says, younger submit to your elders. So four different times he uses the word hupotasso, submit, place yourself under in the book of first Peter. And you see this kind of thing in scripture. And just, I think what you have to remember is, and we got to be wise about it. We don't want to over state something that scripture in a way that scripture doesn't say, but I think we live in such an anti-authoritarian age, anti-authority age, we should be anti-authoritarian, authoritarianism is not good, but anti-authority age, that people's instinct is to resist authority. And sin, at its essence, is it not asserting your own authority against God? Isn't that what a two-year-old's doing when he defies you? He's asserting his authority against the closest thing to God in his life, or the closest expression of God in his life, his parent? That's what's happening. So the Lord has ordained authority. We have to be wise, and there are places where we, you know, what does it look like? We gotta work through it. But we should have an appreciation for it in general, and then realize, hey, God works this way. who God is. And when you think about the way he revealed himself in salvation and in creation, the son's submission to the father, it certainly says, hey, it's not like the world says. And I think a lot of the people driving the argument against saying that Jesus wasn't submitted before, and like I said, I'm not 100% on this, because we can't be 100%, but it seems to me to be something of the spirit of the age driving that. Like authority's bad, and so we want egalitarianism. I don't think God's egalitarian. I mean, he doesn't do it in his own, in the Godhead as it relates to creation and redemption. Anyway, that's enough on that. So glad I could use up all of our time on that and leave you, go home and think about that. No, but I'd be happy to talk about that. If you have questions about it, push back, concerns, I'd be happy to have the conversation with you, because it'd be enriching and helpful. And anyway, let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father, thank you for your goodness, and Lord, what a privilege it is to be your servants, to follow Jesus, who took upon himself the form of a servant. and became obedient even to death, the death of the cross. Thank you, Lord, that you've exalted him above every name that is named. And he is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And Father, you delight for him to have all glory. Father, help us to be people who learn how to lead ourselves that we would be people who are willing to follow others. We'd all be humble and teachable. And as Ephesians 5, 18 says, be filled with the spirit. And then he says in verse 21, submitting to one another in reverence for Christ. May we be people who are willing to submit to other believers when they bring truth to us. And we just gladly submit. And we also gladly submit in placing their needs above our own. So Lord, be glorified in your church. Continue to walk with us this week. We pray all these things in Jesus' name, amen.