My assignment for tonight is to deal with the sufficiency of Scripture and Church government. Being persuaded of the teaching of the Scripture on the matter, the Westminster Divine stated the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture in these memorable words of the Westminster Confession of Faith. The whole counsel of God concerning all things necessary for His own glory, man's salvation, faith and life is either expressly set down in Scripture or by good and necessary consequence may be deduced from Scripture unto which nothing at any time is to be added. As you know that comes from our famous Confession of Faith, the first chapter, section six. that we, as you've already heard earlier today, that doctrine in its totality has been presented and defended by Dr. Morton H. Smith, and therefore it doesn't need to be repeated here. My task is simply to apply this great doctrine to church government. And from the point of view of Presbyterians, all I need to do is stand on the shoulders of the formers of the original Book of Church Order, to use our language of today, of the Westminster Divines. However, before I get to doing that, I need to remind you that we are, among other evangelicals, a unique breed. Because they are not convinced that the Scripture is sufficient for the perspective of church government. And I think I can demonstrate that to you in two ways. One is to have you turn to almost any introduction used in a Christian college and have you turn at some place in that introduction where the author will say words to this effect. There are various views of church government found in the New Testament. They are the views in which the congregation seems to prevail. There are some views in which it seems to have some people called elders or presbyters working. And then there are even some views in which Episcopalianism seems to be evident by people named bishops. It seems that God was willing to have the church govern in each area by the way it suited best to the people of that area. so much for the sufficiency of the Word of God for the doctrine of church government. However, you'll realize that if we could have a few moments with this author of the New Testament introduction, we could ask him some questions that might bring him to a different perspective about why it was that all the apostles seemed to gather together with a group called elders And why it was that those people were able to give instruction, not only to the requesting church, but the churches of the regions beyond. And that all the apostles were there, and all of them were recognized that the representation must be involved with elders. Or you might ask them, why is it that we can find both in the Acts account in the 20th chapter, in two separate verses, or in referring two verses one to another in the Titus account, how the New Testament can refer to episcopi or bishops, overseers if you please, and elders as seeming to refer to one and the same person. Or we might ask a further question. Why is it that almost all the scripture writers Leaving aside the Gospels for a moment, Luke, the writer of Acts, Paul in most of his letters, James in his letter, Peter in his letter. Why is it that all of them seem to refer to a group of men who should call to pray over you, who should not lord it over you, who should be elected in every church, who should be heeded in every way, and who are usually, but not always, called elders. And how is it that if you move throughout the history of the early church, from Jerusalem, Antioch, to then Antioch in the New Area, and in all the churches that Peter writes to, that circle of providences in Asia Minor, to Paul and Philippi, to Paul and Thessalonica, to Paul and Crete, to James, wherever he is writing to, to Hebrews, to wherever he's writing from and to, that all of them seem to refer to a group of male leaders called usually elders. Well, this is a hypothetical person, I don't want to be rude, but I think he might say, I haven't thought about that, but what are you going to do with the fact of all these congregations? And you might just say in turn, well, maybe the Bible taught that both the congregation and the officers should interact with one another, and that they are mutually exclusive in dealing with one another. Well, that would be one perspective we'd have to deal with. The evangelical says, there's no uniform view of the doctrine of the church, and therefore we don't need to talk about the sufficiency of scripture, the reference to the doctrine of the church. But an even more awesome, and one may say, terrifying perspective among many evangelicals today, about the doctrine of the Church and the sufficiency of Scripture is a view that says the scriptural documents were written only to the original recipients. And they only teach us something if something is stated in an absolute, categorically absolute way. Otherwise, they are written to Timothy, Titus, Corinth, Rome, and these are what we might call ad hoc documents. Now I'm not talking about an incidental person who holds this view. I'm talking about a person you may well have read and know to be a rather competent exegete at many times. A man named Gordon D. Fee. who on his little work, this is the second edition, has as a blurb across the top over 200,000 copies in print. How to read the Bible for all it's worth, a guide to understanding the Bible. If you turn to the chapters on Acts, or you turn to the chapters on the epistles, you'll find him articulating this view over and over and over again. In fact, he's not only articulated it in this introductory section, he's written about it in a paper whose title, I think, will give you the meaning that he intends by the very title. I'm referring to his article written in 1985 in the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, which reads with this title, Reflections on Church Order in the Pastoral Epistles, with further reflections on the hermeneutics of ad hoc documents. That is, documents are written, to translate the Latin phrase, to this man, to this church. for its application and significance. And so, four and a half years ago, when I was leaving the presidency of the Evangelical Theological Society, I chose to give as my presidential address, which I'll simply summarize for you tonight, an address that was titled this way. The scriptures were written for our instruction. Now I didn't just do that because I was trying to rebut Gordon Fee or those who were in his camp, and many of those were at the Evangelical Theological Society. I wrote that document because the Apostle Paul, several times over, says about the Old Testament, mind you, think of this, these scriptures were written for our instruction. I don't think we need to charge the Apostle Paul with being a theonomist necessarily, or that he doesn't appreciate the significance of Christ's death and resurrection and fulfillment of many things written therein. But he does believe that when he picks up the Old Testament, he should read it as the Word of God written for his and his fellow Christians instruction. Perhaps you'd like to just reflect on and turn to those passages that the Apostle Paul uses that in. Let me give them to you and let me read them to you at the same time. He does it in Romans 15 verse 4. You may remember in that account he is giving them instructions as to how they should act to those in need and he writes these words. For everything, a very interesting word in the Greek which you need to check out. For everything that was written in the past was written to teach us so that through endurance and the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope. Everything was written to teach us. Or notice how he uses that doctrine which he articulates earlier on in the account of Romans as he writes in the fourth chapter, I believe it is. Let me double check on the reference here. Verses 23 and 24. He writes these words, very significant for us, and for our doctrine not only in church government, but for our doctrine of what he's writing about. The words, it was credited to him, were written not for him alone, but also for us, to whom God will credit righteousness, for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification." So he talks about the fact that something was written in a statement addressed to Abraham in his own affairs is written not just for Abraham but for us. It teaches the way God credits To men's account, they are embracing Him and His promised Messiah as their Savior. Or look how he writes about this in an earlier account. Look in 1 Corinthians. Look first of all at the 9th chapter of 1 Corinthians in verses 8-10. And there we read these words. Do I say this merely from a human point of view? Doesn't the law say the same thing? For it is written in the Law of Moses, Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain. Is it about oxen that God is concerned? Surely He says this for us, doesn't He? Yes, this was written for us, because when the plowman plows and the thresher threshes, they ought to do so in the hope of sharing in the harvest. Notice his repeated refrain, written for us, written for us, written for us, written for our instruction. And notice finally with me the account that he writes about in the 10th chapter of 1st Corinthians in verse 6 and also in verse 11. Notice what he says first of all in verse 6. Now these things occurred as examples to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things as they did. Do not be idolaters as some of them were, as it is written. People sat down to eat and drink and got up to indulge in pagan revelry. And then drop down to verse 11. These things happen to them as examples, and were written down as writings, as warnings for us, on whom the fulfillment of the ages has come." Paul, when he adds those additional words, is talking not just about the Corinthian people, but about all of us who live in the era when Christ's wonderful work of redemption has come to its great fruition and has brought to us. And so I concluded this article that I gave as a presidential address at the banquet there in the Evangelical Theological Society with these words. We should not use these relatively few cultural differences that occur in the expressions of apostolic teaching to nullify or set at naught the apostles' explicit assertion that the scriptures were written for our instruction. So that we would end up saying or implying, no, they were written for them, not for us. As the cultural differences make plain, and therefore they do not directly instruct us and guide our conduct. If we believe that the Apostle Paul is correct as the great apostle and spokesman of the Lord Jesus Christ, to say that the Old Testament was written for our instruction. How much more may we say the New Testament is also written for our instruction? And so let us rather reaffirm this hermeneutical principle of the Apostle Paul by constantly letting it guide us in our understanding of and response to the Scriptures. Because the Scriptures themselves say that they were written for our instruction. And so I said to my evangelicals gathered together, some 800 to 1,000 in that banquet, that we need to recognize, contrary to what Fee and others are teaching, that when Paul writes down that you should select elders or deacons, you should lay your hands on them, he's not writing an ad hoc document. He's writing a canonical document, a document written for our instruction. and a document that we ought to follow. And this is the view, of course, that our Presbyterian forebears shared. We can see it so clearly by standing on their shoulders and gazing out over their handiwork. So our task in the Presbyterian field of endeavors is really one that has already flowered and blossomed through the handiwork of these great men who've written before us. Notice that they not only did that in their Book of Church Order, but our most immediate forebears have done it in our Book of Church Orders as well. For in each of them, following the example of the original put out by the Westminster Divines, our forefathers have begun their documents with an elaboration of this doctrine. how the sufficiency of scripture applies to church government, as it applies to and is to be worked out and abided by in the handbooks they are crafting. The Westminster Divines began with a long sentence, a single sentence if you please, as a preface to their work, crafted from specific scriptures, which sets forth the truth that Jesus Christ is the head over all things to the church. and he rules it sovereignly. That preface has been kept in both the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and the Presbyterian Church in America books of church order with only slight changes. In the footnote which you'll see in the printed form of the book, there are differences about spelling and double L or not, and capitalization, a few other interesting things, and one added statement that has been added in the Orthodox Presbyterian form, elaborating Christ's lordship. It reads as follows from the original form of Presbyterian church government. You may have seen me dragging up this bewilderedly simple little piece covered with plastic. But it's the complete form, rather handy isn't it, of the form of Presbyterial Church Government and of the Ordination of Ministers which was adopted by the Assembly of Edinburgh, February 10, 1645. And it reads this way. Jesus Christ, upon whose shoulders the government is, whose name is called Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace, of the increase of whose government and peace there shall be no end, who sits upon the throne of David and upon his kingdom to order it and to establish it with judgment and justice from henceforth even forever. having all power given unto him in heaven and in earth by the Father. who raised him from the dead and set him at his own right hand far above all principalities and power and might and dominion and every name that is named not only in this world but also in that which is to come put all things under his feet and gave him to be the head over all things to the church which is his body the fullness of him that filleth all in all he being ascended up far above all heavens, that he might fill all things, receive gifts for his church, and gave officers necessary for the edification of his church and perfecting of his saints." That's the touchstone which our Presbyterian forefathers began their document. Dr. Smith, in his commentary on the Book of Church Order of the Presbyterian Church in America, has singled out the scripture references that we have there and made these comments about them. I'm going to read selectively from his section there. He says, the first phrase upon his shoulders, the government rest is taken from Isaiah 9. It sets forth the great fact that he is charged with governing. He is the head and source of all authority in the church. There follows the titles ascribed to the Messiah by Isaiah. Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. The result, as indicated by Isaiah, is that of the increase of whose government and peace that shall be no end. And then he goes on to show us that the second reference which is given is taken from Matthew 28. His reign is seen as the fulfillment and continuation of that ancient dynasty of David. It is to be a kingdom of order and justice which shall be everlasting. The next phrase, having all power given unto him in heaven and in earth by the father is based upon his own affirmation in Matthew 28, just prior to his commissioning of his church to her one great task. The next section is taken from Ephesians 1, 20-23, where Paul multiplies terms to describe the totality of his authority and kingship. He is in charge of everything for the good of his church. Finally, the list of titles ends with a citation from Ephesians 4, 10-12, which speaks specifically of his function as head of the church. In his ascension, he has received gifts for the church. He has given all officers necessary for the edification of the church and for the perfecting of the saints. It is important for us to keep in mind the fact that the whole order of the church is the gift of Christ for the good of his own. The sufficiency of scripture comes to bear then in our books of church order in the lordship and headship and sovereignty of Christ as a head over his church ruling and reigning in it. Now the arguments as you have seen used in this statement are manifold. They are that Jesus Christ is upon his shoulders the government, that he sits upon the throne of David to order and establish it, he has all power given to him, he's ruling over all, he's given to be the head over all things for the good of his church, he has received gifts for his church and that he gave and still gives officers necessary for his church. All these items are, of course, truths the divines have gleaned from Scripture, which have formed their view of Christ's authority and power. He, and He alone, is head. And He, and He alone, rules and reigns over all things for the good of His Church. And He alone gifts the Church with the officers he desires for it to have. Our denominations, respectively, at least to mention two of them represented in our gathering tonight, the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and the Presbyterian Church in America, have both kept that summary because it's such a masterful introductory statement, laying the foundation how Christ in his headship and through the scriptures shows that the scriptures are sufficient for the rule of church government. Now, one of the books of church order have elaborated on this foundational statement. I'm going to follow that one in what we give you and what follows. In section two of chapter one of the form of government of the book of church order, the Orthodox Presbyterian Church form draws out the conclusions from the former section. It begins by saying, There is therefore but one King and Head of the Church, the only Mediator between God and man, Jesus Christ, who rules in His Church by His Word and Spirit." You see, they've captured the essence of what proceeds and have articulated more particularly by talking about Him ruling by His Word and Spirit. Here the exclusive headship of Christ is articulated as well as his rule by his word and spirit. This handbook goes on to say that he rules not only directly, but also through the offices he gives to the church, and I cite that section. His mediatorial office includes all the offices in his church. It belongs to his majesty from his throne of glory, not only to rule his church directly, but also to use the ministry of men ruling and teaching his church through his word and spirit, thus exercising through men his own authority and enforcing his own laws. That statement is concluded by saying that thereby his own authority is exercised and his own laws enforced. That statement is concluded by saying that thereby, by saying that Christ's ordained government in his church revealed its nature to us in his word and promised his presence in the midst of his church as his government, this government is exercised in his name. The third section of the Orthodox Presbyterian form of government applies the truth stated in the second section even more specifically. I quote, Christ orders his church by the rule of his word. The pattern of officers, ordinances, government, and discipline set forth in scripture is therefore to be observed as the instruction of the Lord. Church government must conform to the scriptural pattern and follow the specific provisions revealed in the New Testament. After stating that the general principles of God's word must be followed, the form reverts to its insistence on the authority of the scriptures. And I quote again, a particular form of church government is bound to set forth what Christ requires for the order of his church, and to arrange particular circumstances only in the manner to the degree and for the purposes the Lord of the Church has appointed in Scripture. The Presbyterian form of government seeks to fulfill these scriptural requirements for the glory of Christ, the edification of the Church, and the enlargement of that spiritual liberty in which Christ has set us free. The doctrine of the sufficiency of scripture for church government, therefore, is tied up with Christ's authority and headship over the church. Christ has all authority given to him, as Matthew indicates. Matthew 28, 18, if he rules and directs the church at its head, Ephesians 1 and 4 indicate. If he gives the church its officers, as Ephesians 4 indicates. He is ascended up on high, and he gives gifts to the church, among which are these officers. As well as bringing to the church by ordering it, and by ruling over the church, by ordering it to conform itself to his word, as we see in 1 Corinthians 14 and 1 Timothy chapter 3, we'll see later, To have no other officers than the officers he gives and mentions in his word, to worship according to his directive, then the sufficiency of the word is the mark of his headship. But if we say no, we're not going to do any of these things, then we cut off. deny the sufficiency of Christ and his word to rule and reign in our churches and in our life. If we regard the word as insufficient for ordering the church's government and affairs, then we are arguing implicitly that Christ is not adequately or sufficiently ruling over us and guiding us. We then make our own wills, or the needs and desires of our own day, the norm for what shall be ordered and done in Christ's Church. By doing so, we overturn Christ's unique and absolute headship and substitute ourselves or others in his place. The truth about the sufficiency of scripture in the realm of church government is clearly set forth in three statements in the orthodox Presbyterian form of government. Christ orders his church by the rule of his word, the pattern of officers, ordinances, governments, and discipline set forth in scripture is therefore to be observed as the instruction of the Lord. Church government must conform to the scriptural pattern and follow the specific provisions revealed in the New Testament. A particular form of church government is bound to set forth what Christ requires for the order of His Church and to arrange particular circumstances only in the manner to the degree and for the purposes that the Lord of the Church has appointed in Scripture. That's what our forefathers have done, to lay down for us very clearly, very fully, very explicitly, Christ is the head of the church, his word is sufficient, and should be followed in every way in which it instructs us. But we can see that even more so as we leave from our forefathers' books of church order and look at what we find in the New Testament itself. For example, we see that Christ has indeed revealed in his word the sufficient God for his church as evidenced in several ways. First of all is the Apostle Paul's explicit statement that he is writing his letter to Timothy and the church in Ephesus, I'm writing you these instructions so that He goes on to say, so that Timothy and others will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God's household, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth, 1 Timothy 3, 14 and 50. Why does Paul have to write such a thing? Why does he feel he needs to instruct the church at Ephesus and Timothy how they should conduct themselves? Why so indeed? unless he's the spokesman for Jesus Christ who tells them how to order his church by instructing them how they ought to behave, how they ought to elect officers, how they ought to conduct themselves in every way. And notice furthermore how this is borne out in the way that Paul and others indicate to us how we ought to be guided in are electing officers by the words that Christ has caused his writers to write. This overarching word of instruction is made more concrete, especially in the clarity and fullness by which Christ, Paul, and the other writers lay out all that relates to the officers in all of the New Testament. Christ explicitly calls them by various titles, such as bishop, elder, teacher, pastor, and also by explicit in statements given in the task for which they are called, that is, summarily to teach and to guide. to teach and rule and to guide and shepherd. And we see this in the book of Acts, the 14th and 15th and 20th chapters in Philippians 1, 1 Thessalonians 5, 1 Timothy 3, Titus 1, Hebrews 13, James 5, 1 Peter 5. You notice the writers? A rather full range. of men in the New Testament recognizing that kind of leadership. He indicates that his people are to select those who are to rule and to serve among them. He also gives the characteristics which should mark those chosen so that in effect they can, in their choosing process, select those that he is giving. Notice Acts 6, 1-6, 1 Timothy 3, 1-13, Titus 1, 5-9, Ephesians 4, 11-13. Who should lay hands on them and thus appoint them to office? Appoint to office those chosen is also demarcated in the same passages where we read about the laying on of hands of the Presbyter. How these officers should function among the people, how the people should regard them are also all described in God's Word. First Thessalonians, how you should honor and respect those who are laboring among you. Hebrews, think of those words. Obey your leaders and submit to their authority, for they will give an account about you. Yet at the same time, he warns the officers, don't lord it over the people of God. Be a help to their faith, not a lord over their faith. The duties which these officers should fulfill are clearly delineated, and how they should be judged and disciplined if they fail is also declared in 1 Timothy 5. A two-fold pattern for the official ministry of the Church, that of oversight, episkopos, that of service, diakonos, is presented by the careful and systematic presentation of the Apostle Paul in 1 Timothy 3, 1-13. You remember it well, don't you? Here's those who seek the office of a bishop, and here's the characteristic that should mark those who are elected as deacons. This same twofold pattern is also seen in Philippians 1.1 and seems to be reflected in the early division of labor at Jerusalem between the oversight ministry of the apostles, prayer and the ministry of the word in Acts 6, 1 and 4, and the aid to widows on the part of the seven, verses 1 to 3 of that sixth chapter. These three passages show then, 1 Timothy 3, at Philippians 1.1 and Acts 6.1-4. These three passages show then a two-fold division of labor in early, middle, and later time periods in the life in the New Testament Church. Acts 6, Philippians 1, and 1 Timothy 3. In key cities in three various geographical areas, Palestine, Greece and Asia Minor. And in both Jewish and Greco-Roman settings, we must be on to something here. We may be discovering something here that our forefathers also discovered. This pattern of ministry also manifests itself in an oversight by a plurality of leaders in every place, without exception. Even Titus, the evangelist par excellence, who was by himself on the island of Crete after the wonderful journey of evangelism with the Apostle Paul, must ordain in every place elders, plural. You find this dynamic working out. Elders in every city, elders in every place. Call the elders to pray over you. The bishops should not rule over you. Over and over again, you find this repeated plurality of office. Even in 1 Thessalonians, the fifth chapter, where you don't have the name elders or bishop, but described in such a way with gifts and responsibilities given to them that you know that's what the group is. And even in Hebrews 13, 17, for all its clarity, simply using the word leaders. hegemon, those leading forward and caring for those who follow them. This pattern of ministry also manifests itself in an oversight by a plurality of leaders in every place. The group is referred to using other terms that are synonymous to the slightly more frequent terms episkopoi and presbyteroi, or for example in 1 Thessalonians 5, 12, and 13, proistominoi, And that term is used to describe the activity that the elders and bishops shall be engaged in, 1 Timothy 3 and 1 Timothy 5. Or in Hebrews 13, 7, and 17, hegumenoi, the description of their duties, their care to give oversight to those they lead. Or in 1 Corinthians 12, 28, you have didaskaloi koubernesis. And in Ephesians 4, 11, you have poumenes and didaskaloi, representing the two full duties of the officers, to shepherd, feed and nurture, and also to teach, instruct, as well as to give oversight to. When all the data of the New Testament is looked at as one whole, The universality of a rule by a plurality of leaders is overwhelming. We have described that phenomenon in our commentary on the pastoral epistles in the following words. An analysis of the data seems, therefore, to indicate the existence of oversight by a plurality of church leaders throughout the New Testament church in virtually every known area and acknowledged or commended by virtually every New Testament writer who writes about church leadership. In the Apostolic Council, the Apostles acknowledge and submit to the government of elders, as do the Jerusalem Church, the Christians in the Antioch, which was a center for the Gentile mission, and the churches established on the Gentile mission. So we read about that in the 15th chapter of Acts, also in the 16th chapter, verse 4, and the 21st chapter, verse 25. Every church in which leadership is referred to in Asia Minor, either under Paul and his associates, or under Peter's ministry, mind you, when you read about Peter, you need to be sure that you read Peter's designation of the churches he's writing to. in the first chapter. Because if you read that section and then get out your maps, you recognize he's designating the entirety of Asia Minor. Peter and Apostle, Jesus Christ, the God's elect, strangers in the world, scattered through Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. And so every church in Asia Minor, either under Paul and his associate or under Peter's ministry, has a plurality of leadership. See it in Acts 14. Paul returns after his missionary journey to places where he'd been nearly stoned to death. Goes in and encourages the brothers to elect elders. Reminds them to too much suffering and difficulty they shall enter into the kingdom. Those elders will shepherd them, guide them, and nurture them as the under shepherds of Christ. Or again in Acts 20, where he talks, he calls those elders to Miletus and says, God has made you bishops or overseers. In Acts 20, 17 and 28. Or again in 1 Timothy 3, both the qualifications to elect them and later on how you should discipline them and how they should govern. particularly those who ought to labor in the Word and Doctrine 1 and 5, 17, as well as earlier in the fourth chapter. Ephesians 4, 11, 1 Peter 5, 1-4, all of those indicating how widespread is the rule by elders in all of Asia Minor. So you've gone to, from Jerusalem, Antioch, the whole of Asia Minor, modern-day Turkey, And then you go across the sea to Achaia and Macedonia, where you have such a leadership in Philippi, Philippians 1.1, to the bishops and deacons, or again in Thessalonica, 1 Thessalonians 5, 12, and 13, or in Corinth, 1 Corinthians 12.28. The island of Crete is urged to establish such a pattern in Titus 1, 5 and following. The communities written to by James in 5.14 in the writer of Hebrews 13, 7 and 17 know the same pattern. We may assume that Barnabas continued the same pattern that he and Paul had established at Lystra, Iconium and Antioch in Acts 14.23 when he returned to Cyprus in Acts 15.39. Only Rome, I only say this to suggest maybe that's why we've had trouble with Rome throughout the years. Only Rome and its geographical area provide us with no explicit information because Paul's letter does not deal explicitly with the subject. But it may well be that Paul's very general list of personal gifts in Romans 12, 6-8 implies a similar approach to that of 1 Corinthians 12, 28, with the terms, ho didascon, the one who teaches, ho proi estaminos, the one who leads or cares, and diakonion, the one who serves. Sounds familiar. Maybe even offhandedly, Paul has dealt with it in his letter to the church in Rome. Certainly this overwhelming phenomenon points to an overarching headship, namely that of Jesus Christ building his church and doing so with a model or pattern that he has prescribed and through officers that he continues to give. It would be ignoring the headship of Christ through his words not to have our churches led and cared for by a plurality of men designated as elders or bishops. This is the reason why Presbyterian churches have declared that they believe in and follow a divine right principle of church government. Or some of you may remember hearing in seminary or from some professor or some teacher the Latin form just divinum. That is, that Christ is ruling His Church through ruling it through those that He has appointed and given to Him. And it is also the reason why the Presbyterian and Reformed community believe that in acknowledging and bowing to the complete and absolute Lordship of Jesus Christ, they must also bow to His Lordship as it is manifested in the sufficiency of Scripture with this entire realm of church government. No Lord, but Christ. No rule and authority, but His Word. Thank you.