is on on my end. If you have your Bibles, take them out and open up to 1 Timothy chapter five. 1 Timothy chapter five is we are continuing our study through this letter of instruction that Paul is writing to his young apostolic delegate as he is ministering in the city of Ephesus. And the last week, this week and next week, we are dealing with understanding the eldership or the leadership within the church. Last week, we looked at honor to be given and double honor to be given of those pastors, those elders who labor in their studies. You should not muzzle the ox while it is threshing, verse 18, as he is recommending Timothy to ensure and instruct the church. that remuneration is to be given and also honor and respect to those who labor diligently. And you might be thinking, well, Ethan, why take this extra time that Paul is giving us to Timothy in explaining the structure of the church? You need this instruction. We need this guidance for us as the household of God to understand what is expected of us. What should you expect as the congregant? What should I expect as the pastor and one of the elders here at Five Bridges? And this section here, by way of caveat, it begins to be very awkward for me to be preaching about my role and the other elders' role at this church. It's difficult because it might seem as if I'm trying to set myself up as a self-licking ice cream cone or to pat myself on the back, and I am wishing for everyone to come and kiss the signet ring of the pastor of Five Bridges, and that is not the case, especially with the text we're gonna be looking at this morning, but we need to understand what is the role of the elder, the leader, the pastor within the church? Because God cares about the church. We, the church, we are the bride of Christ. And we need to take that more seriously than we usually take this. The congregants coming together, as we looked at last week, There's an expectation of you, but then there's also an expectation that you should have of me and all of the other elders. We're given further insight in this section into how the church is to be governed, structured, governed and instructed and led, but, We're gonna look at a few other things, but last week, if you remember, go back to verse 17, we see that the church is to be led by a plurality of qualified leaders and those who are especially gifted and pursue after the labor at preaching and teaching, double honors to be given. So we understand we are to honor godly men. But what happens when those men violate their office? What happens when the pastor is not worthy of double honor, in fact, is not worthy of honor whatsoever? The way in which Paul's writing this, and I want you to frame your mind is because often when we read the text of Scripture, it can become opaque. It can become just simply words. But you have to understand that this was written by Paul for a specific reason on a specific occasion to a specific person addressing specific issues that were happening. And what we have to understand is when you take the totality of 1 Timothy into account and when we read these sections, I must go back and forth and look at these cross references to understand truly what's happening within the city of Ephesus and within the churches in Ephesus. Because there is an issue that Paul is dealing with on two folds. One, the churches were not honoring those who needed to be honored, but then two, there were leaders in place that should not be in place. There were leaders still in that church, in any one of those churches, plural, within that city, that needed to be removed from office. 1 Timothy 1.20, Paul highlights this earlier in the passage, excuse me, earlier in the book, where he says, among them are Hymenaeus and Alexander, indicating that these individuals were being, leading the congregation astray. They were false teachers and false teaching, and teaching things that ought not to be taught. And so the implication within that understanding is that these were most likely men in some form of capacity of leadership. maybe not specifically the eldership or the pastors, but they had some form of influence in teaching the church. And Paul said that he personally removed them, got them out of the church. So the church in Ephesus is dealing with a lot of issues. It's dealing with a lot of sexual morality. It's dealing with issues within the church. It's dealing with the cultural pressure that's happening from outside the church. And anytime you look at issues within the church, there's always problems that happen within. their own people, but then there's also problems that happen from without on that external pressure. So there is an importance that Paul is taking the time to give us these verses in 17 to 25 on focusing specifically on what should your expectation be of the elder and what should you do in certain situations. Because the item that stands out the most that you're gonna be seeing this morning in the text in verses 19 to 21 is accountability. And accountability, sadly today, seems to be an afterthought for many people. And sadly, even those who are serving as pastors do not have accountability set up. Now, when we think about accountability, I'm not saying accountability of like, you know, I call you up and say, hey, help me out with this. Accountability is talking about someone who knows you as an individual. They know you at home, they know you at work, they know you at play, they know you in the streets, they know you in the marketplace, they know you. And the accountability comes in when you know somebody, you know something's wrong when their behavior seems off, do you not? If you husbands are married and it's your anniversary and your wife is looking at you, scowling at you and you're thinking something's up and then you recognize, oh my goodness, it's my anniversary. That was an indication because you see your wife day in and day out. I have never done that by the way. I'm a perfect husband, but some of you men need to help on their anniversaries or birthdays. You know that something's off. The body language seems off. The character seems off. The words they use seems off. Their disposition seems off. That's where accountability comes in, is understanding what makes that person tick. What is their passions? What is their joys? How are we to be working with each other with this accountability in mind? And I wish to now transition this into the accountability for the pastors. Pastors, often I have heard from some that I have spoken with and some that I have listened to, claim that they don't have time for accountability. Nor do they feel that they can rely on anyone in terms of accountability because they're scared that someone might out them as something or someone might spread the rumors or someone might say something negative. And so sadly, there's a bit of distrust that many pastors have with their congregation. I don't understand that. That to me should never be the case. If a pastor is fearful to be himself in every aspect of his life, I beg to ask the question if that's not borderline hypocritical, that what you see on a Sunday morning behind the pulpit is different than what you see as he's walking around the streets. Well, in order to understand why accountability is important, Paul's giving us this instance, but at the same time, A lot of pastors can feel isolated because they don't feel that there are people that they can rely on for accountability. And the way in which God has so ordained the church to be structured is to prevent that form of isolation goes back into verse 17 with the understanding that the church leadership needs to have a plurality of elders. When you have a plurality of elders, the pastor should never, the lead teaching pastor should never have this feeling of isolation because he has a group of other qualified men serving alongside with him that is his accountability. And what we have to understand is that the elders will know that pastor more intimately than most, because they see what happens in the elders meetings, they see the discussions, they see the disagreements, and they understand what makes that individual tick. So when something is off, they can approach that elder, they can approach that pastor and confront him. But a lot of times what happens is in this celebrity pastor culture, which is antithetical to the position of being a pastor, the pastor is a servant, is that the pastor has so propped himself up, he's untouchable. You can't talk to him. You can't schedule a meeting with him. No one can get to know him because he's got more important things to do. He's got to carve out time for his family and everything else, which is 100% accurate in one way. But if a pastor is not making himself available for the people, That begs the question of how much can the people actually get to know the individual who is the pastor? I've attended many churches and trying to get a meeting with a pastor would have taken almost my congressional person to come up with a formal request for me to just be able to have five or 10 minutes to sit down with a pastor. And oftentimes, they would delegate it out to somebody else. I'm like, no, this is a question I have for you. I want to press in on something that you said, or I have a question that I would like to have you clarify for me, but they're untouchable. Oh, he's too busy traveling around. Oh, he's too busy with this, or he's too busy with that. And when that happens, what begins to happen is there begins to be this chasm that will grow over time, in which people will then ask, oh, what is your pastor like? I don't know. All I see is what I see on Sunday. And sadly, a lot of individuals put on a good show. But what has to happen is that pastors need to have accountability. A group of men, godly, scripturally qualified men that can hold him accountable, that can help spot out the weaknesses and the vulnerabilities where the enemy would look to attack this individual. And any pastor who thinks that they don't have time for accountability, who does not think that they need accountability, they're being extremely naive and egotistical. Because if pastors do not think that sin is crouching at the door, looking for a stronghold, looking for a foothold, they are lying to themselves and it will be a great destruction. And so what Paul's giving us here in 19 to 20 is he's giving us instructions on how we are to handle a situation in which a pastor disqualifies himself from ministry. And so the title for this morning is gonna be the leadership of the church confronting elders or what I wanted to name it is how to fire your pastor, how to get rid of your pastor. So, and we laugh, and as I was preparing this, it should cause fear in any man who steps into the role of pastor and takes up the mantle of responsibility of being a herald for God's word, because as James 3, one says, is not many of you should become teachers because you will receive stricter condemnation and judgment. Indicating and meaning. It's not just necessarily what you say and what you don't say. It's how you live. And when you are in a role of a public ministry as a pastor, you're in the hot seat. You are easy to get picked on. You're easy to be criticized. You're easy to have accusations levied against you. What you do as a pastor has ripple effects and it doesn't just affect you. And that's what we're gonna be looking at this morning. How to fire your pastor. So take notes. Some of you are gonna take really good notes today. Just kidding, I hope not. All right, let's look at verse 19. 1 Timothy 5, verse 19. Paul says this to Timothy, do not receive an accusation against an elder except on the basis of two or three witnesses. Those who continue in sin reprove in the presence of all so that the rest also will be fearful. I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus and of his elect angels to observe these instructions without bias, doing nothing in partiality. Let's pray. God, we thank you for your word. Your word is truth. Father, we ask for your guidance and illumination of this text to apply to us, to apply in our minds, our hearts, and our consciousness, God, that we understand this, and that, God, may we read this as a foreboding and a warning of not just pastors to live a life above reproach and live a life pursuing of holiness, but that every man and woman and child will also live in this way. God, may we have a fear of you May we have a reverence when we hear your word. May we desire strongly to obey and to pursue godliness. Be with us this morning. Bring clarity to this text. We love you, Father. In your name, amen. So the first item we're going to look at in verse 19 is protecting innocent elders. As I said, the pastor is in the hot seat. And what happens when someone brings an accusation against a pastor? I mean, think about that in this digital age, with this hashtag MeToo movement. It would not be all that difficult for anyone. Honestly, it's been quite surprising that I haven't seen more of this happen, and maybe it does happen, but hopefully the churches are handling this properly, is that why aren't people just immediately just emailing random emails into the church accusing pastors of something? Now let me just say this as well as a quick caveat. Satan in the world does not care about weak pastors who do not proclaim God's word. They could care less because that's keeping people in a form of mediocrity. What Satan in the world cares about is those pastors who take a bold stance on God's word and brings the harsh realities and the truths of scripture to bear upon the people's souls to the point where it steps on people's toes. I can't remember who said this, and I wish I could, but one person said, the problem with pastors today is that nobody wants to kill them anymore. And I'm not saying I want people to kill me. But what I am saying though, is that there needs to be a measure of protection to protect an innocent elder from a false accusation. Let's look at this 19. Paul says, do not receive an accusation against an elder. Hit stop right there. That word receive means do not entertain, do not acknowledge and do not accept an accusation. That word accusation means a formal charge made against someone to incriminate someone on a specific issue. If someone was to go up and say, I hear that Ethan is out there selling drugs off Thomas Street, that would be a formal charge and accusation. And what it's saying here is if one person is bringing an accusation, the church is to turn a deaf ear to that. What is the best method of destroying a church? Gossip, slander, false accusations. And imagine if you heard something about me, or if this isn't your church, or about your pastor, and one person said something, and instead of you ignoring that, especially if it does not line up with what you believe to be true about the individual, and it's coming from one alone source, if you entertain that, what are you doing? You're now complicit within this gossip and within this slander, and it is going to start merging around the church where you're going to be tainting the individual's reputation, the pastor's reputation, in which there's no validity to it. There's no truth behind it. But the church is called to turn a deaf ear to a single soul accusation. Paul is saying, pay no attention to an individual who is making a formal charge at an elder. And it says even too, to put more of a fine point on this, don't even investigate it if one person makes a formal charge. And we're gonna see the why here in a second. You must protect your pastor, me, the elders, from false accusations. And this is a biblical theme throughout the Bible. of not trusting a sole single witness. In Deuteronomy 19.15 it says, a single witness shall not rise up against a man on account of any iniquity or any sin which he has committed. Here's the qualifier, at the mouth of two or three witnesses a matter shall be established. Because think about People who would bring up an accusation. We don't know the intentionality behind why are they bringing it up. Maybe the pastor said something that stepped on their toes, that convicted them of their sin and they unable to deal with their sin of feeling that condemnation instead of repenting and moving on. They decide, no, I'm gonna use this as ammunition to fire back shots at him. Maybe the pastor doesn't look the way that they wanted him to. Maybe the pastor didn't, have that meeting with them that they had desired. And now they're gonna just start to run the name through the mud and levy false accusations. We have to understand too that people from outside the church who are not a part of this church, who do not come into our church body, they may be outside witnessing what we're doing, watching us online, hearing some of the statements that we make during the election season. This church was not silent about the issue of abortion. I'm an abolitionist. There should be no way possible shape or form that abortion should ever be allowable. And for any of those individuals who claim rape or incest in the state of Florida, that's less than 0.02% of the population. So that is not an arguable excuse. So someone might right now might be watching this and say, I don't like that. I don't like him. I don't like that he said that. I'm going to now do everything I can to attack that individual to get him removed. Why? Because the world, the devil, does not like to hear the truth. They do not want to hear God's word. They would rather hear muddied down, ambiguous statements about there is no real right and wrong. Everything is subjective. Choose your own truth. It's your truth. Follow the Jesus of your own making. It's your Jesus. It's my Jesus. It's their Jesus. But when you lay out Scripture black and white, the way in which God intended this to be written and how it was written through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit is that there is black and that there is right. There is right and then there is wrong. And pastors need not have a weak spine and not hit the hard sections of Scripture and then only hit the easy sections of Scripture. Not everybody in your life is a Goliath and your stones are the sin that you're gonna throw at it and take down the Goliaths. What are the Goliaths in your life? No one cares, Satan doesn't care about that. What Satan cares about though is the men who take a godly stance on his word and will accurately proclaim this regardless of the effects that may happen. But one of those effects that may and does and will continue to happen is false accusations. One of Satan's many attacks that he does in these false accusations, and I'm belaboring this point because I want you to understand that we as a church body, you must turn deaf ears to false accusations. We must turn deaf ears because one of Satan's many attacks against the church is to isolate the people of the church from their pastor. is the more that they can isolate the people from the pastor, it will gradually bring up a form of contempt against that pastor in which there should be nothing there. There was nothing of substance there to begin with, but because you entertain these false accusations, you don't understand the bitterness that is swelling up in your own heart, which eventually you will have contempt against the pastor and then eventually You will remove a godly man who needs to be in this position, but because you have fallen prey to the false accusations, you are now implicit and complicit within that removal of being, if you will, a false witness. We see this happen in Acts 6, if you're curious about what this would look like. In Acts 6, We see Stephen comes and he delivers a message to these individuals. And then what we see here is in verse 11, it says, then they secretly induced men to say, we have heard him speak blasphemous words against Moses and God. And they stirred up the people, the elders and the scribes, and they came to him, dragged him away and brought him to the Sanhedrin. And they put forward false witnesses who said, this man never ceases speaking words against this holy place and the law. They brought up false witnesses. They contracted their own false witnesses. Think about the life of Christ. How many times were false witnesses and false accusations levied against Christ? All the time. They would accuse Jesus of being a blasphemer. They would accuse him of destroying the temple and all these other things that they were not understanding what Jesus was saying. And ultimately, that's what led to him dying on the cross. What we have to understand is that there is a method There is a method of when we as a church should accept an accusation against the elder. Lest we take this passage and a pastor props himself up saying, see, you are never allowed to accuse me of anything. And I hear this, touch not God's anointed. Now you don't touch God's anointed when he's doing the right things, but when he's not, you are to lamb blast this elder and Punish him however you possibly can according to the biblical standard. So I wish to say this, that if in case anyone's thinking, oh, see, there's another church acting as propping the pastor up as he's untouchable. Absolutely not. The pastor is not untouchable. But let me say this, if I had someone come to me and say something about one of you, my first reaction is on a singular instance from one person who says, hey, did you hear so-and-so is doing this, is to reject that. If that's just coming from one individual, I may think that you have a vendetta against this other individual. And imagine if I got recruited to their side, and then I sit down with you, and I just start prodding and prying and attacking you in a direct confrontational way, and you're like, whoa, whoa, whoa. Proverbs 18 says, whoever states this case first seems right until the individual is cross-examined. There must be a due process. So what Paul is saying here, verse 19, do not receive an accusation against an elder. Church, protect your elder. If you hear people speaking ill of him, and you know that it is not true, and it is coming from a singular witness, you are to ignore it. You are not to investigate it. You're not even to pry open that rock. Ignore it. But we see sometimes that accusations can come, and they come from a variety of means and a variety of ways, but the understanding is when these accusations come, the reason why you two are rejectus, the reason why you are to turn a deaf ear, is because you are to protect the reputation of the pastor, and you protect the reputation of the pastor by not listening to this lone wolf's accusations. And sadly, what I have seen happen personally, I've witnessed this firsthand, is that as soon as an accusation is brought against a pastor by a singular witness, it's already believed prior to it being proven. They've immediately discounted in their mind that this is in fact true and how quickly these mutinies happen. But we have to understand that bearing false witness and partaking in a false witness of someone bringing a false accusation, the Bible is not silent on this. Proverbs 19.9 says, a false witness will not go unpunished and he who breathes out lies shall perish. So extreme caution must be taken to not give ear to false accusation. And in so doing, by giving ear to a false accusation, you might be implicit and guilty of the sin of false witness. But again, before I transition, this is not saying that the pastor cannot be accused of anything, nor is this saying that the pastor is immune to accusations. Rather, this is going to give us the how on when and the due process to bring an accusation against an elder. So let's look at point number two, fire sinning elders. Look at the last section in verse 19. Do not receive an accusation against an elder, except, if we just stopped there, then yeah, it would be like, yeah, the pastor's untouchable, and that would be horrendous. Except on the basis of two or three witnesses. If there are two or more reliable, credible witnesses levying the charge, then the investigation must occur. And what happens is when you have these two or three credible witnesses, it prevents an act six issue when Stephen was killed of power players recruiting other people to the cause. Because would it not be easy to find two or three people that would say, yeah, I don't like him either. Let's all get together and mutiny against this guy. Because if we're all saying we're in line with the biblical structure, two or three witnesses, But if it's a false accusation, you need to be very careful about levying a false accusation. And let me hit pause real quick. I'm not saying this because this is happening right now within this church. Let me be very clear here. That has not happened here in this church with me. I'm not saying this to also prop myself up to make you guys scared to ever bring something against myself or any of the other elders. I wish to show you the biblical way to do this so that it prevents you from going into sin. So I'm literally, my heart cares for you to know this so that if I sin, any of the elders sin, or if you're at this church or another church, that you do so in a biblical, God-honoring manner so that you, in so doing it, are not falling into sin yourself. So even if with me telling you how to fire me or how to fire another pastor, I'm doing so with care and caution for your souls to not allow you to step into sin unknowingly. I hope you understand this here. Because when we fire these sinning elders with false witnesses, we have to be careful, which is why Paul gives us this on the basis of two or three witnesses. You might say, well, Ethan, where does it say they must be credible witnesses here? Well, we must understand here that this phrase, two or three witnesses, in this era where Paul is writing, there's a type of protocol that was understood legislatively that was implicit within this time period and within the context of what Paul is writing. But what's also happening here is you should be thinking now also about Matthew chapter 18 when it comes to church discipline. So if you have your Bibles, turn to Matthew 18 very briefly. I wish to show you something. Because Matthew 18 shows us the church discipline process. for every Christian. But then the 1 Timothy 5, 19 through 21 issue is in addition to, if you will, an addendum or an appendix to the Matthew 18 process, specifically for elders and those in leadership. Look at Matthew chapter 18, verse 15 to 17. This is the process of how church discipline should be done. And if a church does not practice church discipline, it's not a true church. Verse 15 says, now, if your brother sins, go and show him his fault between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have won your brother. What verse 15 is saying, if you know of your brother or sister who is living in sin, and you know that it's in sin, and you go to your brother and sister and you confront them on that sin, and you say, you're in sin, you need to repent, and they say, you are absolutely right, please, I need to go to God, I'm asking for forgiveness, it need not go any further. The church discipline issue stops right there. But now look at verse 16, but if he does not listen to you, take one or two more with you. There you have it again, two or more witnesses. Why? So that these other witnesses can observe that you're doing due process according to the biblical standard as it comes to church discipline. Take two or more with you so that by the mouth of two or three witnesses, every fact may be confirmed. See, everything that is brought up as an accusation, it must have validity and it must be investigated and it must be validated. Then look at 17. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. So the Matthew 18 process says, one-on-one confront. If he confesses, fantastic, it ends. If he does not confess, take two or more, confront. If he does not confess, you move to stage three, and that's what stage three is here at verse 17. If he refuses to listen to the two or three, then you are to publicly declare it to the church. If he refuses even to listen to the church's declaration of excommunication, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. See, the purpose of church discipline that I wish for you to understand, as you turn back to 1 Timothy 5, the purpose of church discipline is to be understood, specifically Matthew 18, in reference to the parable of the lost sheep, for the purpose, Matthew 18 is for the purpose of restoration. Not excommunication, but restoration. However, in dealing with elders, it's different. Restoration is the focus and both issues spiritually. Restoration should be happening that an individual will confess their sin, come back to Christ and stop living in this habitual sin lifestyle and live according to godly standards. For a church member, if it ever gets to point three and they come back to church, they are immediately restored back into the fellowship. We will never hold that sin against them ever again. But if an individual does not, the individual could leave whatever else, Sadly, that's where it ends, and most churches don't practice church discipline. But with the 1 Timothy 5 discipline issue, the focus is still on spiritual restoration. It's on restoration spiritually, but it's not focused on... I've got to turn a phrase here, but it's not on restoration positionally. The restoration is spiritual focus, but not positionally focused. Because Matthew 18 is the parallel that we can understand, but Paul gives us additional insights in this section here. Well, why do you say that? Look what it says here. You bring two or three witnesses, they levy a formal accusation. Look at verse 20, those who continue in sin. Now, I wish to understand this a little bit for you. When you look at the Greek, this is a present ongoing verb. So it almost could make someone ask the question, oh, so that means if they're continuing the sin, but if they were caught earlier, but they repented, the elders or whatever, it doesn't need to be presented to the church. That's not what this is saying. Those who continue in sin, meaning those who have lived this as a lifestyle, those who have done this sin, reprove in the presence of all. When you see that phrase, those who continue in sin, this is referencing the elders who have a continual and habitual lifestyle of sinning. And if two or three witnesses bring forth an accusation of an elder who is continuing in sin, you are to reprove that individual in the presence of all. But you might ask, well, now what sins? Well, there's obviously a plethora of sins, but what I would like to say is, if you go back to 1 Timothy 3, 1-7, you look at the qualifications that a man must meet to even be in the position of an elder in the first place, you just take the negative of that. So, what sin would disqualify a man from the pastorate? Well, obviously, any form of sexual immorality, period, dot. But then also, if you go through that list of 1-7, this would be a man who's not living a life that is above reproach. This is a man who's not a one-woman man. This is a man that's not emotionally stable. This is an irrational man, an inhospitable man, a drunken man, an argumentative man, an inconsiderate man, an abrasive man, and a man who loves money. If you look at 1 Timothy 3, 1 through 7, the positive character qualifications, just take the reciprocal of that, and that is what Paul has in mind here. Now there is more to that, but this is abundantly clear that if a man violates any one of those sins, any one of those qualifications, he is not above reproach and he is to be removed. How are you to remove a pastor then? Look at what this says. Reprove in the presence of all. The all here is not referencing all of the elders. The all here is reproving in front of the entirety of the church. You are to make that pastor's sin known to the entirety of the church and to show that this individual is being removed from this position because here's why. We must do this, but so often what is happening today that I have seen is a pastor will be violating his oath of office, if you will, according to the qualifications of 1 Timothy 3, one through seven, and it's swept under the rug, and then magically he comes back onto the scene, pastoring another church, leading other conferences, as if nothing ever happened. I will be very clear here, if a pastor violates the qualifications of an elder, he is permanently disbarred from ever stepping back into the pulpit ever again. He has no right. He has no claim. He has completely violated God's word and should never step back into a pulpit. And any man who does is an arrogant, narcissistic, egotistical man continuing to live in sin by violating God's law. And you may say, well, that's kind of harsh. No, this is the bride of Christ. The church belongs to Christ. And how could you ever, Listen to a pastor who's like, well, you know, two years ago I had an adulterous affair with a woman, but I've been restored and now I'm back here. So turn in your Bibles to 1 Timothy and we're gonna talk about adultery and why you don't need to do it. No. I mean, you see the silliness. But what happens though is too many churches are concerned, the public, vocational ministry of this guy, what are the ripple effects going to be? Man, if we out this guy, man, this is gonna be bad for the church. Man, this is gonna do more harm than good if we do this. So let's just, you know what, hey, we'll ask you to leave quietly, here's some severance pay, just go. And we're not gonna talk about it, we're gonna protect your reputation, go find another church somewhere else and continue on in ministry. What would that happen to you if all of a sudden, magically, I was not here anymore? You'd be like, what happened? Where did he go? He's moved on. Where did that come from? Why did he move on? I would have a slew of questions. Why did he leave? What did you guys do, Elder Board? Why did you remove him? When you might have had a valid reason for removing that individual, but because you're trying to protect the reputation of either the church or that man, you're not publicly declaring it to the church. It raises more questions and it's not helpful at all. It causes more damage and it raises more questions, but what's happening now too? Did you know, I had to look this up, there's pastor's insurance that a pastor can take out insurance if he ever gets removed from the pulpit. Now granted, I will say, if he's removed wrongly, I get that, but there's insurance for pastors who are removed for something like this, and there's also a counseling center that will come into a church to help reconcile that pastor back with that congregation to restore him to the pulpit. What is that? That's monopolizing and making money off of the bride of Christ. If a pastor is known to have violated his position, he cannot, nor should not, ever step back into the pulpit. And I think what's happening today is too many men are entering into the ministry thinking, well, if that happens, I've seen what happened to this guy, this guy, this guy, this guy, they're back in it again. So it's not that big of a deal. So it makes the temptation, well, it's not that bad. I mean, I can do that. Look, I'll be restored or you know what? I'll just fade away and I'll go pastor another church somewhere else and I'll still continue writing books and I'll still continue to have a ministry and everything else. That's okay. There should be a fear of the man who steps behind this pulpit to know that the life will be scrutinized through every angle, that if they violate this, they need to step out and they need not ever seek to desire to go back in because they are disqualified. And you might ask, how are they disqualified? Look at one of the first qualifications of 1 Timothy 3.1, above reproach. If an individual in another church, if I was to have done something, and I go to another church, and it was swept under the rug, or someone got out leaking somewhere, that Ethan had a meth problem, and he was selling all this other stuff, and then I went to this other church, it's like, whoa, whoa, wait, wait, wait, isn't this the same guy that was pastoring a church in Texas that is now here? Doesn't he have an addiction problem? You're not above reproach. You understand the logic here, right? The Bible's airtight on this. There's no room for wiggling here. But what happens though is people sweep it under the rug. Churches sweep it under the rug. But what happens is when you restore a man back into his position, how could anyone truly ever listen to this guy? I mean, truly. You violated God's word. You were teaching God's word. You knew God's Word. You interacted with God's Word. You declared God's Word with authority, and you fell for what you were preaching against. Now, am I saying that pastors cannot fall? No, I'm not saying that at all. Pastors can and do fall. But what needs to happen, though, is when they do fall, the church needs to know about it. They must know about it. Why? Look at what it says here. So that the rest also will be fearful. The rest here is referring to the elders, but also as the elders have that fear, it will trickle down to the congregation. Wow, look at what happened and how the church handled that. I don't wanna be in that position ever. There was a prominent man who fell recently. And this man who fell was declared publicly, and I remember that sent rippling shotgun blast waves across the pastoral world. And it made all of the pastors fearful to keep an even higher barrier on their lives, to not ever become complacent in fighting sin actively. I was on a Zoom call this week, and I love to be a part of these with John MacArthur and some other pastors, and the issue was specifically this issue in Matthew, excuse me, in 1 Timothy. And I asked him the question, with what we saw happen, do you believe that this was handled biblically according to 1 Timothy 5? And he says, absolutely it was. It absolutely was handled exactly how it should. There wasn't but one, there was multiple witnesses. The church presented it to the entirety of the church. He was immediately removed, and now he's completely disbarred from ever coming back into any form of ministry, period, dot. And this should send fear, because if men who desired to go into the office of elder overseer, as 1 Timothy 3 says, they desire a noble thing. But what you need to understand is being in the office of pastor, it's a dual-edged sword. In one instance, the honor that you receive in being able to publicly declare God's word and the love that you feel from the congregation is so incredible. But at the other side of the sword, the fall can be so detrimental. Think about what it would take for a man of God who is in a pastoral role, for instance, to commit adultery. You have to blow by your wife, you have to blow by your kids, you have to blow by every single person in the church, the elders, your reputation, your future, your finances, your job, for what? A fling? For what? A slight fall into temptation? Yeah, that's exactly what you have to do. You have to be so calloused and hardened to do that, it begs the question if the individual was ever a Christian to begin with. Because how can you be declaring God's word and then living a closet lifestyle somewhere else? So this is why it must be presented to the entirety of the church. The church is not to sweep this under the rug because it will make the rest of the elders and the rest of the congregation to be fearful. We must understand that this is not to just destroy the guy. Whatever happens in that reputation of him on this earth is nothing in comparison to eternity. What happens if that man who was a pastor actually wasn't a believer, but it took the church discipline of removing him from that position for him to see that he is a sinner in need of grace that only Christ can provide? That is more important than a tarnished reputation or not being able to preach and sell books anymore. That's a far more significance. And when the church is acting the way that the church should, and the church is honoring God's word the way in which God wants the church to be honoring God's word, it will protect the church. I think if that was to be the case, if we saw more churches doing this, and less of them sweeping it under the rug, and they pop up all over the place, there's pastors, their podcasts have been made about them, and they're back in the ministry. What are you doing, guy? No one cares anymore. You violated your office. Imagine if you had a president of the United States that was known to be a traitor to the US and sold government secrets and everything else, and he re-ran again for an election. He said, hey, I confess, I'm sorry, but hey, this time it's gonna be different. We wouldn't trust him. And that's in the physicality of this world. Think about your spiritual souls. How could you ever listen to what a guy has to say if you know, as you're reading this, he's literally hypocritically, you're reading him to be a hypocrite as you're reading him, or as you're listening to him, or as you're interacting with him. The church is the bride of Christ, and it must be treated as a holy, sacred place where the saints gather to worship him. But when you prioritize a man's reputation or good standing or public aspect of the ministry over and against the bride and the holiness of Christ in his church, that entire elder board needs to be fired then, if that ever happens. They cannot, should never find an open door of opportunity to ever step back into the ministry at any church ever. If the elders do their due diligence and inquire, why did you leave that church? Oh, well, I had an affair. Or, oh, I was addicted to drugs. Or, I was addicted to alcohol. Or, oh, oh, oh. No. If the church actually cared about the holiness of the church, they would never allow an individual to speak in that church, to lead in that church. or to be a pastor in that church. Now let me say this too. Does that mean then if a pastor is removed that he can't still use his giftings? No, he can. He can do another aspect of ministry, but never to be in a leadership pastoral role. And I pray that God will use men in that role, but you need to figure it out. What is that role for me now that I have been disqualified for ministry? Immediately take that desire to go back into the pastorate completely off the table. That's not there. God can still use you and will still use you. But some people may say, well, Ethan, wouldn't it be good if the pastor, he can speak to those sins now. Look, I don't have to go to the bottom of the Mariana Trench to know that it's steep. I don't need to know that adultery is bad to hear from somebody saying that I lived through an adulterous affair and say, oh, this is really hitting me harder now. The sin is the sin is the sin. And I should never try and justify like, oh, he can speak to us better on this. Really? I don't think that's the case. It's a permanent removal. Now, let me say this too. The elder should be restored and remain in that church. Could you imagine the testimony of that church if the elder was publicly reproved in front of the entirety of the church? Just think about the embarrassment of that individual, the tarnishment of that individual's reputation. How would the church respond in that regard? If that pastor truly was repentant and desired to stay here, would we alienate the individual? Would he become the black sheep? We've got a special seating section for you, buddy. It's in the back field on the sand spurs. No, there should always be the desire and the prayer if anyone falls into sin and has to go through this discipline process for restoration back into the body, not isolation, but not restoration back into the position, but restoration back into the family and the household of God. I don't know if I've ever seen one church do that. My father at his church, when he went to go pastor the church in Philadelphia, the previous pastor was caught looking at very inappropriate things on his computer screen. They did the 1 Timothy 5 process, he was removed. But the church ostracized him, he was very repentant, he went through a whole reconciliation process. They basically cut him out. And so he had to leave the church. The church handled it poorly. This man repented. This man was very repentant. He was trying to maintain this, but he literally was cast out. And I asked my dad, how did you navigate that? He said, well, we had to disciple the church through that instance. It was very poorly handled, and another church basically took him under and helped continue to restore him. But again, he's never serving in a pastoral position. Now that man is helping out people in prison ministries and stuff like that, which is absolutely something that he can do. He's not to be considered a pastor nor to ever step back in the pulpit, but can he still teach in small settings and everything else? Sure. But never to be gummed back into the role of the pastor. We need models of example. We need models and examples of holiness. The pastor should be the model and example of holiness. Think about Paul, who says, imitate me as I imitate Christ. That should be what we're imitating. Well, Ethan, that seems harsh. It does, doesn't it? But let me remind you of Moses in Numbers chapter 20. What happened to him? He disobeyed God, violated God's rule for what he was to do, and was permanently disbarred from entering into the promised land. One action on Moses completely negated him from, can you imagine being Moses? You just did all of this, and then because you struck a rock, and I was like, nope, not going. Why? Because God cares about holiness. God cares about the holiness of your heart, of your actions, of your intentions, and of your behavior. He will not permit sin. He will not permit sin in the church. He will most especially not permit sin in the pulpit. So you need to take caution. Now let's look at the next verse here, verse 21. I solemnly charge you. There is a significant weight in which Paul's writing this. I solemnly charge you in the presence of God. and of Christ Jesus and of his elect angels to observe these instructions without bias, doing nothing impartiality. Now, let me explain this right here. Obviously, we understand where one person of the Trinity is, all three are present. He is charging us by the authority of God's wording of Christ Jesus, but then also this section here of his elect angels. What this is saying is those non-fallen angels are observing the church, are observing us, and they do care about the church's purity. If you read in 1 Peter, even 1 Peter says that even the angels are waiting for the unfolding redemption of God's plan to be outlined. Angels are not omniscient. Angels are not omnipresent. But the angels in the heavenly realm are watching and observing us and how we are to do this. So this isn't just a testimony of the church here in the physical sense, this is a testimony of the church in the spiritual sense. So this is not something that we should take lightly. And he says now at the end of this, observe these instructions without bias, doing nothing in partiality, meaning don't go after a person just because you don't like him, nor don't withhold the reproving because you do like him. Regardless of how this person stands within the church, within the elder board, show no partiality, show no bias. It's very hard for that to happen, but this charge carries a significant amount of weight in the presence of God, Christ, and his angels. The church should follow and obey these laws because all of heaven is concerned with the bride of Christ. No one has earned Nor should anyone be allotted preferential treatment. That's what he's saying here at the end of verse 21. No elder should be untouchable. Nor should any elder have an accusation thrown against him just because someone doesn't like them. Regardless of how popular or gifted or loved a man is, there should never be any form of preferential or biased treatment. And this, ladies and gentlemen, this is not a fun item to discuss. I looked this up just on Sermon Audio to see how many messages have been preached in this section. I only saw 10. Why would pastors not want to preach this? Think about it. I'm telling you how to fire me. I mean, really, that's exactly what's happening. And if I violate this, I deserve to be fired. And I deserve, I was telling my wife as she was asking me, like, what's the thematic element you think of this? I'm like, it's almost like a spiritual public execution. Like, you stand this guy up, almost put him in stocks, like, look at this guy. Hopefully he's confessing and repentant of his sin, but then also should cause fear in everybody else. Like, if they're doing that to the elder pastor, I need to be very quick to repent of my sin and be grateful too that I won't ever, nor do I want to enter into the third phase of that Matthew 18 church discipline process to be in that position. Why though do we need to discuss this? Why? Because Christ cares about his bride, which is the church. Paul says in Ephesians 5, 25 to 27, husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself up for her, so that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of the water with the word, so that he might present to himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she would be holy and blameless. This stuff is to be done. We honor the word of God so that we will present this church. We the elders desire to present each one of you with no spot or wrinkle or any such thing that this church will be holy and blameless. That is our desire is for us to be biblically driven, biblically centric, biblically submitted to God's word. And that should be your desire as well. And this is done so that we do not have to deal with the hypocritical condemnation that is all too frequent in this era. Church is a bunch of hypocrites. Church is a bunch of, anytime a pastor or someone else falls that's a promise in Christianity, it's like, another one. It's a shame. It's sad. It breaks my heart. It gives me no joy. But at the same time, it should make all of us fearful that we live our lives with such high barriers that we do not ever become ignorant, nor do we ever become complacent, nor do we ever think that sin could never get to me, that could never happen to me. Yes, it could. And yes, it can. And it happens when you don't think it will happen to you. It happens if you do not take up the proper accountability, the proper desires, the proper motivations, and then also if you do not fear God. Fear God. I hope that this helps give you an understanding of what's being said here. Because as we're gonna look at next week, we're gonna look at appointing elders. How do you appoint elders? Imagine if this was the recruitment poster to become an elder at the church. Hey, become an elder, but, you're gonna get fried if you mess up. That's what it should say. I have an advertised recruitment poster. Applications accepted, not all need to apply. Yeah, sign me up, baby. But that should be the standard we have. You mess up, you're done. And you're permanently done. And then you're gonna be flipping burgers. You're gonna be selling MLM stuff online. I don't know. But I hope this is, in one way, a reality for you. Secondly, I hope that if you do still follow a fallen pastor, to think carefully about why. Think carefully, too, about what you're allowing into your life, what sins are in your life. The great thing about Christ is that if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. That's why I love when Chad leads us through the time of confession. I cannot stress enough, you need to be a confessing person. And you need to be a person that has a hardened target against sin. And in my life, the best way that I combat sin, and I believe the best way that all of us can combat sin is through prayer. When you pray, you are humbling yourself before God. You are showing and demonstrating before God and before yourself that in and of myself, I do not have the power to overcome this sin. So if you're wrestling with a sin and you have not seen victory over this, no book is gonna help you. No small accountability group is gonna help you. There are some helpful things in certain instances and everything else. You need to pray. I cannot stress that enough. You need to pray. You pray when that temptation is coming on, you pray. When you have the desire to take a sip or to go there, you pray. God, help me fight this. Help me fight this. That is why we are to pray without what? Ceasing. That's what that means. I pray without ceasing. I'm submitting myself in my prayer life, in my physical life. I wanna respond in anger. God, help me out here. And sometimes it's gotta be a very quick prayer for some of us. You pray, you pray some more and then you continue to pray. That is how you can fight sin. That is how you can prevent these vulnerable areas from coming into your life. You pray and you pray some more. And if you need other people to pray with you, you gather other individuals and you pray with them and have them pray for you. There's nothing that I love more than hearing from people in this church saying, pastor, I pray for you. Thank you. I need and want and desire and covet all of your prayers all of the time. You need to be praying for your pastors. You need to be praying for each other. But you need to be praying for your own soul, confessing your sins, and living a life that is above reproach. Because if any of you are thinking, glad I'm not in that position, because that would happen to me. You still need to be following these standards. You still need to be living this type of a life. Let's pray. Father, help us in our life, in our daily walk, Father, may we be a praying people. God, I also pray for our church. God, as you have been protecting our church, we ask for your continual protection around me, around any temptations that may come my way, Father, that you may help me fight those. Stand resolute for all of the other men, women, and children in here that you will help them fight those temptations as well. God, may we be a church that when you return, we will be presented without wrinkle or spot, that we will be known as a church that is a holy church, a God-fearing church, and a church that submits to your word. Father, these are tough sections, but also these are written for our benefit. Father, we thank you for this time. I thank you for everyone in this room. We love you, Father, and ask all these things in your name, amen.