Well this morning we return to our theme of church leadership that we've engaged in in the last, I guess it's three weeks. This is our fourth study on this theme. We began by looking at models from the Old Testament, particularly the book of Numbers, but other portions of the Old Testament as well. And then we look to our Lord Jesus as the great model of the shepherd of his people. And that theme of shepherding is really invested in the king. It is a picture of leadership in the Old Testament, in the ancient world. And it really gives the model of what our Lord Jesus is to us as the good shepherd who gives his life for the sheep. We looked at the Lord Jesus in terms of his teaching on greatness in his kingdom, being service, not dominating over ones or seeking glory from others or seeking to be great, but to be humble, to be serving, to be instruments in his hands for his purposes and his good. We looked at the Apostle Paul in terms of his example. We saw in Acts 20, we also saw in 1 Thessalonians 2, just a wonderful example that Paul gives of a gospel minister. And now we want to turn this morning to the teaching of the New Testament, the teaching of the Apostle Paul in particular, with respect to this subject of leadership. And I want to begin just by outlining for you the offices that are the perpetual standing, ordinary, usual, the kind of offices that we expect that we would see in a church that we would attend. And again, it's not something that we just have gained as a result of The tradition that we have is Baptist. I think Baptist tradition would probably indicate you have a pastor and then you have a bunch of trustees in the church. At least that's a lot of the Baptist churches that I knew of when I was a young believer. But a lot of Baptist churches back in the 70s, a desirous of some measure of reform in biblical ways, saw that the Bible spoke about elders and not just pastors. In fact, pastors and elders we discovered was not a different thing, actually the same thing. And Again, it's not something that we made up. It's something that we gained an understanding of from scripture itself. And so I want to begin by looking at Paul's words to the church at Philippi in the first chapter of the book of Philippians. Philippians is a typical church in the ancient world. And when you would think of a typical church in the ancient world and letters that you'd write to them, How might you address them? Well, often Paul just says to the saints that are in this or that place, or the faithful brethren that are in this or that place. But here he addresses the saints, all the saints. in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi. That's the second clause of verse one. To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are at Philippi. But he adds something here that's a little bit different. It's not in the other letters. With the overseers and deacons. includes the leaders, includes the office bearers, we might say, officials in the church, the overseers and the deacons, these two classes of leaders in the church. Overseers, the word episkopoi, that's where the Episcopal Church gets its name from that word. Sadly, they understood Episcopoi to be like metropolitan bishops, bishops that had governance over many churches. But here, these bishops are an individual church. They're overseers of the church at Philippi. And the idea of a bishop that has superintendence over numerous churches is is something that developed in church history, but you don't find it in the Bible. You don't find bishops that preside over a diocese of churches, over a grouping of churches. The overseers in the Bible were pastors or elders, leaders in individual churches like the church at Philippi. And so we see that they are, equated with these other offices. We saw that in Acts chapter 20 in our study last week, when in Acts chapter 20, when Paul calls to himself the elders from Miletus in verse 17, it says, now from Miletus, he sent to Ephesus and called the elders of the church to come to him. Who are these people that came to Paul? When Paul was in Miletus, who were these people from Ephesus? Well, they were the elders of the church. And what does he say to the elders of the church? Well, he says in verse 20, that there to be care, I'm sorry, verse 28, verse 28, he calls them to pay attention to yourselves and to all the flock in which the Holy Spirit made you overseers. Wait a minute, I thought they were elders. Well, yeah, they are, but they're also overseers. It's not a different office. It's just a different name for the same office. is just that the office from a different perspective. An elder would be an experienced, older person. regarded, respected in the community of God's people. A trusted person would be definitional of what an elder of the people would be. But yet the work of an overseer is to, I'm sorry, the work of an elder is to oversee, is to guard, is to protect the welfare, the wellbeing of the people of God. But then these elders from Ephesus who he says, the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, He commands them to care for the Church of God. And that word for care of the Church of God, some of your Bibles might translate to shepherd or to pastor. the flock of God, because that's also their work. Their work is not only to guard, it's to care, it's to protect, not only protect, but to provide for the needs of the people, to feed the flock, to teach the people of God, to lead the people of God, to care for the people of God. So that's the work of the shepherd. And so right there, you see that it's not different offices, it's the same office, just from different perspectives, just viewed in different ways. How the shepherd's work is to be seen as a respected leader, well-experienced in the congregation, hence the term elder is an appropriate term used, but then he also guards, protects the people, he oversees them, and then he shepherds and cares and leads and provides for the needs of the flock. The same thing you also see in the book of Titus, Titus chapter one. Paul's letter to Titus in the pastoral epistles is going to become an important passage that we're going to look at in some detail in later studies. But in Titus chapter one, Paul says, this is why I left you in Crete. This is in verse five of chapter one. Paul says to Titus, this is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remained into order, that you might put what remained into order and appoint elders in every town, as I directed you." So that's the work he used to do. And every town where the church meets, you're to appoint an elder for the churches in those towns. And then he says, with respect to this office of the elder, these elders who would be appointed in every city, He says, he's to be above reproach, the husband of one wife, his children are believers, not open to the charges of debauchery or insubordination. And why is that necessary? He says, for an overseer, for an overseer. They're Episcopali, they're overseers. As God's steward must be above reproach, an overseer must be above reproach. So the elder and the overseer, again, is the same office. There are different words in the Greek, presbyteros. The Presbyterians say our church government is presbyteros, it's Presbyterian, and so we're the right ones and we do church government properly because we call ourselves Presbyterians. The Bible speaks about presbyterosis. And the Episcopalians come along and say, well, we're the right guys. We do it right because we have bishops. Of course, they misunderstand what bishops are. I mean, you might as well be playing chess and moving bishops and defining that as a bishop, as what the Bible's talking about when it talks about bishops. It's talking about something completely different. Well, having said those things, the interrelatedness of these titles. Peter also, 1 Peter chapter 5, says about the same thing. We looked at it in a previous thing. I won't go over it with you again. But he also uses those terms interchangeably. He calls himself an elder. He says he's an elder, he's exhorting the elders that they would shepherd the flock, they would pastor the flock, and not do it with a harshness or looking to compel the people, but bring them to be willing obedience. Now, it's an interesting thing what Paul said in the Titus passage that we read, is that Titus was to appoint elders in every city, to set things in order. I said, lefty and creed, that I set the things that remain in order. So it has to do with the order of the church, how the church is to be rightly ordered. But it's interesting, the church is existing prior to this order being achieved. Apart from Titus appointing elders so that there would be an orderly or a government of the church, the church had an existence. In other words, the church is not to be defined by its officers. Hence, I would never want to call myself a Presbyterian, to define myself by the name of a church leader, or to define myself as an Episcopoi. Because the church exists, even if you don't have Episcopoi or Presbyterosis or shepherds. A church can exist without the leaders. Is it good for the church to exist without the leaders? No, that's the reason Paul put Titus in Crete, to put things in order. But it's not a question of the being of the church, as Martin used to say. It's the well-being of the church that is dependent upon the appointing of elders. It's for the good of the assembly. It doesn't constitute the assembly of the assembly of the church to the church. The church is the assembly of the saints. It is the assembly of the believers, whether you have elders or not. And I would say that because there's groups of people that just want to, we want to appoint anybody anywhere as a leader. We want to say, we have these group of people to have leaders. Maybe the other ones will take responsibility if things go wrong. But the point is that they're not qualified. They shouldn't be made elders. You need to wait on the Lord. You need to wait on the Lord. And it's kind of like Abraham not waiting on the Lord for Isaac and say, let's go ahead and make an Ishmael. You just don't want to go ahead and do that, unauthorized. You want to do things the Lord's way, so you pray that God will raise up leaders if we're in a position where we don't have leaders among us. So the elders exist, or the offices exist, not for the being or existence of the church, but for its good, for its well-being. Now, I've said that Paul makes elders and deacons to be the principal officers of the church. Are they the exclusive officers of the church? I attended a church in New Jersey where we had all kinds of officers because we had every single kind of committee that you could think of. A lot of churches is run by committees. So you have a committee leader and they become a church officer, and we have a multiplication of officers. Well, again, I'm not saying a church can't do that, but I'm saying that these are the biblical offices, and we should be concerned about that principally. If we're putting all of our attention upon these other things, who's our elder for music, and who's our elder for counseling, and who's our elder for worship, and who's our elder for, you know, a dozen other things, the missions concerns. And I'm not saying all that's not legitimate or couldn't be legitimate. I'm just saying that should not be that we just multiply people in leadership and make them almost equal to or the equivalent of the biblical offices. There should be a certain sense that it's the biblical offices that we need to be concerned about, and we need to also be compliant with the Word of God about what the Bible says about qualifications of those that hold those offices. If we're going to have a missions committee and have somebody lead it, well, I don't have to say, well, do you qualify? Because I have no standard of qualifications. who could or should be leading a committee on missions. Probably the standard would be, well, what's your interest in and concern for? And how is that reflected? And if you have a deep burden for missions, well, yeah, maybe you're the guy, the person that should be leading it. And I wouldn't have to say, well, it has to be a male husband of one wife. Why couldn't a woman lead a committee like that? I would have no objections to that. It's not a biblical office. It's not a biblical office. So the biblical criteria wouldn't come into effect if it has something to do with an office that just is a committee that the church is designated for the purposes we have. Again, I'm not saying it's wrong to do that. I'm not of the mind that you can't breathe without a biblical passage to support it. I don't believe that that's the case. I believe we have a wonderful flexibility and liberty as a church to meet the needs that the church possesses and without trying to come up with every kind of reason. Oftentimes that becomes a falsification of reasons. We find justifications for practices we want to do, and we want to say, well, that's biblical, and here's why. We come up with a specious reason as to why it is that we do what we do. I grew up in the church in which we heard a lot about the simplicity of New Testament worship. New Testament worship is simple and I guess Old Testament worship is complex. I guess you can fit into that what you want. You really can. Again, I'm not really sure that's a doctrine that is highly defined in scripture. I'm just not certain that it's there. And we want to be fairly certain that if we're saying something's biblical and hence this other thing is not, that we're really framing the argument with clear passages of scripture. and not just something we want to see in it. So anyway, that's just a personal opinion that surfaces. But having said that, there are these two biblical offices. Wait a minute, Pastor. Aren't you aware that Paul speaks of other ministries and other ministers? What about that five-fold ministry that we find in Ephesians chapter four? We have the five-fold offices, not just of elders. In fact, they didn't even put deacons there. What about the apostle? What about the prophet? What about the evangelist? What about those offices? Don't they have something to say to us? And indeed they do. And indeed they do. What do we make of them? Well, my sense of things is just simply this. that Paul is writing to the Ephesian letter in a context in which the church has a definition a bit bigger than some of the other letters. When Paul writes to the Philippians, when Paul writes to the Thessalonians, it's clear to me that he's writing to a local assembly of believers. And so there is a focus in upon that assembly, its church, its government, how it functions. But Ephesians differs in that its meaning of church is never just local. When it says, Christ is made head of all things to the church, the fullness of him that fills all in all. He's not saying, and I'm talking about you and Piebush and no one else. Head of all things to the church is referring to the universal church. Any place, anywhere that a church exists, Christ is head of all things to the church. When he says that the church Again, it's his body, the fullness of him that fills all in all. When he says that Christ loved the church and gave himself for it, he's not saying, well, I'm just speaking to this individual local church that I'm writing to. No, he's talking about the universal church. One of the reasons I do believe the Ephesian letter was an encyclical letter that the copies of the New Testament that we have today that do not include in Ephesus, does testify to the fact that originally it was not written just to Ephesus. Ephesus was probably included because it was the leading city in Asia Minor and would have been the first stop of a courier who would be bringing a letter to a bunch of churches, like the churches in Asia Minor that Revelation speaks about, where Jesus speaks to the seven churches of Asia Minor. It begins with Ephesus. It was the first, you know, you go across the Aegean, you stop, I guess it's in Troas, first stop at the coast. What's the next city? What's the next major city? It's like coming into Brooklyn and saying, well, Manhattan, that's New York. Even living in Brooklyn, we called Manhattan New York. New York was the big city. We were just an outlying borough. The big city was Manhattan or New York. We called it New York. I mean, we're New York. The city is New York. The city is New York, even though we were technically part of the city. Go figure. But that's how we saw things. The major city is the major city. And so Ephesus was the major city of the province of Rome, of the province of Asia Minor. And so that's where the letter would have gone first. But anyway, what I'm saying is that the definition of church is a lot bigger. It's referring to the universal church. So when it tells us that Christ ascended on high, let captivity captive, gave gifts to men, which is the preface to that in Ephesians, And he's quoting, I think it's Psalm 69. And in this ascension of Jesus and in this gift that he gives to the church, he's given these gifts to the universal church. So that opens up the door to the question, which one of these officers that are mentioned are officers of the universal church? he's referring to, and which ones are offices of the local church. And I think the assumption, just to assume, for apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastor slash teacher, all refer to all the churches. So every church should have an apostle. And every church should have a prophet. And every church should have an evangelist. And every church should have a pastor or teacher. I don't think that was Paul's notion. I think he thought that every church should have a pastor or teacher. I'm not sure that every church needs an apostle. But the apostles were given for the purposes of the universal church. And we have to understand what their functions are in the universal church. I don't think he's talking about these officers being local church at a local church level. I don't think he's talking about necessarily officers that are at every period of the history of the church. I want to try to draw a line between the New Testament apostolate and the Old Testament patriarchs. Now, why would that be legitimate? To draw a line between the Old Testament patriarchs, the sons of Jacob, the 12 tribes, and the apostles of the Lord Jesus. What would link them together? What's the most obvious thing that links them together? The number 12. Why did Jesus pick 12 apostles? Why didn't he pick 8 apostles, 13 apostles, 16 apostles? Why the number 12? Well, I think it's because his mission is the mission of the restoration of Israel. I've been sent to the lost sheep of the tribes of the house of Israel. And he's doing this new thing in the world, bringing in a revived Israel, bringing in a restored, renewed, reconstituted Israel through the ministry of 12, just like the Old Testament. Now, what made those patriarchs, those Old Testament... Let me just say this, that the fact that there would be a link between those things isn't just something that I made up out of my own head. The Bible itself draws a clear relationship between the two. And to me the epitomizing text of that is in Revelation chapter 21. Turn to Revelation chapter 21. Here's the picture of the consummation, of the consummation of all things. When Jesus returns and a new heavens and a new earth comes down from heaven from God. This new heavens and new earth is expressed in ways that really bring in the language of the original New Heavens and New Earth, the creation of the New Heavens and New Earth in Genesis 1. It also brings in a lot of the language, imagery, you find in the Garden of Eden so that this city has garden-like qualities. The kind of gems and stones that we read about in Genesis chapter 2 is there with the wall built of jasper verse 18 pure gold like clear glass adorned with every kind of jewel you got the jewels of eden you have the jewels of this new city this reconstituted city of course in chapter 21 you have the the rivers that run through it the waters of life that run through it, and the tree of life, which is for the healing of the nations. So you bring in all creation stuff that's there in Genesis 1 and 2 that's brought into this passage as well. But one of the things I was really impressed by, you know I'm starting a course with Michael Morales on the book of Genesis, you know I was going to bring that in somewhere along the way, is that in his exposition of Genesis chapter one, he contends, I think very rightly, that what we find being described in Genesis chapter one is God's work of the creation of a three-story house, of the house that is the heavens, the earth, and the seas, the earth, the seas, and the sky. He relates it also to the ark that Noah was in as a dwelling, for those that were redeemed, the three levels on the ark as well, and that this is a temple. This is a temple in which God's presence is the key thing, that God himself is the one who fills heaven and earth. In fact, he says, why do you build an architectural temple? Oh, let's look at it in Isaiah chapter 66. I don't mean to get into this deeply, but it's in my head, so let me just spell it out. In the book of Isaiah, again, speaking about a new heavens and a new earth. So it does relate to the Revelation passage. It does speak about the creation of a new heavens and a new earth. Chapter 66 and verse 1 it says thus says the Lord heaven is my throne and earth is my footstool And the throne, of course, in the tabernacle and in the temple was in the Holy of Holies, where God was enthroned between the cherubim. And the Ark of the Covenant was his footstool, that was his resting place, the place that he rested his feet. And he reigned in Israel, in a palace, in an architectural tabernacle and later an architectural temple. But now, in the light of the fact that the tabernacle is no longer, the temple was destroyed by the Babylonians, the picture here is, why do you need such a thing? Why do you need an architectural thing? Because heaven is my throne, earth is my footstool. All creation is my temple. I fill heaven and earth. What is the house that you would build for me? And what is the place of my rest? All these things, my hand is made. And so all these things came to be. declares the Lord. As to this one, how I look, is of a humble and a contrite spirit, who trembles in my word. Where does God dwell? He dwells in the heavens and the earth. He fills heaven and the earth with his presence, and he dwells with the poor and contrite of heart. That's the picture. We become a temple of God as God indwells us by his spirit. All creation is a temple of his presence. So really that is the picture. But now with this new heavens and the new earth where the lamb is the temple and God fills the place. The mention is made in verse 22 of Revelation 21, and I saw no temple in the city. For its temple is the Lord God Almighty in the land. God is the temple. Creation is the temple. God's made creation that he fills it with himself, his presence. What's a temple? It's a place of divine presence. It's a place of divine dwelling. What's creation? It's a place of divine dwelling. It is a temple that God makes for his glory. The glory of God, it gives its light and the lamp is the lamb. And again, I'm gonna get to day four of creation, but where the lamps are spoken about. But anyway, I wanna get back to verse 10. Chapter 21, where in this vision of this new heavens and new earth that comes down from heaven from this new Jerusalem that comes down from heaven from God, he carried me away in the spirit to a great high mountain. And when you think about it, he carried me away in the spirit to see something. Any of you who have been with me when we've studied a particular book of the Old Testament, remember such language of being carried away in the spirit, the visions of God, which prophet that referred to? No, in Isaiah. Ezekiel. Yeah, Ezekiel. Ezekiel was carried away in the spirit. And, you know, so he was in Jerusalem seeing all the abominations that were going on in the temple, but he was bodily, he was in Babylon. But yet in the spirit, God brought him to see these things. In chapter 40, the visions of the visionary temple and of the new city. It's all there in vision. And so John's experiencing something similar to Ezekiel, and he experiences it in language very similar to the book of Ezekiel. We're going to get back to church government, believe me. It seems like we're getting off the topic. No, no, we're going to get back. But I want you to see, he carried me away in the spirit to a great high mountain, showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel. And it had a great high wall. So the city had this great high wall with 12 gates. And at the gates, 12 angels. And on the gates, the names of the 12 tribes of the sons of Israel were inscribed. On the east, there were three gates. On the north, there were three gates. On the south, there were three gates. On the west, there were three gates. Anybody have any sense of this language here reminding you of something that took place like earlier? Really, it harkens back to two things in the Old Testament. One of it is the 48th chapter of the Book of Ezekiel, where this very same picture is given. of the gates of the city, the gates of the New Jerusalem, and of the walls of the New Jerusalem, the gates in the wall, and the gates being the names of the 12 tribes. And in fact, in Ezekiel, the names are given. Who's on the east, who's on the west, who's on the north, who's on the south. And that picture of the tribes of Israel on different sides of a temple or a tabernacle goes back to Numbers, the opening chapter of the book of Numbers, in the way that God ordered his Old Testament people of God. So there was the ordering of the Old Testament people of God. And remember, I said when God ordered the nation, how they would encamp, when there would be the camp of the Lord around the tabernacle when they would break camp and begin to march up to the land. the order in which the march would take place. It all had to do with which tribe goes first and which tribe goes second, where the Levites fit in among those things, which Levites that had charge over which aspect of the tabernacle came next. It was a very orderly process. In a book that we've said a couple of weeks ago is also concerned about leadership. So God's concerned about how his people are rightly ordered And he's concerned about good leadership in the midst of a people rightly ordered. So you might say that the book of Numbers has a lot to tell us about both things, about the way things should be ordered. Paul speaks to the Colossian letter about the way they are ordered, their good order in Christ, he refers to in chapter two. So there was good order. And the order had to do with where the tribes were. Now, I'm just flummoxed to myself just in reading these passages recently and coming up with the reality that what happens in the new temple has lots of similarities in the camp of Israel, around the tabernacle, but also great differences. Also great differences. The most striking difference, I do believe, I want to go back and chunk it, but I'm pretty sure that one of the things that the visionary temple does not include are priests. You have offerings, but you don't have priests. Why don't you have priests? It was so much a part of what was going on in the Old Testament, but they're not there in this visionary temple. And you might want to think that, One of the things that happens in the Visionary Temple is that the way the tribes are ordered around the Visionary Temple in Ezekiel 48, it differs from the numbers picture in a couple of respects. Number one, Around the tabernacle, the Levites who served in the tabernacle were on the east side. The east side was the place of entrance into the tabernacle. And so before you got to where the tribes were, you had a buffer. The Levites provided a buffer between the glory of the God whose glory filled the house and the people. Now you might think that's kind of important when you have a God who breaks out in wrath. upon the sons of Aaron who offered strange offering upon...remember he slew Nadab in the bayou. the wrath of God breaking forth upon the people was a reality that the sacrificial system of the Levitical code was necessary to avoid. If God was to dwell in his glory in the midst of this people and all of these tribes were to be ordered around this tabernacle where the glory of the God of heaven dwelt, what's to prevent his wrath from breaking out? Well, the sacrifices of the Levitical system, the shedding of the blood, the offering of atonement was one aspect of it, and the Levites, the serving ministers of the sanctuary, who carried the sanctuary and transported it and was responsible for much of the things that happened, they provided a buffer between the glory of God and his people. So Levi was set apart for that very purpose, to serve the Lord on behalf of his people, and even in terms of how they were encamped, to provide this buffer between God and the people. And what happens in the Ezekiel picture is not only no priests, but no Levites. It's almost like you don't need a buffer in the visionary temple. Now the Levites are moved from that eastern part. Now they're up north. Now Dan, Asher, and Naphtali used to be up north. Now it's, interestingly enough, it's Levi up there along with Judah. I forgot the third tribe. Judah's not on the east anymore. No buffer. Levites are not that special group anymore. What's on the eastern part where Judah, the leading tribe, the tribe of the kings, the tribe that would rule, the tribe of the blessing, they're moved up north and the tribe of Joseph comes east. Joseph in the original order is west. Now he's east along with his brother Benjamin and the first child of Rachel's servant girl, Dan. So Rachel gets the preference. Isn't that interesting? I just think that's interesting. At the entrance point, the east, are the tribes loved by Jacob. The beloved wives are east at the point of the entrance. I don't want to make a big deal of it, but I think it does point to the fact that this new temple has some new properties. One of it is access. Access. There's no need for ministering priests. There's no need for Levites providing a buffer. Now there's freedom of access to the Lord of the place. And there's also the principle of love, the beloved. the beloved people of God, the ones that are loved, principally, where love takes the prime thing. It wasn't a good thing that Jacob loved Rachel's kids more than the others. It got Joseph into terrible trouble. But she was Rachel's kid, so he loved her. Because he loved Rachel, not Leah, not the servant girls. Rachel was the woman he loved. It was love that produced those children. And it's love that produces the children of the new covenant. So I think that note of love is a very important, vital thing that's there, as well as the freedom of access that the beloved of the Lord have to the presence of the Lord. Does that make sense? It's pretty powerful if you see it in that way. It's pretty powerful illusions that the scripture makes. But here's the point of the thing. vision, and the vision here in Revelation of this new heavens and new earth with the wall, with the gates, the names of the 12 tribes are inscribed. Why? Because it's from the 12 tribes that the Old Testament people of God came. They were the result of the reproduction of the 12 tribes. They were the tribes proliferating, a seed being fruitful, multiplying, providing that number of the descendants of Abraham that you could sooner number the stars or number the sands of the sea or the dust of the earth. God's promise was fulfilled through the 12 tribes. And so their names are there. But not only do you have the names of the 12 tribes upon the gates, But the walls of the city had 12 foundations also in verse 14. And on them were the names of the 12 apostles of the Lamb. Why are they there? Well, in Ephesians in that letter that speaks about the universal church says that the foundation of the church are the apostles, Jesus Christ himself, the chief cornerstone. We're built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ, the chief cornerstone. That's speaking about the new covenant temple that first of all is in Jesus and then all who are built upon Jesus. are that new covenant people. Why are the apostles and prophets? Well, because it's the gospel proclaimed by the apostles and prophets that becomes the means of the spiritual propagation of the new covenant people of God. It's not physical procreation. It's spiritual. It's spiritual procreation. It's new birth. It's the power of a new creation coming through the power of the spirit that brings in a multitude that no man can number from every kindred, tongue, and tribe that causes the church to multiply. So that's the picture of the New Jerusalem. It's built upon the foundation of the 12 apostles. It has the gates of the city, the 12 patriarchs of Israel. Now I have a question. The question is this. What if you lived in the Israel of the eighth century BC? And you're up in Jerusalem one day and you happen to come upon the prophet Isaiah. And maybe it's just somebody else, but other than the prophet Isaiah. You can see there's lots of credibility with us, of course. But let's say it was Isaiah's kid brother that came along. And he said, you know, I've gone up to see my brother Isaiah. Oh yeah, are you a prophet too? He said, oh no, no, no. Well, sometimes I am. Yeah, sometimes. But you know really what I am in Israel? I'm a patriarch. Who's going to believe him? Can he be a patriarch in the 8th century BC? Could he be one that's physically the nation propagates from? No, he's not in the right time and the right place and he's not the right person. You can't add to the patriarchs. The patriarchs are a set number. There are 12 of them. And there are 12 of them that are the sons of Jacob. And there can't be sons of Isaiah's dad. Can't be sons of any other person in any other time in any other place. The number's fixed. Names are written upon the gates. But the names are written also upon those foundation stones. Do you think you can add to the foundation? Paul says the foundation has already been laid. Jesus Christ. You can't add to the foundation. The foundation was set. It was set in the first century. It was set in the first proclamation of the gospel. It was set when this new Israel began its work of proclamation to bring the nations to the obedience of the gospel. And you can't add to the 12. Jesus called 12. Now you can replace Judas with Matthias, but you have to do it on the same basis in which the original 12 were chosen. You have to do it on the basis of, Lord, you who know the hearts of these men, you choose which of these two you would add to the number. It wasn't up to us to add to that number. Only Jesus could add to the number. They went by way of law to see the mind of Christ and to determine who should be added. My question is law drawing legitimate? Well, in the book of Proverbs it is. A lot of places in the Bible it is. Was it the best way to gain a successor? No, but it was the spirit of the thing. They recognized it was Jesus alone who could add to it. Now, what about the apostle Paul? He's called an apostle. Yeah, he is. But again, Jesus chose him. The qualification of being an eyewitness of the resurrection was true of him because he saw the ascended Lord after the resurrection. He saw Jesus risen in the vision. And he called himself an apostle born out of due time. It wasn't a proper birth. It wasn't a proper, it was irregular. But we don't live in a world of irregularities. We live in a world of regularities. Paul was an exception, if anything. And then he's an exception with a different ministry than the other 12, according to Galatians chapter two. because to them were given the apostleship to the Jews. To Paul, it was another kind of an apostleship. He too was sent by Jesus, but not sent to kind of found the new Israel. That was being done in Jerusalem to which the Gentile nations would be added. They're added to a foundation that's already set. So that's more superstructure than foundation. The original apostles, they're building that foundation that everything else in the church comes to be built upon. Does that make sense? So I would say, time's run out. I would say that these apostles and prophets, because he says prophets and apostles provide that foundation. And the fact that there was special revelation given to these people, and it was never just for an individual church. I mean, Agabus was given a prophecy in Acts chapter 11, that the famine should come upon the world. Okay, you guys here in my local church, that's for you. No, it wasn't just for him. It was for the churches. It was for all the people of God to hear and to know. So these revelations that were given through the prophets were for the entire church. And I think the evangelists, if you think of Timothy and you think of Titus as examples of what an evangelist was, a gospeller, who would bring the gospel to places already founded by Paul and then come along later and set in order the things that were lacking. They had responsibility not just for one congregation. They had responsibility for many congregations. So I would say those officers of apostle, prophet, and evangelist are universal church officers. They don't belong to any one congregation. Every single congregation of God's people is subject to apostolic teaching and authority. You don't need an additional apostle to come along and say, well, I'm going to come along, Paul, and be authority. No, you're not. There's apostolic authority that we don't need additions to, and we don't recognize additions to it. It's the authority of the apostles, who are the foundation stones of the New Jerusalem, of the walls of the New Jerusalem, the foundation of the church of the Lord Jesus. And they have a number that can't be added to. So I'd sooner believe you're a patriarch in Israel than that you were an apostle of the Lord Jesus. Anyone who claims such a thing in the 21st century is just as ridiculous as claiming to be a patriarch in Israel. So that's my sense of the thing there. So we're limited in our study of church officers, thinking of the local church to what we've already seen Paul has defined as the elder and the deacon. Our time is gone. Thank you for your intent of this. Let's pray. Father, we are thankful for this time in your word. We're thankful for the glory of the scriptures, the profound things we unearth as we don't just rush through, but read carefully. what your word declares. And we thank the Lord for what we've seen this morning. Pray your blessing would be upon us as we greet one another, as we enter into the morning hour of worship this morning. We'd ask these mercies coming in Jesus' name, amen.