Gifts of Leadership #1

Introduction to the Call to Pastoral Office and Essential Gifts

0:03 Come to our studies this morning.

0:10 Our Father, we bow in your presence, thankful that you have given us your word of promise that if we confess our sins, you are faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And we know that all that is unlike your Son is a dimension of unrighteousness and you have exposed to our own sight our own sins of lack of deep and burning compassion for those who are lost and under your wrath. And we confess our sin of indifference, hardness of heart, callousness in the face of grievous sin and frightening, impending wrath. And yet, as our brother reminded us, we have confessed our sin of indifference, hardness of heart, callousness in the face of grievous sin and we have no power to move these hearts of stone. But, O Lord, we hold them up to you and ask that by the mighty and the present influences of the Holy Spirit you would conform us more to the image of our Savior as we see that image reflected in the Scriptures and in the life of your servant, the Apostle Paul. Help me this morning as I seek to lay out these materials to do so,

1:34 with all of those dimensions of the likeness of Christ appropriate to the subject matter in hand. Give us the aid of your Holy Spirit, O God, we plead, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

1:54 Now we take up again, brethren, this very crucial issue of what constitutes a biblical call to the pastoral office. And as we do, I would remind you, that we are using the term pastoral office in referring to one who functions as an elder within the category of 1 Timothy 5.17, one who is not only ruling well, but working hard at the Word and in teaching. And I have asserted that there are four elements which comprise a biblical call to this office.

2:36 First, first, an enlightened and sanctified desire for the work of the pastoral office. And then secondly, a proven fitness for the work of the pastoral office. And it's under this second major heading that we're considering the specific components of this fitness. I've sought to demonstrate from the Scriptures that the first component is the matter of the graces and character of a person who is a Christian.

3:07 And a mature Christian, as highlighted in 1 Timothy 3 and in Titus 1. We then proceeded to consider the necessity of a heightened level of spiritual experience. Not only must there be mature and balanced Christian character, but a heightened level of spiritual experience. And then in the previous lecture, we began to take up the matter, or the last two lectures, of the subject of the spiritual gifts that are essential for the pastoral office.

3:45 We looked at the biblical witness for the necessity and the importance of gifts, and then considered the source of these gifts, and are now seeking the specific identity of the gifts requisite for the pastoral office. The first category of gift I described as the disposition, was the disposition of a mindset. And the terminology that I used with you was that of a mind that was, if I can find my exact terminology now, the disposition and capabilities and acquisitions of a sanctified mind. And then I gave you five specific things which come into perspective under that heading. And then last week, when I was away from you, you listened to the tapes which addressed the second category of the gifts, namely the gifts that come to expression through the various faculties connected with the facility of sanctified utterance. And then I listed four of them. Now we come this morning to the third category of gifts.

Gifts of Sanctified Leadership: Definition and Biblical Basis

4:59 There must be the gifts that relate to the mind, the gifts that relate to utterance, and now thirdly, and you see it, listed in your notes as number three with a parenthesis on the right-hand side of the number, those gifts which come to expression in a proven ability to oversee, guide, and govern the people of God with sanctified leadership. So we move from sanctified minds to sanctified utterance to sanctified leadership. And we address, first of all, the biblical basis for asserting the necessity for such gifts of sanctified leadership. Remember now, we're talking about the gifts essential to the pastoral office, the pastoral office being defined as a peculiar dimension of the eldership. And we keep emphasizing that because the moment we separate those issues, we're going to land, in a sea of subjectivism and in a hopeless wasteland of confusion. And I'll give you an example of that shortly from a responsible Christian writer who should have known better than to write as he wrote.

6:20 So as we contemplate the gifts essential for the pastoral office, we must consider those gifts which come to expression in a proven ability to oversee, guide, and govern the people of God with sanctified leadership. And I want to open up this third category of spiritual gifts under two major headings. The first is listed in small letter A with half a parenthesis in your notes. The biblical basis for asserting the necessity of such gifts of sanctified leadership.

7:01 And then B, over on page 19, small letter A, the fundamental components of the gifts essential for sanctified leadership. So I will attempt to prove from the Word of God that no man enters the pastoral office in a biblical manner unless he is possessed of these gifts for sanctified leadership. And we turn first of all to what I've described as the explicit testimony of the Word of God. And here I have two lines of evidence that I would call explicit testimony of the Word of God.

Explicit Testimony: Unequivocal Requirement from 1 Timothy 3

7:43 Then we will take up two categories of evidence that I have defined as the implicit testimony of the Word of God. The explicit testimony of the Word of God, the pivotal text, is what I have called the unequivocal requirement of 1 Timothy 3, 4, and 5. 1 Timothy 3, 4, and 5. 1 Timothy 3, 4, and 5.

8:09 Faithful is the saying if a man seeks the office of a bishop or better overseership, he desires a good work. The overseer, therefore, and then our particle of necessity, the overseer, therefore, must be. And in the course of opening up what an overseer must be, we read in verse 4, one that rules well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity, parenthetical statement, but if a man knows not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God? Now, the basic issue of these verses is not that only married men with children or with house servants can be elders. Rather, the basic issue of this is this. It is only those with a proven ability to exercise sanctified leadership of others that are to bear rule in the church of God.

9:27 That's the non-negotiable principle. Only those with a proven ability to exercise sanctified leadership of others are to bear rule in the church of God. Since in most cases the presence or the absence of this gift will be most accurately discovered in a man's domestic government of his family, Paul focuses upon that framework for proving one's ability to rule. If a man is to rule, and knows not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God? Arguing from the lesser to the greater. If he does not show competence in that lesser sphere, what grounds do we have to believe that he will have competence in the larger sphere? The man who cannot command a battalion of so many soldiers, say a hundred soldiers, what grounds do we think that he can command a whole army of ten thousand?

10:41 And that's the way Paul is reasoning. Therefore, if a man does not prove his ability to govern in the framework of the home, which is the most likely and the most ordinary proving ground, he must have some other proving ground, whether he's a single man or a married man with no children, another proofing where he has demonstrated competence in the governing, in the taking care of others from a position of defined leadership. And therefore, if God's providence has withheld from a man some discernible proving ground to manifest that he has gifts to govern the office of the eldership is shut to that man until providence gives him such an opportunity.

11:42 Now that sounds radical, but brethren, if we say sola scriptura and claim to be bound by the regulative principle, on what grounds can we ever believe a man is a gift of Christ who comes into the eldership as an unproven leader?

Explicit Testimony: Unambiguous Gifts of Rule and Government

12:04 In the light of this unequivocal requirement, I say to lay hands upon a man in the name of Christ who has not proven ability to govern and rule in some discernible sphere is to go against the word of Christ. But then I rest the explicit testimony not only on the unequivocal requirement of 1 Timothy 3, 4, and 5, but upon what I've called the unambiguous testimony that special gifts of rule and government are given to men. If gifts of rule and government are not vital and essential to the life and well-being of the church, then Christ is giving unnecessary perks to His church. He's giving luxuries. But Christ who nourishes and cherishes His church gives to His church those gifts essential for her well-being. And we turn to Romans 12 and verse 3, a passage we've had occasion to refer to again and again in the course of our lectures this semester on the call to the ministry.

13:20 And here we read, I say through the grace that was given me to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but so to think as to think soberly according as God hath dealt to each man a measure of faith. And then Paul opens up the analogy of the human body and shows that there are realities that find analogous issues in the life of the church. And one of the high points of emphasis is that though there is one body, in each body there are different members, so within the body of Christ there are different members with different functions. And this sober self-assessment is to have, as its peculiar focal point in this setting, seeking to discern the gifts that Christ has given. Verse 6, having gifts differing according to the grace that was given to us, whether prophecy, let us prophesy according to the proportion of our faith or ministry or service, let us give ourselves to our ministry or service, or he that teaches to his teaching, he that ignores exhorts to his exhorting, he that gives, let him do it with liberality, he that rules with diligence,

14:49 he that shows mercy with cheerfulness, he that rules. In other words, in this particular passage, we have a participial form of proistemi, we have proistominos, and the apostle is assuming that in the course of sober self-assessment, some would discern in themselves, in the context of the church, certain gifts for public utterance, namely, prophecy, teaching, and exhorting. However, however, he does not assume that wherever there is the gift of prophecy, service, teaching, or exhortation, that there will necessarily also be a gift of ruling.

15:46 These things are not dealt with in such a way that you get the package deal in every case. There is to be sober self-assessment to see if indeed there is a gift of ruling. Conversely, he assumes that some may have a gift of ruling that will not have as a dominant gift a gift of prophecy, ministry, or service, exhorting, or teaching. There is nothing in the passage to say that any one of these gifts must come in a certain combination in any given individual.

16:22 However, we have seen from the requirements of 1 Timothy 3 and Titus 1, and in the light of 1 Timothy 5, 17, in the person who would assume the pastoral office, that is, be set apart as an elder to labor in the word and in doctrine, I'm asserting that there must be a combination of the gifts of teaching and of ruling. That gifts of public utterance alone do not constitute a man qualified for the office of an overseer. And to that end, Christ confers upon His church specific gifts of rule. And if there is not, after sober self-assessment, reason to believe, that God has endowed a man with a gift of rule, then whatever that man's function may be in the body of Christ, even in terms of functions involving public utterance, he ought not to enter the eldership.

17:30 And so Christ gives this gift. Another passage, 1 Corinthians chapter 12.

The Timeless Principles of Spiritual Gifts in 1 Corinthians 12

17:36 Key passage. Paul says, I would not have you ignorant concerning spiritual gifts, and let me say, by way of an aside, when you're dealing with some of your charismatic friends and seeking to give them a well-structured biblical argument, not a simplistic one, but a well-structured biblical argument for the cessation of revelatory gifts, and they come back and say, well, if that's true, then you've got two whole chapters of the Word of God that are useless. Wait a minute. If we move from any period of redemptive history beyond a one-to-one equivalence, and that makes those passages useless, most of our Bible is useless.

18:17 No, all Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. And these chapters on spiritual gifts are full. They ooze with timeless principles that are applicable to the Church in her present steady-state existence with the cessation of revelatory gifts. And so we can glean very helpful principles from them, as I will attempt to do this morning.

18:46 Verse 4. Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. There are diversities of ministration, and the same Lord. There are diversities of workings, but the same God who works all things in all.

19:02 But to each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit to profit with all. And the great emphasis is that God gives gifts to His Church, not that the person who possesses the gift can, like a little selfish kid, go off in the corner and eat his bag of candy and be wonderfully and personally, selfishly indulged. But every gift given to the individual is to the end that the whole body might be edified. Gifts are not given to be a form of spiritual thumb-sucking, or as one more crassly stated, a form of spiritual masturbation.

19:42 People talk about their glorious, glorious hours of praying in tongues. They don't know what they're saying, but it's glorious. Well, if you don't know what you're saying, how can it be glorious? How do you know God is pleased with your gibberish?

19:56 How do you know you simply aren't riding the wave of a self-induced psychological experience? An emotional experience has no more to do than with real communion with God described in Scripture as wrestling with God. The cognitive elements in the prayers of the Apostle are dominant, and this is And when you read, he doesn't say, and this I pray, but most of it I don't know what I'm praying, but it's glorious. Just take my word for it.

20:24 No, when he prayed for the Ephesians, he could tell them what he was praying for them. And when he prayed for the Philippians and the Colossians and for Paul, praying for Timothy, et cetera. So, the great principle is that the Spirit of God, who is the executor of the will of Christ in heaven, dispenses gifts according to the will of God. And when he prays, according to his own will and his own purpose.

20:49 And then the gifts that were operative and present there at Corinth, Paul addresses them specifically. Now, among these gifts, we read in verse 28, God had set some in the church, first, apostles, secondly, prophets, thirdly, teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, governments,

21:15 governments, governments, diverse kinds of tongues. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers?

21:22 Are all workers of miracles? Have all gifts of healings? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?

21:30 We could ask the question, do all have gifts of helps? Do all have gifts of governments?

21:38 Now, this particular word, kubernesis, is used in the plural. The plural indicates proofs, of ability to hold a position of leadership or of power. I thought I brought my Reinecker and Rogers with me, but apparently I did not, but I commend to you the excellent little expanded significance of the word. Its sister word, kubernesis, is used in Acts 27.11 and in Revelation 18.17 to refer to the pilot of a ship, the steersman. So, gifts of government are manifested divine endowments to be a helmsman, to give wise and safe guidance to the ship of a given assembly of God's people making its way through often turbulent waters of this present world. And God gives gifts of government, of wise, divinely endowed ability, to engage in the guidance of God's people.

John Owen on the Necessity of Spiritual Gifts for Church Rule

22:54 Now, I quote Owen at this point, chapter, volume 4, pages 515 and 516.

23:08 I don't have Owen in his right place. Do you have it? Good.

23:17 Thank you.

23:20 This particular section is so helpful in reference to this matter of government. And here, I quote, I had my own quote bracketed. I want to make sure now. Yes.

23:34 After opening up the concept that the rule of the church belongs to the ministers of it, and then he establishes from these texts that God has established rule in the church, Romans 12.8, 1 Corinthians 12.28, 1 Thessalonians 5.12, Hebrews 13.7 and 17, this he then says, from these things it may appear what is the nature in general of that skill in the rule of the church which we assert to be a peculiar gift of the Holy Ghost. If it were only an ability or skill in the canon or civil law or the rules of men, if only an acquaintance with the nature and course of some courts proceeding litigiously by citations, processes, legal pleadings, issuing in pecuniary and pecuniary mulcts, M-U-L-C-T-S, and I looked up mulcts, and we'd say that's extortion or bribes

24:37 or seeking to motivate by the use of money, outward coercions or imprisonments, I should willingly acknowledge there's no particular gift of the Spirit of God required. In other words, if all you need to do is what a good lawyer does, consults previous case law, and he reads up in this given area and he finds what the legal precedents are, he finds what the legal precedents are, he said if that's all governing in Christ's church involves, no need of a special gift of the Holy Ghost to govern. If all it involves is following natural human processes of litigation, or if it involves using money to manipulate people, I acknowledge there's no peculiar gift of the Spirit of God required thereunto. But, the nature of it being as we have declared, that is, rule in Christ's church, it is impossible that it should be exercised aright without a special assistance of the Holy Ghost. Is any man of himself sufficient for these things? Will any man undertake of himself to know the mind of Christ in all the occasions of the church and to administer the authority of Christ in them and about them?

25:52 Wherefore, the apostle in many places teaches that wisdom, skill, and understanding to administer the authority of Christ in the church unto its edification was faithfulness and diligence with faithfulness and diligence are an especial gift of the Holy Ghost. And you know which two texts he cites? The two texts I've directed your attention to. Romans 12, verses 6 and 8, 1 Corinthians 12, and verse 28.

26:21 Now, his next statement is very critical. It is the Holy Ghost which makes the elders of the church its bishops or overseers by calling them to their office. Acts 20, 28. And what he calls any man unto that he furnishes him with abilities for the discharge of.

26:46 Now, we say don't end the sentence with a preposition. I'm quoting, though, and not correcting him. But his statement is critical. If the Holy Ghost constitutes men elders, in Acts 20, 28, says he does, what he calls any man unto that he furnishes him with abilities for the discharge of.

Implicit Testimony: Titles and Tasks of the Pastoral Office

27:10 And therefore, brethren, I would rest the case for asserting the necessity of the gifts of a proven ability to oversee, to guide, and govern the people of God with sanctified leadership upon the explicit testimony of the Word of God, that I've broken into two basic categories, the unequivocal requirement of 1 Timothy 3, 4, and 5, and the unambiguous testimony that special gifts of rule and government are given unto men. But then there is a very powerful, implicit testimony. That is, it is inescapably implied, and that, again, in two categories of biblical witness. First, the titles used for the office. Now, what we're trying to prove is that gifts of rule are essential and must therefore be discerned in a man before he can consider himself called and equipped of God to that office and its function. And what are the major titles used for the office, the pastoral office?

28:24 Well, you have an overseer, episkopos, one who inspects and looks over a group of men or people with a view to understanding their true state and condition and giving them wise guidance and direction. Overseer. Then we have the word elder, the word which refers in its etymological sense to an older man, and the assumption is that generally with age is to come wisdom. You remember the text that our brother Salvador preached on some weeks ago where Elihu says to the older men in Job 32.7 that generally wisdom is to be found with the aged. And therefore it was generally older men who were recognized as elders in Israel, elders in the synagogues throughout the dispersion, and therefore that name came to be incorporated into the governmental structure of the Christian church, not necessarily meaning that a man must be an older man chronologically, for Paul does not in any way hint that Timothy should leave the ministry because of his youth. Rather he says let no man despise you because of your relative youth, but outstrip them in godliness

29:51 and in likeness to Christ. But that word has come over into a designation of one in the pastoral office because of its connotation with this matter of the wisdom to govern and to guide wisely with respect to the church. And then the term shepherd or pastor poimane obviously, obviously brethren, everything that is poured into the biblical concept of a shepherd or a pastor clearly implies management of the church and the church has manifested proven gifts of government or of rule. Unless we're prepared to say that these nouns that become titles for the office of an elder have no divinely given intention to highlight aspects of the task of the office, unless we're prepared to say that, then all of the terms which the Holy Ghost has used to designate and describe this office underscore the necessity of proven gifts to rule and to govern. What is an episkopos, an overseer, who cannot see accurately or seeing accurately cannot act wisely with respect to those whom he oversees?

31:19 What is a presbyteros? What is an elder if he does not bring to the circumstances of that sphere in which he has responsibility the wisdom the wisdom of a wise and a mature man? And what is a shepherd who does not know how to keep sheep together and how to sort out problems among the sheep or even to discern when the sheep are in danger and to take appropriate action to protect them as a flock of God? I say the titles used for the office in their noun form constitute powerful implicit testimony for the necessity of proven gifts to oversee to guide and to govern the people of God with sanctified leadership. And then second implicit testimony is the tasks associated with the office. And here we have the verbs. And what are they?

32:19 Well, the verb to shepherd. Poimaino. Acts 20.28 and 1 Peter 5.

32:26 Shepherd the flock of God which is among you. Take heed to yourselves and to all the flock in which the Holy Ghost has made you shepherds, overseers, to shepherd the flock of God. You are to act the part and fulfill the actual functions of a shepherd. Well, surely, brethren, whatever else that involves, it involves overseeing, guiding, governing, feeding, and having God given a vision and abilities for that task.

33:02 And then to lead or to manage the word proistemi to lead, to be at the head of, to direct, to manage. 1 Thessalonians 5.12 Remember them that are over you in the Lord. And it's interesting.

33:20 Proistemi is used in the 1 Thessalonians, the 1 Timothy passage of a man ruling his own house. But then he says how shall he, he switches from proistemi to epimeleomai. How shall he take care of the church of God? The very verb used with reference to the good Samaritan who took this mud character, patched him up with first aid, brought him to an inn, and said, take care of him.

33:49 And if you use up this money, I'll make it up when I return. Well, surely, if one's task is that expressed in the verb proistemi, proistemi, to lead, to be at the head of, to be over, to direct, to manage, there must be gifts of proven ability to manage, to be at the head of, to direct. And then hegeomai, to lead or to rule. The verb used in Hebrews 13.7, Hebrews 13.17, and Hebrews 13.24.

34:25 Now this is the very word that is used of our Lord in Matthew 2 and verse 3. It's almost a striking use of the word in Matthew 2 and verse 6. And thou, Bethlehem, land of Judah, art in no wise least among the princes of Judah, for out of thee shall come forth a governor, hegeomai, who shall be shepherd, poimen, of my people. Shepherd, governor, used synonymously or used in a parallel way with reference to our blessed Lord.

35:04 And surely then, to lead or to rule, to do anything that makes any sense of the verb hegeomai involves gifts to oversee, to guide, and to govern with sanctified leadership. And then, episkopos, the verbal form of episkopos, to oversee, to care for, used in 1 Peter 5 and verse 2. Exercising the oversight is a translation of, I believe, a participial form of episkopos. Now again, what are these activities but the open door to confusion, schism, and dissension unless they are performed by men endowed with gifts for sanctified leadership? To be a man who's engaged engaged in poimaino poiste mi hegeomai episkopai without gifts is simply to be in a position to cause more harm to the people of God than the average person sitting in the pew.

36:15 It's to be in a position to do great harm to God's people. So I rest my case for asserting the fitness for the work connected with the pastoral office demanding those gifts that come to expression in a proven ability to do good. So I rest my case to oversee to guide and to govern the people of God with sanctified leadership upon the explicit testimony of the word of God and then upon the implicit testimony of the word of God. Now then, consider with me in the second place over to page 19 of your notes the fundamental components of the gifts essential for sanctified leadership.

Fundamental Components: More Than Ordinary Spiritual Discernment

37:01 It's one thing to see that scripture requires this. Now, the moment of truth comes when you say but what is it and how will it appear to my eyes when I see it. And brethren, at this point the task is not a simple one. And according to my present light and I'm satisfied after several times going over this material or going over it several times that there's nothing in it that I want to change at this stage and I doubt I doubt there'll be any major adjustment in this with the passing of the years.

37:37 I hope there'll be some refinement in ongoing growth and development but as I've sought to subject this matter to critical analysis it appears to me and we have the confirming voice of those wiser than ourselves that the fundamental components of the gifts essential for sanctified leadership are comprised of at least these five things and I'll take up probably two of them now then we'll take our break and then we'll come back and pick up the others and hopefully have time for discussion of last week's lecture when I was not here as well as concerns growing out of today's lecture. First of all I have described the first component as that a man possesses a more than ordinary degree of spiritual discernment. Now according to 1 John 2 and verse 27 every true child of God is given by the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit a modicum of spiritual discernment. 1 John 2 and verse 27 And as for you the anointing which you have received of him abides in you and you need not that anyone teach you but as his anointing teaches you concerning all things and is true and is no lie

39:05 and even as it taught you abide ye or ye abide in him. You have one of those forms of meno that as you Greek students know sometimes the indicative and the imperative have precisely the same spelling and it's a matter of seeking to judge whether you have an indicative or you have an imperative. But one thing is clear from the passage all all of the children of God have this anointing whatever it is. This is not something reserved for a special few.

39:37 He doesn't say and as for you the anointing which some of you receive abides in some of you and you're safe from errorists who are seeking to inflict and to afflict the church with their false gnostic teaching and the rest of you better pray for the anointing or you're going to go under. No, no. He says all of you who are born of God have the anointing. You have anointing.

40:04 You have received an anointing and that anointing abides in you and it does not mean that human teachers are unnecessary for that would violate the very fact that John as a human teacher appointed by God as an apostle is writing an epistle and it would contradict the analogy of faith that it's by the spirit that gifts of teaching and prophecy and exhortation are given. So whatever the text is teaching it is not as some have sought to use it negating the need of human teachers except the particular one who's telling you it negates the need for human teachers. That's why I've always kind of chuckled when I've heard people say we don't need books we don't need concordances we don't need commentaries we have the anointing. Well what are you doing standing up there telling me that for? Let me read it and discover it in my Bible. You're assuming the role of a teacher when you tell me I don't need no teachers. So when you hear that just raise your hand and very humbly say sir if your theory is right will you please say sit down and shut up and we'll all sit here and open our Bibles and wait for the anointing to teach us.

41:10 So that's just a little aside that's a freebie. Alright? But as the anointing abides in you so it teaches you the primary ministry of the Holy Spirit is to bear witness to Christ and the truth as it is in Christ and it seems to me my basic understanding in a surface way of this passage is that the anointing is brought I brought forward in direct conjunction with the ministry of the Spirit in connection with a proper doctrine of Christ the Holy Spirit who was the agent in the conception of the theanthropic person in Mary's womb will never never never lead us into erroneous views of the person and the work of Christ. But that anointing then gives to every believer a modicum of discernment in the fundamental issues of the Holy Spirit. the Christian faith and secures him against damning error. My sheep hear my voice and a voice of a stranger they will not follow.

42:17 So the anointing gives to every believer a modicum of discernment that will keep him from falling into damning apostatizing error. However however the man who is going to lead to govern to guide the flock of God as an overseer as an elder as a ruler as a bishop surely he must have more than an ordinary degree of spiritual discernment. He must be able to distinguish things that differ. For example what would you think of the father coming back to the biblical paradigm if a man know not how to rule his own house there the emphasis falls upon ignorance not if a man has not the moral courage to rule but if a man know not how to rule his own house how should he take care of the church of God. What kind of father is it who had no ability to discern between the cry of pain in his child and the cry of petulant brattishness and determination to have his own way. What kind of father is it that will bring the rod upon the cry of pain of a child that may have a gastrointestinal bug and he is just torn up with pain. What kind of father is it that will bring the rod upon

43:46 in the same way he would bring it upon him when he knows that that child is throwing a temper tantrum. If he can't distinguish between the cry of petulance and the cry of pain he knows not how to rule well his own house. Fathers provoke not your children to wrath. Provoke them not that they be not discouraged.

44:04 Well we could carry that out in all kinds of errors. What about the father doesn't know the difference between the teenager who's mad that he can't go out with his buddies because he has to help his dad with a project at home and kicks the refrigerator as he walks by and the poor teenager who hasn't caught up with his appendages and he's always stumbling over his feet and his hands and knocking over glasses of water at the table and all the rest. What kind of father is it that has no discernment to distinguish between those things? Well likewise how can a man rule in Christ Church with the full spectrum?

44:43 I don't care if it's a congregation of 25 people. There will be in principle the full spectrum of all the characters that Bunyan parades before us in Pilgrim's Progress. You'll have your faithfuls and you'll have your you'll have your Mr. Ready to Halt and you'll have Feeble Mind and you'll have them all.

45:03 And if you don't have discernment if everyone who seems to be walking on the road that leads to the celestial city all look like identical twins to you God have mercy on those people if you're their pastor.

45:17 You have some of those sheep that you just barely tap them with a crook of positive correction and I mean they just yield to the slightest pressure and they're in the way others you've practically got to break your rod over their back to get their attention. And if you don't know the difference how in the world do you going to wisely rule for remember Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 2 as a father with his children so we exhorted you and we admonished you we instructed you as a father discerning what child breaks with the word and which one needs the rod until his behind is beet red before he breaks.

46:00 And that difference is seen within the human family. If a man know not how to rule his own house how should he take care of the church of God. If a man doesn't know the difference of how to deal with his wife's irritability at certain times of the month and make a difference the way he deals with it when her hormones are leaving her peculiarly vulnerable to irritability from a time of the month when hormones ain't in the picture at all. I wouldn't want to be that man's wife.

46:30 He's to nourish and cherish her as his own body. Are you sensitive to your own signals of your own particular mood, swings, etc.? Well that's how we're to love our wives.

46:42 If a man know not how to rule well his own house, if he doesn't have that measure of discernment that goes beyond the modicum of the ordinary Christian, then surely he is unfit to exercise rule in the church of Christ. So I would submit to you based upon the word of God and the general teaching of scripture that upon these specific texts and the general teaching of scripture that the fundamental components of the gifts essential for sanctified leadership begin with this that I've called a more than ordinary degree of spiritual discernment and then let me touch on the second, a more than ordinary measure of spiritual wisdom.

Fundamental Components: More Than Ordinary Spiritual Wisdom

47:32 Wisdom, as you know, is most commonly described as that which enables a man to use his stock of knowledge to make righteous judgments and to secure right ends by the best means. That's wisdom.

47:56 That which enables a man to use his stock of knowledge, what he knows, to make righteous judgments, judge not according to appearance, Jesus said, but judge righteous judgments. Judgment. John 7, and I believe it is verse 53, and he said that to unconverted Jews.

48:27 He, verse 20, I'm sorry, 24. John 7, 24. Judge not according to appearance, but judge righteous judgment. Wisdom is that commodity which enables a man to use his stock of knowledge to make righteous judgments and to make to secure right ends by the best means.

48:57 Now, examples of this, of course, we are immediately reminded of the example of Solomon. First Kings chapter 3, when he comes to the place in his life where God is going to actually confer upon him the responsibility of administering the affairs of the nation of Israel as king, and tells him that he may ask for whatever he desires, and Solomon responds 1 Kings 3, 7-12, And now, O Lord my God, you've made your servant king instead of David my father, and I'm but a little child. I don't know how to go out or how to come in. And your servant is in the midst of your people, which you have chosen, a great people that cannot be numbered nor counted for multitude. Give, your servant therefore, an understanding heart to judge your people, that I may discern between good and evil, for who is able to judge this, your great people? Give your servant an understanding heart to judge your people, to make righteous judgments, and growing out of that, as we see illustrated in one of the incidents, to secure right ends by the best means. You've got two women before you, each claiming

50:27 the baby is mine.

50:30 All the knowledge in the world that anyone could have at that time about babies and about harlots, and about litigation in family disputes would do Solomon no good unless he knew how to take that stock of knowledge in that setting and secure right ends, the just disposition of this child, by the best means. And God gave him wisdom to suggest, all right, let's cut the baby in two and give one to you and one to you. And by that means, the wisdom that came as a divine endowment, Solomon was not naturally shrewd. God says, I have given you this in answer to your prayer.

51:12 Verse 12, I have done according to your word, lo, I have given you a wise and an understanding heart. So whatever wisdom he had accumulated from the gene pool in his mother's womb, at the feet of his father, in his general observation of life, this wisdom, for this peculiar responsibility of government in Israel, was primarily a divine endowment. He was given a gift of wisdom. And then, with respect to our blessed Lord, Isaiah 50 and verse 4, a text we've looked at in another connection the Lord God has given me the tongue of them that are taught, that I may know how to sustain with words him that is weary. He wakes morning by morning, he wakes my ear to hear as they that are taught. And here we find Messiah himself taught of the Father that he may admit to minister a word in season, as the marginal reading renders it in the 1901. And couple this with Isaiah 11, 1 and 2, and we see that this wisdom, even in the case of the

52:40 incarnate Son of God, was a divine endowment. There shall come forth a shoot out of the stock of Jesse, and a branch out of his root shall bear fruit, and the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the Lord. The Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, and in resting upon him he shall function as the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding, the Spirit of counsel and of knowledge. So, brethren, there must be by the operation of the Holy Spirit as an essential component of this gift for sanctified leadership a more than ordinary measure of spiritual wisdom. Here is a parent concerned that his child does not get malaria. He knows that in the particular area where he lives, the mosquitoes carry that which gives malaria if they get the proboscis under your skin. And he so loves his child, so determined he won't get malaria, that he sees a mosquito on his forehead, and for you South Africans, he takes a cricket bat.

54:09 He squashed the mosquito all right, but he puts his kid in the hospital with a fractured skull. For we Americans, he takes a baseball bat. A cricket bat is better. It's almost flat.

54:19 You've got a better surface to squash it. Well, you say, no parent would do that. No, no parent would. But I've seen many a man supposedly, called of God, deal with Christ's sheep that way.

54:31 Oh yeah, there was a mosquito on the forehead, but he split the skull wide open going after the mosquito. For lack of spiritual wisdom, for lack of this divine endowment, he did not choose the best means to secure the best ends. Use totally inappropriate means. His end and his desire and his motive was good, but he lacked sense.

55:04 And as a result, you've got a split skull among the sheep of Christ.

55:11 It struck me in reworking the lecture that if one of the requirements for those men from whom we believe the office of deacon grew, we cannot in the strictest sense call them deacons, isn't it interesting that just for the task of administering the daily concerns of the widows, what were the people to look for? Verse 3 of Acts 6, Look out among you therefore, brethren, seven men of good report, sterling, proven, matured, balanced, Christian character is the fundamental requirement for deacons, even though their task is not primarily preaching, teaching, and the administration of government and oversight. Godliness is to be the fundamental baseline requirement. Not shrewdness. Men of good report, full of the spirit, and of wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business.

56:14 Why do they need wisdom? They're dealing with a bunch of women. I don't say that demeaning women. They're dealing with this segment of the female contingent of the church, all right?

56:29 And dealing with widows who don't have the government of the husband, and are the only therefore more vulnerable to either be head strong and independent, because they've had to cultivate a measure of it to exist, and for those with whom it hath not yet ceased to be with them after the manner of women, women with their monthly cycles, women with their PMS, women with their peculiar fragility emotionally. If these men didn't have wisdom, you could have an ongoing brawl.

57:05 Wisdom. Now, if you're that's needed for the administration of the widow's tables, brethren, how much more for overseeing the flock of God in everything from the discipline and the outreach to building programs, to the resolution of conflicts. Just last night, in the issues brought forward for our season of prayer were enough to make me pray that God might raise Solomon from the dead and let us borrow his head for an hour. When we sat, as we were as an eldership, minus one of our brethren who's in Pakistan, and each man just share growing out of his pastoral involvement this week with this relatively small flock of God's people compared to other places in the world, the issues that were brought forward all the way from tensions arising from the fact that one of the young couples has had a baby, and that baby has been the catalyst to open up all kinds of old wounds. There's a divorce on one side of the marriage. There's a divorce on the other side of the marriage. Well, what's happened?

58:10 Visiting the woman and the baby in the hospital brought the former husband into face-to-face contact with the former wife. Then in the extended family, some have taken the posture, treat the scoundrel like dirt. He was unfaithful to her. She put him away biblically.

58:27 Treat him like dirt. He's not a professing Christian. Treat him like dirt anyway. The other hand, the young couple is trying to witness to him, handing him tapes from this pulpit that he's listening to, now what are we going to do?

58:40 That's just one situation that has the potential for affecting two, four, six, seven, eight people in the membership or part of the extended fellowship of this church. That's just one issue.

58:53 You want to hear what some of the others were? Got a pastor, not in our own assembly, thank God, involved in emotional adultery with a woman, going for a year and a half, no physical adultery, but real emotional adultery.

59:10 The thing gets lanced. We've been asked to help and deal with it, and it seemed like it was all dealt with, but now the wife is having the emotional adhesions and the husband doesn't understand it, and his leadership doesn't understand it, and they want to, as it were, put the wife on trial because she can't go up and throw her arms around this woman who stole the affection of her husband for two years.

59:31 Now he says, I've really blown it, I'm going to resign. It's not scandalous sin. Do you encourage him to resign, rob a flock of people of a proven shepherd,

59:42 or do you lower the standard of the ministry if you don't encourage him to resign? That's just money going on. One elder's meeting, brethren,

59:53 and if fools sit there who don't have an endowment of spiritual wisdom, it'll be tragedy upon tragedy. And whose name gets dragged in the mud? The name of our blessed Savior. That's what Christians do.

60:11 God have mercy on us. We must, by the grace of God, if we are to have any degree of conviction that God has equipped us for the labor and office of overseership, have some degree of confidence that he has given us not only more than an ordinary degree of spiritual discernment, but more than an ordinary measure of spiritual wisdom. Well, I've gone for an hour. Let's break here for ten minutes, and then we'll come back and pick up the final three components in this area of the gift of sanctified leadership.

60:53 All right?