In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Good morning, brothers and sisters. If you would, go with me to 1 Timothy 5. We will be back in 1 Timothy 5, finishing out the chapter this morning. 1 Timothy 5, beginning in verse 17. This is the word of the living God. Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching. For the scripture says, you shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain, and the laborer deserves his wages. Do not admit a charge against an elder except on the evidence of two or three witnesses, As for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all, so that the rest may stand in fear. In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus and of the elect angels, I charge you to keep these rules without prejudging, doing nothing from partiality. Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands, nor take part in the sins of others. Keep yourself pure. No longer drink only water, but use a little wine for the sake of your stomach and your frequent ailments. The sins of some people are conspicuous, going before them to judgment, but the sins of others appear later. So also good works are conspicuous, and even those that are hidden cannot remain hidden. Let's pray one more time. Heavenly Father, Would you help us to see the glory of your design? We pray that you would help us, Holy Spirit, to look to Christ, to be sanctified, to be changed for the glory of Christ. We pray it in His name. Amen. Amen. A sort of a second week on this passage dealing with elders and I want to start this morning by asking a question. Does the Bible give us a sufficient framework for how pastoral leadership should be structured in the local church of Christ? Does the Bible give us that? Can, when we think about pastoral leadership, can we be word regulated when we come to that topic? Has God left the post-apostolic church to itself to figure out its leadership structures however it sees fit? however it might work well in the culture. However it wants to do that or has God through his son and through his apostles given the post-apostolic church the pattern for how it is to structure and maintain and develop its pastoral leadership. Now, before I spend the rest of the sermon answering that question, I need to give a few qualifications. There is a big difference in churches who either don't know or are apathetic to God's commands in Scripture regarding how to build its eldership. And a church who wants to do that, wants to be faithful, wants to be obedient, and is striving toward the biblical ideal, but their current pastoral leadership situation falls short of that ideal. There is a big difference between those two. And so this morning I'm going to argue for what we might call the biblical ideal, or the biblical goal, But just because a church's pastoral leadership doesn't currently reflect the biblical goal doesn't necessarily mean that that church is in sin. Let me unpack what I mean. A lot has to be factored in here. The size of a church matters here. Just a few statistics. In America, 59% of churches have less than 99 attendees on a Sunday morning. So over half of the churches in America have less than 100 people in attendance, and so it's likely that most of these churches have just one paid senior pastor who is on staff, who does the majority of the preaching and the teaching and the organizing and the governing and the shepherding. And some of these churches might have an associate pastor as well, but it's going to be very difficult for a church of 100 people or less to have a well developed, well rounded, balanced eldership. You think about a country where Christianity is illegal, you know, and you have a little underground church of 11 or 12 people, 13 people hiding out from the government. It's going to be very difficult for that church to maintain and develop the biblical eldership that I am going to argue for this morning. And so we have to think about God's sovereignty in light of all that we discussed this morning and keep that In mind, and so I want to preach this text more broadly and speak about it more objectively, and I would encourage you as you hear the things I'm arguing for not to immediately begin to think about churches, you know, or specifics or to even think about our church. You know, right now we have two elders and so as I'm preaching, you might say, wow, it seems like we're falling short of the biblical model. Let's change that right now. and the temptation can be to be pragmatic. So I encourage you to let your minds just stay in the text. Let's see what the text says and then let's get to the particulars in a more appropriate setting. And so I want to argue this morning that while God has not given us an overly specific, nuanced leadership manual that addresses every situation for every church, for every culture, and all ages, and while all of these principles must be applied thoughtfully and wisely in every circumstance, He has given us what we might call the normal framework for a biblical eldership. for structuring, maintaining, and developing a biblical eldership. And this passage before us this morning, along with a few others, is vitally important when we set out to form the way that we think and the way that we do pastoral leadership in the local church. And so I want to jump into this text and deal with every verse. And I've organized the content around three main points this morning. The structure of a biblical eldership, the maintenance of a biblical eldership, and the development of a biblical eldership. And so let's jump into the first one, the structure of a biblical eldership. Let's look back at verse 17. He says, let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching." And so last week, many of you were here. focused on these two verses, and we spent the majority of our time primarily thinking about elders who labor, as Paul says, in preaching and in teaching. And we looked at other passages of Scripture and tried to build out what that actually means. What does it mean for certain men among the elders to labor, to work, to strive, In the ministry of preaching and in teaching and we saw the necessity of the men who do that to be compensated so that they can give their time and their energy and their efforts to be to being able to do that well because Paul tells us in chapter 4 verse 16 that there is a direct correlation between the health of the theology and the life of the men who teach. And the health of the hearers. Says in 4.16, keep a close watch on your life and on the teaching. Persist in this for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers. And we looked at what it means to be worthy of double honor. So I would encourage you if you missed that to go back and look at that sermon, but I won't be primarily addressing those things again this morning. However, 1 Timothy 5.17 has within it some vitally important things to consider when we ask the question, how is a biblical leadership, pastoral leadership structured? And I want to build out some of those important points. Within a biblical leadership is a plurality of biblically qualified elders working together and functioning as a unit in the local church. We might call this an elder board or an elder ship or a council of elders. Notice again he says let the elders plural let the elders rule who rule well and so I can assure you that the church at Ephesus was not a mega church. Amen, it was a more developed church than other churches in the first century, but it but there weren't a plurality of elders because there was just this massive number of congregants. Right, but yet Paul still says to Timothy that there were a plurality of elders and we can assume that there would have been more than one man functioning as leaders in the church and we see this truth affirmed elsewhere in the New Testament. I'll just give you a few passages. Acts 20 verse 17. Now from Miletus he sent to Ephesus and called the elders of the church to come to him. Acts 1423 and when they had appointed elders for them in every church with prayer and fasting, they committed them to the Lord in whom they had believed. He says to Titus in Chapter 1 verse 5. This is why I left you in Crete so that you might put what remained into order and appoint elders in every town as I directed you and he says to Timothy in Chapter 4 verse 14. Do not neglect the gift that you have, which was given you by prophecy when the Council of elders laid their hands on you and we could just keep going and giving these examples. But brothers and sisters, it is very clear that the apostolic vision for pastoral leadership was that and is that under normal circumstances, again, we've got to factor in God's sovereignty here, but under normal circumstances, there would be more than two men functioning as the overseers of the church. And not only do we see from verse 17 a plurality of elders functioning together to govern and shepherd the flock, but within this plurality, we see what we call a legitimate parity, parity with a T, meaning that the elders are on par when it comes to the authority that they have to rule and govern in the church. There is equal authority. There are not two classes of elders on an elder board. There are not some men who are the pastors of the church who do the majority of the public teaching and leading, and they're the real pastors. And then you have a group of men over here that we call elders that sort of just manage and make some decisions, but they don't really do the work of a pastor. That is just not a biblical pattern. We do not see that in the New Testament. Anyone ordained to the office of overseer is an overseer in its fullest sense. Back in chapter 3, when Paul gives the qualifications for overseers, he gives no distinction with regard to how those men will function, whether they will be on staff or lay, whether they will do preaching or not preach very much. He makes no distinctions. The qualifications are just there. He says an overseer must be, and then he gives a list of qualifications. And again, as we saw last week, while certain elders will normally do the majority of the public teaching and preaching, that does not mean that they have more authority than the other elders. The elders are the elders in the church. The office of overseer itself comes with a God ordained authority that the man has when the church lays hands on him and ordains him to the office. and let me address some possible confusion for some of you, and I addressed this more thoroughly when we were back in chapter three, but I think it's worth mentioning again. Some of you, depending on your previous churches and how you were raised, may already be confused because I'm using three terms interchangeably. I'm using the word elder, the word overseer, and the word pastor. interchangeably, and I'm doing that because it seems clear to us, and this is just standard Reformed Baptist polity, and I think faithful to the New Testament witness, that the title elder, presbyteros, where we get the term presbyter, is used interchangeably with the title overseer. Episcopal's in the New Testament. And when we look at the function of those two titles, we see that they primarily are doing the work of shepherding. And pastoring and caring for the flock. That's why we use the term pastor today, because it's an essential function of those who are elders and overseers in the church. That's what elders do. They shepherd the flock of God. It's their identity. It's who they are as elders. So to use the term elder for men who in no way do the work of shepherding or pastoring. Is to betray what the word actually means. and to use the word pastoring in a way that doesn't denote a man who is ordained to the office of overseer is to betray the function of the pastor in the New Testament. In a key text that demonstrates this reasoning is Acts 20. Remember when Paul was saying goodbye to the Ephesian elders before he goes to Jerusalem. And it says in verse 17 that Paul sent to Ephesus and called the elders of the church at Ephesus the elders. But listen to how Paul admonishes them in verse 28. He says, pay careful attention to yourselves and to all the flock in which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers. So the men that Luke calls elders are the same men that Paul calls overseers. Men that the Holy Spirit has made overseers of the church. And then listen to what these men do. He says, pay careful attention to care for, literally to shepherd, to pastor the flock of God, or the church of God, which He obtained with His own blood. And so brothers and sisters, it just seems to be absolutely clear in light of the apostolic word that Jesus has ordained that His church would be governed by a plurality of men that have been ordained to the office of overseer and that these men would do the work together of shepherding and caring for the flock of God. and to see themselves as having to give an account for the flock of God, to care for her. Now, having said all that, let me make sure that I say something very important, lest we run into some of the same errors that other churches who get this and understand this fall into. And so while among the plurality of elders there is legitimate parity regarding their authority, that does not mean that there will not be legitimate diversity among that eldership, among that group of men. And so just as the body of Christ is composed of many parts, and we can't say to the other we don't need you and I can't say to myself there's no need for me, but we all build each other up into the head. We're all part of the body. So will it be on a biblical eldership. There will be a diversity with regard to giftedness. With regard to age, with regard to skill set, with regard to the season of life. Some pastors will be on staff full-time. Other pastors will be bi-vocational. And so it makes sense that the men who are not fully on staff would not have as much time to shepherd and pastor as the men who are on staff. A young elder who has small children at home will not be able to leave his home at night to do pastoral visits in the same way that a man who's retired and his children have moved out of the house will be able to do that. There will be a diversity within the eldership. Some elder elders will be stronger in the areas of administration, while others will be stronger in the areas of pastoral counseling. And we see also from verse 17 that there are some who are elders. They're not a special class of elders. They are elders, yet they will give the majority of their time to preaching and teaching. And so just because all the elders share equal authority, that does not mean that they need to share equally the pulpit. Or the public ministries of the word. The Bible says all elders must hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught so that he may be able to give instruction and sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it. However, it does not say that they all need to be equally supernaturally gifted to get in the pulpit and proclaim the word of God publicly. There's a difference there. There's a distinction there. And so let me conclude this point. by quoting from Albert Martin, whose feet, again, I've sat under for many hours with regard to these things. He says this, he says, the normal framework for the task of oversight is that of a plurality of scripturally qualified overseers functioning with true ecclesiastical parity and with realistic and harmonious diversity. And so a biblically structured eldership is an eldership made up of biblically qualified men, men who uphold the qualifications in 1 Timothy 3, who are ordained officially through the laying on of hands to the office of overseer. You don't just get to say you're a pastor when a church hasn't laid hands on you and ordained you to be a pastor. These are officially ordained men who share equal authority, who function together as a unified whole to shepherd the flock, yet they will demonstrate real diversity with regard to their strengths. They aren't just copies of one another. And if we just step back for a minute, I mean, you just see the wisdom of God in this model, in this design. You know, this keeps the church from becoming a replica of one man. And it enables the church to be cared for more holistically. And it allows some men to give the majority of their time to laboring in the Word. It allows some men to give the majority of their time to administration and more ruling in that type of way. Some men to counseling and visits and it allows the church to be cared for more effectively and it provides legitimate checks and balances. And so this leads me to the second point. Not only must an eldership be structured according to Scripture, but it must be maintained. According to Scripture. You know what happens when elders progress in patterns of sin? Or theological error? How does the eldership remain pure so that the church remains pure? Look at verse 19. Do not admit a charge against an elder except on the evidence of two or three witnesses. As for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all so that the rest may stand in fear. Now you could look at these instructions and essentially say that these are just general instructions for dealing with all, dealing with sin for all believers. And some might argue that this is essentially just a Matthew 18 church discipline passage, and I agree that you do see Matthew 18 principles here in First Timothy 5, but I think that the reason is because Matthew 18 becomes the framework for how the apostles thought about any kind of disciplinary procedure in the local However, Paul here in the context is speaking of relating to and dealing with elders. And so while these principles will certainly overlap with the general principles of church discipline, I think to be faithful to the text, we need to understand these verses in light of their specific application to elders. And again, I want to avoid getting into all the specifics and all kinds of examples. The first thing that we want to do is just look at what the text is saying, get our minds around the text and realize that these things have to be applied in a thousand different situations in the church age. And so the first thing to see here is that a charge against an elder is not even to be entertained unless the charge is verified. unless it is established as true. And this is a principle that we see across the whole Bible. Accusations must only be established if there is legitimate testimony to confirm them. Two or three witnesses. Actual evidence. And this principle applies for all believers. We see that in Matthew 18. But elders who have already shown themselves ideally, to be qualified, who labor in shepherding the flock, they must be specifically protected from false accusations. You know, you think about the nature of what overseers do. It involves ministering the Word of God. Which sometimes involves saying things that people don't like to hear. And doing things that people don't like. And so it's possible to open oneself up to false accusations. And there must be protection against that. But what if there is a private concern? What if there's a private dispute between a congregant and an elder? Let's just kind of step back and think in that category. If someone has a private dispute, maybe there's a disagreement about leadership, or maybe that elder said something in a sermon that the person is confused about or doesn't like. What is a person to do? Should that person go to the other elders? I think Biblically we would say no. That person needs to follow Matthew 1815 where Jesus says if your brother sins against you, Go to your brother privately. Confront him over his sin. And reconcile. And win your brother. And it's over. And there's a general practice of peacemaking here. And the elders, if that were to happen, need to say very gently to that brother or sister, brother, you need to go talk to him directly. And if it doesn't get worked out, come back to us. But that's a private matter between you and the man, go handle it the way Jesus says to handle it. So, but, you know, what happens if an elder persists in sinful behavior? And it's clear, there's clear proof that something is not right. You know, there's evidence to prove it, or perhaps there's multiple people who are seeing this man deviate morally. It's becoming public. It's clear that his theology is going down a bad trail, and it's just clear that he didn't, you know, make a mistake every now and then or fumble his words. There's clearly something going on. and this man is heading in a wrong direction and his sin is becoming public. He's persisting in sin. What's the protocol for addressing this? Well, the text seems to put the stress on elders being willing to deal with other elders who persist in sin. He says in verse 20, as for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all so that the rest may stand in fear. And I think what Paul has in mind here is not the normal struggle with sin that all Christians have, that everybody's trying to fight their sin and deal with sin. He's talking about disqualifying behavior, public sin that brings reproach upon the church of Christ. Public sin that harms the people of God that brings accusation from the world onto the Church of the living God. We're talking about sin that would render him no longer to be called above reproach. You know, once it's clear that that elder has morally or theologically swerved to the point to where he's no longer qualified, the rest of the elders need to step into that situation and not show partiality and deal with that situation. And oftentimes. As much as we don't like to think about this, the public sin of the elders has public far-reaching effects. And so it must be dealt with on normal occasions publicly. Now that's the biblical idea. And again, in the modern church, we have moved so far from that kind of thing that to read these verses almost seems shocking. But when you really take a step back and think about it, think about this. If the if the church deals with its elder sin seriously. How does it help everybody else? They're going to deal with my sin seriously. If they don't show partiality to him. They're not going to show partiality to me. And so there's a healthy biblical fear that's created that says there's no partiality here. Everybody is dealt with fairly. Everybody is dealt with objectively, and it leads to holiness. That's what church discipline does. It leads to holiness. And so if you're a part of a church, and Lord willing, we are a church striving to be this, where you know, if I keep going down this trail, if I keep committing these sins and I don't repent, I'm going to get church discipline, and I don't want that. That is God's means of grace to keep us on the narrow road. Amen? And so for elders to see, I'm not above that. I'm not above church discipline. I don't have a position to where I'm allowed to live two different lives and get away with it. I'll be dealt with. It creates healthy fear, which leads to holiness. And having understood this, verse 21 all of a sudden makes perfect sense. In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus. I mean, think about the seriousness of this. In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus and of the elect angels, I charge you to keep these rules without prejudging. Doing nothing from partiality. You know, think about the temptation to show partiality when dealing with anyone's sin. Much less a gifted man who's an elder of the church. This must be why Paul put so much force behind the command. The elders are to be so committed to their allegiance to Christ that even if it requires losing friends. Even if it requires losing members. Even if it requires losing money. They must be committed to doing what God says to do. They must be committed to obeying Christ at any cost and not showing partiality in confronting sin. And I would just ask this generally. Is that where your heart is? That I will not show partiality in confronting sin. That I don't turn a blind eye to certain people while rebuking others quickly. Is there partiality in the way that we judge sin in our lives? Something to think about. And in doing so, the elders will maintain a biblical eldership. And the church will be blessed. Because these men will be above reproach. And they will minister to the flock of God. And there will be health in the body. How? Well, because disqualified elders will be removed from the office and godly men will, or godly fear will grip the elders so that they don't flirt with sin and they'll remain pure. They'll be an example to the flock. How wise is God? And this leads me to my third and final point. the development of a biblical eldership. Now that we've seen how a biblical eldership is structured, and now that we've seen how it is maintained, and I trust that we've all seen the goodness of these things, it might lead a church to think, okay, this is clearly God's good design, let's do it. Let's go raise up elders. Let's do it now. Let's strive to do this. Let's get on with the biblical idea. What are we waiting on? And Paul says, not so fast, verse 22. Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands, nor take part in the sins of others. Keep yourself pure. You know, the office of elder brings with it such weight and responsibility, and it brings with it such public profile that when an elder falls morally and brings forth a public scandal onto the church, the consequences are much more far reaching than when a member falls morally. The consequences extend further. There's more public damage being done to the name of Christ when that happens. It provides more occasion for people to doubt the faith, or turn away from the faith, or leave the church, or divide the church when that happens. Think about how confusing it is when a man disciples you for years, and you feel like, man, I grew. so much under his leadership. I've listened to thousands of hours of his sermons. I've read his books. And then he falls. It's confusing to think about that. Then you begin to question, did everything he said, do I need to delete it out of my mind? Am I wrong? Am I crazy? Brings harm to the church. Not only that, but if a man who is not qualified is ordained to the office, who's going to ultimately suffer? The hearers. The hearers, the church. Remember the connection from 416. The connection between the minister's life and doctrine and the state of the hearer's souls. And Paul exhorts Timothy, don't participate in the sins of others. In other words, for elders, and I would add the entire church, to lay hands on a man and ordain him to the office before he is qualified, or if he is not qualified, is to A, judge partially, And it is to be participate in his sins by putting him into the office, even though there are aspects of his life that clearly render him unqualified. And if he falls morally at that point and brings great damage to the church, to some degree, the elders who made the decision to ordain that man before he was qualified, share in those sins. They bear that responsibility. And Paul saying, do not partake in others sins. And so what's necessary to avoid this? Well, first, Paul tells Timothy to keep himself pure. Keep yourself pure from any thinking, any relational dimension, any fear of man, any love of money, anything that would lend Timothy to judge partially and put men in the office who shouldn't be there, Paul says, get rid of it. Keep yourself pure. That's how he will judge objectively here. And now verse 23 just seems a little out of place, doesn't it? He says, no longer drink only water, but use a little wine for the sake of your stomach and your frequent ailments. You know, it's almost like Paul just gave this extremely serious charge to Timothy, not to show partiality, keep yourself pure. All this weight, I imagine Timothy is feeling as he's reading this. And it's almost like Paul says, oh, and by the way, Timothy, before I forget, No longer drink water, but take a little wine for the sake of your stomach. And when you read through 1 Timothy and your devotions, it's like this command just comes out of nowhere. And it's hard to make sense out of what is being said. But the more I have thought about this and studied 1 Timothy, the more I'm convinced this is not just some one-off command that doesn't belong. So take this for what it's worth, but it seems to me that there is a direct connection between the command for Timothy to be pure and the command for Timothy to consume some wine for his stomach's sake. And when you think about it, for Timothy to hear the command, be pure, it's possible that he would have understood that to mean abstain from alcoholic consumption. And so for some reason or another, I think it's probably because there are some elders in the church, we've seen this multiple times as we've studied 1 Timothy, there are some leaders or teachers in the church who are just overwhelmingly concerned with asceticism. abstinence. Remember we studied how some were teaching don't eat this kind of food, don't get married, this is how you be really godly. There was that kind of thing going on in Ephesus and it could be that Timothy had become a teetotaler because he associated consuming alcohol with being pure. And so when Paul says keep yourself pure, Timothy could have heard that as don't drink alcohol. But Paul says in parentheses Almost as if he's saying, you heard me say, keep yourself pure, but drink a little wine for the sake of your stomach. No longer drink water only. This will be good for you. It will help your frequent ailments. You can take that for what it's worth. That's all I'm going to say about that this week. And so what's the point about all of this, you know, when you think about it? Well, the point is this, the church can't allow a godly means to justify, a godly end to justify ungodly means. The church cannot allow the godly end, which is a well balanced plurality of diverse biblically qualified elders, which is a godly end. To justify ungodly means to getting to that end. And you can imagine the temptation. Let's let's skip some steps. Let's ignore some qualifications. Let's move too fast to get to the end. And Paul is warning Timothy from that. While the biblical idea is to have this well-rounded, diverse plurality of overseers who have equal authority, the church is not to force that ideal into a reality by being hasty to lay hands on some men before the Holy Spirit has made them overseers. We are to trust God. The church is to trust God. He says in 1st Timothy 3.6, he must not be a recent convert or he may become puffed up with conceit and fall into the temptation or the condemnation of the devil. And so Paul is warning Timothy against looking at a man and saying, wow, he's charismatic. Wow, he's gifted. Wow, people like him. Let's let's get him up there next week. Paul is saying no. There must be time. Do not be hasty to lay hands on men. Under normal circumstances, there needs to be sufficient time to pass so that the elders and the church can assess the man's life, to watch him interact publicly and in private, to watch, to see how his wife and his children respond to him, to see him through difficulty, Through trial. Through difficult situations to watch how he responds. They need to meet with him privately and ask a lot of questions and know what he believes and know his theology. This just does not happen quickly. Sufficient time and assessment are needed. Why? He says in verse 24 and 25, the sins of some people are conspicuous. Going before them to judgment, but The sins of others appear later. So also good works are conspicuous, and even those that are not cannot remain hidden. You know, those verses sound somewhat complex, but I think the message is very simple. Time will tell. Time will tell. A man will show who he really is. Some people's sins and character failures are conspicuous. They're obvious. They're blatant. Everybody sees them. But some people are really good at hiding who they really are. And you know, this is what's true for most of us. We may not know who we really are. That's why God brings trials into our lives. To show us who we really are. To show us the sin that is still remaining. And it's His grace. And it's His mercy to show us what we need to deal with. That's why He brings us into difficult situations. You know, when difficulty comes into most of our lives, for most of us, what's the first thing we ask? What needs to change structurally? How do we need to change our schedule, our routine, our church, our this, our that, our other? And we immediately begin to think in that context, and certainly those things are needed to be assessed. But what if God's goal for our suffering and our trials was not to ask what needs to change outside of me first, but to ask what needs to change in me? What's God trying to do in me? What's He want to deal with? What sins is He showing me that aren't pleasing to Him? That by His grace, this suffering is drawing out of my heart. And He's given me the grace to crucify those sins and to put those things to death. You know, what if Christlikeness was God's goal for our trials? I submit to you that it is. It is and so people may appear solid. We may appear solid. But at a later time, as time goes on, as trials come, as criticism comes. As dissension comes as disagreement comes as life gets difficult. As our bodies hurt. And all of these things happen. Sins manifest themselves. And in the same way, you may have a man who is of a more timid disposition. And he's not as eloquent. Perhaps he's not the most intellectually gifted. Perhaps he's not the most theologically astute. Maybe he's not the best with words, but he's a godly man. And he loves his family. And he's patient. And he's gracious. And he loves the church and he understands the word and he takes great pains to obey Christ and as time goes on that man's works. Will be shown. They will be displayed. They will be clearly manifested and so Paul says give time. Do not be hasty with these decisions. Give time. And still brothers and sisters following these protocols doesn't guarantee perfection. A church may follow all of these protocols closely, and their desire may be totally set on honoring the Lord. And yet, they may allow a lot of time, they may vet, they may do everything they need to do, and yet later on, a man still might become disqualified in sin and bring reproach upon the church. And that's why Paul gives us a disciplined process. It's the same way with church membership. You know, we have protocols where we where we meet with people. We interview people. We try to get people's understanding of the Gospel. We ask them questions. We hear their testimony. And we bring people into the church on the basis of their testimony and on what we can see in a short period of time. But yet some still will. inevitably go out from among us because they were never of us. And he's given us the process of church discipline to deal with those things. We simply will not bat 1000 when it comes to these things. And again, the immediate context is focused on elders, but this is true for everyone. Perhaps you are in a season of life where it seems like everything you do goes unnoticed. You know, all the good goes unnoticed. Nothing is glamorous. Everything is hidden. No one praises you. There's no award ceremonies for you. There's no public acknowledgement. The Lord sees. The Lord sees. And he's telling us here that as time goes on, as you continue to do good and not grow weary, those good works will be clearly seen. They will be evident to all and they will see those good works and give glory to the Father in heaven. They will not remain hidden. And as we sort of conclude our study on elders, one thing that we just can't say enough is that Christ is the pastor of the church. And elders are a great blessing to the church. Pastors are a great blessing to the flock of God. It is a blessing to have biblically qualified elders doing the things that we've talked about the last couple of weeks. But Jesus Christ is ultimately who we must look to. He is our pastor. He is our great shepherd, and while the Bible gives us a sufficient framework for establishing and maintaining and developing this biblical eldership, it's all coming down from Christ. Because Ephesians 4 says that when he ascended on high, what did he do? He gave gifts to men. Amen. Brothers and sisters, let's continue to pray for pastors, continue to pray that the Lord would continue to build here a biblical eldership, and let's rest in his sovereignty and look to Jesus Christ alone. Amen. Let me transition us to the table. If you're a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, and you have confessed with your mouth that he is Lord, and you believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, and you have shown that publicly through the ordinance of baptism, please come and take the supper with us. And if you have not, we would ask that you would refrain, but there are some prayers that you can pray in your bullets and during this time. Brothers and sisters, take some time in your seats, meditate on the goodness of God, meditate on the glory of Christ, all the things that we have sang about today, what he's done for you in his death and resurrection. And when you're ready, come down and receive the elements and go back to your seat and we will take the supper together. Let me pray for us. O gracious Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank You that You are wise and You show Yourself to be wise in the way that You have given instructions for us to live, for Your church to be what You've called it to be. And so we pray, Lord, that we would continue to think about these things and meditate on these things. And Lord, help us to go from this place and bring much glory and honor to Christ. And Lord, as we come to the table, I pray that our thoughts would be focused on Christ alone. And we ask in Jesus' name, amen.