The Biblical Importance of Oversight

The point: Make a clear distinction between your sanctified desires and direct revelation or insight into God's decretive purposes.

Paul's distinction between his 'sanctified desires' and 'direct revelation' or 'decretive purpose' serves as an example for pastors not to equate their holy desires with God's direct will or decrees.

in terms of the offices of elder and deacon. So that these things obviously bring us right into the heart of our subject matter. Now, he writes from a perspective of a sanctified desire. These things I write hoping to come unto you shortly, the apostle had more sense than to designate his sanctified desires a matter of direct revelation or of decretive purpose.

5:40 - 6:19 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Paul's concern stems from his conviction about the church's identity and unique function. The church is designated 'the house of God' (place of divine indwelling) and 'the church…

Jacob's vision in Genesis 28:17, where he calls the place 'the house of God,' is used to trace the biblical theological concept of God's special dwelling place from the Old Testament to the church.

And if you want a rich biblical theological study, start with Genesis 28.17. When Jacob awakes that morning, after that morning, when Jacob awakes that morning, he has a marvelous vision of the angels ascending and descending upon a ladder that reached into heaven. And he says, this is none other than the house of God.

11:33 - 11:55 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Paul's concern stems from his conviction about the church's identity and unique function. The church is designated 'the house of God' (place of divine indwelling) and 'the church…

A quotation from Fairbairn's commentary on the pastoral epistles explains the significance of the indefinite relative 'hatis' in 1 Timothy 3:15, clarifying the relationship between 'house of God' and 'church of the living God'.

Then you have the particle hatis, and here I quote the significance of it from Fairbairn's commentary on the pastoral epistles, which, by the way, if you can come across this, is excellent. And on page 154 he says, God's house which indeed is the church of the living God.

13:01 - 13:24 Read in full sermon

The point: Do not be indifferent to the matters of your responsibilities in terms of overseeing the corporate life of God's people.

The contrast between the 'living God' and the 'dead idols of the heathen temples at Ephesus' highlights the awesome nature of God and the church's identity as His assembly.

It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of what? Of the living God. When you take all the concepts of deity and add to them livingness, then it becomes an awesome thing. And it was Paul's understanding of the church and its identity that caused him to be passionately concerned about its behavior because it was God's house, the ekklesia of the one true and living God.

14:53 - 15:28 Read in full sermon

The point: Do not be indifferent to the matters of your responsibilities in terms of overseeing the corporate life of God's people.

Paul's experience with the Corinthians, dealing with discipline, heresy, and rejection, illustrates that his high estimation of the church's identity was not starry-eyed but grounded in the realism of pastoral ministry.

For years, alas, to our shame, it was true. But rather, he viewed the church in all of the realism of a working pastor-apostle or apostle-pastor who had no starry-eyed view of the church in its present state, who knew what it was to have his hands dirtied in dealing with the matters of discipline and heresy and irregularity and all of the rest. This is the Paul who writes, the letter to the Corinthians. This is the Paul who knows what it is to be rejected by the very people who are his spiritual children.

15:46 - 16:25 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Paul also understood the church's unique function: to be 'the pillar and ground of the truth.' This means the church is the divinely established organism where revealed truth…

The debate over whether 'pillar' (stoulos) refers to structural support or an ornamental/decorative effect in ancient buildings is presented to illustrate the nuances of biblical interpretation.

Now, pillar, what is the pillar, the stoulos? Well, some say Paul is thinking of the ancient buildings in which the pillar was the support which held up the roof. But others say no. Pillars in ancient temples had more of an ornate or decorative effect and there are some indications of that in a passage like Revelation 3.12.

20:26 - 20:56 Read in full sermon

Driving home: For the truth is not of the church's making but of God's revealing. She has it not as of her own but from above and has it not to alter or modify it at her own will but to keep it as a sacred treasure for the glory of Go…

A lengthy quotation from Fairbairn's commentary clarifies the church's function as a secure basement and a pillar for the truth, while refuting the Romish misuse of the passage.

Fairbairn has an excellent comment on this on page 156 in this same exposition. They should be and they are while steadfast to their profession that is the church's a basement whereon the truth may securely rest amid all the fluctuations of the world and a pillar to bear it aloft that all may know and consider it. There has been a disinclination in certain quarters to acquiesce in this mode of interpretation because of the supposed tendency to play into the hands of the church of Rome. It is no doubt one of the passages on which Rome seeks to ground her claim to universal homage as the one chu...

22:39 - 23:48 Read in full sermon

Driving home: Surely you can trust God to know how it is best to organize his church so that it may perform its functions in the world and surely you must assert that his ordering of the church which is his is necessary if not for the…

A quotation from Warfield's 'Faith in Life' emphasizes that the church's high function as guardian of truth necessitates God's detailed ordering of its organization and work, not human caprice.

analysis analysis of this imagery and also a devastating expose of Rome's illegitimate use of this passage. Now it is in conjunction with Paul's understanding of the function of the church that he writes Timothy if I tarry long I want men to know how they ought to behave themselves. And in another very helpful exposition of this passage found in Warfield's Faith in Life on pages 375 to 378 Warfield says again some of the most perceptive and needed things in our hour with respect to the tremendous place given to the church. His position compressed in a nutshell is simply this the function of th...

26:00 - 27:27 Read in full sermon

The point: Spend your lifetime building the church according to God's blueprint, ensuring the quality of your work, not just the quantity.

The metaphor of laying 'two bricks' according to God's blueprint, even if small in quantity, illustrates the importance of qualitative, biblically faithful church building over quantitative growth.

and loneliness you feel so alone and you're pulling against all the prevailing tide and the man two towns over came into the area the same time you did and he's got three hundred people in his three ring circus and he's got that's maintaining enough of the gospel that you couldn't say it's not a church but it's a church full of irregularities and here you are seeking to build meticulously and carefully according to the divine blueprint and you've got your handful of twenty-five and you feel something of the weariness of plodding on and the loneliness never forget it's God's church worthy of yo...

30:25 - 31:54 Read in full sermon

The point: Do not claim to be in touch with the Bible while being unconcerned about being fastidious about corporate church life, order, organization, government, and structure.

Martin shares his personal anecdote of realizing late in his Christian life that the New Testament epistles were written primarily to churches to correct and direct corporate life, not just for individual devotions.

and to direct the corporate life of the churches I'll never forget the first time it dawned on me that the epistles were not written primarily for a man to have something rich for his personal devotions and I was a Christian a long long time before it dawned on me because I was told when I got saved now the most important thing is memorize some scripture and I was given thankfully the old navigator's topical memory system and I'm glad for that and I was told you've got to start having your devotions and I just thought well all those rich epistles and the rest in the New Testament that was give...

36:22 - 37:51 Read in full sermon