Responsibilities of Members: Submission & Unity

Introduction to Membership Responsibilities: Peace and Unity

0:03 The following message was delivered on Sunday, May 31st, 1992, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey. This is lecture number 13 in our pre-membership class. This morning, we come to the 12th of 13 studies in our pre-membership class.

0:28 Don't see many visitors here this morning, but for the sake of any who are, what we have been doing is we have been conducting this class as though everyone present here were now in the process of applying for membership in the church. And we are addressing those things which must be faced if someone can come into the membership of this church with a good conscience. And this morning in the 12th of the 13 studies, we are focusing upon the duties and responsibilities of members because we believe that if someone is to make a commitment to this church and join this church, then that person must know what is expected and required of all who make such a commitment and become members of this church. We saw that there was a commitment to preserve various things with the Church of Christ. We saw that there was a commitment to preserve various things with the Church of Christ. We saw that there was a commitment to preserve various things with respect to the Church, the priority of the Church in terms of stated meetings and financial support, the purity of the Church in terms of living a holy and godly life, supplying and utilizing the means of grace.

1:57 And finally, the third of those responsibilities is our focus this morning, that it is the responsibility of all those who come into the membership of the church that it is the responsibility of all those who come into the membership of the church to promote and to respect the peace and unity of the church. And as we consider this duty to promote and respect the peace and unity of the church, let us pray and ask for God's blessing upon our study.

2:31 Our Father, we thank you for your holy and infallible word. We thank you, O God, for the Holy Spirit and the enablement, which he gives us to understand your word. And yet we come before you this morning, though we are thankful for previous blessings. Yet we come knowing that we cannot do what is right and acceptable in your sight this morning if we are left to ourselves.

3:00 Therefore, we plead with you that you will open up the heavens and send down upon us the showers of spiritual blessing today. As we hear the rain upon the roof, and think of the blessing of those showers coming upon us, we pray, O God, not merely the physical rain, but that there may be showers of blessing in this place today. Not only in this Sunday school class this morning, but in the worship of your holy name in the morning and in the evening, that you would shower the Holy Spirit upon us in abundant measure, that you would receive all of the honor, praise, and glory that our minds have received. That our minds would be illumined by your word, and our hearts warmed to those things. And that your church may be preserved in peace and in unity by the outpouring of your Spirit upon us. For we ask this in Christ's name. Amen.

3:59 Now, with respect to the duty of those who come into the membership of this church, to respect and to promote the unity and peace of the church, the focus of this duty, is primarily upon the responsibility of members to respect and promote the unity and peace of this church as a local church. But that is not the whole of the responsibility, because this church does not exist in isolation from the church universal. And therefore, part of that responsibility is to respect the unity of this church with regard to the entirety of the body of Christ, the church Catholic or universal on earth. And it is with reference to that our duty to respect the peace and unity of this church not only as a local church society, but also as part of that larger society of the people of God called the church Catholic or the collective church. Now, in reference to this responsibility, there are two paragraphs, in our present constitution, which address the subject. And these paragraphs

5:26 are paragraph E and paragraph H in section 5 of the conduct required of members in the article on membership. And the first focuses upon our duty to preserve the peace of the church. And the second, focuses upon our duty to preserve and promote order in the church. If there is to be unity, then there must be peace.

5:59 If there is to be unity, then there must be order. You cannot have unity if you have chaos, disarray, disorderly behavior. And you cannot have unity if you have war and hostility. You have unity where you have peace.

6:20 And you have unity where you have order. Now, that's evident and straightforward, isn't it? But you need to know that. And coming into the membership of the church, unity is an important issue.

6:34 And unity is associated with peace and with order. Where there is hostility and suspicion and slander and grudges, the opposite of peace, there, there is disunity. And where there is a lack of church government, where there is no rule but anarchy, chaos, disorder, there you have disunity. And our commitment in coming into the church is to uphold and maintain both the peace and order of the church.

The Importance and Dangers of Disunity

7:07 Now, therefore, for any who wish to listen to sermons on this subject in greater detail, I spoke to the manager of the Trinity tape service this morning. And he said he will have some of these available and ready if you come in and ask for them. And that is Pastor Bob Martin's tapes on local church unity. I had an outline of that material which he presented as the substance of that material to the pastor's conference several years ago.

7:42 It's excellent material. And if you want to study it in greater detail, I would commend those tapes of Dr. Bob to you. And in those tapes he answers questions such as why is this unity so important?

7:58 And he opens up and shows convincingly from the word of God how it undermines the mission of the church to have disunity, how it undermines the worship of the church to have disunity, how it undermines the testimony of the church to have disunity, where there is a lack of peace and order. It's distracting. And it distracts God's people from the mission to which they are called as a church. Where there's a lack of peace and order, it is grieving.

8:28 It is grieving to the souls of God's people. And it is grieving to the Holy Spirit of God. And where the Holy Spirit of God is grieved, then where the souls of God's people are grieved, you cannot enter into God-honoring worship in such a climate as that. Furthermore, it's scandalizing.

8:49 It's scandalizing. And where there's disunity because of a lack of peace or a lack of order, this is a poor testimony. And it's a scandal upon true religion and upon the name of the church. But disunity is therefore something greatly to be avoided.

9:13 We are to bend over backwards in the maintenance of unity and peace. And each one of us, if we are contemplating coming into the membership of the church, must make a commitment to that end. Now, nobody comes into church membership sincerely and says, well, what I'm going to do with my life is when I get into this church, what I'm going to do is I'm going to destroy the unity of this church. Did any one of you join the church with that end in view?

9:43 I doubt there's anybody except it were someone sent in to infiltrate the congregation and destroy it by an enemy. How could anyone come into the church and say, well, I'm going to destroy the peace and unity of the people of God at Trinity. That's my mission as a church member. And no one would come in with that mentality, not if they came in sincerely.

10:07 No one would join the church and say, what my mission is is to divide this church. My mission is to split this church apart if I possibly can. And yet sometimes it happens. Churches are divided.

10:23 Churches are split. There's a lack of peace. There's a lack of order. Well, how do these things happen if people don't come into the church with an intent to do them?

10:36 How do they manage to do them? Here's the point. It happens either when you are ignorant of the things that will be said this morning and have been said on many other occasions or if you neglect them and reject them. If you're ignorant of them, you don't understand them, you don't know even that these things exist, or that this has anything to do with membership.

11:03 Or if you reject and neglect these principles associated with the preservation of peace and order. That is how you, though you never joined the church with that in view, you could become involved in being an instrument to split and divide the church of God. And therefore it is important that we take to heart the things that are being said this morning. First, with respect to peace.

Constitutional Basis for Peace: Foundation and Specific Duties

11:35 And second, with respect to order. Now, peace is addressed in paragraph E of our Constitution. And let me read this paragraph to you. It's found on page 7 of our current Constitution.

11:53 Inasmuch as the church is represented in Scripture as a body having many members, each of the members having its particular function, and yet having a concern for the health and protection of the whole. 1 Corinthians 12, 12-27, and Ephesians 4, 4, and Ephesians 4, 11-16. This church expects that each of its members will strive for the good of the entire body. In that phrase we have what I have called the foundation for promoting peace in the church. And then in the second part of the paragraph, we have the specific duties associated with the maintenance of peace in the church. The members must actively seek to cultivate acquaintance with one another so that they may be better able to pray for one another, love, comfort, and encourage one another, and help one another materially as necessity may require. They must refrain from speaking ill of one another,

13:20 and must keep in strict confidence all matters of private concern to the church, and not discuss them with persons outside the church. This is the purpose of this fellowship. I would also like to say that we have in our proposed revision of the Constitution added two more specifics with reference to maintenance. The first is the cultivation of spiritual intimacy.

13:55 You see I have that on the board as number one. And the second specific is the preservation of the integrity or good name of the brethren. And the third is the protection of the privacy of the brethren and of the church. We have added two more, and that's why, or I shouldn't say we have added, that's not true.

14:17 We have added to our draft two more. That is we are proposing or preparing some day to propose God willing, we might again revise a little bit of it before it's actually presented to you. But we are preparing to propose two other specifics with reference to this subject that they might be, might be added to our Constitution God willing in the future. That's why they have them in parenthesis.

14:39 Four with reference to confession and five with reference to confrontation. Let me read you what we have proposed. In addition, in addition, members must or should discreetly confess their sins one to another, James 5, 16, and faithfully, faithfully admonish and encourage one another. Matthew 18, 15 and following, 1 Thessalonians 5, 14, Hebrews 3, 12 and 13, and Hebrews 10, 24 and 25.

15:21 With reference to this second point regarding integrity, which is presently stated this way, that we must refrain from speaking ill one of another, it has been reworded to perhaps be more precise in terms of exactly what we mean, we suggest that we put this way, refrain from all backbiting and gossip. Refrain from all backbiting and gossip. Psalm 15 and verse 3 and Proverbs 16 and verse 28. And also, we thought with reference to privacy, a little word of explanation would be in order.

16:04 And we said this, and keep in strict confidence all matters which the elders determine are of private concern to the church, because we conceived of a situation where people might not know what should be kept private and what should not be, so the elders are taking responsibility for telling the people what matters are to be kept in confidence, and I'll get to that in a moment. Well, now let me then open up these things in the order in which they are presented in this paragraph. First, we'll consider the foundation of peace in the church, and secondly, we will consider the maintenance of peace in the church. But what is the foundation of peace in the church?

The Foundation of Peace: Spiritual Unity in Christ

16:47 The foundation of peace in the church is spiritual unity in Christ. Turn with me, please, to the book of Ephesians, chapter 4. The foundation of peace in the church, and this is the passage that's mentioned in our church constitution, the book of Ephesians, chapter 4. Therefore, the prisoner in the Lord, beseech you to walk worthily of the calling wherewith you were called, with all lowliness and meekness, with long suffering, forbearing one another in love, giving diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. One of the ropes or bonds or chains which holds the unity of the Spirit together is peace, as we are about to see. Another one is the rule or government or order of the church. But peace among the people of God is one of those things which keeps the people at one.

18:00 And this unity is a spiritual unity. The foundation of this unity is the reality of a united Christian spiritual experience. For example, look at verse 4. It is a unity of religious experience with the Son, with the Spirit, and with the Father.

18:22 First, with the Holy Spirit. There is one body and one Spirit, even as you were called in one hope of your calling. There's one body. That is, the church is one.

18:36 Because this one church is the temple of God. It is indwelt by the Holy Spirit. It is the place of God's special place. Of God's special presence.

18:47 And there is a unity of the people of God because of the presence of the Holy Spirit in the midst of the church, indwelling the church. But notice with reference to the individual. Even as you were called in one hope of your calling. The Holy Spirit not only unifies the people of God by dwelling in the midst of them as the place of God's special presence, but also by dwelling in every individual whom God calls out of darkness unto light.

19:21 We have all experienced the same calling. We've all experienced the same gospel regeneration. And we've all experienced the same indwelling by the Holy Spirit. And that is the basis, that is the foundation of unity.

19:40 Without that you can't have unity. You can't have unity between sheep and goats. You can't have unity between the temple of God and idols. Between those who have been regenerated and those who are unregenerate.

19:54 Between the wicked and the righteous. Between those who have been called into the fellowship of the Son and those who have not been called. This is the foundation of spiritual unity. But notice, there's a second strand.

20:07 One Lord, one faith, one baptism. One Lord, one faith, one baptism. The unity is not only rooted in the person and work of the Holy Spirit. The unity is also rooted in the person and work of God the Son incarnate, the Lord Jesus Christ.

20:24 There is only one God incarnate, Lord Jesus Christ. And only one saving faith in Him, which trusts in Him as our God and as our righteousness and as our atonement and as our power and as our hope. There's only one gospel. And only one faith in that gospel of God's Son.

20:46 And only one baptism, which is the public confession of that faith. In that one Christ. And we all have that faith. If we don't have that faith, we can't have unity.

20:58 You can't have unity between people who believe and people who don't believe in the church. It's just not possible. You can't have peace. And thirdly, it's not only rooted in the person and work of the Spirit and in the person and work of the Son, it's rooted in the person and work of God the Father.

21:16 One God and Father of all, who is over all and through all, and in all. One God and Father of all, who is over all. All of those who are partakers of this spiritual experience, which is the ground of unity, are in submission to God the Father. He is over them.

21:41 They walk in a lifestyle of filial obedience to the Father. And He is through all and in all. There is communion with Him. There is a Father-Son ongoing relationship of communication, of love, of fellowship between the believer and His God.

22:10 Spiritual intercourse. Intimate personal fellowship between you and God. That's the basis of unity in the church. You can't have unity between those who know God and those who don't know God.

22:26 You can't have unity between those who obey God and those who rebel against God and reject Him and reject His oversight. It doesn't work that way. So you see the basis of unity? The basis of unity is the experience of gospel grace.

Diligence Required to Maintain Unity Despite Remaining Sin

22:41 It is the personal work of the Spirit, the personal work of the Son, the personal work of the Father, experienced by those who are in church membership. Without that, we have no unity. Well, you might think then, if that's the case, if that's the foundation of spiritual unity in the church, and it is, you might think then it'll just come naturally. Just come naturally.

23:09 And you don't have to do anything to maintain it. Well, if I've been saved by the Holy Spirit and if I believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and if I have communion with God the Father, then there's no problem. Then there will automatically be unity. Period.

23:23 And there's nothing that I have to do or say or think or no manner in which I have to behave in order to promote and preserve that unity. It'll just come. But that's also false. If that were not false, why did the Apostle Paul write to these Christians and say, give diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace?

23:45 No, there is danger of disunity, even among those respecting whom this is true. There's the danger because of our remaining sin. There's the danger because of the pressure of the world upon us. There's the danger because of the plots and devices, schemes, and evil workings of the devil to divide and to destroy the unity of the people of God and to get God's people so twisted around and so confused in their minds and in their hearts that they forget what's right and wrong.

24:20 They forget who their friends are and who their enemies are. They forget where they belong and where they don't belong. Now this can happen. And when the devil does that successfully and when our remaining corruption goes along with it, except we be diligent, the result will be the division and splitting of the church.

24:42 And that we do not want. Therefore, we must give diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. And therefore, we give these guidelines and expectations of those who come into membership with respect to the preservation and maintenance of that unity. Well, the first thing is the members must actively seek to cultivate acquaintance with one another.

Specific Duties for Maintaining Peace: Cultivating Acquaintance

25:11 Must actively seek to cultivate acquaintance with one another. Actively seek. Now we have a church of approximately 350 members. And we are not saying that if you come into the membership of this church that you have to be intimate best friends with all 350 people or otherwise you cannot be a member.

25:34 We're not saying that. That's your duty. We realize that that's not realistic. We're not saying that you have to go up and down the aisles on Sunday morning, shake everybody's hand or you're in sin.

25:47 We're not. Neither are we encouraging you to go over and sit in the corner in the dark with your face to the wall either and say, this place isn't friendly. Nobody found me and nobody said anything to me. So you see the point within the reasonableness of being friendly, and open, and available, and trying when you can to take the initiative as well the people who are members of the church.

26:20 Since this is a pre-membership class they're not here. The people who are members of the church, we exhort them as well to take the initiative to get to know you because you're the newcomer. You're the one who's just arrived. You're the one who feels insecure and strange and awkward about anybody.

26:40 And it's the duty of those who have been members a while to make themselves friendly to you and to come to you and to introduce themselves and to try to get to know you. And so that's what we exhort the members, don't we? Yes. You've heard such exhortations I know many, many times at some site.

26:58 But for those who are coming into the church, you too must show yourself friendly and seeking to get to know the people of God here in this place. But we're not suggesting that everybody in the church has to be intimate friends with all 350 members. But there are circles of friendship. And those circles of friendship interlock with one another and we trust that by natural gravitation for those with whom there is that, whatever it is, chemistry that gives rise to the seeking of a godly friendship, that there won't be anyone who will be totally left out, isolated, all on his own and that we don't want a situation here where there's no one who can be in or out of this relationship. As far as I know, and I can tell you this who are thinking about joining the church, I've been here for over 20 years and it is not so. Whoever comes in here is welcome here. I know it's often said about Trinity that Trinity is just a preaching station.

28:05 I tell you, it is not so. It is not so. It is not so. It's a spiritual family.

28:12 And you come in here, you don't have to put on airs. You don't have to pretend to be something that you're not. You can be open. You can be spiritually honest.

28:25 I know that's the thing. I'll tell you my own testimony. That's the thing that encouraged me way back in 1971 to stay here in the first place when it was a little group of 35 people meeting over on Runnymede Road. It was the fact that when you went into that place, even though I looked like I shouldn't have been in church at all, when I went into that place, the people were such that you could be very open and honest with them.

28:54 You didn't have to put on airs. And that hasn't changed, my friend, until this day. And so, that's what we're talking about. We're not talking about being best friends with everybody in the church.

29:10 Well, all right, I'm going to stop. We're talking about entering into spiritual fellowship with each other. And the reason for this is this is so you can pray for each other. And this is so you can love each other.

29:28 And this is so you can show benevolence to each other. It's so you can pray. People can't pray for you intelligently if they don't know you. People can't love you intelligently if they don't know what you're suffering and what you're going through.

29:42 And they can't help you financially if they don't know that you're in real trouble. And I know it's hard for some people that have always been self-supporting all their life and have always worked hard to make men's eat meat and don't want to have a welfare mentality and don't want to take advantage of anybody to come and make their needs known. It's hard. I understand that.

30:01 But people can't help you if they don't know. If you don't come and humble yourself and admit, I need help, people can't help. I know it's hard. And when there's ignorance and when there's silence and when there isn't this intimacy, what it does is it breeds suspicion.

Specific Duties for Maintaining Peace: Integrity, Privacy, Confession, and Confrontation

30:17 But then, also, our time is rapidly going and I cannot do what I just did for the rest of these points. I realize it. I can't do it. The second thing is preserving the integrity of each other.

30:32 Preserving the integrity of the brethren. Preserving the integrity of the brethren. In the original Constitution, we express it this way. We must refrain from speaking ill of one another.

30:45 More explicitly, we mean by that we must refrain from all backbiting and gossip. The passages to which I refer you, Psalm 15 and verse 3 and Proverbs 16 and verse 28 and Proverbs 27 and Proverbs 29 and Proverbs 30 and Proverbs 31 and Proverbs 32 and Proverbs 32 and Proverbs 36 and verses 20 to 22. I cannot turn to these passages or will go no further this morning. I just can't do it and I won't do it.

31:13 I wish I could. But fellowship, brethren, that I'm speaking about and that we're requiring is not intended as an opportunity to cut and backbite the people of God. You are not to make yourself the brother so-and-so complaint department so that everybody knows that if they have a problem with this brother, the right place to go is to you because you want to hear all the complaints you're talking about. And yet it's easy to do.

31:40 And when that type of stuff is going on, you can't have open-faced fellowship with that brother that you've been listening to all that garbage about. You just can't do it. And it tends to destroy that man's integrity or that woman's integrity in your eyes. And therefore, what it does is it tends to turn the heart sour against that brother or against that sister.

32:02 But then we must also, according to Proverbs chapter 11 and verse 13, say, maintain the privacy of the church. Maintain the privacy of the church. Refrain not only from speaking ill, but also keep in strict confidence all matters of private concern to the church and not discuss them with persons outside the fellowship. So I say, we've added which the elders determine are of private concern to the church.

32:33 Proverbs 11 and verse 13, that there's a man of a faithful spirit is one who conceals the matter. And it's not, it's no great benefit to go around as a tale-bearer. Rumors are those things which so often are the means of division among the people of God at large. And how do rumors get started?

32:56 Rumors get started when people, either carelessly or at worst, maliciously, take information out of private congregational meetings and tell it to people who have no business hearing it and knowing it. Now when you become a member of the church, you are being committed, or you are having a sacred trust committed to your care. You are having the sacred trust of access to private information given to you. Private information about people.

33:32 And sometimes if we have acts of discipline or we have people leaving the church in a manner that is less than appropriate and righteous and biblical, sometimes very delicate things are said in those church meetings. Things which if they get out don't do anybody any good if they go out as rumors and all they do is damage the reputation of the people involved and all they do is damage the reputation of the church in the eyes of the churches at large. That's all it does to spread rumors. It does no good whatsoever.

34:06 It doesn't change this church. It doesn't change the people. All it does is destroy the church. Now what good is that?

34:18 Didn't they used to have a saying in World War II was it? Loose? Was it World War I? I don't remember.

34:25 I wasn't alive so I never heard it. I heard about it loose lips sink ships. No need for loose lips. And so what I'm talking about is you got to be careful.

34:37 You're sitting around the table with your kids. But you don't be talking about private church business at the table with the kids and then rumors and stuff is necessarily done maliciously. But there's a danger that that could be done carelessly. Or you don't tell your relatives lest all kinds of rumors spread throughout your family unless your relatives are church members.

35:02 And you don't tell people that you know outside the church because they don't need to have the information. Now there may be cases where there are certain individuals that have a right to information that's private in a church meeting and they have to know it. And if you have a question whether you should talk to this or that decision of the elders as to exactly what you should say and to whom, just don't take it into your own hands to release private information from church meetings to other people outside the church. Don't do that because it's not conducive to peace and unity.

35:34 But then we've also encouraged this as well. We've encouraged also and required that there would be a discrete confession of sin. In James chapter 5 and verse 16 it says confess your sins one to another. Now you've got to be discrete about it.

35:49 But you've got to do it. The point is not that you go up to everybody you see in the church and you say you member of the church and he says yes that's good let me tell you all my sins. Past, present and maybe future. But that's not that's not right.

36:06 That's indiscretion and foolishness. It's not in such a way as to wallow in the sins but to be willing to be open to confess your sins to your brethren that they might pray for you that they might watch over your soul. That's part and parcel of biblical religion and the final thing that we are encouraging here is confrontation. When people are holding grudges against each other when people are offended at something that someone else did that's one of the main reasons that people backbite in the first place because they don't want to go to the person they're offended at and tell them so they go to other people and tell them instead of going to the one they should go to.

36:42 So what we're going to do here is we're going to suggest that we spell out explicitly not only must you refrain from backbiting but positively you must faithfully admonish and encourage one another faithfully reprove faithfully encourage. We have a responsibility to watch out for one another and for one another's souls we have this duty and we ought to faithfully we ought faithfully to pursue it. Matthew 18 if your brother sins against you go show him his fault between you and him alone. In that instance it's not talking about well maybe he walked past me in a hall and didn't greet me or maybe it's not talking about something that is possibly maybe something that has a problem with you.

37:24 It's not talking about some petty thing. It's talking about something which if it's not dealt with would become the means or the occasion of eventual church discipline. That you have to take two or three others and then bring it before the church. It's not talking about some possibly maybe somebody might have intended to snub me.

37:45 If you think that go ask the person. Go talk to them. You still don't talk to them but it depends on the person. That says if there's sin then you have to go talk about it to the person who did it.

37:58 And there's Hebrews 3. You've got to be you've got to be concerned for one another lest there be in anyone an evil heart of unbelief. You begin to see patterns of of neglect and non-attendance in a brother's life. Well you've got to go talk to the brother about it.

38:13 Because if you're aware of it then you've got to be concerned for the well-being of their soul and of their faith. So you've got to take a responsibility to go to people about the concerns that you have. This is not just the duty of the elders but it's the duty of the whole congregation and everybody coming into the church has to take some part in this responsibility. Hebrews chapter 3 verses 12 and 13.

The Necessity of Order in the Church

38:38 Well that's what I wanted to say then about the responsibilities associated with peace. Well let me come about 15 minutes remaining to the responsibilities associated with order in the church. The responsibilities associated with order in the church. It goes without saying in a sense that without order in the church you will not have unity in the church.

39:06 Without order in the church you will not have unity in the church. Could you imagine where the church would be if it had no leadership? If it had no elders? If it had no deacons?

39:17 And if everybody just ran the church based on what was right in his own eyes? Do you think the church would be marked by order? Or do you think the church would be marked by confusion and chaos and disarray and disunity? Well it's evident.

39:35 And it's in recognition of this that the apostolic pattern was in all of the churches to make provision for the ordination of an eldership. And the establishment of a plurality of men that's the uniform pattern of the New Testament. And if that's not the case then it's an abnormality. That we should not simply happily live with but we should strive to correct.

40:00 The implementation of an eldership to govern the congregation. And when the labor becomes too much for them to bear of deacons to help them and assist them with respect to the mundane aspects of that oversight of the church. This is the Lord's will for church leadership. And one of the reasons that he has designed it as he has is in the promotion of that order which is crucial to the maintenance of peace and unity in the church.

Constitutional Basis for Order: Recognition, Submission, and Support

40:31 Now therefore we have in paragraph H of our present constitution on page 8 specified this requirement about submission to the membership to the leadership of the church as exercised in the elders. Paragraph H All who come into the membership of this church are expected to recognize and submit to the authority of the overseers of the church. 1 Corinthians 16 15 and 16 1 Thessalonians 5 12 and 13 and Hebrews 13 and verse 17. Now with reference to the duties as far as promotion and maintenance of order in the church are concerned you can see that in our present constitution we have two. First to recognize and then to submit to the authority of the elders or overseers of the church. The first is recognition and the second is submission. But then what we have done is we have added in our proposed revision a third and that is in parenthesis on the board is to recognize submission

42:00 and support. So you have recognition submission and support. But what do we mean by support? We have added this statement all who come into the membership of the church are expected to support and submit to the overseers of the church.

42:20 And I'll get into a minute what we mean I probably won't be able to go into detail but briefly at least what we mean by support. And then when it comes to submission we felt that it was not adequate simply to say you have to submit because you're coming into the church and you wonder well perhaps what does it mean to submit? What exactly does that mean? So we felt that it was appropriate to spell out at least five areas clearly that indicate what submission to the eldership of the church means.

42:55 And I'll read those as well in a minute. Now I'll open up these three things submission to their authority and thirdly supporting of them in their life and office. First of all recognition. Well you have to know if you're going to recognize you need to know what are the limits of their authority.

Understanding the Authority of Elders

43:18 You have to know what they are. Now I'd like to just then read to you something that recently has been written associated with the doctrine of the church but it opens up what is this authority and what is the basis for it. The office of elder is a spiritual stewardship. The scripture says the bishop must be blameless as God's steward.

43:41 And to be a steward is to receive an authorization from a master for which that steward is accountable to the master. And who's steward is the bishop. The eldership each and every one of them and all of them are stewards of God and of their master the Lord Jesus Christ. And generally speaking they are authorized to govern the entire life of the church according to the word of God.

44:10 And since this oversight is comprehensive they're responsible to promote God's glory and to honor and implement his word in everything germane to the church. It's policy or polity by which it's formed constitution confession it's membership who should be in the church it's leadership it's commission and tasks it's order by the various traditions through which it walks it's assemblies or meetings and it's associations with other churches. The elders are responsible to give comprehensive oversight with regard to the polity they're responsible to ensure that the doctrinal standards our confession of faith and the polity statement our constitution our biblical are enforced and they must guard against wolves arising to draw away disciples after them and preserve doctrinal purity and unity in the church and oppose the errors and heresies which threaten the church. Regarding membership they must take heed to all the flock so as to honor the biblical standard for membership and to apply it graciously impartially conscientiously courageously. Respecting leadership we must take heed to ourselves to enforce the biblical standard for leadership to give careful oversight

45:38 to the existing leadership respecting both the life and teaching of the elders and the life and labor of the deacons. Regarding the commission and tasks and mandate of the church the elders are responsible to know how men ought to behave themselves in the house of God and knowing what is expected of the church's tasks. They have to be convinced of the church's competence to perform her tasks. They must keep the church from being diverted from her tasks and they must guide her to pursue her tasks with God honoring methods and means.

46:19 They are responsible to maintain a biblical climate of worship to formulate and promote a biblical policy of evangelism to institute a generous equal and principled benevolence to nurture each one of the disciples under our care in the word and ways of the Lord to implement a biblical discipline of the disorderly regularly to administer and observe the sacraments to lead the congregation in corporate prayer which is focused on the glory of God and the concerns of his kingdom and the success of the labors of the church. Regarding the order of the church according to the apostolic traditions they are expected to implement those apostolic traditions and these must be boldly and graciously implemented respecting the place of women in the church respecting the use of church finances respecting the honoring of Christian liberty and the use of spiritual gifts and the formulation of biblical marital ethics. Regarding church assemblies and meetings the elders are responsible to ensure that the church convene and conduct its assemblies in an orderly edifying manner in accordance with the laws of God and regarding church associations and relations they are responsible to foster and establish and maintain communion and cooperation and peace between their church and all the other true churches

47:46 of Christ as far as conscience and providence permit. You say who is sufficient for these things and we say not from us our sufficiency is from God. This is what a frightening overwhelming thing it is. I know when I was listing these things in the doctrine of the church it was overwhelming.

48:12 Therefore brethren as an aside pray for us. But something else to be said if you're to recognize this authority you not only need to know what's expected of the elders but you need to know the capacity in which they do it. You need to know that the elders exercise this authority in their capacity as representatives of Christ representatives of Christ and of the church. They represent Christ even as governors represent the kings who sent them.

48:45 And therefore in the exercise of this authority they speak for Christ in so far as they follow and implement the word of Christ and to reject them and their biblical leadership is thus to reject Christ and his leadership and to reject and receive them and their leadership is thus to receive Christ and his leadership. He that receives whomsoever I send receives me. As far as their judgments are in accordance with biblical principle and truth they are the living embodiment of the loving rule of Jesus Christ. The Bible says in Acts 15 that the person of God was to God and his от and to God and his flesh and his flesh and His blood and his flesh and His blood and His blood and His

50:14 Sometimes we sin.

50:17 And, according to the Bible, the sins and faults and errors of judgment in the eldership should be faced with impartiality, 1 Timothy 5, integrity, Galatians 2, 11, and courage, 3 John 9-12. But nevertheless, that qualification notwithstanding, here's what you need to know and to recognize. That as far as their leadership is in accordance with biblical principle and truth, they are just that far and no further the living embodiment of the loving rule of Jesus Christ. And therefore, they are to be honored.

50:51 And the way we express this honor around here is the way that we address them. The elders are addressed not as first name basis, Don and Frank and Greg. The elders are addressed as Pastor Dixon and Pastor Barker and Pastor Nichols. And the reason for that is to show respect.

51:08 It's in that way that we recognize their authority. Because we address them as those who have authority over us. But we must also submit to the authority. Now, we must also submit to the authority.

The Nature of Submission to Elders

51:29 Now, I'd like to here make reference to three sets of tapes. Hardly seems possible, but 11 years ago, in 1981, there was a series of tapes on the eldership, which I did in Sunday school from March 8th to March 29th of 1981.

51:47 There's... There's a series of seven tapes on what it means to submit to the elders, which Dr. Bob did in the exposition of Hebrews 13, 17 in the Sunday school.

51:55 And then there's tapes that go all the way back to the beginning, which Pastor Martin did on church officers. And I would commend to you the teaching on submission to elders found in those things. So let me just read to you here. Now, I knew we wouldn't have much time for these additions, but I want to just mention them to you briefly.

52:16 I just want to read to you the additions. I just want to read to you the additions on submission and supporting and commend them to you for your prayerful consideration. Here's what we're planning to add about submission. Submission to God's servants necessitates imitating their graces, faith, and godly principles as they imitate Christ.

52:34 First thing, you look at their life. And submitting to their life means you're willing to imitate their life in as much as they imitate the Lord Jesus Christ. Hebrews 13 and verse 7. Receiving their teaching with all readiness of mind, and teachableness of spirit, yet with ultimate allegiance to the word of God.

52:53 Acts 17, 11. The Berean spirit. That means you come and sit under their teaching. You can't submit to the teaching if you're not willing to come and sit and listen to it.

53:02 But when you receive it, you're willing to be instructed. Their instruction is something that you sit under with an eagerness to learn, a willingness to learn, and yet your allegiance is not to them. You don't say, well, the pastor said. You say, well, the Bible says.

53:16 Because when the pastor says it, you open up your Bible, and then you see if what the pastor says agrees with what the Bible says. They search the Scriptures whether these things were said. Thirdly, with reference to their corrections. Because they're over you in the Lord, there are times coming when they're going to correct you.

53:32 And in this way we put it, by humbly heeding their scriptural rebukes and warnings as from those appointed to watch for the souls of the sheep, and committed to labor to present them complete and mature in Christ. They're not just speaking to you as any other brother, but they're speaking to you, as one who has been given a charge from the Lord. And therefore, that is something which ought to be very seriously heeded. And remember, you are entering into that relationship with them.

54:01 Fourthly, with reference to their counsel, seeking and carefully considering their counsel as from those counted faithful by the Lord. Now, in this we're not talking about you becoming dependent upon the elders, that the elders are going to make all the decisions of your life, and you can't brush your teeth and buy toothpaste, without calling the elders and finding out which brand you should buy. But we're talking about, if you are contemplating and regarding major decisions in your life, that you ought to seek their counsel and advice about those decisions.

54:36 And carefully consider it.

54:40 Because you're entering into that relationship with them, as those counted faithful. Now, the Bible makes a clear distinction in 1 Corinthians 7, between counsel and directive, authoritative directive and counsel. Paul says, I've given you this counsel about getting married, but if you do it, you're not sinning. Even though I'm telling you, I think it's better if you don't.

55:01 But if you do, you're still not sinning. So there's a distinction. We're not talking about the elders running people's lives and authoritatively dominating people and telling them everything they have to do. There's a distinction.

55:12 And Paul makes that distinction in 1 Corinthians 7. We mention it here. But we're talking about seeking and carefully considering their counsel. And then cheerfully embracing and abiding, abiding by their decisions regarding the corporate policy in the house of God without gainsaying or murmuring, even when personally differing with their judgment.

55:32 Submission doesn't mean you have to agree with everything the elders say and do. But it means as far as the public policy of the church is concerned, that you must be willing cheerfully to embrace it and not go around seeking to undermine it in the lives of all the people of God. But be ready to submit to it means embrace it, not gainsaying, not backbiting and bad mouthing, just because you don't agree. It doesn't mean you have to agree with everything.

56:00 And it doesn't mean that you can't come to the elders and express your disagreement. It just means as far as the house rules are concerned, you respect them and you cheerfully embrace them because they're ordained of God for unity. Now, I've got to go. I'll just read this section on support.

The Nature of Supporting Elders

56:16 Supporting God's servants necessitates praying for them and their labors. That is their work. Brethren, pray for us. Cultivating personal acquaintance with them, loving them and esteeming them highly for their work sake.

56:31 One of the things brief suggested. There's a tape from the Sunday school which has the testimony of every elder on it. Suggest that you would get it. So you might know something of our spiritual history and you could pray intelligently for us by standing by them and not forsaking them and their afflictions and all their good causes.

56:47 The elders are going to be afflicted and they need the support of the people of God to stand by them in the midst of those afflictions. And by doing that, they're going to be able to stand by them in the midst of those afflictions. And by doing that, they're going to be able to stand by them in the midst of those afflictions. By defending rather than prejudicing or damaging their good name.

57:01 We don't ask that you regard us as infallible and impeccable. But we do ask that you respect the integrity of our good name. Earned and maintained over many years. That we do ask.

57:16 And so does Paul. Says against an elder received not an accusation except to be at the mouth of two or three witnesses. And our duty is to respect the good name. The credibility.

57:25 The integrity of all those that the Lord has put into the office. Well, I regret we went a few minutes over time here this morning. I didn't want to read you those proposed additions just to familiarize you with them. I trust that God will be pleased to grant us grace.

Conclusion and Prayer for Grace

57:43 That peace and order may be maintained here until the Lord Jesus Christ comes again. Let us pray.

57:55 Our Father, we give you thanks for your holy word. No, God. We know that if there is to be the maintenance of peace and the maintenance of order, we cannot do it. It must be of you.

58:08 You must maintain it. You must give us grace to strive with diligence to maintain it. Or Lord, we will surely fall apart. For the devil we know hates us and hates your work here.

58:21 And our own sin to our shame is allied with him. And therefore, we pray our father that you will restrain the remaining corruption of our hearts. And grant us grace that we may pursue peace, that we may pursue unity and follow after biblical order for your glory and for the honor of the name of Jesus and the preservation of this church. Hear our prayer.

58:46 Be pleased to answer. For Jesus' sake. Amen.