can. Let's get in fellowship with the Lord if we need to. We do that by confessing according to what verse? First John 1.9, it's like 1.1.9, we got that, right? And it's a simple transaction. All we have to do is confess, which means to acknowledge. We don't have to sit there and name everything that we ever did in the past, but we have to acknowledge that we have sinned. If you look at David's confessional psalm, it's a great example. David doesn't sit there and say, I did this, and I did this, and I did this, and I did this. He doesn't do that. He doesn't list his sins. That's not what the word homologuer or confess means. The word simply means to acknowledge it. and you move on. You don't want to list it because then you're thinking about it. And that's kind of like the worst thing you want to do is like think about sin. Because then you're going to commit sin. That's how it works. Because Romans 8 says if you set your mind on the things of the flesh, you'll do the deeds of the flesh. So when you think of listing your sins, all you're doing is setting your mind on it. That's not a good idea. That would conflict with that passage. So it's very necessary that you just simply acknowledge it. You just simply confess it in that sense. And then you move on. And God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. So let's do that. in His manner, and then we'll look at the rest of these gifts. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, you are a great and awesome God. We look at this world around us, we just kind of marvel right now at the things that are transpiring. The rise in anti-Semitism, the rise in lawlessness, things that are setting the stage. As the book of 2 Thessalonians says, there's the mystery of lawlessness that's already at work in the world system. And this sets the stage for the man of lawlessness to come on the scene, to make his covenant with Israel, begin to unwrap the 70th week of Daniel, which is shown to us in great detail in Revelation 6 through 19. We live on this side of that, and we're so grateful that you have a plan and purpose for us, as it's declared in 2 Thessalonians, that we are not destined for the wrath that is to come, but we are destined for ultimately deliverance at the rapture of the church. We can't wait because we know that in the wake of all of the judgment that will transpire, You are going to return your son, the beloved one, the king of the universe, the one who is awesome, and he's going to set up his kingdom, destroying all this mess. He's going to set up what Romans calls the difference between the world we live in, which is death, and the world that is to come, which is life. And this is such a distinction. It's such a radical distinction. We think that we have life now, and we enjoy part of it with the eternal life we have. But the world that is to come is so far beyond this. And we cannot even imagine, as Ephesians 3 says, the height, the width, the depth, the magnitude of all that you have in store for us. So we pray that we keep our eyes on the prize. As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 9, we run the race so as to win the prize. We don't get knocked off track. We're in a race. We're trying to win. And we don't want to be disqualified from the prize. We don't want to lose rewards. We want to be faithful. So teach us how to use our spiritual gifts and how to do so in love, of course, so that it's a building up of the body of Christ. Because you're building something inside this context of evil. That's not evil. You're building something glorious to be a dwelling of the Spirit of God. We are a temple and of course the temple is supposed to be holy. So help us understand like what it is exactly that you are accomplishing and how we can enter into it. And we ask this in Jesus precious name. Amen. Okay, we've been going through the gifts, right? I've divided the gifts into four basic categories, and these four basic categories really are broken into two categories, I guess, because the first three of the four are really all what I call completed gifts. So you've got the completed foundation gifts because the foundation was the Apostles and Prophets. And prophets had a tandem gift that went along with that. It's the distinguishing of spirits. People that would detect, hey, that's not really a true prophet because in the early church you've got true and false prophets. So you had to have those who had the gift of distinguishing spirits so they could distinguish, hey, is what this proclaimed prophet is saying true or is it false? And so basically you have three gifts in the completed foundation category. Apostles, prophets, and then you've got distinguishing of spirits. Then after that we talked about sign gifts. These were certain gifts that were given to those who were the recipients of new revelation. Because you've got the Old Testament, I mean, nobody's debating that. In fact, the Roman Catholic Church doesn't even debate that up till you get to Malachi, right? After Malachi, I always do that to just get your attention. Then you've got these books that are written in the intertestamental time, like Ecclesiasticus, not Ecclesiastes, Bell on the Dragon, Judith, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th Maccabees, all these books that were written in the intertestamental times in Greek, not in Hebrew. And these books were not accepted by the Roman Catholic Church until the Council of Trent in 1546 to 1564. So that council, over 1500 years after the time of Christ, and they come back saying, oh, we think these books need to be in the canon. Oh really? Why didn't anybody see this before you guys? Okay, so those books are not supposed to be a part of the canon of scripture. Everybody agrees in the Old Testament, what we call the Masoretic Texts. It's the Hebrew books of the Bible. They divide it into like 22 books. We have 39, right? But they had 22. But it's the same books, it's just we divide them differently because they didn't say 1st and 2nd Kings. They just had Kings. They didn't say 1st and 2nd Chronicles, they just said Chronicles. They didn't have Jeremiah and Lamentations, they just had Jeremiah. So basically even with the 12, they just called it the 12. They didn't go through Nahum, Habakkuk, Jonah. They didn't divide them all up. The reason is because they were so small. Can you imagine a scroll of Jonah? I mean, it's four chapters. I mean, like, they were worried they were going to lose them. That's the technical story behind all that. I mean, because they're so tiny. It's like, oh no, it's Jonah. Everybody got a handle on Jonah? No, I don't have a handle on Jonah. It's so tiny, I can barely hold it. And so they put them all in one scroll, and they called it the Twelve. So anyway, they only had 22 books, we have 39, but it's the same content. That's the point. And so, nobody was debating that. But look, in the New Testament, you've got all these new things coming. You've got Matthew, you've got Mark, you've got Luke, you've got John. I believe those are chronological, by the way. I do not hold to what's called Marking Priority. I don't know if you've ever seen this, but this stuff is what's going on in the academic world for the last 250 years. This is the idea that Mark, Mark is depending on another document called Q. I don't know if you've ever heard of this document, but basically biblical scholars who don't believe the Bible. Does that make sense? Biblical scholars who don't believe the Bible. In other words, people who study the Bible who don't believe it. But it'd be just like you studying Aristotle. Do you really believe it? Do you really believe that his philosophies are true? I mean, probably not. You're just trying to understand what Aristotle was saying, right? Well, these guys don't believe the Bible, but they study the Bible. And they said, you know, you've got Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, you've got all these guys. They agree. This is so amazing, like how these guys could all agree. So how could they all agree? Oh, there's got to be a previous document that they're all drawing from. And they said, that's Q. It's like the fifth synoptic, the fifth gospel or something. You know, and they go into all this. I'm not even planning on talking about this. But anyway, I am. So, but you've got these books coming. I don't believe in that, okay? So that's just nonsense. You can discard that stuff. But you've got these books coming, right? You've got the book of Acts. It's kind of written late. It's first church history, though. I mean, who wrote a history book on the church before Acts? Nobody, it's the first church history book. And you really got books like Galatians coming, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, now we're into 1st Corinthians. So realize there's very little of the New Testament written at this time, because actually Mark and Luke and John are not written yet before 1st Corinthians. So you've really only got, let me see, I would say what you have at this time in church history when 1st Corinthians is written is you've got Matthew, okay? It would be the only gospel they had at that time. No Mark, Luke and John. You've got Galatians, you've got 1st and 2nd Thessalonians, you've got James, which is non-Pauline, and that's it. That's it. So the New Testament is in the process of formation. So you've got to have revelatory gifts. And these revelatory gifts are mainly apostle and prophet. Then you've got those who are these apostles and prophets doing signs. Why are they doing signs? I mean, what's the point of miracles, healing, things like that? Well, those things are necessary. I mean, because how do you know this guy isn't just Mohammed saying, I got a revelation. I went to Mount Zion, I had a vision, and this is what God said to me. Well, I mean, you have over a billion people in the world who are following a guy who said that, right now, in this world. His name is Muhammad, and he is not the prophet of Allah, and Allah doesn't exist. But you have all these people following this person because they have been deceived. I mean, because we know, because the Bible tells us there are princes and principalities of darkness. and that those who are in unbelief are walking according to the prince of the power of the air. They are totally deceived by him. In fact, this Sunday we're going to get into these principalities of darkness, just to see how much they impact history. What's so interesting is you have unseen beings, invisible beings, who are impacting world history as we speak. And all these people are following a guy who said he's a prophet. Now look, the Bible is not like that at all. The Bible is nothing like Islam. It's nothing like, you know, their book about the traveler. It's nothing about all their supposed documents, the Quran and all this. Nothing like that at all, because all that's based on one guy who said, I had a vision. The Bible says, no, there was over 40 people who received divine revelation from God, and they actually had a school who evaluated when people said, you know, I got a revelation from God. Oh, really, did you? Let's see. And they checked it out. They were like, oh, does it conform to previous writings? Are you changing anything? Are you manipulating anything? Adding anything? Subtracting anything? And so forth. And so, you know, all this was very carefully overseen. So the signs, gifts were given so these individuals would be authenticated by God. It's what's so interesting about Acts. Okay, back away from the book of Acts. As interesting as the book of Acts is, it's so wonderful. Let's just back away from it and think of something. There's two main guys in the book of Acts. It's called Acts, people say it's called Acts, which means deeds, works, right? Things that were done. And some people said, no, it should be the Acts of Peter and Paul. Why'd they say that? Because those are the two main characters, as far as humanly speaking. And if you look at their miracles, they're the same. They both, You know, raise people who are lame, fix people who are lame. They both raise people from the dead. I mean, it's like, boom, boom, boom. They all do the exact same ones. It's like, why? Why do you see the same miracle done by two different guys to authenticate that their message really is from God? That's why. because it's a validation. And that's what these sign gifts were there for, to authenticate that their messages were coming from God and they weren't just making it up. So you've got those sign gifts. Tongues was also a sign, sung to unbelieving Jews mainly. Of course, interpretation of tongues goes along with that because, you know, you had to have those people there to authenticate that actually the people who are saying they're speaking in tongues are actually speaking something that actually has a message, right? and so forth, and it was mainly for unbelieving Jews. The two completed mission-critical gifts, which we called wisdom and knowledge, and I could give some examples from the book of Acts, but things like knowing that Ananias and Sapphira were lying, what did they do, sit down with a polygraph? No, Peter didn't sit down with the polygraph. How did he know? Because he had the polygraph of the Holy Spirit. That's why. He had what was called the gift of knowledge. Well, what about the gift of wisdom? You know, this ability to understand the plans and purposes of God when it had yet to be revealed. And that's what's going on in Acts 15. You've got the Jerusalem Council. You've got these people saying, hey, look, Gentiles can believe. They don't need to be circumcised. These other people saying, oh, yes, they do. Oh, yes, they do. We're not going to put up with that. That's malarkey. And so Paul says, hey, look, we go to these places, and we preach the gospel, and they receive the Holy Spirit. They didn't get circumcised. And Peter says, hey, yeah, that's what happened with me when I went to Cornelius' house, right? I just preached the gospel, and while I was preaching, the Holy Spirit fell on them, and we were all sitting there amazed like Jews, like, hey, wait a minute, they didn't get circumcised. So this is not like Judaism. In the Old Testament Judaism, if you were a Gentile and you wanted to be a part of the people of Israel and have citizenship in Israel, you had to get circumcised. I mean, that was unnecessary. Precondition and when you got circumcised what you were saying was I'm putting myself under the yoke of the law of Moses I'm going to keep the law of Moses and bring the proper sacrifices and all that but that's not happening in the book acts It's like whoa, you know, how can the Holy Spirit come to and dwell these nasty dogs and yet he is Okay, because when they when you believe okay, what happens the moment you believe? God credits you with the perfect righteousness of Christ. So you're no longer nasty see and In his eyes, you're perfectly righteous. So the Holy Spirit comes to indwell you. Is that too difficult to understand? It was a struggle for them. But in Acts 15, those guys couldn't solve it. Peter couldn't solve it. Paul couldn't solve it. James had to come on the scene. And James quotes this verse out of Amos 9. And you're thinking, what in the world are you going to Amos 9 for? Most Christians say, I didn't even know Amos was a guy in the Bible, right? And it's the very last chapter of Amos, Amos 9, 12-15, and he starts talking about the restoration of the house of David, and how Gentiles will be involved in being blessed through all this. And he says, this is the evidence that in fact God is doing what Peter and Paul are saying, and he's accepting Gentiles simply by faith. And actually one of the great verses on justification and salvation just by faith, by grace through faith alone, is right there in Acts 15. One of my favorite verses in the whole Bible. And how was he able to do that? How was he able to use the scriptures that way? He had the gift of wisdom. A mission critical gift. Because this could have been a decisive turning point in the church. Acts 15 has been called by some scholars the most important chapter in the entire Bible. Because you might not be here today if they had not had that counsel. That's right. You would probably not be here today if that chapter was not in the Bible. It's that pivotal. And so those are the first three, they're all completed gifts, foundational, signed, and then mission critical. And now we come to the one class of gifts that is continuous. The first three are completed, this one is continuous. So there's your category. Completed, completed, completed, and these are continuous. There's ten of these. Now these are gifts that are given to help the church. There's three of these that are given to the church to grow to maturity. Three of these that are given to grow the church to maturity. The last seven are given to the church to help the church be healthy. Remember, it's a body, right? The body both grows, but the body has to be healthy. So three of the gifts that are given, continually now being given, are growth gifts, and they're all in Ephesians chapter four, so let's turn there. Ephesians chapter four. And then seven of them are for the good health of the church, because the body also needs to be healthy, right? So let's look at the three that are given to grow the church to maturity. Ephesians chapter four and verse 11. And he gave some as apostles, some as prophets. We already know those. We've been through those. Those are the fulfilled or completed foundation gifts. And here come the building gifts. Some as evangelists, some as pastors, and teachers. There they are. There's three of them, okay? Evangelists, pastors, and teachers. Let's start with evangelists, then we'll get into the interesting stuff about pastors and teachers. Evangelists. Well this is interesting obviously. People who preach the good news in a way that results in people being saved. Those who preach the good news accurately and yet don't see a lot of results simply don't have the gift. because the one who brings about the results is God, right? 1 Corinthians 12, 6. I mean, if you don't have the gift, there's not going to be a lot of effects simply because you don't have the gift. And God is the one who brings about, the Father is the one who brings about the effects. So, you know, a lot of people preach an accurate, not a lot, but some people preach an accurate gospel, but when they preach it, people just don't respond. And you say, like, why? I mean, I heard him say this message, and then, you know, so-and-so else preached the same exact message, and yet a lot of people responded this guy, and nobody responded this guy. Well, it has to do with the, number one, about the gifts that are given. Maybe that individual doesn't have the gift, and this one does. And it also has to do with about the effects that God brings about through the gift. You know, we really cannot force our gift to be effective. You know, I mean, I really want my teaching ministry to be effective around the world. But guess what? I can't change what happens. I mean, I can only be faithful to use my gift. That's all I can do. And guess what? I'm just trusting that God makes my gift effective to the amount that he wants it to be effective. That's what I'm trusting. See, some people, I think, they're really frustrated with their gift. They say, I don't even know what my gift is because I'm not seeing a lot of results. You can't do anything about that. All you're supposed to do is just exercise your gift. Because 1 Corinthians 12 says the results are up to the Father. I mean, He sets that. Sometimes I'm just amazed that certain people get a lot of effects. You know, I'm like, that guy? You know, but it's not up to me, you know. I remember Martin Luther. I mean, Martin Luther was not exactly, like, the greatest guy. You know, like the most spiritual person or something like that. Like, from a human vantage point, I mean, the guy was hanging out in the bars, drinking beer, you know, making music according to what was considered secular of the day. And most Christians today would be like, that guy's a Christian? That's how they'd think of him. Like this guy? I mean, he was rambunctious, he told jokes, he was flamboyant, you know, he was a little bit dangerous, a little bit risque type of guy. Okay. But guess what? I mean, God used him for amazing things. And God's kind of like, it's funny, because he's like, I don't care who you are. I'm going to use who I want. And people say, but we think you should use these people. And God says, but I'm not going to. And the reason I'm not going to is because I'm going to show you that it has nothing to do with you and has everything to do with me. And I think that's really the issue, because I am not For example, I am not the greatest thing since sliced bread. You may think I am, that's wonderful, but those who live with me know I'm not. It's almost hilarious. I'm like, okay, well, okay. My daughter's laughing right now. She's laughing at something else. Yeah, yeah, I'm just old and crusty. See, it doesn't matter. God's like, I'm going to use you to do whatever I'm going to use you to do. And guess what? The reason for that is so he gets all the glory. That's the bottom line of the whole story. I mean, if he used all the people who were just the best already, well, we'd say, well, they're the best. But he says, no, I'm going to use people who are idiots, like Jeremy. And through that, I'm going to get glorified. And that's the point. That's the point. So we've got evangelists who preach and people respond. We've got people who preach and nobody responds. You're like, what's going on? Okay, the spiritual gifts are what's going on. That's what's going on. Now preaching is different than teaching. Preaching is different than teaching. Preaching focuses on exhortation and giving the gospel. You know, it's telling people what they need to believe in order to be saved. Okay. Teaching focuses on explaining what it is that we are to believe. What it is that we are to believe. So the gospel is a very narrow topic, a very narrow subject. It's basically focusing on the person and work of Christ. Who he was and what he did. We're going to talk about Jesus Christ, the God-man, gave his life for us on the cross and rose again. I mean that's the gospel and that's where the focus, focal point of the gospel is. And that's preaching. You're going about, you're telling people the good news. That the sin problem's been resolved by God himself who became a man. and paid our penalty for us on the tree, and he rose and lives forevermore, and he gives his righteousness to anyone who believes. I mean, that's preaching, right? Teaching is going into, now, in the book of Genesis, six days and you got the six days of creation and the seventh day of rest and then you go to the fall and this discussion of Adam and Eve and the tree and the serpent you know you go through all that and you've got Cain and Abel and you've got the story and Cain killed Abel and what God's doing there you know cursing the earth the ground for Cain and chasing after him and he becomes a nomad and wander on the earth and then you're going into Genesis 5 and people begin to live they're living 900 years and then they die I love the story of Genesis 5. What's the story of Genesis 5? So-and-so lived so many years, he gave birth to so-and-so, he lived this many more years and he died. You know, and then you come to Genesis 6, right? And you've got the story of the sons of God coming and the daughters of men, you know, and you've got the wickedness that corrupts the whole earth. And God says, I'm not putting up with this any longer. My spirit will not strive with man any longer. I'm going to destroy the earth. So this is teaching, see? You're going through and you're teaching a lot more detail than just who Jesus is and what he did. So there's a difference between preaching and teaching. The evangelist is focused on preaching, okay? Philip is an example of a preacher. Remember in the book of Acts, chapter 8, you see him going to Samaria, and you see him with the Ethiopian eunuch, and you know, the Ethiopian eunuch is riding in a chariot, and he comes up along, he's running beside him. And he's reading Isaiah 53, and he calls Philip up into the chariot, and it says, beginning from Isaiah 53, he preached Jesus. So that's the text he started from, and then he backed up and he preached him from all the Old Testament. And the Ethiopian eunuch believed, and then, you know, Philip is caught up, raptured, that's the word for rapture, caught up and he found himself at Azotus. So this is a guy, when he preached the gospel, people responded. Paul is another example, right? I mean, everywhere the guy goes, what's the first thing he does? He goes to the synagogue, he begins to preach Jesus as the Messiah from the Old Testament Scriptures. And so an evangelist can take the Old Testament Scriptures and develop it and show people how Jesus is the Messiah, okay? This is what they're really good at, and they get a response. These people also become all things to all people, so they might save some. You know, and that's an example. Paul's a great example of that. You're like, why is this guy, he doesn't have Titus circumcised, but he has Timothy circumcised? You say, this guy's a contradiction. Paul's a walking contradiction. You know, and then in Galatians, he says, if you get circumcised, you might as well just cut the whole thing off. And you think, Paul, how could you say that when you had Timothy circumcised? And they don't understand this guy, right? They don't understand his principle in 1 Corinthians 9, that you become all things to all people, yet so you may save some. And the only reason he had Timothy circumcised is just for what reason? Can anybody remember? Why did he have Timothy circumcised? So the Jews would accept him so he could have access to evangelize Jews. It didn't have anything to do with his justification or sanctification. Paul knew that. Timothy knew that. They just did it so they could just get access. That's becoming all things to all men so you can save some of them. Timothy gave up a lot of liberty because Timothy didn't need to be circumcised. He gave up his liberty, and that's what an evangelist will do. He will give up his liberty for the sake of others, because he either wants them to come to salvation, or he wants them to grow spiritually, over and out. And they're willing to do this type of thing. Did Paul need to take the vow at Centuria? And, you know, cut his hair? I mean, I shaved my head once. I'll tell you, I did not do it for the gospel. I only did it because I had twins that were born, and I didn't have any time to take care of my hair. That's the only reason I shaved my head. I was like, that's it. I don't have time. I mean, I got to work. I got these babies. They're getting my wife a bonnet. It's going crazy. I'm going to die. So I cut my hair off, OK? And she's like smiling. She's like looking at me like, mm-hmm. But this was it. But Paul took a vow. He cut his hair and he did all this stuff. He didn't need to do that. He has liberty. He didn't need to do that. But he did it for what? He did it for the sake of the Jews so he could win more Jews. That's why he did it. And so he gave up freedom. So these people who are evangelists can often be misunderstood, but what they're trying to do is they're trying to reach people and they have a specific gift. It's a fantastic gift. It's a growth gift. The church has to have more people to grow, right? I mean, it has to. How can the church grow if people aren't believing the gospel? They can't. So you've got to have this gift, and it's great that people have this gift. Now let's go to pastor and then pastor-teacher. Another growth gift. Pastor. People who teach the scripture. Remember, not preach, but, well, pastoring is kind of preaching, but we'll talk about that. Who teach the scripture and preach the gospel. So they're really doing both, as we're going to see. And they communicate its meaning in the local church context as the means of attending to the needs of the believer in order to build up the church. In other words, look, every believer needs the teaching of God's Word. There's preaching, and this is, in one sense, exhortation, like to do something with what you've learned. But the other side of that is teaching, right? You've got to teach them something. give them some content, and then you say, you exhort them, you preach to, hey, do something with this, right? So that's being a pastor, okay, and it's important for building up the church. It's right here in Ephesians 4, 11 as well, it says some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, it says some as pastors, and then it says pastors and teachers. And some have come along and said, now see, pastors and teachers is one gift. You've probably heard this. This is not a mystery for people in our circles. The claim that all pastors are teachers and all teachers are pastors. It's not true. It's just not true. So, in the Greek language, There is a structure that was discovered by a man named Granville Sharp. I think the year is, I don't want to, I could get it wrong, so I'm going to not even make a comment about it. The Granville Sharp Rule. It's a lovely rule. I love this rule. He actually evaluated every grammatical instance of this rule in the entire New Testament. and it was discovered that what he said about this rule was true 100% of the time. So every time this grammatical structure is found in Greek, the two are referring to the same thing. So the rule basically states this. If you have, it's called TSKS construction, it's another way of talking about it for people out there who want to know if I know what I'm talking about. If you have a definite article, followed by a noun, a singular noun, followed by chi, which is the word and, and then another noun, so definite article, which is the word the, then you have a noun, singular, and then the word and, and then another singular noun, those two nouns refer to one and the same person. every single time forever in the whole New Testament. There's something like 198 examples, if I remember right. Some of them are absolutely critical for the deity of Christ. Titus 2.13 is one of the absolute strongest verses on the deity of Christ because it uses this construction. And why not look at it, right? Get all your T-books together, 1st, 2nd Thessalonians, 1st, 2nd Timothy, and then Titus. Titus 2.13. It says, our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. Okay, 2.13. Looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of, here we go. There's a definite article. Our great God, the great God, There's and, Savior, Christ Jesus. So who is our great God and who is our Savior? Christ Jesus. Okay, and it's that Granville Sharp rule. Article, definite article, noun, singular, and, the word chi, another noun, singular. They both refer to the same person. Who is our great God? Jesus Christ. Who is our Savior? Jesus Christ. These are not referring to different people. They're referring to the same person because it follows that structure. Now, The problem in Ephesians 4.11 is that a lot of people said pastors and teachers follows this rule. It doesn't follow this rule because neither of the nouns is what? Pastors is a noun, teachers is a noun, but neither one of them is singular, is it? The rule requires that both be singular. When they're not singular, they're plural. It opens up a number of other Greek possibilities. The real meaning of pastors and teachers is what we call first subset of second. First is a subset of the second. Meaning that the first one, which is pastors, right, is a subset of the second, which is teachers. So if we have a big circle and it says teachers in it, and we have a little circle that says pastors in it, that's the meaning. The first, pastors, is a subset of the second, teachers. So if you have the gift of pastor, you're also a teacher. But if you have the gift of teacher, you may not be a pastor. You may not be a pastor. In fact, when I was in Fredericksburg, and the church was founded by a guy named Jerry Bain, who was a graduate of DTS in 1978. And Jerry pastored Fredericksburg Bible Church for seven years, and he quit, and he got out. And he will tell you to this day, the reason he is no longer a pastor is because he never was a pastor to begin with. He was a teacher. He did not want to shepherd people. He did not want to exhort people. He just wanted to get in there and teach the Word and everybody leave him alone. He didn't like people asking him questions. It offended him. It bothered him. He felt like people were questioning him every time they asked him a question. And the reason is because he was just a teacher. He wasn't a pastor, and he didn't identify with the people, and he wasn't able to exhort them and be in that context with them. And was there anything wrong with that? Absolutely not. He was simply a teacher, okay? And the good news is he's back teaching today, and he's in his 80s. He's in his 80s. He's teaching at that church on Wednesday nights. He's teaching the Gospel of Matthew right now. And that's fine, but he's not the pastor. And he'll never be a pastor again. He went to work for the city of Fredericksburg. He did the city planning and things like that. And that's fine. Okay? So pastor, all pastors are teachers, but not all teachers are pastors. Okay? First subset of second. Pastors are also termed elders. in the New Testament, which is the Greek word Presbyteros, from which we get the denomination Presbyterian, which always follow the elder model of church government. Presbyterians follow the elder model of church government. All pastors are elders. The word is a word for mature. I mean, we know that. Elder, what does that mean? Somebody who's older. It's almost the same word, elder, older. But it's older in the faith, like mature. In other words, they don't have to be old. Timothy wasn't old. He was considered a youth. Youth was up to like age 40, but still. But he was older in the faith. Right? Meaning he understood Bible doctrine. So pastors are also elders, and they're also called overseers, episkopos, skopos, like a scope. A scope that you may look through or something. So epi means over to oversee or to overlook, right? You're looking out for the well-being of other believers, right? So pastors do that. Pastors are older in the faith and they're to oversee or have oversight over the people that they're shepherding. which are really Christ's flock, right? And so their function is to shepherd by means of teaching the word, admonishing believers, and living a good example, right? Paul gives a great example in Acts 20, 17 through 38. I've been at several church when they were like dedicating a building or a new pastor had come in, and you give them a charge, you know, you give them a charge. Like Paul was giving in Acts 20, he was giving a charge to the Ephesian elders. And I always teach this passage, every time. And I will never teach any other passage. Well, maybe 1 Timothy. There's one in 1 Timothy. But the main, because the main thing in the next 20 passages, Paul's giving them a charge and he's saying, hey look, look how I ministered among you. I went house to house. I taught from beginning to end, the whole Bible, the whole counsel of the word of God. shrink back from declaring you anything, right? In the Word of God. And he says, and I minister to you with tears, you know? And this is what a pastor does. This is a true pastor. And Paul had this gift, obviously. So that's a pastor. Now we also have a teacher. Well, I forgot the passage. He also has to meet certain requirements. Let's go into this. So this gift, if you have this gift, to exercise it, you have to meet certain requirements. And in fact, it says that in 1 Timothy 3.1, he must be above reproach. It doesn't say he can be or he should be above reproach, right? It says he must be above reproach. Titus says that the same thing, you must be. And the one who is in this role will incur stricter judgment, and so he has to be able to control the tongue. Remember James 3? Says he who teaches, and all pastors are teachers, so if you teach, it says you must be able to control the tongue. And it says the tongue is the most difficult thing to control in the entire body. He says it's so tiny, But he says, it's like it's like a rudder on a ship that controls the entire ship. And so he says, it's like this strange instrument that we have. The most strangest organ is this one. Because with it, you can both bless and you can curse. And he says, you have to be so careful with this instrument, how you use it, because we're going to be judged as teachers for what we said. So it's very serious. I'm working with a pastor right now. The guy is at another one of my churches that I've been at in the past, in Lubbock, Texas, Cornerstone Bible Church. His name is Steve Sperling. He's a really good guy. I knew him back in seminary 20 some years ago. This is how long he spends on his Sunday sermon. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday. part of Friday, we'll do a part of Friday, and then Saturday. Four and a half days on one sermon. And I say, man, you're going to kill yourself. That's what I say to him. You're going to kill yourself. You can't do this. You got to teach Wednesday too. So he's kind of borrowing some notes and things like that from Wednesday. That's fine. Well, OK. He's trying to survive, right? I listened to his sermon. I listened to the sermon on 1 Thessalonians 5, 1 through 3. And I was like, this is an excellent sermon. This is so good. It is just perfect. It is like so precise. It is so excellent. I love this sermon, right? But I say, well, you took four and a half days to put it together. It better be excellent. I mean, it better be absolutely perfect, because you spent like, I don't know, 45 hours on this thing. No, you need to do it much. I tell them, you're going to die. I'm working with him on how to get it done quicker, right? Get the same results, but do it quicker, because you're gonna die. Nobody can do that, and it's not sustainable. But what it is saying is that he is so afraid of messing up what is said in the Bible. I mean, how many of you ever spent 45 hours on three verses? ever in your entire life. Anyone? I bet there's no one in the universe who has done that. Now, I mean, over time, I've studied this passage many, many times, so maybe, you know, if you teach the same book, like, three or four times, you do that, but... Okay. But it's illustrating this point. It's so important what the Word of God says, right? And he's really respecting that. For that, that's highly honorable. Now, the overall arch inequality of everyone who's a pastor is they have to be beyond reproach. Their life has to be beyond reproach. I mean, it goes into the qualifications. Husband of one wife, can't be a drunkard, can't be a fighter, pugnacious, you know, he goes through all this stuff. Has to have his home in order, right? Because if you can't manage your own household, how can you manage the church of God? I mean, hopefully, as a pastor, I have this stuff memorized. Because if I don't, I mean, it's what I'm supposed to be doing to be qualified. So it's all there, and it says they have to spend their time studying the scripture. 2 Timothy 2.15, right? He tells Timothy, rightly dividing the word of truth, being a workman who is not ashamed, right? Rightly dividing the word of truth means cutting a straight path. It's the word for orthopedics. When you set the bone, you set it straight, right? I hope, if you're a good orthopedist, right? And it's the idea of being a good teacher. You're like a good orthopedist. You shoot the word of God straight. You teach it in a straight path. You don't get involved in fanciful things and genealogies and blah, blah, blah. It goes into all this other stuff. which is a crooked way of teaching. So he says you have to be studying the scripture and rightly dividing the Word of Truth. You have to be reading books. 2 Timothy 4.13. Do you remember this passage? Paul says, can you bring me My books. He was in prison in Rome, second imprisonment. He says, can you bring me my books and especially the parchments? Do you remember that? Does everybody remember that passage? Now the books are extra biblical books. The parchments are scriptural scrolls. And he was saying, bring me both. So if you're a pastor, you have to read books. You cannot just read the Bible. I am so tired of people in the 21st century saying, I only read the Bible. Well that's great, but I guarantee you, you haven't thought of 95% of the things you should be thinking about when you read the Bible because you haven't thought about what other people thought about when they read the Bible. Here's the thing, nobody is a Lone Ranger in the Christian life. You cannot possibly ask all the questions that you need to ask in any passage that you are studying. It is not possible. Because you are very limited in your, and I am too, in your outlook. And so you're going to ask questions of the text. You're going to say, who wrote it? When did they write it? Why did they write it? How did they write it? Or whatever. You're going to ask the who, what, when, where, whys, and hows. But I guarantee you there's going to be a hundred of those that you didn't ask. When I was taught to study the Bible back in seminary, we were studying interpretive method, how to interpret. My professor stood up in front of us, and he said, there was a teacher of anatomy and physiology, and he gave us a fish to dissect. He gave us the fish, and he set it on the little thing, and we're supposed to dissect this. He said, I want you to start your dissection according to this method, and then I want you to write down 100 questions about it. They're thinking. What? So they go home. They come up, I guess, 100 questions. They come back the next day. And he says, OK, all right, I want you to keep dissecting. You have another 100 questions tonight. And they're like, are you serious? They come back the third day. It's kind of stinking now. The fish is kind of stinky. And he says, I want you to come back with 100 more questions. That is how I was taught to study the Bible. Not, what does this mean to you? That was never even a consideration in any of my training. Not even for one second, because it doesn't matter what that fish means to you. It matters what is there. And that's what we're trying to find out in the Bible. What is there? Not what do I think is there, not what do I feel is there, not what makes me feel good, not what do I want to see there, not what do I want to believe, but what is there? People do not exercise that discipline because it is so taxing. It requires you to not be concerned about whatever you think. And it forces you to ask, OK, I may think it means this, but I now have 100 passages to look up that use that word so I can get the true biblical sense, so I can tell people what it actually means. And that takes time, and it takes effort. I was sitting there the other night. Oh, I keep going story, story, story, story, story. But I'm sitting there the other night, I'm listening, one of my students chimes me in on this chat that's going on on YouTube, and they're discussing divorce and remarriage. Or actually marriage, divorce, and remarriage. And they go to 1 Corinthians 7, verse 10 and 11, and they're all sitting there saying, well, it's obviously that, you know, in the Old Testament, yes, you could get a divorce, but now you can't. This is what they're saying. It's very clear, they said, because 1 Corinthians 7, 10 says a woman, if she leaves her husband, she must remain unmarried, or else be reconciled. Everybody here knows that verse. I know that verse, I know it by heart. They all said, therefore, you can't get a divorce. If they had known one, if they had read one book about Roman divorce, they would have known that the interpretation is exactly the opposite of what they thought it was. Because Paul is using the language of Roman divorces there. And the language means this. If a woman leaves her husband, that's the Roman way of divorce. All you had to do was leave the house. You didn't have to go down to a courthouse. You didn't have to file nothing. It was the Roman way. And Paul's saying, if a woman left her husband in that way, she's not really divorced. That's what he was saying. She's not really divorced in God's eyes because there was no biblical grounds for divorce. And so yes, she must remain unmarried or get reconciled. Because if she doesn't and she marries someone else, in God's eyes, now she's married to two people. And that is what the Bible calls adultery. And these people were sitting there saying, that means you can't get a divorce. And that is so exactly wrong. And the reason is because they didn't study the Bible. They did not get the historical background, and they don't know what's being said. And this is the problem with people reading the Bible. They don't really read it in its historical context, and so they make up what they think it means. Over and over. I mean, I see this. Why do you need pastors and teachers? Why do you need them? Apparently we don't today because we have Google. We can just Google it. And that is what is going on. I mean, everybody is an armchair pastor and teacher today. And many of these people refuse to go to a church. And on one hand, I understand, right? I mean, so many of these guys who are filling the pulpits are actually total jokes. So why would you want to, right? But because of that, the right answer is not to just simply act like you are a pastor teacher and to rebel against authority. I mean, if Christ gave pastors and teachers to his church, and he said in 1 Thessalonians 5, 12, and 13, that you're supposed to appreciate those who labor among you by teaching the word. In Hebrews 13, 17, he says obey your leaders and submit to them. And yet the church isn't doing that. They're saying, well, we're just going to go do it ourselves. We're good enough because we've got Google. I read a book one day. I mean, honestly, I just want to totally laugh. But I can't laugh because the church today has become so rebellious against the authority that God invested in pastors and teachers that I'm actually extremely upset about it. As obvious, you can see my attitude. Not very happy, because they are splintering the church in so many different directions right now. It's not necessary, but they think they know what they're talking about in the Bible, and they actually do not have a clue what they're talking about. and we've got people with faith and faith plus works and you know faith and works in the Old Testament of salvation now it's just faith alone I mean there's so many things like the church is just splintering into a million different splinters and I there's nothing I can do about it but you know what what do you do I was at a thing on July 4th and I'm sitting there talking to a guy about he's asking me all sorts of questions about lordship and about other things and this guy walks by and he hears we're standing by the port-a-potties. He's talking about the Bible, right? And this guy walks by and he says, you just need to read the Bible. You don't need to read anything else, just read the Bible. And I looked at him and I said, the Bible says that you're supposed to listen to pastors and teachers, that he's given them to his church for the building up of the body of Christ to the full stature of Jesus Christ. If you don't do that, are you really gonna listen to the Bible? Because it says you have to do that. And if you're not doing that, then that means you are a rebel against God. That is what it means. And I'm very, very upset about, not y'all, I'm not upset at y'all. I love y'all, I love y'all. But this spirit, this spirit of this age is against professionalism. Think about it. We used to have these people called taxi drivers. They had to take courses to become taxi drivers, especially in a place like New York City or San Francisco, right, where you gotta know the road system, you know. It's kinda important. Now it's just, I got my Uber thing and I can drive you around. See, that's the spirit of this age is that we don't really need taxi drivers anymore because we can just, you know, people off the street can just become an Uber guy or something like that. The fact is though that the taxi drivers know a whole lot more than the Uber people. That's the fact of the matter. It's an anti-intellectualism. It's an anti-university system. It's an anti-seminary system. And the reason is because what has happened is the flood of information that's accessible through the internet. You know, people say, well, I could just look it up on Wikipedia. Okay, this is a joke, okay? It's a joke. Most pastors, real pastors and teachers, study hours and hours on end, not just one source. That's why in the seminary, you have to write papers and you have to have a lot of sources. You can't just cite one guy you read on the internet or a YouTube video you watched last night. That's not study. That's saying I read a book or I heard a video. No, the person who actually studies it knows the original languages, number one, and is able to investigate. Number two, they're going to look at multiple, multiple sources of which they have acquired a large library in order to be able to do so. These sources are not Wikipedia or Google, whatever comes up on YouTube. These are academic resources where people spend their lives in the sources themselves. I remember who's the guy who's a professional and the best guy, Gary Habermas on the Resurrection. He has a book that's 7,000 pages long on the Resurrection. You're going to Google that? Next. Okay, that's not the way it works. Now look, they need to read books, especially the Bible, right? Not everybody, that's what I was just going into. Not all are teachers and not all have the skill to handle scripture rightly and thus there is the need for teachers. They may reveal new insights into the scripture. Nehemiah 8 is a good Old Testament passage where Remember, the people did not know the language, the Hebrew language, so they had to bring people to translate and give the sense so that it was understood. What does a pastor teacher do? He translates the Bible so as to give the sense to his audience. Because why? Because the audience doesn't know the original language. I mean, how many of you know what metamelemai means? How many of you know what erene means? How many of you know what, I don't know, ampelos means? I mean, how many of you know what any of these words are? No, you don't know any of these words. You might know theos, you might have heard of logos, okay, but that's about it, you know. The meaning, these words are not, they're not one for one correspondence into any language. It's very difficult. It takes time and effort to try to go, what does it mean in the original language, and how can I communicate that in the English language to people and get the right sense? That's what you're trying to do. The teaching gift is not a natural ability, but it's a supernatural ability. Some unbelievers have a gift of teaching. I had some great teachers in college. Did you? Sure, but they are not able to communicate spiritual truth. So the gift of teachers involved in communicating spiritual truth. Okay, moving on from the three that are given for the growth of the church, we now look at the seven that are for the good health of the church. This is where you probably come in. Some of you probably come in. Some of you probably also have a teacher and things like that. Administration, or sometimes called government. Hubernesis, this is a Greek word. The ability to guide the church in the proper direction, especially in difficult decision making. Sometimes a church will come to a crux. They need to make a decision. This person knows enough about the history. They know enough about the people to help guide the church and to go in a smooth direction. So that's the gift of administration or government. We have some of those people here. And these people are absolutely essential, you know. I mean, I have to listen to these people. I'm the pastor, but guess what? I don't have this gift. So I have to listen to these people. These people take precedent over me. I want to hear what they have to say and I'm going to listen to their wisdom because they have this gift. That's what I do. I really seek to not try to import my will on the situation just because I'm the pastor. I want to know what they are thinking and how they're sorting it through. so I can listen to their wisdom. It's a supernatural ability. Serving, which is the ability to serve by action rather than word. I say that, by action rather than word, because in a minute you get to exhortation, that's another gift, and exhortation is primarily by word. So serving is primarily by action. These people are behind the scenes. They do, they're the doers in the church. Now, the root of this word is the same word for deacon, diakonos, which sometimes translates to servant, but sometimes deacon. It's a gift, but of course, those who are in the office of deacon should have the gift, they would be those who serve. And their main purpose is to free up the pastor so that he doesn't have to do all that, and he can focus on study and prayer. Focus on study and prayer, prayer of which is a full-time vocation I've discovered this year. Never had a clue in 20 years that prayer was a full-time vocation, but I learned this year that it is. So I could spend all of my time praying, and I would still never be done. I learned that this year. That's a good thing for me to learn. So obviously my prayer life is lacking because I have to spend some time not praying. But that's what deacons do. They can cover all sorts of things by action, action items to take care of things, right, that need to be taken care of. Supernatural, supernatural gift. All of these are supernatural. Okay, none of them are natural, supernatural. Faith, the ability to trust God in a way that's not normal to most believers. You say, well, yeah, but we're all supposed to live by faith. Faith comes by hearing, hearing by the word of God. That's right, we're all supposed to hear the word and be convinced of the word so that we can live by faith more and more effectively. But some people have a faith that they're able to live by faith. It just seems like it's just so much easier for them. And guess what? It is. And sometimes these are the people that can carry the tide in the church. In other words, most people in the church, difficult decisions coming, something that requires stepping out in faith, let's just say, and most people are like, I don't know, I don't think that's a good decision, that's not very wise, we shouldn't do that. But there's these few people that are saying, hey, we just need to trust the Lord for this. He's gonna take care of it. And you say, how can they, what, are you an idiot? And that's how most of these people sometimes get couched that way. People that live by faith are considered idiots. But really, what they have is just a supernatural ability to trust the Lord. And you know what? Those are the people you're supposed to listen to in those situations. Those two or three people that are saying, no, no, no, it's okay, we're gonna trust, we can step out of here, it's gonna be fine, the Lord's gonna take care of it, don't worry. Remember Joshua and Caleb? Yeah. Those two guys were the only two that had faith that they could take the land. And the other 10 guys said, no, no, no. And most of the people said, let's listen to the 10 guys. Because, you know, it's a democracy here, right? Let's go with the majority. They were wrong. They were wrong. And if we don't listen to the people who have faith and are able to trust in this local church through the difficult decisions, we're going to be wrong, too. Because we're not trusting the Lord. And these people, they can just trust. It's like they have the faith of a mustard seed, right? It can move mountains. And that's what this gift is all about in 1 Corinthians 13. Let's go on to exhortation. Like, serving was, you know, you're acting with actions, you're using actions. Exhortation is encouraging with words, primarily, to comfort others. The word, you know, to come alongside, that's what this word is about. You come along someone who is discouraged, who is in an uncomfortable position, and what you do is you encourage them, and you bring comfort to them, right? Bar Nabas had this gift. Bar Nabas. You say, what's Barnabas? Yeah. His name means, Bar means son, Nabas means of encouragement. So son of encouragement. And he actually had this gift. He was the guy who, you know, they go on the first missionary journey and it's Paul and And there's Barnabas, and there's John Mark who comes along. And John Mark says, you know, about halfway through the thing, he says, I don't know if I'm cut out for this. And so he says, I'm going back to Jerusalem. I don't like all these Gentiles. And so he leaves. And that left a bad taste in Paul's mouth, didn't it? Paul didn't really like John Mark. Well, he didn't like him. He was just like, the guy is not going to do the work. If we bring him along and we rely on him, he's going to falter. So the second missionary journey comes along in Acts 15, 36 to 40. And Paul and Barnabas says, hey, will you want to take John Mark? And Paul's like, are you crazy? We're not taking that guy. He flaked out the first trip. And they have a big disagreement, it says. And so Paul chose Silas and Barnabas took John Mark and they went on separate missionary journeys. So God divided the work and he increased the church, right? But the reason Barnabas was doing that and working, he just kept working with John Marcus because he saw potential in this guy and he wanted to encourage him along the way. When Jews get to the age of 13, little 13-year-old boys, wherever they are on the spectrum, they go do this thing called, if they're Orthodox, the Bar Mitzvah, right? Like the Barnabas, right? Bar Mitzvah means son of the law, okay? Now, if you're a girl, they have this on the Western Wall. You've got this big section for the boys, and then there's a section over here for the girls. There's a wall in between, there's a fence, right there at the Western Wall. I don't know if you've ever seen it. And the girls will go do what they call the Bat Mitzvah, Daughters of the Law. It's called a Bat Mitzvah. So I have somebody in the assembly, it's a lady here, and she's always an encourager, so I call her Bat Nabis. And that means she's the daughter of encouragement. She always encourages me. And the first time I called her Baton Abbas, she was like, what are you calling me? Bat Nabis. I said, well, there's Bar Nabis and there's Bat Nabis. There's a son of encouragement, there's a daughter of encouragement. You're an encourager to me. So this is a gift that people have, and they are a great help to established or new believers, as well as established believers who need encouragement. Helps quickly. The ability to see a need and step in to help. You just step in to help. These people are quiet, they're behind the scenes, and they are the backbenders in the church. I mean, they're the people who pull the load. And a lot of times I think they're the people who say, why isn't anybody else helping? It's always me. And the reason is because they don't have that gift. I mean, they just don't have that gift. And I've thought about this a lot over the years, and I'm like, yeah, why isn't there anybody helping? It just seems like it's the same people helping over and over. It's because those people probably have the gift of help, and the other people don't. And other people have something else. So what does Paul say? Every part of the body is important. One part does this, one part does that, but we're all working together. It's difficult because you feel like you're always having to help, maybe. When you realize, well, maybe they don't have that gift and maybe I do, then maybe that relieves some of that tension in your mind. So this is a supernatural gift, even if it means just fulfilling natural tasks like cleaning the kitchen, taking care of the nursery, cleaning the building, whatever, working in the audio video room. Okay, it's all helping, right? Alright, mercy. Well, this one I mentioned last week. But if you come in and you're able to really identify with people in their situation, their suffering situation, their circumstances, right? And come in alongside of them into their plight and have pity on them. I have a little bit of this, but not much. I really don't think this is one of my gifts. But people that don't have this gift, they really don't care. I got my own things I gotta deal with. You got yours, take care of yours, I'll take care of mine. But people who have this gift, they will come into your life and you're like, what are you doing? Get out of my space. But they're really just trying to come alongside of you and help you identify with you and walk you through it. So they have a compassion. Jesus had this. It says, it's a Greek word, spalagkanak. Have you ever heard this word, spalagkanak? It refers to the bowels, the innermost depths of your being, your emotional part of you, which is identified with the bowels. Because when you emotionally get frustrated and everything, it affects your bowels. And it says, he had compassion. on them, and it uses this word for bowels. It means that he realized the depths of the person's struggle and difficulty, and he really wanted to enter into it with him. That's our Savior. You're gonna see that all these gifts, they're all our Savior. That's the crazy thing about these gifts. You know, none of us has them all except the head who directs the whole body. He has all these. He serves us salvation. We did not serve him, but he served us, right? He helps us. He comes in alongside of us, right? He teaches us. He preaches to us. He has mercy upon us. He's a governor. He has the best way. He has answers. I mean, these are all just little pieces of him that we become, that he's gifted us with. That's what's so remarkable about these. So this person, again, mercy. Someone who's behind the scenes, but they do this for you. And they're like unsung heroes. They come into your life, and they greatly help you. What a blessing. And lastly, giving, right? The ability to give financially very generously relative to how much they can give and to do so cheerfully. In other words, it doesn't matter how much money they have, it's the amount they give relative to what they have. Remember the widow's mite? She put in one mite. And everybody's like, pfft. Did y'all see that? She just threw in like a half a penny. And yet she gave more than everyone, according to Christ, didn't she? Because she gave out of what she didn't have, and everybody else gave of what they did have. There was a guy named Letourneau, some of you probably know him. There's a university named after him in Longview, Texas. When I lived in Northeast Texas, Paris, Texas, two or three of my friends were like the Valedictorian, you know, whatever, whatever those people are. Those really smart people in my class. And they wanted to be engineers. They wanted to go to the Letourneau University, and I was like, OK, I'll go with you guys, because you're my best friends. I said, they have a soccer team, I'll do the soccer team, and you'll do the engineering. But, I went with them to investigate this school. That school was named after a man, Letourneau. Very wealthy businessman. When they started their business, he and his wife, they said, he was a Christian, he said, we're gonna give 90% of what we make, and we will live off of 10% of what we make. And they did that for many, many years. And as time went on, they sat down together again, and they said, we are going to give 99% of what we make. And we are going to live off of 1%. Now we all, it's a rich person, right? So whatever, oh yeah, well they're rich. But it's still a great story, right? Someone's saying, you know, we're going to give all this. John Wesley was another one. John Wesley, it was reported that he died with less than $700 to his name, but that he had given over $185,000 in his life. That's centuries ago, so $185,000 back then was a lot of money. He died with about $700 in his bank account. That was it. Some people just have this gift to give. They see a need, and they're going to meet that need without a second thought. They're not trying to get anything back in return. It doesn't have anything to do with that. What does the Bible say? God loves a what kind of giver? A cheerful giver. I mean, these people just want to give. And there's no thought of return. It's not like that at all. If we don't have that and we're kind of like, eh, I don't know if I can part with this, guess what? We don't have the gift. You just don't have the gift of giving. Not everybody's supposed to give, you know, as he's prospered. But people who have the gift of giving, it's a totally different ballgame. They recognize God loves a cheerful giver and they have no problem parting with it. Whatever it is. And so they just do. And so they realize, hey, we're going to store up treasure in heaven. That's the stuff that's going to last. So let's give. OK. You have one or more of those last 10 gifts, OK? Either the growth gifts or the health giving gifts. And you know, you are supposed to and I am supposed to exercise these gifts in love. You know, none of us are perfect. Give up on that. OK, that's over. You don't have to be perfect, but you're supposed to utilize your gift in some ministry, in some capacity. And guess what? God will take care of the rest. He will bring about the results. You don't have to worry about it. I don't think you have to go take a psychological profile test, some spiritual gifts inventory, go through these questions that are basically mostly nothing more than a psychological profile. You just have to function in Christ's local church. That's all you have to do. And is everything gonna be okay? Yes, everything is gonna be okay. And you say, but I don't get a lot of results. Don't worry about it. That's up to God. You're just gonna do what? You're just gonna be faithful with your gift or gifts. That's all your call to do. That's all your call to do. And 2 Corinthians is one of my favorite books in the Bible because it presents the fear of the Lord in a context which I can understand. I mean, everybody can look up the fear of the Lord. It's gonna say this, respect her all for God. I mean, it's like textbook, okay? No problem, we got that part. But this is the thing, okay? When you want to understand what it means to fear God, this is what you will understand. God is watching you. You are on center stage, and you are the only person he's looking at, and that's how you have to think about it. When you realize that, then you realize, ooh, what am I doing with my life? Because he's watching, and that is the fear of God. It's the cognizance that He is there. Let's go to the Lord in prayer, because He is there. Father, thank you for this day. Thank you for these gifts. Pray that you will give us wide understanding and deep understanding of these gifts, and realize we have one or more, and we need to function within your church, because this is what you're building in this world, and it is a supernatural thing that you're building in the midst of all this wickedness that surrounds us. And soon, very, very soon, you'll come and destroy all that, and you will take us to yourselves, and then you'll come back in your kingdom, and we will set up your administration. We'll function in it in some capacity. So we want to be faithful in this life so that we're prepared for that. So give us the ability to focus and trust in you, and we thank you for these things in Jesus' precious name. Amen.