Are we functioning, Verla, there? All right, we're on. So just a reminder to everyone following online that if you get dropped, you haven't been excommunicating. The internet did it to you. And we'll have any backup uploaded by this evening for everyone that missed. So I wanted to, the scripture reading is going to be 1 Timothy chapter 6, but I wanted to, also read. So I guess we've got two scripture readings. I want to give you a little miniature sermon here, first of all. And I'm doing this because in these days, needless to say, Israel is in the news, right? Israel's in the news. And it's very important for us to have a proper biblical understanding of just who and what Israel is. And there's been great division in the church since the mid-1800s because of dispensational theology that separates Israel, the Jews, from the church and says that God has two covenant peoples, for example. If you embrace that theology, and I was more or less raised in it, but if you embrace that theology, you will never make heads or tails out of the Bible. It won't happen. And I just wanted to give you an example here. This passage in Ephesians 2 is enough to put an end to this whole business of separating supposedly one covenant people of God, Israel, the Jews, from another covenant people of God, the church, all right? Well, I'll just read this to you. It's Ephesians 2, starting at verse 11, all right? Therefore, remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called the uncircumcision by that which is called the circumcision. The Jews referred to the Gentiles as the uncircumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands. Remember that you were at that time, see, before you were in Christ, separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel. Now, make a mental note of that. When we were apart from Christ, we were separated from the commonwealth of Israel. And strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus, you who Once we're far off, have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he himself is our peace. Now look at this. Who has made us both? Who's the both? Israel, Jew, and Gentile, all right? Who has made us both one? and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances." So Christ fulfilled the law of God. So it's fulfilled. And that covenant, then, that old covenant by which the earthly nation of Israel related to God is over. It's over. It's entirely incompatible with the new covenant in Christ. By abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in the place of two. You can't get any more clear than this, right? I mean, this is obvious. That he might create in himself one new man in the place of two, so making peace, and might reconcile us both, Jew and Gentile, to God in one body, through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. He came and preached peace to you who were far off, the Gentiles, and peace to those who were near, the Jews. For through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints." Now look at it. And members of the household of God. So verse 12, you were alienated from the commonwealth of Israel. Now we're members of the household of God. How many households are there? There's one, one household of God. The church built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place of God by the Spirit. One people of God in the new covenant one covenant of God now in Christ, one body of Christ. And that has incredibly important ramifications in that I think it's pretty obvious that dispensational theology, which has spread through evangelicalism so much, has done a lot to fuel the fires of unrest in the Middle East. And it exalts the nation Israel. It exalts the earthly nation of Jews. And it's very similar to the theology of the Pharisees. Well, I've talked about that in the Romans Bible study. And we'll be talking about it a bit more this week, this coming Friday, in the Romans Bible study as well. But it's very clear that we not unduly exalt the Jews. There's coming a day when there's going to be a great revival that God will affect among the Jews. But when he does that, what's going to happen? They'll come to faith in Christ, and they'll be true Israelites like every Christian. You are a Jew, a true Israelite. If you're in Christ, you are children of Abraham. And so as I said, There's no end to the splitting of hairs and division that you have to make of categories in scripture if you embrace dispensational theology, all right? So all right, well, let's read together here then. 1 Timothy chapter 6. Let all who are under a yoke as bondservants regard their own masters as worthy of all honor, so that the name of God and the teaching may not be reviled. Those who have believing masters must not be disrespectful on the ground that they are brothers. Rather, they must serve all the better, since those who benefit by their good service are believers and beloved. Teach and urge these things. If anyone teaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching, that accords with godliness. He's puffed up with conceit and understands nothing. He has an unhealthy craving for controversy and for quarrels about words, which produce envy, dissension, slander, evil suspicions, and constant friction among people who are depraved in mind and deprived of the truth, imagining that godliness is a means of gain. But godliness with contentment is great gain, for we brought nothing into the world, and we cannot take anything out of the world. But if we have food and clothing, with these we will be content. But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation, into a snare, into many senseless and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs. But as for you, oh man of God, flee these things. Pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, steadfastness, gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called and about which you made the good confession in the presence of many witnesses. I charge you in the presence of God, who gives life to all things, and of Christ Jesus, who in his testimony before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, to keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which he will display at the proper time. He who is blessed and only sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone has immortality, who dwells in unapproachable light, whom no one has ever seen or can see. To him be honor and eternal dominion, amen. As for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be haughty, nor to set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly provides us with everything to enjoy. They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share, thus storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is truly life. Oh, Timothy, guard the deposit entrusted to you. Avoid the irreverent babble and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge. For by professing it, some have swerved from the faith. Grace be with you. There is great instruction to the young pastor, Timothy, and then to us as well. And we particularly are going to be considering that last verse in that section, verse 20, where Paul instructs Timothy, guard the deposit entrusted to you. And we're going to see how that applies then to us and to the church then today. So let's ask the Lord's blessing then on the ministry of his word. Father, we want to be faithful servants of Christ and guard that deposit entrusted to us. We want to hear what your word has to say about this subject, and we pray, Father, that you would enable us to hear it, that you would give us, by your Spirit, ears to hear and eyes to see, and that we would be wise in this regard, and that we would become wiser our ability by your spirit that dwells in us and by your word to discern evildoers when they come, when they would distort that gospel entrusted to us. And so, Father, we pray that you would equip us for that battle now as we hear your word. And we pray this in Christ's name. Amen. Well, here's that verse, that last couple of verses there, 1 Timothy 6. I printed it out at the start of your handout. By the way, those of you listening online, if you aren't aware of that, you can go to sermonaudio.com slash CRC. And everywhere where one of our sermon videos is posted there, There's also a copy. You can click on that, and you can print out a printed copy of the sermon manuscript as well. But here's this charge that Paul gives to Timothy. Oh, Timothy. So he's serious. Here's Timothy. It's important. Oh, Timothy, guard the deposit entrusted to you. And it's almost like he's saying, Here's one way you can guard that deposit. Avoid the irreverent babble and contradictions of what is falsely called knowledge. A lot of the stuff that's taught in seminaries, that's a great description. Irreverent babble and contradictions, what is falsely called knowledge. For by professing it, some have swerved from the faith. Grace be with you. Well, as we're going to see this morning, as we turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 4, the first five or six verses there, as we continue our series through 1 Corinthians, we find that we are stewards. If you're a Christian, you are a steward, and this church, is a steward. We are the body of Christ, and we've been entrusted with something, with a treasure. That's what a steward is. A steward is a person who has been entrusted with something, generally something valuable, something that belongs to someone else who has entrusted it to them. We, as Christ Church, our stewards. And as Paul tells Timothy here, this treasure that Christ has entrusted us with has to be guarded very, very carefully. Guard the deposit entrusted to you. And it is only by doing this that we're going to be found faithful in the Lord's sight. You can't go to the right. You can't go to the left. There's no room. For variation here, this treasure that we've been entrusted with has to be preserved in the exact same form in which it was delivered to us by the Lord. So what is this treasure that he's entrusted us with as his steward? Well, it's the gospel. It's the gospel. It's the very same treasure that Paul entrusted, passed on to Timothy. And I think we can very much say that by gospel. Sometimes the word gospel, specifically, it's the message of salvation in Christ. But if you think about it, the whole Bible from Genesis to Revelation is that gospel, that good news as you find Christ on every page. So we could also say that, as Paul talks to Timothy about this, all scripture has been entrusted to us. Christ's church has been entrusted with his word. It is a sacred, and holy trust. It is not to be trifled with. It's not to be tweaked or altered. It is to be faithfully, then, preserved. We see this further here. Here's another example of this instruction, 2 Timothy 1, 13 to 14. Follow the pattern of the sound words that you've heard from me. Well, even right there. The sound words he heard from Paul, what were those? Scripture, right? In the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, and here it is again, guard the good deposit entrusted to you. You as an individual Christian, when you're holding your Bible, you have been entrusted by Christ to stand for that word of God, and to share it, to proclaim it faithfully as it has been delivered then to you. 2 Timothy 3, but as for you, continue in what you've learned. Well, what was that? Scripture. And have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it, and how from childhood you have been acquainted with, here it is, the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. Now, what were those sacred writings that Timothy was trained in as he was growing up? The Old Testament. So there you see that even the Old Testament can said to be the gospel, because he says, he tells Timothy, the Old Testament writings that you were raised up in are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. The Old Testament preaches Christ Jesus. All scripture, here it is, all scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. So he's telling Timothy, now continue in this, in what you've learned, what? Scripture, continue in it, preserve it, it's a sacred trust, 2 Timothy 4. I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing in his kingdom, preach the word. What word? The scripture. Preach the word. Be ready in season and out of season. Reprove, rebuke, and exhort with complete patience and teaching. For the time is coming, and we're in it, when people will not endure sound teaching. What's that sound teaching? It's scripture. It's the Bible, it's the word of God. But having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions, and will turn away from listening to the truth, God's word, and wander off into myths. And we see endless examples of that happening so much then today. So this sacred trust, the good deposit which has been entrusted to us, must not be tampered with. We are to guard it. We are to preserve it. And when we share it and preach it, we are to share it and preach it as it has been delivered to us, unaltered, unchanged. Nor are we to permit anybody else to alter it. That is to say, when someone creeps in among us and starts trying to teach something that is a distortion of scripture We are not to allow it. If we're going to guard the deposit as good stewards, we're not going to permit that. Some of you know, some years ago, it's probably been, what, 15 years ago or something like that, a man and his wife moved up here and they were all excited about our church. They'd come from the south. reformed church down in texas somewhere and so here they came they're all excited and flattering and you know this is the greatest church and and so on and and we just love this place but they had a hidden agenda especially the guy and his hidden agenda was he had embraced federal vision theology and which is nothing less it's just salvation by works it's It's Roman Catholicism, basically. So that was his real goal. And he was trying to spread it. He came up here to convert us to federal vision. And as that became more and more evident, and he got more outspoken about it, I remember one Sunday morning, he had been particularly verbose about this stuff in a previous men's Bible study. So one Sunday morning when he showed up for Sunday school, I called him back to my office and I said, okay, you can be here, but you're not to talk. You are to keep your mouth shut because you're spreading False doctrine, and that's not going to be permitted. And of course, he got mad, and great offense, and so forth, and grabs his cell phone and calls his wife. And we're being commanded that we can't worship the Lord, you know, and all this kind of classic narcissistic stuff and whatever. But it wasn't a lot, but just a few days. He sold his house and moved back to where he came from and so forth, see? But we're not, so we don't permit that stuff. When somebody is going to corrupt the word of God that's been entrusted to us, we don't stand for it. Largely, that's what the reformers were doing. They were standing for this treasure that God had entrusted the church with, and which Rome had corrupted, you see. And so they said, uh-uh. We're not going to be subject to that. And we're going to expose this. And some of them died and were killed as a result of standing for this sacred trust. But we are stewards of the Lord. And a steward, as we'll see Paul say here in a minute, there's one thing that's required of a steward. And that's that he be found faithful. Faithful in what? guarding the deposit that his master has entrusted him with. And in our case, then, it is the church. You know, it's rather amazing, when you think about it and you study the history of the church, that the Bible even exists. I mean, the Bible, how many times have tyrants and so forth tried to stamp out the Bible? William Tyndale and others translate the Bible. And all of Rome's attacks come against them, and their blood is spilled, and so on. Rome came against Luther and would have killed him if it hadn't been for God's providence there. But he was standing. He was raised Roman Catholic, remember? And he was a priest. He was a Roman Catholic priest. But he read the Bible. He found the Bible, and he read it. And eventually, the fireworks of God's spirit went off in his brain when he was reading Romans 1. And he began to understand the righteousness of God, which is revealed from faith to faith. It's entirely a faith. Here he is. This is a picture of a faithful steward. He's standing before this inquisition, standing alone. All of the big church hotshots and all of their garb and so forth, telling him he's wrong, telling him he's wrong. And he says, here I stand. Here it is. Faithfully guarding that which has been entrusted to the church, then, you see. Well, what was happening in Corinth is what Paul warned Timothy about. The Corinthians came from a background of Greek philosophy, exalting human wisdom, which was, of course, then, in the end, foolishness. And the Greek philosophers considered the gospel to be nonsense, a folly. foolishness. And that attitude, that arrogance, that pride was infecting the Corinthian church so that the gospel was being endangered. And to mix the Greek philosophy up in the gospel so that it was no gospel then at all. So the Corinthians were not being faithful in preserving this pearl of great price. And so here's what Paul tells them. 1 Corinthians 4, beginning in verse 1. This is how one should regard us, and he means himself and the other apostles, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. Moreover, it is required of stewards that they may be found faithful, but with me, It's a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court. In fact, I don't even judge myself, for I'm not aware of anything against myself, but I'm not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me. Therefore, do not pronounce judgment before the time. Before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart Then each one will receive his commendation from God. Well, there's at least four points here that we want to look at that this passage of scripture brings up. First of all, human beings gravitate towards a false message that exalts man and diminishes God. Because man, in his sin, craves the world's wisdom and considers God's wisdom as foolishness. That's the reason Timothy has to guard the deposit of Scripture entrusted to him. Because, as Paul told him, days are coming when it's going to be even more widespread that people don't want to hear the truth. They want to hear an altered gospel. that appeals to their flesh and so on. Secondly, the gospel is the gospel of God, God's gospel. It doesn't originate in man. Paul's gospel was Paul's gospel because it was the gospel he preached. But it wasn't Paul's gospel. He was merely, and that's his point here, he was merely a steward entrusted with this valuable deposit. the good news of salvation. Third, the church and you and I individually must never fear man's judgment, nor must we even doubt ourselves as long as we are faithfully guarding what's been entrusted to us by the Lord. We must never fear man's judgment. And fourth, a day is coming, Paul says, when Christ will come, He will examine us, and he will specifically determine whether we've been faithful stewards of his gospel or not. So let's think some more about man gravitating toward a false gospel. He craves it. A lot of the Bible is, a lot of the Bible, Old and New Testament, would never have been written if it weren't for the fact that man is alienated from God and he despises God's wisdom. What we've got here, there's always this bent, and we have to guard our own flesh against it, there's always this bent, this tendency in man to drift away from the truth of the gospel toward human philosophy, some kind of gospel, so-called, of works or something like that. That's what was happening in Corinth. They were drifting. And it was the same thing that happened in the churches of Galatia. Here, listen to Paul. I'm astonished that you're so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel. Not that there is another one, but there are some who trouble you and wanted to distort the gospel of Christ. So there's this tendency to drift away from God's truth. And there's always, always wolves in wool, false teachers, evil people who creep into the church to present a lie that appeals to people's flesh. And so that's man's tendency. The Corinthians, in doing this, they regarded themselves as being wise. What they were doing was they were exalting the man instead of the treasure that he delivered to them, all right? That was the error. And that will lead to this tendency of embracing a false gospel. Their focus was upon the person, upon the preacher. Remember, they were saying right off the bat, I am of Apollos. I am of Paul. I am of Cephas, and so forth. So their focus was on the preacher instead of where it should have been on the mysteries of God, as Paul calls it, which the apostle had delivered then to them. And this is one of the ways that people drift away from the true gospel and from those that preach the true gospel and preserve what's been entrusted to them. And they drift toward a false gospel and false teachers. Why? Because they focus on externals. They focus on the man instead of the message that the man is delivering. So this is happening. It always happens in the church. How often have you heard people say, they'll say things like, well, you know, I read this verse here from Paul. And you know, Paul can just be so dogmatic. I kind of prefer to read Peter or something like that, you see. So they're looking at the person. I like Apollo's style of preaching. You guys like Paul or Peter, but I like Apollo's. And so such people are focusing on the steward rather than the treasure he's been entrusted with. Now, this is a dangerous trap because, If you compare, you know I'm always gonna talk about Lloyd-Jones, right? But think about it, that's true. If you compare the preaching of Martin Lloyd-Jones with, let's say, the preaching of, let's see, who's a slick heretic? Yeah, there you go. Piper's got his problems, all right, for sure. Here's somebody who's like, they're really impressive in how they're preaching. Paul told the Corinthians, I didn't come to you that way. I don't want to present myself to you that way, because your face can rest on me instead of on the gospel. But if you look at the external, and this happens all the time. I've tried to refer people to, look, here's Lloyd-Jones, and you can listen to his message. I tried that, you know, but he's got that accent and this and that. See what I mean? Their focus is in the wrong place. Lloyd-Jones, or any genuine preacher, doesn't want people to focus on them. You need to be focused on what they're saying, on the message, on this gospel that's been entrusted to them, and comparing it with Scripture. to see whether it is, whether they are a faithful steward or not. If we look at externals, oh, man, that guy's a great speaker. Wow. And he told so many good stories. If you go that route, inevitably, you're going to end up embracing, then, a false gospel. This is why Paul says, this is how one should regard us. himself, and Apollos, and Peter. He said, this is how you guys should consider us. Even though he's an apostle, even though they're apostles appointed by Christ, this is how you should regard us, as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. It's required of stewards that they be found faithful. And we are to take our Bibles and compare what we're being was being preached to us, and determine whether this person is a faithful steward of Christ, then, or not. Now, a little note here. It's interesting, isn't it? Why does Paul use this phrase for the gospel, the mysteries of God? The mystery. This is how one should regard us as servants of Christ and stewards of the mysteries of God. He doesn't say of the scripture. doesn't say of the Gospel, but he says the mysteries of God. Well, what he's doing there, and it's what he's been doing all along in 1 Corinthians, is he's rebuking the Corinthians for their arrogance. He is reminding them that the Gospel is a mystery. That it is the wisdom of God, and it's a mystery, an enigma to the natural man. The natural man can't see it. He can't understand it. It has to be revealed to man by the Holy Spirit. So he had said, 1 Corinthians 2, yet among the mature, we do impart wisdom, although it's not a wisdom of this age or of the rulers of this age who are doomed to pass away. But we impart a secret and hidden wisdom of God, which God decreed before the ages for our glory. And then in the last verse of that section, verse 10, these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit, for the Spirit searches everything, even the depths, then, of God. And so the faithful steward, the faithful servant of Christ who is guarding that treasure of deposit, the word of God that's been entrusted to them, is going to be preaching and delivering a message that's foolishness to the natural man. And it's like Paul is saying when he says, the mysteries of God, he's saying, if you're stumbling over this gospel that I've preached to you, then just maybe you need to take a hard look at yourself and see whether the spirit of God is in you then or not. Well, secondly, the gospel is God's gospel. It is not a product of human wisdom. Paul says that he is to be regarded as a steward of the mysteries of God. They're not mysteries that Paul drummed up. They're the mysteries of God. It's the gospel of God, you see. That is, where did it come from? How did the apostles get it? Paul's going to remind them. When I came to you, my message I was preaching to you wasn't my message. I didn't invent this thing. It was delivered to me. He says it really clearly to the Galatian churches, Galatians 1, for I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man's gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ. How do you become a steward, a master that owns something, chooses me to be a steward and entrusts me with this something valuable that I am to guard then and protect. And that's how Paul became an apostle. He didn't just dream up what he was preaching to them, you see. He reiterates this later in 1 Corinthians 15. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, all right? He said, I received this from Christ, and I am commissioned as his steward to use what he entrusted me with as he instructs me to use it. to preach the gospel just as he delivered it. You remember, if you watch, most of you probably watched The Lord of the Rings, or remember that character, kind of a disgusting character, the steward of Gondor, the steward of Gondor. And that's just a good example of a steward. Here he is. He's sitting on the throne of Gondor, acting like he's the king. He was not a faithful servant. He was not a faithful steward. He was entrusted with management of the kingdom of Gondor in the absence of the rightful and true king. But he took over as if he were king, and he almost destroyed Gondor then as a result. He was an usurper. The Pope of Rome is an unfaithful steward. He claims to be the vicar or the representative, the steward of Christ in this world. But we know that his claim is false for lots of reasons. But if for no other reason, he's not a faithful steward. What is a faithful steward of Christ? A faithful steward of Christ is a person to whom Christ's gospel, God's word, has been entrusted to be used proclaimed as Christ instructed the steward to use it and without altering the content at all. So we know that the Pope of Rome is a false steward because he and his minions long ago distorted the gospel so that it's no gospel at all. They didn't guard the treasure then that was entrusted to the church. His gospel, the Pope's gospel is of his own creation. And the reason that Rome has millions and millions and millions of followers is because it's man's wisdom, right? It's man's wisdom. You can see here, if you're trying to determine who is a faithful steward of Christ and who's not, you can see how foolish and stupid people will look at the externals. They'll look at the Pharisees, the whitewashed tomb. And oh, that's nice. So they'll look at Rome and all of its pageantry and its cathedrals and its wealth and its magical rites and so forth and its claim that I can just, yeah, we can justify this person. We'll just baptize him. There, you're justified. And all of these false things, the fleshly attraction of Mary, co-matrix, co-redeemer with Christ, and all of these things that are injected to appeal then to the flesh and to reinforce the Pope's power, the Pope is an unfaithful steward. And he is anathema in God's sight. Thirdly, the church must never fear man's judgment. Paul says this in verses 3 and 4. But with me, it's a very small thing that I should be judged by you. That's what the Corinthians were doing. They were judging him. You know, these false teachers had come in. Well, look at the guy. He's not very impressive. And his speech is unimpressive. And so, well, sure, his letters are weighty and strong and all that. But the guy himself is just not impressive. And so they were buying into this. And they were being then alienated from Paul, and therefore alienated from the gospel and from Christ. And Paul says, I know that you guys are doing this. But it's a small thing to me. that you would judge me. It's a small thing to me that any human court would judge me. I don't even judge myself. I'm not aware of anything against myself, but I don't acquit myself even. It's the Lord who judges me. Now, why is it that churches and individual Christians and preachers and so on so often distort the gospel rather than being faithful stewards and entrusting what has been and guarding what's been entrusted to them. Why do they do that? How come? Why do they take this gospel, the gospel of Christ, and then they want to change the message, just alter it some? How come? Well, typically, it's because they fear what Paul's talking about here. It's a big thing to them that people might judge them. It's the fear of man. And so they crave the approval of the world. Look now, if you follow Christ, if you're born again, you are not going to have the approval of the world. If you're craving the approval of the world, of people, you can't follow Christ. You can't. He won't have it. The two things are incompatible. So Paul and his gospel were being judged by the Corinthians due to these false teachers. But Paul keeps things in perspective. I know you're judging me. It's a small thing, no matter, it's a small thing to me that you're examining me this way. I don't even examine myself. You guys are being arrogant, you see. Paul's perspective here on this business is very clear. Here's the truth of the matter. If you're following Christ, if you're born again, and you are faithful to his word, and you believe his word, and you share his word accurately, truthfully with others, you're gonna be judged, and you need to keep it in perspective. It's meaningless. It's a small thing. It's a small thing when people begin to judge us. If we begin to fear not being popular with people and so forth, well, then all of a sudden, when people judge us, it's a big thing. And that's going to mess you up, right? The fear of man is a snare. It's responsible for a lot of our anxiety and our troubles. Many, many, many professing Christians, pastors, and so on crave the approval of man. They want the approval of man. And what's the inevitable outcome of that? They're going to change the gospel. They're going to tweak it. Sometimes just a little bit is enough to make it acceptable to man. That's what Rome has done. But many, many Protestant and evangelical preachers and churches and theologians have done exactly the same thing. If you fear man, this is something that you should really think, all of us should think seriously about this. How much of my life and my thinking is driven by the fear of man, right? How much of it? It's a terrible, Snare. Some of us grew up with the fear of man, right? And maybe you had a parent that was a narcissist or something, right? Something like that. And so what'd you do from your earliest years? You set out to live your life, what? To please them. to please them. You live your life in the fear of man. And Paul says, as Christ's people, as Christians, we've got to come to the point where we've got to stop that. We have to be free of the fear of man. I want to be a faithful steward. I want to fear God. I want God's approval, you see. That's the way that we are supposed to go. I think all of us will be amazed how, to one degree or another, probably every one of us, to one degree or another, is influenced by this business of the fear of man and trying to please man. to just get it through our head. You know, you guys have acquaintances who aren't Christians. I have acquaintances that I know who aren't Christians who I like them. But I can catch myself, if I'm not careful, I can catch myself being kind of disappointed because you wish they would be better friends, you know, you want to be friends with them, you want to be, but if they're not believers and they know that you're a Christian, that relationship is only going to go so far, right? And so you can slide into this business of trying to, how can I get that guy to like me more? Well, you can't, unless you start compromising your walk with Christ. you see, and go to the world, then, instead. And we must not do that, you see. We have to apply these things very much to ourselves. All right? So let's put the question to yourself. What do you want? I mean, when you get out of bed in the morning and you start living your life, what is it that you're after? What do you want? Do you want the approval of Christ or do you want the approval of man? You will never have both. You can't have the approval of the world and the approval of Christ at the same time. It's been my experience in, let's see, I lose track anymore. I've been a pastor now for over 40 years. And in the three churches that I've been the pastor of, there have always been people who claim to be Christian, sometimes a lot of them, who claim to be Christians. But their real goal is to maintain the approval of man, to gain that. It's like sometimes you wonder, why do you bother being a Christian? I don't understand why, you know. See the stuff in your life. Why do you even bother? Well, they're using religion as another way to gain the approval of man. Look at me. Look at what a fine Christian I am, and so forth. But in every one of the churches that we've been in, There have been plenty of those kind of people. They claim to be Christians, but their real goal is to gain and maintain the approval of men. And this church is no exception. In fact, in the history of this church, there's probably been more of that than other places that I've been. It is a deadly disease, and it will take you to hell. If you're living your life to be popular with the world, then plainly, you are not a faithful steward of Christ. Because you're not getting this. If you're getting popularity with the world, with unbelievers, you're popular with them. That's what you crave. You're compromising the gospel, which has been entrusted to you. You're not willing to be regarded by the world as a fool, as Paul was, or to pay the price. encourage people to ask themselves, when's the last time your claim to be a Christian cost you something, you see? So many, many people that profess to be Christians are actually living a lie. They're not faithful stewards. And so Paul says in this regard, he even says this, I don't even judge myself. Now, does this smack of arrogance to you, right? On the surface, it can sound like it. It's a small thing whether you guys judge me. I don't even judge myself. Well, we know that Paul's not being arrogant, so what does he mean? Well, what he means is explained in verse four. It's the Lord who judges me. Paul says, look, I'm, to my knowledge, I'm a faithful steward of Christ. But in the end, it's not man's judgment whether I'm a faithful steward. It's not my judgment. It's not your judgment. It is the judgment of the Lord. Matthew 24, who then is the faithful and wise servant whom his master has set over his household to give them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that servant whom his master will find so doing when he comes. Truly, I say to you, he will set him over all his possessions. But if that wicked servant says to himself, my master's delayed, and begins to beat his fellow servants, and eats and drinks with drunkards, the master of that servant will come on a day when he does not expect him, and at an hour he does not know. He will cut him in pieces and put him with the hypocrites. In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. The faithful and the unfaithful steward, you see. Now, there's another side, a little bit different angle, nuance here that we want to look at in Paul's statement that he doesn't even judge himself, right? It's the Lord that judges me. I don't even judge myself. And it's this. Here's, all right. We may judge ourselves to be unfaithful. See, it's not just a matter of, oh, I judge myself to be a faithful servant of Christ. He, of course, you know, Paul's saying, no, no, it's Christ who will call me a faithful servant or not. It's his determination that matters. I don't boast. But if I judge myself, I'm going to look at myself. Am I a faithful steward? Well, to my knowledge, as Paul says, I'm a faithful steward of what God's entrusted to me. But what if I I as a Christian, I look at myself, I judge myself, and I've messed up here, I've messed up there. I'm an unfaithful steward. And then what do you do? You do something really stupid. It's a trap. We are not wise when we compare ourselves with ourselves. We start comparing ourselves to others, right? We start comparing. And what's going to happen? What's going to happen? This is a huge trap. If we start looking at, for example, other churches, other Christians, other pastors, right? Look at Rome if you want, but let's just keep it within evangelical ranks here. We look at others and What do we come up with as a conclusion? Man, look at what they're accomplishing. Look at the buildings they've put up. Look at all the people that apparently they're winning for Christ, right? And they got hundreds and hundreds of people coming, so forth. Man, those guys must be faithful. servants and God's blessing them, and then look at me. And Paul's warning us here also. He says, don't do that. Don't judge yourself. Be a faithful steward to the best of your ability. Leave the results to the Lord. And in the end, it's him that makes the judgment. All right. We just have a little bit left to go here. So we'll see if we can fly over it, but this is extremely important as well. Wait for the Lord's judgment and look for his praise. Now, what I wanted us to focus on here particularly is what the Corinthians were doing, and this can be something that we fall into as well, all right? We've seen this. What are they doing? How are they judging Paul? How are they judging him? How were they judging Apollos and so on? Well, they were largely judging them by outward appearance, but also they were presuming to be able to disclose the motives of Paul's heart, to look into his heart and pass judgment then upon his motives. Now, to understand this, We need to also look at verse six. Listen to it carefully. I've applied all these things to myself and Apollos for your benefit, brothers, that you may learn by us not to go beyond what is written. There's the punchline that we gotta get a hold of. Don't go beyond what is written. is written. You guys are judging me. You're judging Apollos. And the way that you're judging is you're going beyond what is written. What does that mean? I mean, after all, we're supposed to judge a preacher or somebody that claims to be a Christian and so forth, whether they're real then or not. But Paul says, when you evaluate a word, or a message preached, or a preacher, or whatever, or somebody else that claims to be a Christian, when you evaluate them and examine them, don't go beyond what is written, or you're going to be in trouble. It will take you right back to Rome. What does he mean by that? What is this? What is written? What is that? It's not that hard to figure out. Here's Paul's own phrases right here in 1 Corinthians, repeatedly. 1 Corinthians 1, for it is written. What does he mean by that? He means it's scripture. It's scripture. It is written. And then he quotes scripture. I will destroy the wisdom of the wise. 1 Corinthians 131, so that as it is written, and this is out of Jeremiah 9, let the one who boasts boast in the Lord. 1 Corinthians 2, but as it is written, what no eye has seen. Quotes the Old Testament again. 1 Corinthians 3, 4, it is written, Old Testament quote, he catches the wise in their craftiness. So when Paul says, When you examine someone or some teaching, and he says, don't go beyond what is written, what he means is judge by the scripture. Don't be thinking that you can look at somebody's heart and motives. Don't be thinking that, well, I will make my conclusion based on how this guy looks. or something like that, or how eloquent his speech is. You evaluate by the word of God. Test the spirits, John says in 1 John. That's how you do it. Perfect example, Acts 17. The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea, and when they arrived, they went into the Jewish synagogue. Now these Jews were more noble than those in Thessalonica, because the Jews there just persecuted them. Why were they more noble in Berea? They received the word with all eagerness. Now look at this. Examining the scriptures daily to see if these things were so. Here's Paul preaching to them, and they're going, oh, we better see if this is so. How are we going to do that by what is written? We're going to go to the scriptures, you see. It isn't just because, well, I don't like what that guy is saying. I don't like that. I don't like this guy. I don't like how he looks, right? You go to the scripture or you're going to be in trouble. We can put it like this. If we're judging a person, if a person is a faithful steward of Christ or if a church is a faithful steward of Christ or a preacher, then we greatly err and are guilty of arrogance if we examine by anything but the written word of God. If we go beyond what is written, we will inevitably reject the genuine and embrace the false, all right? Oh, they have a huge, campus and so forth, and buildings, and a huge budget at that church, it must be genuine, right? Because, boy, that's the blessing. Now, wait a minute. What are they preaching? What are they teaching? And how does that compare with what is written? That is how we are to examine it. You know, people, it's frustrating, isn't it? People can be so gullible. Sometimes I've been gullible. You have those moments when you kick yourself, you know. But people can be so foolish and so gullible. It's like, I was in that church service and I could just feel the spirit. Well, you may have, but what spirit was it? You're supposed to test the spirits. Well, I just know. I just know that was the Holy Spirit. How do you know? How do you know? The only way you're going to know is whether you take what the preacher was preaching, those words, and compare those words with scripture. And they're going, you do not use your feelings to then evaluate. And that's why Paul is saying it. It's not just a small thing if you guys are gonna judge me. What really matters is what the Lord has to say. and what his word has to say. Well, all kinds of important things for us to chew on then this week and pray about and grow wise in regard to this great salvation. Father, we thank you for your word. Thank you that it is written and that we can hold it right here in our hands. We can open it up, study it, and be equipped then for every good work and to be able to discern your truth from error. We give you thanks for all of this in Christ's name we pray, amen.