Elder Who Teaches

[00:00:01] O Lord our God, we thank youk that we can rely on youn, that yout always care for us, give us what we need. And we confess that what we need most of all is yous. [00:00:20] Our souls were made to know youw, to have fellowship with youh, to be even your friends. [00:00:31] And we thank you that you have made a way that this would be possible. [00:00:38] Yes, through your Son, Jesus, forgiving us of our sins and taking away what stood between us and you, so that we might be reconciled to you, that we might truly be your friends, your children. [00:00:55] We might draw near to you with boldness, as we do now. [00:00:59] But we thank you that through the Lord Jesus and His ministry, you have given your church the most marvelous gift that we could receive in this life, that you have poured out your Holy Spirit on us so that you indwell us, you live in us by your Spirit. [00:01:23] And he draws us into union with Jesus, your Son, who is the way, the Truth, and the life, so that through him we are drawn to you, the Father. [00:01:37] And so we worship you, Father, Son and Holy Spirit. And we ask now, O Holy Spirit, that you would work on our hearts through your Word, that your Word might touch our hearts, dealing with them in every way that we have need, and most especially by drawing us into greater faith and love for the Lord Jesus, our Savior, in whose name we pray. Amen. [00:02:08] I'm going to ask you to be seated now as we turn in our Bibles to hear from God's Word. [00:02:18] I'm going to read from three texts, first from the Old Testament in Malachi 2, and then we'll turn to the New Testament and I'll tell you where we're going after we read from Malachi 5, chapter 2. Malachi, chapter 2, we're going to look at, as we look at Titus 1:5, we're going to look at two texts here. [00:02:49] Here from two texts, one in the Old Testament, one in the New Testament, both of which tell us something about the ministry of the Word, what it is that preachers do. First, looking at the Old Testament preachers, the priests and Levites, and then secondly at the New Testament preachers, the ministers of the Gospel. So first, from Malachi, chapter two, beginning in verse five, my covenant with him, that is, with Levi, the Levites. My covenant with him was one of life and peace. [00:03:25] I gave them to him. [00:03:28] It was a covenant of fear. And he feared me. [00:03:31] He stood in awe of My name. [00:03:34] True instruction was in his mouth, and no wrong was found on his lips. [00:03:43] He walked with me in peace and uprightness and he turned many from iniquity. [00:03:52] For the lips of a priest should guard knowledge, and people should speak instruction from his mouth, for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts. [00:04:06] And then turning in the New Testament to 2 Corinthians, chapter 4, 2 Corinthians chapter 4. I'll read verses 1 through 6, 2nd Corinthians 4, beginning in verse 1. [00:04:20] Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart. [00:04:28] But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. [00:04:34] We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's word, but by the open statement of the truth, we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God. [00:04:51] And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing in their case. The God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. [00:05:11] For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants. For Jesus sake. [00:05:22] For God who said, let light shine out of darkness has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. [00:05:34] And then turning finally to our sermon text, Titus 1:5. Titus 1:5. [00:05:43] This is why I left you in Crete, so that you might put what remained into order and appoint elders in every town as I directed you. [00:05:55] That's part of God's word. [00:06:03] We took a break from Titus to explore the kingship of Christ as it was revealed in that Christ child. It was predicted in Isaiah 9:6, that child that was born to us. Now we're returning to our study in Titus Brief. [00:06:24] Try to briefly summarize everything we've looked at so far. Here in chapter one, we looked at how Paul laid out for us the aims or goals of the gospel ministry. [00:06:37] And then we looked at the basis upon which the gospel ministry stood. The promise of God to save sinners in Christ Jesus. A promise made from all eternity. [00:06:49] And then lastly, we left off when we looked at the mission that Paul had given Titus as he left him on the island of Crete. Paul had started this missionary work with Titus on the island of Crete. And then Paul had to go away to do something else. And. And he left Titus behind to do several things to finish and complete the mission that they had begun together. [00:07:14] They'd gone around and preached the gospel in all the towns on the island of Crete. People had heard the gospel. They had come to saving Faith in Christ. So now there were new disciples. [00:07:24] And it was Titus job as a pastor to go around and finish training these new disciples. They needed to be untrained, as it were from their pagan ways and retrained into true faith in Jesus Christ and obedience to the Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, they needed to learn how to live as new Christians, new believers to be built up in that faith in Christ. That was the first thing of what remained that Titus was left to complete. The second thing was that he needed to to organize these new believers into congregations. [00:08:05] This new church made up of disciples needed some structure. It needed some care and oversight. And that was the second thing was to appoint elders in every city. [00:08:17] Now we're going to look consider together this evening. Begin considering together this evening who these elders are, these guys that Titus was supposed to go around training and appointing over the new believers, organizing them into churches. [00:08:35] I want to look with you briefly now at our text, verse 5, especially considering this phrase that Titus had been left to appoint elders in every town. [00:08:50] As I directed you. [00:08:54] I want to start with the end of that phrase. [00:08:58] You need to appoint these men as I directed you or as I commanded you. [00:09:04] Paul, as he gives these instructions to Titus, is doing so not just as Titus senior pastor. And he was. He was the leader. He was sort of the senior pastor on the missionary team. [00:09:17] He could give directions to Titus as the senior pastor. But the way Paul's speaking here is not just as sort of the senior guy, but as an apostle, as one who was appointed by Jesus Christ with authority to speak on behalf of Christ. In other words, Christ had given each of the apostles a body of teaching instruction that they were in turn to tell the new churches this is what Jesus wants us to do in his church. And in time, those teachings would become the Gospels and then the Epistles and the rest of the New Testament as we have it. But in the meantime, until the New Testament was completed, Paul and the other apostles could give instructions that came from Jesus Christ. And this is one of those that in each of Christ's churches, wherever new believers were gathered together, that some men were to be trained and appointed as elders. [00:10:13] Jesus has commanded that there be elders in each of his churches. [00:10:18] So who is this elder? So this is not just a command from Paul, but it's a command from Christ. [00:10:24] We don't have elders in our churches just because we think it's a good idea or a nice thing to have or it helps things run smoothly. No, we do it because Jesus says so. That's the first thing we draw out of the text. The second thing is, who are these elders? Who are these guys? [00:10:42] There's two terms in this chapter, two names that both refer to the same group of men, the same kinds of men. One of them is the word elder in verse five. [00:10:54] And then if you look down at verse seven, Paul uses a different word. He says an overseer must be above reproach. Some of your translations use an older word, bishop. Maybe you've heard that term bishops in the Episcopal Church or the Catholic Church. The word bishop or overseer, it's a biblical word. These two terms refer to the same people. Now, they have different. [00:11:18] They're emphasizing different things, but the two men are the same. If someone's an elder, he's a bishop. If someone's a bishop, he is an elder. The two words are used interchangeably here and in other places in the New Testament. [00:11:32] So who are these elders or bishops or overseers? [00:11:37] The term elder comes from its use in the Old Testament. So if you're reading your New Testament, you're reading along and you don't really bump into the word elder until you get to Acts where Paul, Paul and Barnabas are going around preaching the Gospel, planting new churches. And it tells us that they appointed elders in each city where they preach the gospel. [00:12:01] And it just tells us that. And it keeps going. It doesn't explain who these elders are. It doesn't give us all sorts of instruction. There's not some manual on what is an elder and how to be an elder and all of this. So you have to. You have to look at the Old Testament and say, oh, here's where this idea of elders came, came from. [00:12:19] Now, the word, just like our English word elder, the word in the Greek, and the word in the Old Testament in the Hebrew, both of them, it literally just means an old man. That's its original meaning. So elder just originally means old man. But you find in the Bible that it's used sometimes to refer to old men, but it gained a special usage. You know, we have that in English sometimes we have words that we use to commonly one way. And then. And then we have a special, special use that we attach to the word. And the word elder functions that way. It has a special usage. It became a title to refer to men who were in leadership roles or ruling, governing roles over God's people. [00:13:03] So if someone was a ruler or a governor among God's people in the Old Testament, he was called an elder. [00:13:12] There's various places you find this in the Old Testament. One Place where you hear this, you see it immediately is numbers 1116. [00:13:22] This is a good example because you see it right away. [00:13:25] I'll read it. The Lord said to Moses, gather to me 70 men of the elders of Israel whom you know to be elders of the people and officers of the over them. [00:13:37] Bring them to the tabernacle of meeting that they may stand there with you. [00:13:43] They aren't just old men, they're elders of the people who are officers over the people. So the word elder refers to men who serve as rulers or governors over the people. [00:13:57] The word bishop or overseer that you find in verse seven, that word bishop is an old English word that originally came from the Greek. And I won't give you all the etymology story, but that word bishop literally refers to the Greek word which itself simply means someone who keeps watch over others. [00:14:20] Someone who keeps watch over others. So our modern English word overseer is perfect translation for this word, just means someone who keeps watch over others. [00:14:30] So the one word elder refers to the ruling function, the word overseer. Bishop means this is a guy who keeps watch over other people, he cares for other people. [00:14:43] So we have elders and bishops. The older words or more modern words would be rulers, leaders and overseers. [00:14:52] That's who these people are, people who serve some kind of official function leading governing God's people. [00:14:59] One more point to draw out of this text. [00:15:03] And that has to do with the way the New Testament uses the word elder or elders. [00:15:10] There's more than one kind of elder in the New Testament. [00:15:16] In our church, mostly when we use the word elder, we use it with the word ruling elder. We talk about guys who are ruling elders, like Scott and Pete sitting up front here. So you're familiar with that word there. [00:15:30] They're ruling elders. And we use that to refer to guys who don't get up here and preach. They don't spend their whole life studying God's word and teaching and preaching. Instead, they have other jobs, but they serve a leading or ruling function in the church and primarily focus on that. [00:15:52] But the word elder in the Bible is used as a broader category to refer to any of the men, any of the men in the church who serve a special role that includes ruling any ruler in the church, not just the guys we call ruling elders, but any of them. And so the word seems to refer to a class of offices, a group of offices. [00:16:18] Maybe some examples in our own experience that would be similar to this would be if we said. Use the term, if we said that in the army there are commissioned officers, it's a class of men who all are leaders in the military, but they have different roles. Some of them maybe are lieutenants, some of them are generals, Some of them are majors. Right. They. They're all commissioned officers. Or maybe you could think of people who serve as legislators. We could say they're lawmakers. Right. [00:16:55] But there are different kinds of lawmakers. Some of them serve in the House of Representatives, some of them serve in the Senate. So we call some of them senators, others we call congressmen, but they're all legislators or lawmakers. This word elder is used in a similar fashion to refer to a class of offices, a group of offices. Some of them are ruling elders who only function as rulers. Others are also teachers, or sometimes we say teaching. Elders usually call them pastors. [00:17:27] In the New Testament, it includes these guys who only rule. It includes the guys who preach and teach the pastors or ministers. It also includes others. I'll give you one example. There's a couple examples. I'll give you one. So you can see this clearly in 1 Peter 5. 1 Peter says that the apostles are also elders. [00:17:50] So you know the apostles, guys like Peter, James, John, Andrew, Paul, they were apostles, but they're also included in this group of elders. So the term elder comprehends or includes several different offices. Ruling elders, pastors or teaching elders, as well as the apostles and some others. And all of them are called elders because all of them participate in ruling or leading in the church. [00:18:18] All right, enough about the meaning of words and etymologies and so forth. [00:18:24] One other verse where you can see this distinction made within the eldership is First Timothy 5, 17. And here the functions of the office, in other words, the work that the men do, is described. It says this. Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor. [00:18:45] The elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who work hard at preaching and teaching. [00:18:53] So there are elders who rule. That's all of them. And then there are some of these men who work not only in ruling, but also in preaching and teaching. So some have only one function, others serve both. [00:19:07] You see, there is distinction made according to function. So sometimes we call them ruling elders and teaching elders, or ruling elders and pastors. And these are the two offices that we have in the church today, the ruling elders and the pastors or the teaching elders. [00:19:25] Okay, there's your sort of beating the text to death. Drawing out of the meaning of the passage, we can summarize that teaching this way. [00:19:34] We're going to focus then first on the pastor or the Teaching elder. [00:19:39] We can state it this way. Jesus Christ as king and head of the church, has appointed in his office elders who teach, or we call them pastors or ministers. [00:19:52] We want to consider this guy, this elder, the teaching elder, or the pastor and his work. [00:19:59] We could do this a couple different ways. You can study the New Testament in terms of the pastor and his work. You can look at it in terms of his calling. There are passages that talk about the calling of ministers. There are passages that talk about his gifts that have been given to him in terms of preaching and studying the Scripture and so forth. [00:20:19] We're going to look this evening at this office through the titles, the names that the New Testament applies to this man, this teacher, teaching elder. [00:20:30] We usually call him pastor or minister. Both of them are biblical titles. [00:20:36] It turns out if you scour through your New Testament, you will find that there are lots and lots of names that the New Testament uses to describe this guy, the pastor or preacher. We're going to look at some of the more, maybe important ones, the ones we're more familiar with, and some of the more common ones, the ones that are used widely. [00:20:58] The New Testament calls this man the teaching elder. It calls him an ambassador of Christ. And if you want all the references later, if you're interested in looking all these up, just ask me, I'll give them to you. I'm just going to buzz through them here so you can hear the variety, the range of titles and functions that are described. This man is called an ambassador of Christ because Christ sent. The king sends this man to plead with sinners, to plead with them that they would turn from their sins and be reconciled to God. So he's called an ambassador of Christ. [00:21:34] The New Testament calls this man a shepherd or pastor. The words mean the same thing, pastor being coming from a Latin word for shepherd. He's called a pastor or shepherd because he gathers Jesus lost sheep into the fold. He goes out and he finds the sheep like a shepherd does. He gathers them in and then he feeds them, feeds them with the proper food that Jesus sheep need. [00:22:01] They need to be fed with Christ, and they're fed with the bread of life. Jesus, he's a shepherd because he's called to protect the flock from wolves and others. [00:22:17] This man is called a teacher because Jesus wants him to go and make disciples for the great teacher Jesus and to take those new disciples and to teach them everything that Jesus commanded. So he's a teacher. [00:22:33] He's called a steward of the mysteries of God. [00:22:39] As a steward, he's like A manager placed over the household of God. [00:22:44] And it's his job to dispense food and sustenance to the members of God's household. [00:22:54] He dispenses the Gospel and the sacraments as a steward of the mysteries of God. He gives the members of the household what they need. He feeds them with Jesus. [00:23:07] In the Gospel, he is to lead the household of God as a steward in worshiping God. And so he's to be devoted to the ministry of the word and to prayer. [00:23:19] As he dispenses the mysteries of God, he seals those who are in the household of God with the seals of the covenant, the seals of the household of God with baptism in the Lord's Supper. [00:23:33] He's an ambassador, he's a pastor, he's a teacher, he's a steward. [00:23:37] He is called, and there's two Greek words, two different Greek words that translate into our English as minister. [00:23:44] He is a minister of Christ, and he's also called a minister of the word. [00:23:50] This Greek word refers to the idea of a royal official who serves under the king. [00:23:58] He's a minister. [00:24:00] Think of the king's herald who goes and represents the king and declares the king's edict. [00:24:08] So the king sends his ministers in this sense, ministers of the king. He sends them out to open wide the doors of the kingdom of heaven. [00:24:19] And he does so by calling men to repent and be saved, turn to Jesus, follow the king, come and enter his kingdom as ministers of the word, ministers of Christ. They go forth, forth and call men to Christ. [00:24:39] They speak for the king with his authority. So when men hear and obey, they obey not the minister, but they obey the king. [00:24:50] And then finally we come to the most common, the most commonly used title for this man, the pastor or the teacher. [00:24:57] He is called. This is also translated different Greek word, translated as minister or servant. [00:25:04] It's the word that we also use for deacon. So this is a little confusing. We have deacons in our church, right? Those who are especially charged with caring for the poor. [00:25:15] This same word, deacon, it just means a servant. So this isn't the royal official idea. This is the lowly, humble servant idea. [00:25:24] This word is used over and over in the New Testament to, to refer to the pastor. [00:25:30] And I'll just kind of read through them and you can hear how over and over again this is what the pastor is called. He's called a lowly servant. [00:25:38] He is called a servant or minister of God. [00:25:43] He is a minister of Christ. [00:25:45] He is a minister of the New Covenant. [00:25:48] He is a minister of the Gospel. [00:25:51] He is a minister of you, the. The church. [00:25:55] He's a servant or minister. As a servant, he has a service, a work that's entrusted to him. [00:26:03] The work of serving, serving, ministering, administering the Gospel to men and women that Jesus purchased with his blood. He sends his lowly servants out to go and care for. [00:26:19] For the sheep that he died for. [00:26:22] You might think of it in a parallel. Deacons are charged with administering the mercy of God, the care of God, especially to the poor, in dealing with their physical needs. [00:26:34] The deacon or servant of the gospel administers the message of salvation, of forgiveness of sins to sinners who are lost and dying. [00:26:43] As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 3, 6, we are just servants through whom you have believed. [00:26:52] So let's summarize all of this. We've run through those titles. Hopefully you're getting a flavor of them and how they all relate to Christ and His work. [00:27:01] I want to summarize the office of the teaching elder, the pastor. [00:27:07] First consider its basis or foundation. And you kind of hear this in those titles. [00:27:14] What does this office rest on or what does it flow from? [00:27:19] It comes out of the covenant of grace. [00:27:23] God made this covenant through the death of His Son. We hear that every week in the Lord's Supper. This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Jesus sealed this covenant in his blood. [00:27:34] He paid for the sins of his people. [00:27:37] He purchased men, women and children all around the world. [00:27:42] And so the office of teaching elder of the minister of the Gospel flows directly out of the saving work of Jesus. He is sent to minister to those people whom Jesus purchased with his blood. [00:27:56] No covenant of grace, no minister of the gospel, but there is a covenant of grace. There is a Christ who died. And so there are servants who go to find all of Jesus people and bring them back to Him. [00:28:11] There's its basis or its foundation. [00:28:15] This man who is his master, he's a servant. He's a minister. He must have a master. [00:28:22] King Jesus ascended on high. He died. He rose from the dead. He ascended on high. He sits on the throne of heaven. And what does he do? Ephesians 4 tells us that he poured out gifts on his church. [00:28:35] And among those gifts is the pastor. [00:28:40] We are his servants. He is our master. We serve at his pleasure, just like every Christian, just in a particular role. [00:28:53] The man's work, you hear it in the titles as well. His work is to preach the word of God. [00:28:59] Jesus sent us out. He said, go into all creation and preach the gospel to. To every creature, to every man, woman and Child. So we're to preach the gospel here in the church, but we're to preach the gospel out there in the world to the people who are lost, that they might be drawn to Christ. We're to preach the gospel here to every man and woman who sits in the pews. And then we're to go to your homes and minister Christ to you in your homes, corporately and individually prior, preach the gospel to every creature. That is our work and our goal. And we had a sermon, almost its own little mini sermon series on the aims or goals of the gospel ministry. But you hear it here as well. [00:29:44] The purpose and end for which pastors are to strive is the salvation and building up of the lost everyone that Jesus died for. Our aim is that they would be drawn to him, strengthened in him, assured of their salvation, that the elect would know that Jesus lived and died for them and that they are safe in him. [00:30:07] So Christ has appointed his ministers the teaching elder in his church. [00:30:13] He's appointed him to preach the gospel. That's the core and heart of our work. What do we do with this? [00:30:19] You've given us this lecture. If I stopped here, it would just be a lecture. Not much of a sermon, right? What do we do with this? Why has Christ given us this office? And what do we do about this teaching? [00:30:33] Well, first we can apply it to the pastors. There's at least two of us here. [00:30:39] And it helps you to think through how this applies to pastors as well, particularly for our work. We can think of it this way. If Christ has appointed ministers to this work, then this is our job. [00:30:55] This is what we need to do. [00:30:57] We need to give ourselves over to it wholly and completely. [00:31:02] The Master calls and sends us. [00:31:05] He funds us. Jesus pays my salary. [00:31:08] He does it so I don't have to go work some other job. He says, I want you to go and do this. [00:31:14] Feed my sheep, find my lost and tell them the gospel. He wants us to devote ourselves to this. [00:31:23] And the Bible says so. That's not just me talking first. Timothy 4:13. [00:31:29] Paul says to Timothy, the young pastor, till I come, give attention to the public reading of the Word, to exhortation, to teaching, meditate on these things, give yourself entirely to them, that your progress may be evident to all. [00:31:55] Another translation says, immerse yourself in them. [00:32:01] We're supposed to be saturated with the Word of God, studying it continually so that we can bring it to you. [00:32:10] And Paul says, if you do this, it should be evident to everyone that that's what you're doing. [00:32:17] Your pastors are supposed to give themselves over holy. Their life's devotion is to be studying the Word so that they can bring it to you. [00:32:27] Think about every single one of those titles we read. All of them have to do with the Word of God and bringing it to you. [00:32:35] We're to give ourselves over to it wholly and completely. It's to be our devotion. [00:32:44] Secondly, we can. There's lots of things. The second thing that we'll draw from this teaching, from these titles for ministers is that we are heralds of God's Word. [00:32:58] We're not heralds of our own ideas. [00:33:02] We don't get to have our own agendas. [00:33:06] The subject matter that we're supposed to study and bring to you is the Word of God. Not psychology, which may have nice things to say. Science, which has helpful things to say. Not history. There's all sorts of things we could study. We could study business, marketing tactics, we could help you with all sorts of things. But this, this is what King Jesus has sent us to talk to you about and to talk to the world about. [00:33:34] We're not to rely on clever ideas, clever tricks, fancy speech. [00:33:41] Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2, My speech and my preaching were not with persuasive words of human wisdom, but in the demonstration of the spirit and power. In other words, he preached the gospel, showed forth Christ and His work, and the Spirit worked in the hearts of men. [00:34:01] He says it's foolishness to the world, but it's the power of God to salvation to those who are perishing. [00:34:09] You don't need all that other stuff. You need us to bring God's word to you. [00:34:14] And it's a simple thing. If I tamper with the message, if I alter it, I do anything to it, it's no longer the King's message, it becomes mine. And that does no good to you. [00:34:28] You need Christ and Him crucified. Paul says, I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified. [00:34:39] We are heralds of His Word and nothing else. [00:34:44] But we can apply this doctrine to you. [00:34:48] 2. [00:34:50] If Christ Jesus has appointed a minister to come to you and speak his words to you, then it's in your best interest to attend to his words with great care and diligence. [00:35:04] Christ Jesus Himself has appointed his ministers and he's appointed, told us to speak to you in his name. [00:35:14] Think about this. Jesus doesn't come and speak to you through self help gurus. He doesn't speak to you through philosophers. He doesn't speak to you through Some voice that you thought you heard in your head while you were meditating in your closet. [00:35:31] He speaks to you through his appointed messengers. [00:35:35] We read from Malachi 2, verse 7. For the lips of a priest should keep knowledge. Those are the Old Testament preachers. [00:35:43] For a lips of a priest should keep knowledge. And people should seek the law from his mouth. For he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts. [00:35:55] I don't come and speak to you for my own health. [00:35:58] I come and speak to you for your health, especially your spiritual health. [00:36:05] This, in the preaching of the Word, is where you come and listen for God speaking to you. [00:36:13] Secondly, you should attend to the words of the minister with great care and diligence. [00:36:18] Not only because Christ has appointed us to speak to you, but because the minister speaks for your salvation. [00:36:28] There is no other official here on earth, no other person who serves in a formal capacity that was appointed to serve in that way. No other official here on earth speaks for your salvation. [00:36:44] Kings issue edicts. Governments pass laws and make pronouncements. They send their officials out nowadays on Twitter, I guess, or whatever, to make their pronouncements and announcements. [00:36:55] None of them speak for your salvation, only your ministers. [00:37:02] As the herald of King Jesus, the minister brings the gospel of eternal life to you. [00:37:09] Is there anything more important for you to heed or to attend to any better news than that the door of heaven is flung wide open to you in the preaching of the Gospel? [00:37:24] What do we say over and over? Believe on the Lord Jesus and you will be saved. That's our message. [00:37:31] So listen to us. [00:37:35] Thirdly, this is the practical part. [00:37:40] Come prepared to listen. [00:37:42] I know Saturday is one of the few days that you have off with your family, one of the few days you may have off to get work done, finish up tasks, pursue your hobbies, play video games. [00:37:58] But Saturday evening is precious. [00:38:01] You need your rest and sleep. Your heart needs to start being calmed and quieted so that you are rested, you have energy, and you're able to listen. On Sunday, when you wake up in the morning, preparing for Sunday morning starts the night before. [00:38:20] And don't spend Sunday morning sleeping in and being distracted with all sorts of things. Wake up Sunday morning and begin preparing your heart. In prayer, in meditation, in reading the Word, so that when you get here, it's ready to think about Jesus and about Heaven, because that's what we came to talk to you about. And that's what you come to hear. [00:38:44] Finally, if all of this is true, be doers of the Word. You come and you hear God's Word from his heralds, his ministers. [00:38:58] Don't go home and forget it. [00:39:01] Go home and live it. [00:39:04] You can read the story Ezekiel 33, verses 30 through 33. It's short, but it's worth reading and meditating on. [00:39:11] God comes to Ezekiel, and he says to this Old Testament pastor and preacher. He was caring for the exiles, often Babylon. And Ezekiel was preaching to them every week. And he was a popular preacher. The people loved his preaching. And God comes to Ezekiel and he says, the people love your preaching. [00:39:33] They love your beautiful voice. [00:39:35] Every day, every week they come, they hear you preach on their way home. They talk to each other in the street as they're walking home. What wonderful words the preacher has given us. He's given us words from God. And if you've read Ezekiel, you know he was a wonderful preacher. [00:39:51] Marvelous stories, marvelous parables. [00:39:55] God says they hear all of that. They say it's wonderful. They love the sound of your voice. It's like a song, it's like a melody. [00:40:06] But they don't do my words. [00:40:12] He warns us, don't just come and hear the word and then say, boy, that was a great sermon. And then go home and forget about it. [00:40:23] No. [00:40:24] Did you hear the pastor preach on faith in Jesus Christ? Go home, gather your family together, maybe around the dinner table, and talk to each other about faith. [00:40:37] Is our faith weak? Are we discouraged? What did the preacher say this morning that encourages our faith? [00:40:43] What is it about Jesus Christ that gives us greater cause for believing? [00:40:50] Meditate, encourage one another in your faith? Did the preacher preach on repentance? Guess what? Every person in every family has things they need to repent of. [00:41:01] Gather the family around, dad, and say, kids, what do I need to repent of? What are we doing wrong as a family? [00:41:08] Let's talk about it, and let's take it to the Lord and ask him to help us in changing and repenting this week? [00:41:15] Don't just hear the words. Do the words. [00:41:21] One last thought here. And this is probably the most important thing I had to say to you this evening. And it comes right out again of this passage in Ezekiel. [00:41:32] The minister is Christ's servant, and Christ is His master. [00:41:37] He's my master. He's my king. [00:41:40] He sent me to speak to you, and he did not appoint me to lead you to me. [00:41:49] He appointed me to lead you to Him. [00:41:54] If you hear my preaching, you hear Pastor Chopka's preaching. Any other pastor you have, you hear our preaching. [00:42:00] Do not fall in love with us. [00:42:04] Fall in love with Jesus. [00:42:07] We may be great speakers I'm not. But you may have a pastor who's a wonderful preacher. Don't fall in love with him. Don't fall in love with his voice. [00:42:16] Receive Christ from him. [00:42:21] Don't fall in love with me. I will come and go. You'll have other pastors, but there's only one Jesus. [00:42:28] Or to put it the way Paul put it, don't learn to love me. [00:42:33] I didn't die for you, he says. Was Paul crucified for you? No. Jesus was. [00:42:41] So I come and I preach Christ and him crucified because that's my job, because I want you to know him. [00:42:48] Because there's no salvation here. There's salvation in him. [00:42:53] Turn to him. Find comfort in him. Find him to be the one who loves you. [00:43:00] Find peace in him. Find joy in him. [00:43:06] Turn to Jesus and be saved. Let's pray. [00:43:09] Our God and our King. [00:43:12] We confess that we are all so distracted by everything. [00:43:18] You even send pastors to us to tell us about you. And we get distracted by them. We get distracted by who they are, by their appearance, by our relationship with them. And what we really need is you. [00:43:33] Our sin distracts us, it discourages us. But always there you are. O Lord Jesus, we ask that you would help us to learn to receive your word, both in the preaching and when we read it at home, to receive you. [00:43:51] Show us more of you, Lord Jesus. Fill our hearts with you. [00:43:56] Touch us with your love. [00:43:59] Show us your cross that we might see. Ah. There is forgiveness. There is peace. [00:44:05] O Lord Jesus, we ask that you would do what you promised to do, to take us in your hands, to give us eternal life and to never let us go. [00:44:15] You've done that. Now help us to see it, to believe it, and to live it out this day and this week. [00:44:24] Lord Jesus, we go forth from your presence into homes where we are all sinners and where we have our problems. We grumble, we fight, we complain, we tear each other down. [00:44:35] Jesus, reign in our hearts. Take all that away from us. [00:44:39] Help us to live in love, in rejoicing, knowing that you are with us. [00:44:46] Help us to live before our neighbors in this watching world, showing forth you that we are changed because of you, and that you give yourself freely in kindness, gentleness and mercy. [00:45:02] O Lord Jesus, we ask that you would grant these things and more for your name's sake, we pray. Amen. [00:45:12] We're going to respond to God's word.