So if you would turn to your Bibles to 1 Timothy 4, 6 through 16. We'll read Paul's words of instruction there. To Timothy. Indeed to the church in perpetuity. But before we go to the word of God, let's go to the God who gave us that word and let us ask him to bless the reading and preaching of it this evening. Please join me. Almighty and most merciful God, Lord, we thank you that you've gathered us together again in this place. that we are here to hear your word. And we pray, O Lord, that you would open our ears to hear and that you would prepare our hearts to receive all that you have to tell us. Lord, we pray that our hearts would be plowed up and they would be prepared to receive that gospel seed, that it might go down within us and that it might produce that bountiful harvest that you desire. Lord, I know that I can reach ears, but I know that only you can reach hearts through your spirit. I pray that you would do that this evening. I pray, O Lord, that you would give me only those words that I should speak to your people, that I would not go astray to the left or to the right, and that, Lord, I would not be exalted, but that Jesus Christ would be exalted. He must increase. I must decrease. O Lord, help us to see him this day, to hear his instructions, and to glorify him and seek to serve him, realizing that these words of instruction apply not only to the elders of the church, but in due course to all the members of it. We pray these things in Jesus' holy name. If you instruct the brethren in these things, you will be a good minister of Jesus Christ, nourished in the words of faith and of the good doctrine which you have carefully followed. But reject profane and old wise fables and exercise yourself towards godliness. For bodily exercise profits a little, but godliness is profitable for all things. having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come. This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptance, for to this end we both labor and suffer reproach, because we trust in the living God who is the Savior of all men, especially of those who believe. These things command and teach. Let no one despise your youth, but be an example to the believers in word, in conduct, in love, in spirit, in faith, in purity. Till I come, give attention to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine. Do not neglect the gift that is in you, which was given to you by prophecy with the laying on of the hands of the eldership. Meditate on these things. Give yourself entirely to them, that your progress may be evident to all. Take heed to yourself and to the doctrine. Continue in them, for in doing this you will save both yourself and those who hear you. Grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God will stand forever. What makes a man a good elder or minister? What is it that makes his ministry a success? What qualities does a minister or elder have to have in order to be a good minister? Well, if we were to turn to the world for advice on that particular subject, to ask those questions, we should expect to hear that a good elder would have the same kind of qualities that a good businessman would have. That he is able to grow the church, both numerically and monetarily. That the business, so to speak, grows under his directorship. That's what they would be looking for. We might also expect to hear that a good elder is also a dynamic man, a charismatic man, a personable public figure. that he speaks well, that he is interesting, that he puts people at ease by his very manner and that he says the kind of things that people want to hear and therefore flock to hear and by and large that is the kind of elder, that is the kind of pastor who receives national attention, who receives national acclaim, the kind of man who do these things Now, we could expect to hear that from the world. That's in keeping with their thinking. Because the only gauges that the world really has for success, the only things that they generally understand are popularity and profit. Those are the gauges for success. That a man is popular and that he is a profitable person in the sense that he produces income and revenue. Noses in nickels, as a friend of mine puts it. But what may surprise you is that often pastors themselves are tempted to measure their own success. Elders tempted to measure their own success in exactly the same terms. For instance, one recent Barna poll revealed this. A national survey among pastors revealed that a majority feels they are doing an excellent or good job in leading people spiritually in relation to 12 of the 13 areas of performance evaluated. The exception was in the area of raising money for ministry. In fact, the larger the church the more likely the pastor is to feel pleased with his performance as its leader. That is how pastors unfortunately are measuring their success by the size of their church. But I think George Barna in the comments as he went on commenting on this poll showed very well the terrible shortcomings of applying the world standard for success to the ministry. Barna wrote this. Pastoring is a difficult job, he acknowledged, and it's important not to become discouraged by the magnitude of the spiritual battle in which we are engaged. After all, we know that we are aligned with the winning camp. However, it's a bit troubling to see pastors feel they're doing a good job when the research reveals that few congregants have a biblical worldview. Half the people they minister to are not spiritually secure or developed. Kids are fleeing from the church in record numbers. Most of the people who attend worship services admit they did not connect with God. The divorce rate among Christians is no different from that of non-Christians. Only 2% of the pastors themselves can identify God's vision for the ministry they are trying to lead. And the average congregant spends more time watching television in one day than he spends in all spiritual pursuits combined for the entire week. Pastors alone cannot be held accountable for the spiritual disrepair of America, but it's worrisome where there is a strong correlation between church size and self-satisfaction because that suggests that attendance and budget figures have become our mark of success. It's troubling when our spiritual leaders cannot articulate where we're headed and how the church will fulfill its role as the restorative agent of our society. Maybe the comfort afforded by our buildings and other material possessions has seduced us into thinking we're further down the road than we really are. I think there's a lot of truth in what Barna says there. And it's worthwhile noting that noses and nickels was never never how the Bible gauged the success of a ministry or whether an elder was a good minister or a good servant of the Lord Jesus Christ. It was not the criteria they applied. Paul, for instance, here in writing to Timothy, one of his most faithful assistants, in this letter says that there are two qualities that mark out a good elder, a good minister of the Lord Jesus Christ. And those qualities are not that he brings in a lot of people. or that he raises a lot of money. He says the two qualities that particularly mark out that elder are soundness of doctrine, the doctrine he teaches, and holiness of life. The two qualities then, brothers and sisters, that the Bible predominantly identifies as the marks of a good minister, a good servant, are orthodoxy and godliness. then what Paul is going to go on as he writes to Timothy is to show how those two things are absolutely connected, that they cannot be disconnected from one another. That they are both essential qualities. When a man has those qualities, those under his oversight will prosper spiritually. But when those qualities are absent, inevitably, Regardless of how wealthy a church is, regardless of how large a church is, regardless of how well known or popular his ministry becomes, the people within it will tend to spiritually stagnate, will tend not to grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. So let's look at the qualities that Paul encouraged Timothy to continue in. First, he said, Timothy, you must have good doctrine. You've got to have good sound teaching, good sound theology. I know theology has become a kind of a dirty word, doctrine, a bad word in the evangelical church of today. But it wasn't in the Bible. It is a word that is that is precious to Paul. It is the substance of the faith that is taught, those things that we teach people to believe, the substance of the scriptures, teachings, the theology of the word. Now the words of faith that Timothy learned from scripture and that sound doctrine that he learned from the inspired apostles and in particular his teacher Paul are essentially the same thing. Paul points out that the biblically based theology he should be teaching is the same biblically based theology that Timothy learned first from his grandmother and his mother and then later on from Paul himself. Same theology. Now, parents, I hope that would encourage you as you go about the process of teaching your little ones biblical theology from the scriptures. How can we know whether or not we're training the next Timothy, the next great leader of the church or the next great leader of a church? It doesn't have to be the big church, the big guys, just a faithful man of God or a faithful husband who will raise up a family that knows and loves the word. when we are teaching our children these things we should have that in mind the next generations after us Paul himself wrote this to Timothy he said in 2nd Timothy 3.14-17 but you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of knowing from whom you have learned them and that from childhood you have known the holy scriptures which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work. Now, Paul throughout his ministry pointed out that the apostles doctrine and their teachings and the teaching of scripture were one. that what the apostles were doing was not contradicting everything that had come before. They weren't contradicting the faith contained in the Old Testament. They were completing it. They were adding to it, but everything that they spoke and they talked, and they said, and they passed on to those who followed after them was in perfect complicity with what had been taught before. The fulfillments of prophecy, for instance, were one of the major themes of their preaching. Peter, for instance, preaching to that crowd on Pentecost is constantly saying, you are saying what was foreordained by God, what was prophesied, the things, the events, these amazing things were spoken of, for instance, by the prophet Joel. again and again they were dipping back into scripture and saying we are just telling you what God has been telling you for ages we're showing you that the fullness of the scripture is being unveiled in front of you and we as Christians should remember that Old Testament and New Testament are not warring with one another but rather as I can't remember who the first man to say it was but it's a wonderful little practical cliche that we can use What is in the old concealed is in the new revealed. In other words, that although we have greater understanding now of what was in the Old Testament because we have the New Testament with us, it was all the same stuff. All right? It's just that we know it more fully. For instance, Old Testament believers were looking forward to the coming of Jesus Christ. They did not know that his name would be Jesus. They knew him by names such as Emmanuel, God with us, God our righteousness, things like that. But they knew he was coming, and that is why Jesus was able to proclaim to the Pharisees, Abraham saw my day and he rejoiced. He knew what was coming. Why don't you know what was coming? You've got the same scriptures that the church has always had. So, in their preaching, the apostles were simply preaching scripture doctrine. They were preaching the theology of the Bible. and Paul emphasized that and said you have to maintain this faith once for all delivered to the saints with all your strength you have to maintain that and avoid the tendency to deviate into the teaching of that which is not true that which is not biblical you have to avoid Timothy teaching the non-biblical opinions of men you have to avoid compounding your ministry on non-biblical philosophies You have to avoid founding your ministry and teaching people merely popular sayings, the maxims of the culture, the things that everybody, you know, nods their heads in, no matter how old they are, no matter how pithy they are. I have heard preached from pulpits, God helps those who help themselves, as though it was a biblical maxim. It is not, brothers and sisters, that Ben Franklin, poor Richard's almanac, it's not the Bible, and it's not biblical. God doesn't help those who help themselves. God is the helper of the helpless! As a matter of fact. Well, why then would people turn aside into teaching these things? Why is there a danger that Timothy might suddenly start teaching old wives tales? Popular philosophy, things like that. Why would he cease to reject these profane and old wives fables? Well, because they are popular and they tend to captivate. They tend to interest people, to enthrall them. And Paul warned that a time was coming when people would begin to reject sound teaching and instead, excuse me, they would turn aside to that which was not sound doctrine. They would turn aside precisely to these fables. He wrote to Timothy in a later letter, 2 Timothy 4.3, for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine. but according to their own desires because they have itching ears they will heap up for themselves teachers and they will turn their ears away from the truth and be turned aside to fables Paul knew that in our hearts there is a desire to feed that desire that other people have that itching ear disease to hear what they want to hear and to as a result teach fables to teach myths at heart Paul knew that every elder, every minister has a desire to be loved, a desire to be applauded, a desire to be thought worthy of being listened to. Deep down in every pastor's heart, there is a desire to be idolized. I have to fight against it all the time. It's one of those reasons why I tell people, please don't tell me that was a good sermon at the end of the day. If you're convicted, say, I was convicted, whatever, you know. But do not say, you preached a great sermon. Because in a sense, what you're doing is you're hooking up the tube to my head and going, And I walk out kind of like, you know, I want that feeling back. What was it I said that really got, you know, that kind of thing. And after a while, you're not preaching sound doctrine anymore. You're preaching to please people. We all want to be the Joel Osteen's. We all want to be the Rick Warren's. We don't want to be small unknown church pastor. that's not the aim of most people's hearts to be known only to Christ and his people it is hard to be satisfied very hard in this world to be satisfied with doing what Christ commanded and no more Calvin knew that for instance that's why he wrote this he said men frequently aim at something else than to approve themselves to Christ and consequently many are desirous of being applauded for genius eloquence and profound knowledge And that is the very reason why they pay less attention to necessary things, which do not tend to procure the admiration of the common people. But Paul enjoins Timothy to be satisfied with this alone, to be a faithful minister of Christ. And certainly we ought to look on this as a far more honorable title than to be a thousand times called seraphic and subtle doctors. Let us therefore remember that as it is the highest honor of a godly pastor to be reckoned a good servant of Christ, So he ought to aim at nothing else during his whole ministry. For whoever has any other object in view will have it in his power to obtain applause from men, but will not please God. Accordingly, that we may not be deprived of so great a blessing, let us learn to seek nothing else and to account nothing so valuable and to treat everything as worthless in comparison to this single object. Let us make the sole object of our ministries the glory of God. keeping his word pure, teaching his people what he has commanded. That is what we are called to do, and we will not do that unless we are teaching the doctrine, the commands that he has given us in his scripture. The degree to which we deviate from teaching what he has given us is the degree to which we are unfaithful in the ministry, in our calling. Now, the second thing that Paul said that the elders of the church must have equally essential to good doctrine is this, godliness. Brothers and sisters, good theology is not enough by itself to make a good ministry. Right doctrine without a godly life is of no value, while a godly life without right doctrine is not possible. That's how one man put it. Now, Timothy was what some would have considered a man who was kind of young to be an elder, alright? He was probably in his thirties, and at that time in society, I mean, the very word Presbyterian comes from the word for aged, where the old guys, okay, the presbyters, the elders of the church. And being elderly was considered a qualification for the office, because it was held that the longer you had lived, the wiser you had become. the more time God would have had to have molded you, to shape you, to give you life experiences. Now, we all know that there are young wise men and there are old fools. We've all met them. Perhaps you haven't. There are some, okay, out there. But Paul says, don't let this be an impediment to your ministry. Okay? He says, It's going to make it, yes, difficult for people to look up to you when you are younger than them. I've experienced that myself. It is very difficult to go to somebody who is several years your elder and to advise them from the word. And it would be impossible if they knew your character to be worthless. No matter how good your theology is. To sit down with somebody who has many years of life experience on you and to show all of the common failings of a young man in their presence and around them and in your ministry for instance impetuosity, pride, intemperance, lack of common sense all of those things that tend to mark out young men if that is the way you display yourself in front of your people of course you're not going to have people looking up to you doesn't matter how good your theology is I have met men whose theology was brilliant They knew biblical theology really well, but they were so arrogant that people, you know, great, I can't stand hearing it! Because of their character, their temperament, their lack of godliness. And so instead of those qualities that so blight a ministry of a young man, what Timothy needs to be studying is to be an example of godliness before the people of God. A man who would set an example worthy of following. A man who would be able to say with Paul, follow me as I follow Christ. And have it not, you know, people go, what are you kidding? Follow you? No. He wants him to be somebody worthy of emulation. And for the people of God, he needs to have a holiness about him that is genuine. He needs to have a reputation that is good, both within and without the church. Now, Paul identifies the kind of qualities that make for a godly man. One of the greatest explications of this idea, what is godliness, is given to us in Thomas Watson's The Godly Man's Picture. It's hard going at some points, but it is a wonderful consideration. Guys, if you ever have a chance to pick it up, pick it up. It is a great book, but Paul gives us kind of a brief outline of the major qualities that a godly man has in verse 12. He says first, he has godliness in his word and his conduct. In what he says and in what he does, he shows himself to be a pattern of good works, a pattern of holiness. His speech is temperate, it is seasoned with salt, it is informed by the Bible. And in his walk, he is not bringing dishonor upon the church. He is not, by what he does in the world, contradicting what he preaches or says or teaches. Those are very important. He also identifies love. If you know 1 Corinthians 13, you know that without love, anything that we do in the ministry is worthless, profitless. Love is an incredibly important quality. It is one of the major qualities or characteristics of God that is set before us again and again in the Bible. God is love. Therefore, if we are Christ ministers representing him to the people, we need to be loved to them. We need to love them. We need to love Christ first and foremost, but to love his bride as well. And not just in that kind of worthless, honey, I love you kind of, you know, but there's no substance to it way. How does a man show his wife? He loves her. Well, he brings her flowers once in a while. He tells her. Or he doesn't tell her otherwise. Honey, when we got married, I told you 20 years ago I loved you. Nothing's changed. Why should I tell you again? No, he not only tells her, he shows her. There's one place in my marriage I fall down consistently. It is in showing that I love my wife. By my actions, by my willingness. And guys, how do you really show your wife you love her? By showing her how willing you are to sacrifice yourself. To deny yourself. To put her first. And put yourself last. That is so difficult. That is a quality that an elder has to have. He has to put Christ first in his life and deny himself. Christians, you need to be willing to do that. To not put your desires ahead of Christ. To not put the world ahead of Christ. To put nothing ahead of Christ. To put him first and foremost in your heart. Ministers and elders, we need to be setting Christ burst in our heart and if we do that then we will serve his people well we will be willing to die for the bride of Christ willing to sacrifice ourselves if necessary to even die for the church that he purchased with his own blood another quality Paul identifies in verse 12 is spirit that you will have a godly spirit Now, what does he mean by that? Well, the spirit is not just zeal and ardor for God, but that is an important thing, that a man has a burning ardor for God, and his spirit is pervaded by that. But it speaks of the overall spirit of the man. Now, there have been men who have exuded this spirit of godliness. I wish, I wish more that I was one of them. It was said of Jonathan Goforth, I don't know if you've ever heard of him. He was a Canadian missionary to China. A man who did great things for the Lord in that particular country. That he was an electric, radiant personality, flooding his immediate environment with sunlight that was deep in his heart and shone on his face. And God used him in mighty revivals. It wasn't merely that he talked a good talk. People could barely come into his presence and know this is a man who knows the Lord. This is a man who has made God number one in his life. It was true of Goforth and it was true of men like Robert Murray McShane that people who entered into their presence quote felt the breathing of the hidden life of God. McShane knew that that was so necessary for his ministry. He used to say what my people need most is my own holiness. And that is very true. Pastors and elders need to be people who have a spirit of godliness about them. They also need faith. We need to be devoted to this which we're teaching. It's not merely an academic pursuit. It is something that we need to set first in our hearts and pursue with all of our heart for our entire lives. People need to know that that which we preach is that which we believe, that which we would be willing to die for. Our faith in Christ and in his word needs to be that which will carry us all the way to the heavenly country. And we need as elders to be walking by faith, not by sight. We need to be not in this sense pragmatists and utilitarians in the church faith is critical for orthodoxy faith is what says I'll do it God's way according to his command even though it's not popular even though I'm not going to see an immediate response from it but I will trust that if I do what God commands me he'll bless it because he said he has only faith avails against that awful spirit of pragmatism that pervades our culture. Then lastly, purity. God's elders need to be pure. They need to be chaste. They need to be men who are setting high hedges in their lives, who are avoiding temptation as much as is possible. Now, brothers and sisters, in our current age, a lack of zeal for this particular quality has blighted the church. I go to presbytery meeting after presbytery meeting and I see again and again ministers, candidates, licentiates who have been caught in adultery or fornication. They come before the men and they confess their sins and they also have to say, I have tarred my ministry, I have destroyed it. Some other men who, for instance, are caught in it refuse to admit and then do even greater damage to the church. Brothers and sisters, we have to remain pure. or we will bring dishonor upon Christ and his church. We will become a stench in the nostrils of the world. How much damage was done to the Christian witness by the buffooneries and the fornications and the adulteries of the televangelists? I get that thrown in my face all the time. I have to explain Jimmy Swagger. I have to explain Tammy Faye and what was his name? Jim Baker. That's what the world remembers. Brothers and sisters, let us not be adding to that particular stench. Cultivating true godliness, Paul says, is even more important than exercise. We live in an exercise-crazed environment. We tend to think that if we exercise our bodies, that we're good. But Paul says there's something far more important than our bodily exercise. And when he was writing to Timothy, he was speaking more, not the exercise that we would think of, jogging and lifting weights and so on, but more the kind of the aestheticism, denying yourself, wearing hair shirts, abstaining from certain foods and things like that, shaving your head and so on. All of these enterprises that look like a physical application of the faithful body. But he said that there was something far more important than all of these outward observances, and that was that inward godliness and holiness. Because it is something that avails not only for this time, and think about it, we exercise our body and then what happens to them? They die. Okay? Doesn't matter how healthy you are, how many times you lift weights, how many times you go running, eventually something kills you anyway. But brothers and sisters, godliness is not something that is only for this life and for a brief period of that life. It is something that goes on forever. As you grow in godliness in this life, you are gaining something that lasts for eternity and which has a practical impact that goes down the generations. I dare say that most children would rather look back and say not that my father was in terrific shape, but my father was a godly man and he taught us well. I'm sure that is what most sons would like to remember. Now, what makes all of this so difficult? What makes godliness difficult? What makes preaching the truth difficult is that it involves hard labor. Doing it God's way is difficult. Being a pastor, a position of the soul, an elder who is really involved in the lives of his people is tough. It is very difficult to get into somebody's life. And to ask the difficult questions, it is much easier to have a programmatic ministry where essentially you just act as an administrator and you say, OK, on Wednesday you're going to do that, on Thursday you're going to do that, go into room A, go into room B, rather than doing pastoral visitations, for instance, on a regular basis. Rather than going through the terrible, often, process of church discipline which rends the souls of pastors and elders. It would be so much easier to adopt the program of the American church as a whole and just eliminate the third mark church discipline. Entirely and say, OK, look, we're just going to leave this one aside. We're not going to do it, but we would not be faithful in our calling. But it tends to be the case that the more faithful a man is, the more subject to condemnation he is. For instance, the more exclusive a man is in his preaching that Christ is the only way. the more he is heaped with opprobrium. It's not something that the world wants to hear. They want to hear that all good people go to heaven. They want to hear that every religion leads somehow to God. But we know that's not what the Bible teaches. Lastly, there's so much more I could say, but I don't want to go on. Let me leave you with one application. And this is the most important thing of all. Why is it so important to cultivate and to continue on in this sound doctrine? and the answer to that is in what he says take heed to yourself and to the doctrine continue in them for in doing this you will save both yourself and those who hear you the end of our continuing on in sound doctrine is not only to glorify God that should be our primary aim in all things but also for the salvation of souls it is only this word of God that actually saves souls and if we do not continue on in them Brothers, those of you who are called to be elders, those of you who might be called to be elders, let me give you this warning. God in Ezekiel said that for all those who end up going on to their destruction because we do not warn them, He will hold us accountable for their blood. I come into this pulpit on a regular basis and I quake in fear because as I look out at these faces, these people I love, I know this. I know that someday I will be called to account for all of your souls. That's something that worries me. Because I have to think to myself, did I proclaim the full counsel of God? Or did I say things that I knew would please them? Did I tell them what they wanted to hear? Or did I tell them the truth? Did I lead them to Jesus Christ? Did I show them the way of salvation? Did I show them how to live a Christian life as God has opened it up in His Word? Or did I give them my opinions? And I worry about that. I worry deeply about that. That is something that you, as elders, should worry about as well. The other day, Joy and I were watching television and we saw a major name in the evangelical world. A guy who's created quite a stir and he was preaching in a stadium. There must have been 60,000 people there. I sat there, I did the quick mathematics and I figured in 10 years I might not preach to that many people. Okay, but there they were. before him. And here's this man and he comes out and he is immaculate. He's got a suit. My salary wouldn't pay for this guy's suit. I'm pretty sure. Okay. He is shining. He's so perfect. All right. He comes out. His diction is perfect. His pacing is perfect. His hand gestures are perfect. And he's got this smile on his face the whole time. And His pattern just leads you in, and leads you in. And the thing was, we listened for what, 10, 15 minutes? No gospel, no gospel, no Jesus, no Jesus. And I'm thinking, 60,000 souls are hearing this. Oh man, I wanted to say, stop speaking now, before you heap further judgment upon yourself. What you are doing, is not only wrong in that you are giving these people a false gospel of the power of positive thinking. Don't speak negatively. Negativity brings negativeness into you. How does that help? How does that take people to Christ? The Christ you're not mentioning. Brothers, the worst thing that we can do is to be men pleasers. Because not only are we sending men to hell with a smile on their face, But we are heaping God's judgment upon ourselves. Let us rather, even though it is hard, even though the world may not want to hear it, even though it may force us to preach to 50 people, 100 people instead of 60,000, let us preach the truth. Let us preach Jesus Christ in Him crucified. Let us say we preach Christ crucified. He is the hope of glory. He is the means of salvation. No man comes to the Father, but by Him. And let us cleave to that message all the days of our lives. If we do, then and then alone, Will we hear those words that every elder wants, longs to hear? Well done, O good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of your master. I long to hear those words. I hope you do too. Let us now go before the God who does bless faithfulness. Gracious God, I do pray that you would raise up elders in this church, O Lord, that you would continue to do so. Men who are committed to holiness and to godliness, I pray as Christians we would cleave to your word, that we would know the power of it, and that we would not desire to hear fables, to have itching ears, to go astray after other things. I pray that we would teach our children the gospel, that they might know you, O Lord. And I pray that we would be known when we pass, when we depart from this world, above all things, O Lord, as men and women who loved Christ and who were godly. Lord only you can make us Godly. We pray for that this day. We pray this in Jesus Holy Name. Amen