A long break because of my absence from our study of the Westminster Larger Catechism. If you need a copy, by the way, there on the back table. But when I left, we were right in the middle of the section of the catechism that has to do with the means of grace. And not only in the middle of the section, it has to do with the means of grace, but also in the middle of the first of those means of grace, which is the word of God. You remember that there are three that are mentioned particularly In the larger catechism, the word sacraments and prayer, and that the only way that we can receive blessing from these as means of grace is when God is pleased to use them and to bless them to us. Their ways means that God has appointed so that when we read the word, it engenders faith in us as his spirit works, strengthens our faith if we already have faith. allows us to to go on in the in the grace of God and in our sanctification. And we saw that with the sacraments, it is the same that when God is pleased to bless them, then he uses them to to strengthen and increase our faith. And of course, with prayer, where we call upon the name of the Lord, that God will answer that. Now, we haven't gotten to sacraments and prayer yet in particular, but as I say, we're looking particularly at at the word. And with that, we began. in that section by looking at, first of all, how God blesses the word to us. And again, that we're dependent upon him to make it useful in our lives. Then we begin to look at. So that's how he uses the word in our lives. Then the catechism goes to look at how we are to use the word. So how does God use it was first, then how do we come to the word? How are we to use it so that it will be a blessing? And first we looked at by whom the scriptures are to be read. And that was question 156. And we particularly focused on the idea of that we need to read the word ourselves daily and that we need to have family gatherings where we read the word and explain the scriptures and that we read them in church by those that are appointed. Then we went to question 157, and this is where we stopped. This is the last question that we did that asks us how we are to read the scriptures. I just want to review that a little bit to bring you back up to where we are. You remember that we looked in Joshua chapter 1, some of you might remember that, 1 through 18, where we saw that the Lord, when instructing Joshua about how to lead Israel to take the promised land, did something that might be surprising to us. First, he said what we might expect. He said, be strong and courageous. That's what you'd say to somebody that was going out to battle, you know, be strong and courageous. But then he told Joshua that he was to meditate in the law of God day and night, that the book of the law was not to depart from his mouth, but he was to meditate in it day and night. And he said, wait a minute. Now he's going to battle and he's going to be engaged in leading armies and all these things. And he's supposed to meditate on the word of God day and night. That's exactly what it says. And from that, we saw that sometimes we have a wrong understanding of God's word because we look at it as something that we kind of tack on to our lives. Oh, I did my little devotion here and now I'll go out and work. But we need to look at it as that which fuels our work, that which guides us in everything that we do every day. It's very practical. It directs us for everyday living. So we need to be meditating on God's word. How does this apply to me? You know, when I'm when I'm working at home in the kitchen, when I'm When I'm out in my garage, when I'm out at the gym or whatever it is that I might be doing, the word of God needs to be speaking into our lives. So remember that we saw that the Lord emphasized to Joshua that the reason for reading the word is in order that he might do it. It's not just so I can say, well, I did my little devotion thingy for God, but it's so I can actually implement it, put it into into life by the grace of God. I also pointed out that there were two other key components of right reading that when we read the scriptures, we need to understand that they are the word of God. If we miss that, the scriptures aren't really going to do us much good because if they don't come to us with that authority as being the very word of God, then they're not going to really have a lot of impact to to prevent us from doing things we ought not to do, from directing us to where we need to go. Don't listen to the many false ministers who cast doubt on the plenary verbal inspiration of the scriptures. They're wicked deceivers. And we're going to be looking at that particularly as we go on today. But the other key component to right reading is that we are to receive the word with faith. Believing its promises and in particular, the promise that God will help us with respect to the word, to receive it, to understand it and to apply it. If we don't have faith in our reading, we'll do us a little good. Talked about Joshua in particular, that God had told him to go in and take the promised land of Canaan. He had to go in with big, fortified cities. And if Joshua hadn't believed that God would enable him to do what he had been called to do in the word, then Joshua wouldn't have been very motivated. You remember the other spies when they didn't have that faith, they had the command, they had the word. But it didn't do them any good, because they didn't receive it with faith. They said, well, we can't do that. It's too hard. And they backed away. So we need to receive it with faith. Now, having shown us how we are to read the Scriptures, from last time, I started to say last week, the Scripture moves on to speak about the preaching of the Word. So we've seen the reading of the Word. Now we go to the preaching of the Word. And there's three questions this week. We're going to look at question 158, which asks us by whom the word is to be preached. Next week, we'll look at question 159, which asks us how the word is to be preached. And then in question 160, we will look at how we are to receive the preached word. So you see, it's very thorough. As we enter into this section, I want to remind you about the importance of the preached word. Back in question 155, when we were looked when we learned about the means of grace and saw that the spirit uses the means of grace in our lives, it said that he uses the reading. But what? Especially the preaching of the word. Remember, I showed you that the scriptures just just fall. of statements about the preaching of the word, the word which you heard of us, Paul says, when you came to us, we looked at just the abundance of information that this is one of the primary ways that God works in his people. The scriptures show us repeatedly that God is especially chosen to bless the preaching of the word to his people. So is it any wonder that the church is weak today? When we see how preaching has been set aside and discarded in so many congregations, it's a judgment of God when preaching is taken away from his people because of their ingratitude that it's taken away. We need to pray that God will restore it and that he will preserve it. And now, as we take up this portion of the catechism, we need to give careful attention and we need to understand what the scriptures teach about preaching and in particular about by whom the word is to be preached. So look at question 158 says by whom is the word of God to be preached? And the answer is the word of God is to be preached only by such as are sufficiently gifted and also duly approved and called to that office. Now, I think the rigidity that is spoken of here, it only preached by them that we need to recognize a little bit of flexibility here. This is talking about In the assembly of God's people, in particular, who is to preach? Only those. that have been appointed. Now, if you're out on the street and you meet someone and they start asking you questions about the faith, you start talking to them and then a bunch of people gather around and start talking and listening. Go on and preach. Preach away. But as far as the idea of the regular ministry within the assembly of God's people, then the catechism is setting forward something here that needs to be guarded about who is going to preach Those that are sufficiently gifted and also duly approved and called to that office. I believe it's a very important question. If the preaching of the word is the primary means that God uses in imparting grace, then it's essential that the church carefully guard the pulpit. The pulpit, which is able to do so much good for God's people, can also do very great harm to God's people. If men who are not sent occupy it, it can be a source of tremendous harm, leading congregations into full apostasy. Take the United Church as an example. I grew up in a church very similar to that, so I think I can be at liberty to speak about that. I grew up in the PCUSA in the United States, very, very similar type of church. Here is a church made up of congregations that only a century or two ago preached the gospel of salvation. Today, there are still a few believers that remain in those congregations. But for the most part, her congregation are congregations are in darkness. You talk to people in those churches. They do not know the gospel. They do not know the Lord. They do not know the gospel because they they admitted men into their pulpits that did not believe the Bible to be the word of God. As one generation passed into another, the true faith almost completely disappeared. The men in the pulpit have caused the people to err and the members are responsible. They never should have let these men in their pulpits. It is only because of their ingratitude for the pure word, their lack of love for the word, that such deceivers were allowed to come in among them. But though the congregation bears the blame for this, the false teachers are the means by which the ruin has come. Preachers that God has not sent have been the ruin of God's people again and again. Is it any wonder, therefore, that the Bible is filled with passionate warnings about who teaches? Is it any wonder that you can hardly open the New Testament? You can hardly open your Bible without finding such warnings. It is the subject of the entire epistle of the Galatians. False teaching has come among you. Of Jude, of 2 Peter, of 3 John and 2 John. It's the subject of many of our Lord's parables and teachings. John 10, the false shepherd that comes in by the other way of Matthew 23 about blind leading the blind and leading them to destruction and making them children of hell. Matthew 24 about false teachers that will come up in Christ's name and lead people to destruction. There is the urgent plea with tears of the Apostle Paul in Acts 20 to guard against wolves that will come in sheep's clothing. Timothy, in the book that bears his name, is given the task of rooting out false teachers at Ephesus. Titus is called to ordain men to the office of ruling elders that will be able to deal with false teachers and recognize them. The first epistle of John speaks of many antichrists that will come in the last days. And 2 Thessalonians speaks of the great apostasy. The letters to the seven churches that Jesus wrote in Revelation have rebukes to the congregations who allowed false teachers and tolerated them in their midst. I could go on and on. In fact, the only New Testament book that I can think of that doesn't say anything about this is Paul's little letter to Philemon. That's the only one that I can think of. Now, maybe you can think of another one, but I don't think there is one. It's the same in the Old Testament. Moses. continually warning about this matter. In Deuteronomy 13, Deuteronomy 18, he presents a zero tolerance policy for false teachers or those that would even encourage others to follow false teachers. Come and let us go and listen to these false teachers. They were to be exposed, Moses said, even if they're your own flesh and blood and delivered over to be executed. But despite this warning, The covenant people in the Old Testament, the covenant people in the New Testament have instead continually tolerated false teachers. They did it right in the first century, right from the very beginning. It's because there are men with unregenerate hearts in the church. And what do men with unregenerate hearts want? They want to be religious, but led astray from the truth. They don't want the gospel. They want to be told that I can come to God without the cross. You see, they want to be led astray. And so they keep up false teachers to themselves. Paul says that in Timothy. They have itching ears. They want to hear something. This is often the case in our study of the catechism, then the difficulty with this question by whom is the word to be preached was not in finding some suitable scripture that I could use for our scripture reading today. But it was in choosing which scripture that I might read. And I decided on the book of Jeremiah. In this book, the Lord frequently complains about prophets among the people, and his primary complaint is that he did not send them. OK, we're going to look at Jeremiah 14, but if you look at Jeremiah 14, 14, that complaint is given. It says, I did not send them. Jeremiah 23, 32, same complaint. Jeremiah 27, 15, same complaint. Chapter 29, verse 9, same complaint. People have gone to preach in my name that I did not sin. So let me now read to you for a scripture reading. Jeremiah, chapter 14. The word of the Lord that came to Jeremiah concerning the droughts, Judah mourns and her gates languish. They mourn for the land, and the cry of Jerusalem has gone up. Their nobles have sent their lads for water. They went to the cisterns and found no water. They returned with their vessels empty. They were ashamed and confounded and covered their heads, because the ground is parched, for there was no rain in the land. The plowmen were ashamed. They covered their heads. Yes, the deer also gave birth in the field and left because there was no grass. And the wild donkeys stood in the desolate heights. They sniffed at the wind like jackals. Their eyes failed because there was no grass. Oh, Lord, though our iniquities testify against us, Do it for your name's sake. For our backslidings are many. We have sinned against you. Oh, the hope of Israel, his savior in time of trouble. Why should you be like a stranger in the land and like a traveler who turns aside to tarry for a night? Why should you be like a man astonished, like a mighty one who cannot save? Yet you, O Lord, are in your midst or in our midst, and we are called by your name. Do not leave us. Thus says the Lord to this people. Thus, they have loved to wander. They have not restrained their feet. Therefore, the Lord does not accept them. He will not remember their iniquity now or he will. Sorry. He will remember their iniquity now and punish their sins. Then the Lord said to me, do not pray for this people for their good. When they fast, I will not hear their cry. And when they offer burnt offering and grain offering, I will not accept them, but I will consume them by the sword, by the famine and by the pestilence. Then I said, Oh, Lord God, behold, the prophets say to them, you shall not see the sword, nor shall you have famine. But I will give you assured peace in this place. And the Lord said to me, the prophets prophesy lies in my name. I have not sent them. commanded them nor spoken to them. They prophesied to you a false vision, divination, a worthless thing and the deceit of their heart. Therefore, thus says the Lord concerning the prophets who prophesy in my name, whom I did not send and who say sword and famine shall not be in this land by sword and famine. Those prophets shall be consumed and the people to whom they prophesy shall be cast out in the streets of Jerusalem because of the famine and the sword. They will have no one to bury them, them nor their wives, their sons nor their daughters, for I will pour their wickedness on them. Therefore, you shall say this word to them. Lift up my let my eyes flow with tears night and day and let them not cease. For the virgin daughter of my people has been broken with a mighty stroke, with a very severe blow. If I go out to the field, then behold those slain with the sword. And if I enter the city, then behold those sick from famine. Yes, both prophet and priest go about in the land, in a land that they do not know. And there we'll end the reading of God's word, may he bless it to our hearing. What do you see in that reading? Verse 14 and 15, see that the primary error of these prophets is that they're teaching that God will not judge his people. Their message is that as long as you're part of God's people, you know, you go to church and whatever, you know, it doesn't matter what you believe or what you do. You know, God's going to be merciful to you. Jeremiah was telling them, on the other hand, that judgment was going to come. That's what the Lord was saying. That captivity would come because they had rejected the Lord. But the false prophets had a very different message. Isn't this not the very same message that we hear today repeatedly from the pulpits in our land? God is love. You don't need to repent. You don't need an atoning sacrifice. Just believe God will empower you and bless you and he will empower you and bless you. It's true that there is forgiveness with God, but it's not true that he merely overlooks our sin. Our sin comes between us and God and separates from us and can only be removed through faith in Jesus Christ. We must repent and believe the gospel, or we cannot be saved. The false prophets have an entirely different message. You don't need to worry about that. God accepts you just fine. So the primary error of these false prophets is that they deny the judgment of God. To put it in New Testament language, they preach the acceptance of God in terms other than reconciliation through Christ. That's their primary error. But look at what God's primary complaint is against them. He says, I did not sin them. That's why it behooves us to be sure that those we receive into our pulpits in our churches have been sent by God. It's only those that have been sent by him to preach that are to preach. In Romans 10, the Apostle Paul asked a rhetorical question about this very matter. Please turn to Romans 10. We'll look there now for a bit. Paul is speaking, if you look at the overall context of that chapter, about his great desire for Israel that they would be saved. After all, they're the people that God gave his word to. Remember, he says that at the beginning of Romans. He says they have the very oracles of God entrusted to them, given to them. So here are people, the word of God, the promises of God, all sitting right there in the mouths as they read the scriptures. It's all there. for the covenant people. So what do they need to do? Receive it. Believe it. Take these promises of faith. Believe it. So Paul tells them this, verse eight. He says, he's quoting from Deuteronomy, by the way. He says, The word is near you in your mouth and in your heart. It's right there. That is the word of faith which we preach. They had it memorized. They knew it. that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. For the Scripture says, whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame. For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek. For the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. For whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. So God has put this wonderful salvation message right in the midst of His church. If only the covenant people will believe the good news, trust in what it says, trust in Jesus as the one given and crucified and raised again, they will be saved. But their leaders are, for the most part, not preaching the gospel of Christ. Most of them rejected Christ, the Jews, when Jesus came. Most of them do not themselves believe. And so nobody is hearing the true saving message of the Gospel from these false preachers that God did not send. In verse 14 and 15, the Apostle speaks about this, and this is where he asks the rhetorical questions. He says, How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach unless they are sent?" See the progression there? It's kind of a reverse progression. There are many preachers among God's people, but those who hear them don't benefit if God didn't send those preachers because those preachers don't preach the Word of the Gospel. They can't preach the Gospel because they have not themselves received the Gospel. And if the Gospel is not preached, People can't be saved by believing that gospel. And so you see that what our catechism speaks about with reference to preachers being called by God is extremely important. We're not to let just anyone in our pulpits quit. The answer to 158 again, the word of God is to be preached only by such as are sufficiently gifted and also duly appointed and called to that office. So those ones that God didn't send in Jeremiah should be listening to them. That's the idea. James warns that not many should become teachers because such will incur a stricter judgment. And James 3.1, he says, my brethren, let not many of you become teachers, knowing that we shall receive a stricter judgment. So how do we know if a preacher has been sent or not? Is he one that's sent or not sent? Well, that's what I want to spend the rest of our time really looking at. To begin with, the most basic test of all. This is the most important, most fundamental test, and it's very simple in many ways. We've already looked at it. You do not have to be an expert in theology or in biblical languages in order to apply this test. If a preacher has been sent by God, he will believe and preach the gospel of grace. He will preach salvation that is promised in the scriptures through Jesus Christ, the very message that Paul has just declared in Romans 10, 9 and 10, that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised him from the dead, you will be saved with the heart. One believes unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made to salvation. This message will be the center. Of one who has been sent by God's teaching, he will not dismiss it. He will not ignore it or neglect it if God has sent him, because this is the essence of what he has been sent to preach of such messengers. Paul says in Romans 10, 15, how beautiful are the feet. of those who preach the gospel of peace, who bring glad tidings of good things. They come to you with the glad tidings of what God has done to save desperate, helpless sinners. What marvelous news it is to those who know their need, to those whose hearts are prepared. And if you know that you're a sinner and you know that you need salvation, how glad you are when the gospel sounds. It is good news to you and it refreshes your heart. But you see, not all teachers have this message, because after saying how beautiful are their feet in verse 15, verse 16, Paul says, but they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, Lord, who has believed our report? Looks around. So in the context of when Jesus comes, looks around, he says, OK, this good news is going up. Who believes the good news? People aren't preaching. I don't hear it being preached. What's going on in Jerusalem? Why are all of the Jews, why are all their teachers and their leaders, why aren't they proclaiming the gospel? The good news, who has believed the report? So if you encounter a preacher who does not believe or preach the gospel, you know, right away, God didn't send them. He didn't tell you that he was sent by God. They always say that we shouldn't listen to him. It's a false prophet. But sometimes false teachers can be very subtle, can't they? Sometimes you cannot tell right away whether they've been sent by God. So the Bible gives you some help that goes a little deeper in your investigation. In his second epistle, John addresses this. He says that false teachers and deceivers can be detected by a certain test. The denial that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh. Second, John one seven. For many deceivers have gone out into the world who do not confess Jesus Christ is coming in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist. He's defining what is a deceiver, what is an antichrist. It's someone who does not confess that Jesus has come in the flesh. Now, there are two things with regard to this denial that Jesus is coming in the flesh. There is the denial first that was common when John wrote, namely the denial that Jesus truly took to himself human flesh, that he really became fully man. Such a teaching, when that's denied, the Gospel is denied. Because if Jesus didn't come in the flesh, if He wasn't a real man, flesh and blood, He can't represent us. He couldn't have offered an atonement for us. He had to be one of us. So this is very, very important. But the second denial related to denying that Jesus comes in the flesh is more common in our day. It's the denial that Jesus came. in the flesh. Understand what I mean? They say that he was in the flesh. He was here. Yeah, he was in the flesh. But they deny that he came in the flesh, that he came from heaven, that he was the son of God who came and took to himself human flesh. In other words, the modern way is to deny that he was truly divine. He is seen to be a very good man. He is seen to be a wonderful, inspiring teacher that we should all listen to. But he is not seen to be very God of very God. Begotten, not made, he is less than divine in their estimation. But if he is not the very son of God, it would have been impossible for him to make an atonement that could take away our sin. It would be impossible for him to have the power in himself to give eternal life to us. So find out what a minister really believes. Does he believe that Jesus came in the flesh? Does he declare that without qualification? Go out. I mentioned the United Church before. I mentioned the PCUSA before. Go out to those churches. Ask the ministers. You'll find, oh, Jesus is a wonderful teacher. He's a wonderful prophet. He's a good man. But they do not believe that he is very God of very God. This is a important test. Another test to see if the preacher is to see if the preacher denies any part of the scripture. The Bereans were commended in Acts, because when Paul came and preached to them, they examined what he said. Is this in accord with the word of God? Isaiah declared in 820 to the law and to the testimony, if they do not speak according to this word, it is because there is no light in them. Simply ask a minister, then, if he believes the Bible to be the very word of God. to be infallible and inerrant. If he denies this, it shouldn't be in the pulpit. Once a minister denies that the Bible is the word of God, he assumes to himself the authority to judge what is and what is not true in the word. And that is a prerogative that no man should take to himself. A minister should not judge of the word, but he should be subservient and under the word of God. Does he believe in the miracles that are clearly reported in the Bible, that God created the world with his voice in six days, that Moses part of the Red Sea, that Jonah was swallowed by a great fish, that Jesus was born of a virgin and was raised from the dead on the third day? So there you have a test of the pastor's teaching to see if God has sent him. But there is another variety of very important tests that any of you ought to apply to those who preach. And that would be the test of the preacher's life. Now, we want to be careful here. I know that we all want to be careful. We don't want to be judging one another, gossiping about one another. But when a man is brought forward to publicly minister God's Word or to serve as a ruling elder, it is not only permissible, but it is required to examine that man, to explore that man, to make known anything that you know about that man that might disqualify him from that office. It is for this reason that God has given you a list of qualifications in the Word by which to examine a man to see if God has indeed called him to serve as an elder. When a man puts himself forward, volunteering to serve as an elder, then he is also offering, examine me. Look at my life. Because this is what is required of us. So we need to we need to do that. It's not only permissible, but it's our duty. It's for this reason that God has given you this list of qualifications then for any elder, either a ruling elder or a teaching elder or minister. I'm going to call them by those different names, minister, teaching elder, minister of the word. It's all the same thing. And then you have the ruling elders who are not ministers of the word. You can find the list in First Timothy three. beyond the scope of this sermon to go into a detailed explanation and examination of what is taught here. But basically, godly Christian character is what is required. He's not expected to be a super Christian, but he's expected to be a consistent Christian. This is what it says. First Timothy three one. This is a faithful saying, if a man desires the position of a bishop, that word is an overseer and it's used interchangeably with elder. If he desires the position of a bishop, he desires a good work. A bishop then must be blameless. The husband of one wife. temperate, sober-minded, of good behavior, hospitable, able to teach, not given to wine, not violent, not greedy for money, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetous, one who rules his own house well, having his children in submission with all reverence. For if a man does not know how to rule his own house, how will he take care of the Church of God? Not a novice, lest being puffed up with pride, he fall into the same condemnation as the devil. Moreover, he must have a good testimony among those who are outside, lest he fall into reproach in the snare of the devil. And I tell you, churches would have saved themselves a lot of grief if they had taken the trouble to examine men along these lines before admitting them either to the eldership or to the ministry. Is he is this man given to excess? Is he engaged in immorality? Is he courteous and kind? How does he treat his wife? Are his children obedient? Does he have a good reputation? Is he greedy? Does he have a short fuse? You know, all of these things. A man may be an excellent speaker. He may be impeccable in his doctrine and his understanding. No inconsistencies. But if his life does not comport with those teachings, he does not belong in the pulpit until he has learned to live what he preaches. He ought not to preach. And of course, they say, live what he preaches. He better not be preaching perfection either. If he preaches sinless perfection, nobody lives up to that. But if he preaches the calling of God that we are to be striving to attain the sanctification that we're to seek and he meets the qualifications that are set forth here in scripture. Then he should practice those things. Looking to Christ is his only righteousness. Consistently, though, men have been admitted to the pulpit whose doctrine or life does not comport with godliness. Listening to men that God has not sent has been the bane of the church, both the old and the new covenant. I can say with assurance that the majority of those that stand in pulpits today in North America have not been sent by God. based upon what the words of Scripture say. They do not meet the simple qualifications that we have seen are put forth in the word of God. There is one more thing that must be added to the test that we have seen to determine if a man is truly sent to preach the word. It's actually mentioned in that list in first Timothy three in verse two, it says that an overseer bishop must be apt to teach. In other words, he needs to be able to explain things in a way that people can understand. And not that everyone will always understand. I mean, people didn't understand what Jesus said a lot of times. They didn't understand what Paul said a lot of times. But he needs to have an ability to teach and to make things clear. It's entirely possible that a man can have perfectly sound doctrine. and a perfectly godly life, but simply not be gifted and able to teach. If that's so, he shouldn't be in the pulpit. Even if his voice is defective in some way so that you can't understand him. then God has not given him gifts even in that physical way that would make him a preacher. Before the days of microphones, Spurgeon used to say that a preacher had to have a barrel chest. He had to be able to belt out in a big auditorium and be heard. Nobody can hear him. Then he's not sent to preach. And there's a truth to that. So you see, when God sends someone to preach, he gives him all of the graces and gifts that are associated with the office. If these are absent, God has not sent that man. It's that simple. Anyone can conduct these tests and you should conduct them. The members in the church have a role to play in the selection of ministers and in deciding who they will listen to. If a man that is not sent by God is in the pulpit, it's your duty to oppose it. And if the church refuses to hear, it behooves you to leave and find another church where you will worship. You are not to submit yourself to false prophets whom God has not sent, nor are you to subject your family to the teaching of false prophets that God has not sent. I mentioned before in Deuteronomy 13 that that's addressed to ordinary church members in the old covenant, not just to the leaders. And it tells them that they are to personally bring out false teachers or those that try to get them to follow false teachers before the assembly to be stoned and that they are to cast the first stone. Even if it's their own brother or sister or wife, not to pity them. Deuteronomy 13, 10, You shall stone him with stones until he dies, because he sought to entice you away from the Lord, your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt from the house of bondage. It was that serious. This was done in the courts of justice. Of course, they were to bring them before the civil magistrate in that regard and in an orderly manner. But then They were the accuser. And once they were found guilty, then they were to cast the first stone. It's a very serious thing in our day. It's our duty to see that such persons are removed from the congregation of God's people. Every church member is responsible. Now, I'll admit that it's a daunting thing to make such judgments, but God knows that and he has not left you alone in making this judgment. You're not all by yourself. The matter of teachers is so important that God in his wisdom and in his kindness to us has provided help that goes beyond your individual personal judgment. He has given you your brothers and sisters in the church to help you evaluate from Scripture those who are sent to preach the word with the help of faithful brothers and sisters who are also committed to the gospel. You are enabled to make a better judgment than you could make on your own. That's why it's important to be in a good church with people that are devoted to the word of God and to encourage those people to be diligent in the word of God, because they will help you and be beneficial to you. Even in this very matter, they'll be beneficial to the church and its health as a whole. We have a shared responsibility to ensure that only those who are sent by the Lord are in this pulpit. But the Lord has given us even more help than mere numbers. He has also established a very wise system of government to help us thoroughly evaluate those that labor among us in the word and scripture. We find a pattern established from the Old Testament that's carried over into the New Testament for choosing ruling elders to serve among us and any elders. But I'm sorry. The pattern of government that we have found is that an aspect of it is that we are to choose out ruling elders to serve among us. The ruling elders are not themselves preachers, but hearers in the congregation. You need to understand that scripture makes a distinction between those who speak and those who hear. That carries all the way through the scripture. The ruling elders are among the congregation who hears. They're not among those who speak to them is given the responsibility of ruling in the congregation, along with the pastors or ministers of the word, which are sometimes called teaching elders in the Old Testament. There are there are two bodies of these elders. OK, it's helpful for us to see this. There was the body of elders that served in the church courts. alongside of the priests with the high priest presiding over them. So there were these ones that were responsible for church matters. And then there was another body of ruling elders who served alongside of the king and the judges of the land. They were responsible for civil matters. What would the church ones do? They were responsible for excluding persons from worship because they were unclean or some other thing. They labored alongside of the priests, elders and priests. Then the ones that were over here with the civil responsibilities, they were the ones that would say, hey, a crime has been committed here. This person needs to be executed. They had the power of the sword. The the priest didn't have that. They could say that someone was worthy of death, but then they delivered him over to the other court who would determine Jeremiah. Actually, that happened with him. And then the civil court said, no, he's not worthy of death. So kind of interesting how how that plays out. Now, if you want to see that distinction that I'm talking about between these two bodies of elders, then let me add one more thing in saying that it is also very possible that you could have the same men as elders in both courts. For example, to put it in our modern context, you could have someone that was serving as a judge, for example, in a court of law, or as one of these men that were not even an official judge, but they were ruling elders that assisted the judge. He could be in the congregation. Then he could also serve in the other court, the Sanhedrin. There were two Sanhedrins. You could have in the Sanhedrin, the ecclesiastical one, the same individual that was also over in the civil. Sanhedrin. So that's just something to understand from the Old Testament. It helps us to understand the New Testament because this all carries over into the New. Second Chronicles 19, verse 8 to 11, we see clearly these two bodies in the time of Jehoshaphat. Jehoshaphat is here restoring the civil and the ecclesiastical government. And in verse 8, it says, Moreover, in Jerusalem, for the judgment of the Lord and for controversies. This is the church court. Jehoshaphat appointed some of the Levites and priests and some of the chief fathers of Israel when they returned from Jerusalem. The chief fathers of Israel. See, that would be the elders. And he commanded them, saying, Thus you shall act in the fear of the Lord faithfully with a loyal heart. Whatever case comes to you from your brethren who dwell in their cities, whether of bloodshed or of offenses against law or commandment, against statutes or ordinances, you shall warn them lest they trespass against the Lord and wrath come upon you and your brethren. Do this and you will not be guilty. And take notice. Here are the two courts. Amariah, the chief priest, is over you in all matters of the Lord. That's the church court. And Zebediah, the son of Ishmael, the ruler of the house of Judah, for all the king's matters. That's the civil court. Also, the Levites will be officials before you. Behave courageously and the Lord will be with the good. In the New Testament, we're told that we're to submit to what kind of government? The civil government? and the church government, the church courts continue. Only now, instead of ruling elders and priests, we have ruling elders and ministers of the word who serve together and sit in session together. The ruling elders are distinct from the teaching elders who labor in the word. This is shown in First Timothy 517. where it says, let the elders who rule well be counted worthy of double honor. And then it distinguishes especially those who labor in the word and doctrine. So you have elders of two types. All of them rule. But those who are called ruling elders are responsible only for ruling. The teaching elders are ministers of the word responsible for teaching. So you see here that there are those two types together. They make up the church court. Just as ruling elders and Levites and priests made up the church courts of the old covenant, the established practice from the old covenant is that this body of men, which we call the session, I hope I'm not losing you here too much, is responsible for receiving persons into membership when they make a credible profession of faith and then for shepherding them. and for overseeing them, and if necessary, for excommunicating those who do not continue in a credible profession after due warning. There are many offenses in the Old Testament for which persons would be cut off by the church courts, either from worship at the temple for a time or completely cut off from God's people. You read about those kind of offenses all through Leviticus. This corresponds to the New Testament church courts in which persons may be excluded from the Lord's table only or completely put out of the congregation of God's people if they refuse to repent. The ruling elders who sit with the ministers are to be men of sound judgment who are mature in the faith and so are able to guard the purity of the congregation. When their work of ruling and oversight is faithfully carried out, then the church is protected by these ruling elders. God has given them to the church for judgment. Now, what does that mean to our subject of who is to preach? These elders are charged with helping the congregation, guiding the congregation, and overseeing the selection of ministers who are going to be in the pulpit. They are charged with laying hands on those who are chosen by the congregation to serve. In 1 Timothy 4.14, Timothy is reminded of how he himself received his ministry through the laying on of the hands of the elders, or in Greek, the presbytery, The Presbyter Roy. And as it is the duty of the elders to ordain those who are worthy of office, so it is also their duty to refuse to lay hands on those that they do not regard to be worthy. First Timothy 522, the charge is given. Do not lay hands on anyone hastily, nor share in other people's sins. Keep yourself pure. In other words, Timothy, if you lay your hands on someone that you haven't properly examined, That person is not fit. He's not sent by God. Then you bear the responsibility and that you laid hands on him. See, this is a reminder that the elders are to be careful in the selection of officers, whether they're those officers or deacons or other elders or ministers. They need to be very, very careful. This is why ministers are thoroughly examined. in our presbyteries and church courts to see if they are men who are indeed sent by God. Great care is to be taken lest they ordain men to office who are not scripturally qualified and sent by God and will lead the people astray. So while every member bears the responsibility for the selection of church officers, there is this extra protection and help that comes through the service of wise and judicious ruling elders. But because the ministry of the word in particular is such an important means of grace, there is yet more protection that is given by our gracious Lord in the selection and oversight of ministers of the word in particular, not distinct from ruling elders and deacons selecting of ministers. There's an even greater provision made by God repeatedly. We are shown the pattern in the New Testament of the elders, all the elders in one region coming together to provide oversight of those who teach in their region. We call this the presbytery. Because the Greek word for the elder, again, is presbyteros. So the presbytery appears at Antioch to send out Paul and Barnabas to minister to the Gentiles. They give oversight. They examine them with other teachers and elders, and then they send them out. Even Paul was sent by commission and laying on of hands. And Jerusalem, the presbytery in Jerusalem, gathers to give Paul counsel when he comes to minister there. They're directing his ministry. They meet with him. They give him guidelines about how he needs to conduct himself while he's there. It's an example of a presbytery meetings, a bunch of congregations and the teachers and the elders from all of those congregations gather together to oversee the teaching that is going on in their region. One of the clearest examples of a presbytery meeting that particularly pertains to our subject is found in Acts 20. You might want to turn there when Paul meets with the Ephesian elders. At this time, Ephesus was made up of many congregations with their own elders. Remember, Paul ministered there for a couple of years. It says people from all over Asia came together to hear the word of God. And there were congregations established in different households all around in the region of Ephesus. So here Paul comes back to this area after he had labored there, and he earnestly warns them to take heed to the flock over which the Lord has made them overseers. And what is it that they're to particularly look out for as a presbytery there to look at who is teaching and what is being taught? So look at this. It's his solemn words are found in Acts 20, verse 28 and following. He says to these, this presbytery, these these ruling elders and ministers gather together, take heed to yourselves and to all the flock among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers to shepherd the church of God, which he has purchased with his own blood. For I know this after my departure, savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock. Also from among yourselves, men will rise up speaking perverse things to draw away the disciples after themselves. Now, is that not precisely what we see has happened in apostate churches? Is that not exactly what happens? He says, therefore, to this Presbyterian, therefore, watch and remember that for three years I did not cease to warn everyone night and day with tears. So now, brethren, I commend you to God and to the word of his grace, which is able to build you up and give you an inheritance among all those who are sanctified. And what happens? A few years later, Paul writes to Timothy and he says, I am sending you to Ephesus. I have sent you to Ephesus in order that you might teach them not to, you might forbid the teaching of false things. So get rid of the false teachers. He tells him that his responsibility is to lead the way in dealing with the false teachers. Where? At Ephesus, the very place that he gave these warnings to. So you see, the responsibility is there. It's not just for one congregation that the elders give this oversight. But it's for their entire presbytery, the pastors and elders of several congregations in a region that can conveniently work together in this way. Then it is not only the ruling elders who make the judgment in a particular congregation, but it's also ministers of the word from other congregations. They're involved in ordaining and providing oversight to the ministers of the word. So you see the additional protection here. Because now we're no longer just in the local congregation with the ruling elders, but we have ruling elders from different churches, along with ministers from different churches who together are evaluating whether a minister of the word has been sent by God. So our presbytery gets together and we have, you know, Kevin Carter and David Ells and Henry Barch and all these ministers of the word, along with the elders from their congregations. And we meet together and we examine men and then we decide, can we lay hands on this man? This congregation wants to call this man. Can we endorse him? Can we lay hands on him with good conscience and put him into this this work? So this should be of great comfort and encouragement to you. But you must not let it make you slack either. Because whether you are an elder or whether you are a member of the congregation that is not an elder, you bear responsibility in the selection of those who minister the word among you. If congregations and churches that have gone apostate had been more vigilant, their churches would not be filled with teachers that God did not send. and consequently filled with false disciples who follow those teachers. Yes, presbyteries are responsible. And yes, presbyteries are warned as in Acts 20 about guarding the flock from false teachers. But both congregations and presbyteries are admonished not to allow such men to minister among them. In the letters to Jesus, to the seven churches in Revelation, the rebukes are issued In some cases, to very small congregations. In other cases, to churches like Laodicea, where there would have been a multitude, where it would be a presbytery of congregations. We need to take this matter quite seriously on all levels. Individual, congregational and presbyterial. We ought to, if God has not sent a man, then we ought not to listen to that man. It's important to remember that We only need to evaluate preachers, though, at the time of their ministry. What do I mean by that? I mean that God sometimes sends ministers to minister among us who have secret sins or who are even unbelievers. Our duty is to remove them when they are found out. But until they're found out, God can use them to edify the congregation. It's not the men themselves you see that cause the word to bless us. It's God using the word. But you see, where we err is if we know that a man is an unbeliever or we know that he doesn't meet the scriptural qualifications and we don't we don't say anything, we don't do anything. That's where we err. If we don't know, God can still use that man. God can use Judas, did use Judas. I think I can say confidently when he went around with the twelve and ministered with them, he can use unbelievers. But we have a duty, you see, when the hypocrisy is discovered. then to see if we're going to obey the Lord. When that happens, we can thank God if a man is discovered for using that man in our lives, even though he's an unbeliever. And we can see also that he is promptly dismissed lest we dishonor the Lord by allowing one that we know to be unqualified. Our responsibility is not to know the secrets of men's hearts, but to receive those that God has sent to us in accordance with the guidelines of God's word. So we don't have to go back and listen to all the sermons on that passage from somebody else because there was an unbeliever who was detected in the ministry or go back and everybody that was baptized by him be rebaptized or anything like that. His ministry is still used because God is the one that blesses the word. And let us remember that it is God who sends the ministers to us. Hebrews 5.4 warns us that no man is to take the office of ministry to himself unless he's sent by God. And we've seen what it entails to be sent by God. Jesus instructed the church to pray for laborers because of this fact that God is the one that sends them. Luke 10, too. He said to them, the harvest truly is great, but the laborers are few. Therefore, pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. Jesus himself, upon taking his throne in glory, is the one who sends ministers to bless his people. In Ephesians 4, 8 through 15, ministers of the word are said to be donated by him to the church at his ascension. Listen to verse 8. It says when he ascended on high he led captivity captive and gave gifts to men There's a parenthetical part in the verse 11 and he himself gave some to be apostles, or you could read that, some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, or pastor-teachers that could be. I think it's probably actually just as well to say pastors and teachers, because you have some, like, teachers in seminaries, sometimes called doctors, and then you have pastors in the congregation. But they're ministers of the Word. See, all of those, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers, they're all ministers of the Word. He gave them for the equipping of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, so we all come to the unity of the faith and knowledge of the Son of God. to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into him who is the head, Christ." In conclusion then, consider that if Christ has sent ministers of the Word, as it says here, to bless his people, then it behooves us to be sure that we receive those that he has sent and not those that he has not sent. How do we know? By using the guidelines that we are given in scriptures. Please stand and let's call upon the name of the Lord. Heavenly Father, we thank you. For your care of your people, Father, we are overwhelmed when we consider all the pleadings that are in Scripture about this subject that we have looked at today. Father, you plead with your people about false teachers and about not receiving them. You have graciously given ministers of the Word to your church through the ages in order that they might be edified, they might be strengthened, and they might not be tossed about by every wind of doctrine. We pray, O Lord, that you would help us to have discernment and wisdom and courage to stand for what is true. Father, perhaps the last of those is what we especially need. We often know when things are not right, but we don't have the courage to address those things that need to be addressed. And we pray, Father, that you would make your people strong, that they would realize how important these matters are This is certainly why they are so emphasized in your word. Father, we pray that you would send forth men into the harvest that you have sent, Lord, faithful men that you have provided to your people. We plead with you, O Lord, to raise up those that can minister among us. We need a minister in our presbytery to go to Kingston. We need a minister now down in Woodstock to minister at the congregation there. And Father, we plead with you provide able, suitable men that you have sent that will be able to care for the people and to minister the Word to them. And Father, we know that unless you bless the ministry of the Word, that whether the man is however qualified he may be or not be, that it will do no good. So we also ask you to bless the ministry of the Word in all the congregations where you have sent men, that it would prosper, multiply, increase, flourish, all of these things. For, Father, it is your grace to your people that you have promised, and we know that you will not go back on your promise. In Jesus name, Amen.