Well, let me start off with a, what do you call this, a commercial. Yeah, that's what it is. A few months, there is a publisher named Broken Wharf Publications, or Broken Wharf Publisher. They're out of the UK, out of the Manchester area. And they are closely connected with IRBS, International Reform Baptist Seminary, that you see information out on the table about each week that our church partners with. And Darren Gilchrist, who directs Broken Wharf, a friend of mine, I texted him yesterday and asked him if we could do something. For the last couple of months, Broken Wharf has had its American arm, if you will, of their bookstore housed at Matt and Katie Kid's house. If you know Matt and Katie, they have a couple of shelves and a room basically in their home dedicated to the Broken Wharf bookstore, and they have probably about, oh, I don't know, 40 titles or so probably about 600 books all over this room and they've graciously given that room in their house for that and what we want to do here at the church is make some of those titles available to people that come to the church and that way you can purchase a book and it's you don't have to pay for the shipping because they're they're already here, so we'll just keep these here each week and put some out on the table. And we have about nine or 10 titles, I think about three copies of each one, one of which is Sam Renahan's book, The Mystery of Christ. Some of you know this is also published by Founders Press here in the States. I think it's just called The Mystery of Christ, but here, The Mystery of Christ, His Covenant, and His Kingdom. This is the Broken Wharf edition of it. Also, the book I've mentioned several times over the last few weeks, Faith and Life for Baptists. which is a collection of documents from the General Assembly from 1689 to around 1694. There's a few copies of this back there as well. So look at those after Sunday school or after service and if you want to get one You talk to Matt, and I believe all he needs from you is your name and your email. He will supply that to the guys at Broken Wharf. They will email you an invoice, and you can pay them by credit card that way, all right? Most of the books, I think, are between $15 and $20. And like I say, we do save on the shipping. Ryan, I see you back there. Can you hold that one up, that red one? I meant to grab that. That little red book right there that Ryan is so wonderfully modeling for us is written by our own Julius Santiago. It's a book on preaching. And so it's a very helpful little book on preaching as a primary means of grace. So check those out. And if you want, Grab one of those today. That's it for the commercial. I'll ask Matt later if I missed anything. Well, if you have a copy of our confession, go ahead and take it out. and turn to Chapter 26, Paragraph 10. We have a few copies of the Confession on the table at the back, I think, and if any of you need one of those, you can go back there to the table and grab one. They're free, little paperback editions of the Confession. Let me start off today by talking to us about a man by the name of R.L. Dabney. R.L. Dabney was a 19th century Virginia Presbyterian, served in the Civil War, taught, got his degrees from Union Theological Seminary, pastored some Presbyterian churches. R.L. Dabney was a, we might call him an old school Presbyterian, who held a very traditional line when it came to what are sometimes dubbed lay preachers. Lay preachers. You might or might not be familiar with that kind of a phrase. A lay preacher is basically a non-ordained preacher of the gospel. that in our own Baptist heritage goes under the banner of a gifted brother. And that is what we want to talk about today from our confession, chapter 26, in paragraph 11. Tell you a little more, though, about Dabney before we get to the confession. Dabney believed that lay preaching was a danger to the church. And then it operated, in his mind, without boundaries and was fueled by what he called a broad churchism. Now you may not know what broad churchism is, but you can probably kind of already get that sense of disdain that Dabney probably had for it. Anything called broad churchism just doesn't sound very good. Broad churchism according to Dabney, is caused by the church, or it causes the church to, quote, fling out her doctrinal standards and open her doors to latitudinarian doctrine. You wanna impress your friends, you can learn that word, latitudinarian, right? It's basically doctrine with a whole lot of latitude, all right? A lot of breadth, all right? A lot of wiggle room, if you will. Furthermore, he says, when the church opens her doors to this latitudinarian doctrine, it has fearful consequences. He warned his Presbyterian brethren of his day in the 19th century that they should bear in mind as one fixed fact that the recognition of lay preaching means broad churchism. It's like there's no way to avoid the broad churchism that comes as a result of these lay preachers. His view of lay preaching was that it speaks under no ecclesiastical responsibility, and further, that lay preachers may present the truth aptly or inaptly to the edification or the misleading of hearers, but that the church, which permits them to preach without her commission, cannot curb them. It would seem that Dabney's views of lay preaching were kind of akin to a free range chicken that just kind of wanders to and fro in the field, kind of going where it pleases and doing and saying whatever they want. Now Dabney, we don't have time to fill this out, but Dabney was reacting to a kind of lay preaching that he saw prevalent in 19th century American preaching, especially that preaching of the Baptists, and we might even say the Methodists, and that tended to be very present in mid-19th century America in the frontier, right? As the gospel begins to spread out to the frontier, and you have these revival meetings, and somebody comes to Christ, and he gets all excited, and he seems full of the Holy Spirit, and the church goes, well, then go out and preach. You know, who are we to stop you, type of thing. And you can probably imagine the kind of problems that might come from such a thing. Well, he is, in his cultural context, reacting to this 19th century American-type lay preaching, and the consequences of which were, indeed, quite detrimental to the overall health of the churches. However, Dabney's context aside, His views were very similar to the views of the strict Presbyterians in the day of our Baptist forefathers who wrote our confession as well. The practice of the Presbyterians in that time were to, according to Jeffrey Nuttall, who is a church historian, he said that the Presbyterians, their practice was, quote, not to hear a man not bred up at the university or not ordained. If he didn't go to university, like seminary, and he wasn't ordained, then we shouldn't be hearing him preach. This practice, according to our own friend Jim Renahan and his work, Edification and Beauty, that some of you are familiar with, caused many of the Presbyterian churches to stop meeting. And why would this be? Well, this was because in the latter half of the 17th century, remember there was something that happened in 1662 known as the Act of Uniformity. And in the Act of Uniformity, the Church of England mandated that every preacher strictly conform to the Book of Common Prayer. They had practiced their own kind of latitudinarianism in the early 17th century, giving room to some preachers to allow them to take some exceptions to the articles of the Church of England, but in 1662, it was a flat. You know, you're either conform or you don't conform. And if you don't conform, you're out. And thousands of dissenting ministers, maybe 2,000, 3,000 dissenting ministers in 1662 found themselves overnight without a pulpit. Well, not only are they without a pulpit, Because of the act of uniformity, Presbyterians couldn't send their young men to university anymore. They couldn't be trained. The Baptists had had kind of exclusion from Oxford and Cambridge for years, but the Presbyterians had made some inroads there. But at this point, they're not even allowed back in, and you can imagine what this does. If you can't get your guys trained and you have a policy that says you can't preach unless you're trained, pretty soon your churches are what? Your churches are empty of ministers and they can't meet, all right? So Renahan says that this kind of clericalism, it's a high view of clericalism, was not atypical of much high Presbyterian argumentation. And as we find in Dabney, the high clerical spirit remained for many years to come. But the Baptists had a different view. They held a view in their confession of faith which they shared and perhaps truly learned from their independent counterparts who we often refer to as the Congregationalists. Well, if you have your copy of the Confession there, let's just read from Chapter 26, Paragraph 11. And there we find these words. Although it be incumbent on the bishops or pastors of the churches to be instant in preaching the word by way of office, yet the work of preaching the word is not so peculiarly confined to them, but that others also gifted and fitted by the Holy Spirit for it and approved and called by the church may and ought to perform it. Although they in truth root this in scripture, and we'll look at a couple of those verses in a moment, they drew it most immediately from the Congregationalist document that we've looked at before known as the Platform of Polity. Maybe you remember that from oh, maybe back a month or two ago when we were studying something earlier in Chapter 26. In fact, a good portion, remember, of Chapter 26 is drawn from the Congregationalist's platform of polity. And this is what it says in the platform. It's not verbatim. There's a few extra things, but I just want you to hear it. This is in paragraph 13 of the Platform, and I'm sure you probably have a copy of the Platform of Equality right there in your pocket, and you can pull it out. I'm just going to listen. Although it be incumbent on the pastors and teachers of the churches to be instant in preaching the Word by way of office, yet the work of preaching the Word is not so peculiarly confined to them, but that others, also gifted and fitted by the Holy Ghost for it, and approved being by lawful ways and means in the providence of God called thereunto, may publicly, ordinarily, and constantly perform it, so that they give themselves up thereunto. It's a little bit different, but the jest of it is the same. It seems like some of the most significant words that the Baptist dropped were the idea that these men would be preaching publicly ordinarily and constantly. I'm not sure the background of why they would drop those words, but perhaps they saw the gifted brethren preaching not so much publicly, but in local churches, and not so much ordinarily or constantly, but maybe irregularly in the life of the local body because in the life of that local body you would normally have other pastors, elders that would be doing the bulk of the preaching. That's just a guess. Now, they didn't just draw it from the Congregationalists and say, okay, great, the Congregationalists have this, so we need to have this too. No, they're drawing this from the scripture, all right? And they have a couple of proof texts that are listed in our confession, and I want us to look at them. Acts 11 and 1 Peter 4. Acts 11 and 1 Peter 4. As you're turning and you're looking for that, what questions come up or comments arise in your mind at this point? Anything? OK. I'm sure in the American frontier, the ordained, experienced, university-educated preachers would be few and far between. They'd be few and far between. Yes. Not going to find a lot of those in the middle of Kentucky. In a lot of congregations, I was once a Methodist as a child, and they greatly admired the circuit riders that would go, I guess, from church to church. Yes. And the most successful group in that circuit riding preaching in mid-19th century America were the Methodists. And they, Francis Asbury and others, I mean, they rode all over the place. I mean, the Baptists had plenty of that going on as well. The Presbyterians did not. That was not a primary Presbyterian way to get the gospel out, if you will. And so, yeah, Jason? Yes. Yeah, yeah, he sees the damage from it, and I understand. And Dabney has, I think this is in volume two. If you have Dabney's works, there's like five volumes to be, you know, worth getting into if you're a. I'm a book fanatic, like some people I know are. But there's some interesting things, and I think it's volume two, I think maybe like the first article, and I read it, you know, some years ago, and overall it's very good. It sounds like a prophetic denunciation of using Bethel and Hillsong and whatever in your church. I mean, it's just, he talks a lot about music. If you think about revivalism, if you know much about 19th century revivalism in particular in America, a lot of it is driven by music. and the experience of singing, and most of the songs, he just, they're like dribble, you know, but they're very exciting. And it's interesting, in the chapter, he really addresses D.L. Moody and Iris Sankey. So we're getting later 19th century, even mid to late 19th century, contemporary of Spurgeon in many ways. And he's no fan of Spurgeon either, but he's certainly no fan of Moody and Sankey. Sankey was Moody's music man that followed him around all over the world, leading music while he played the trombone. If you're a trombone player, you can imagine how that might have looked while you're directing the whole group. And they were very successful, externally speaking, but it did create all kinds of havoc in the churches. Billy? I guess I have a question to make clarity. Daphne would clearly have issues with not just gifted brothers, but anybody who hasn't been seminary trained. I guess my question would be, if you have a church, like we've brought up in a small town, a country church, that has a pastor that's not seminary trained, would that person, according to our confession, be a pastor, or would we consider him to be a brother? Because you're kind of, in your presentation, it almost kind of seems like we're talking about gifted brothers, which are not seminary trained, and pastors which are. Gifted brothers could be seminary trained, and pastors need not necessarily be seminary trained. I'm answering this as a Baptist. I'm not answering this as I'm Dabney. We would not have a stipulation or requirement that any man have to go to seminary before he ever served the Lord in the ministry of the word. That being said, we would also highly encourage, excuse me, and affirm that that training is of great importance in ministry and would serve as a corrective to a lot of things that Dabney's kind of reacting against there in the 19th century. So it's not the cultural context of the 19th century that I necessarily want to transfer back to the 17th century. It's Dabney's stringent views against anyone preaching that's not seminary trained and ordained that go back to the 17th century that show there's a kind of a comparison with those more strict Presbyterians in that day. All right. Well, let's look at these texts just for a moment. And remember, when we're talking about proof texts, we're not looking in these verses for the phrase gifted brother. We're not looking for the phrase lay preacher, all right? What we are looking is for some broad principles that might give the church guidance to the idea that in order for one to go out and preach the gospel, he need not necessarily be ordained or educated. Now, we're going to get in a moment to what the confession actually is proposing should happen with these men, all right? but here we're looking for like broad principles that might open up the idea that there are some in the period of the New Testament that do preach the word that may not necessarily have to be pastors, elders, and churches. So in Acts chapter 11 in verse 19, 19 through 21, can somebody read that for us good and loud? So then those who were scattered because of the persecution that occurred in connection with Stephen made their way to Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch, speaking the word to no one except to Jews alone. But there were some of them, men of Cyprus and Cyrene, who came to Antioch and began speaking to the Greeks, also preaching the Lord Jesus. And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a large number who believed turned All right, so for a little background context to what's happening in Acts 11, 19, notice the phrase, it says, those who were scattered because of the persecution that occurred in connection with Stephen. So there's some background here, all right? It's referring back to a period of persecution that caused a gathered group of believers to scatter. Now, if you go back in your Bible to the chapter eight of the book of Acts, we're gonna find this very event. Acts chapter eight, beginning in verse one. This is after the death of Stephen. Remember, he has been stoned. Saul, in verse 1, who later becomes Paul, right, was in hearty agreement with putting him, that is, Stephen, to death. And on that day, a great persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. Some devout men buried Stephen and made loud lamentation over him, but Saul began ravaging the church, entering house after house and dragging off men and women. He put them in prison. Therefore, those who had been scattered went about preaching the word. Now the very next section in Acts chapter 8 opens us up to the ministry of a man by the name of Philip. Remember Philip? Philip was one of the seven, right? These seven were appointed for the care of the Grecian widows that were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. Perhaps they administered funds. They cared for the people that were there. and they weren't selected for their preaching abilities, but clearly at least Philip had some abilities to preach. And Philip goes out and he begins to preach. It says he went down to the city of Samaria and began proclaiming Christ to them. I've heard this passage in Acts chapter eight used many times by people who want to promote the idea that everybody's a preacher. Everybody needs to go and be a preacher. We all need to be proclaiming the gospel of Jesus, all right? You hear this under the banners of sometimes it's called every member evangelism or the idea that everybody basically is called to preach, all right? Or you'll hear it in conjunction with conversations about the Great Commission, all right? All of us, the Great Commission is given to every Christian. Every Christian is supposed to fulfill the Great Commission. And if you can think about the Great Commission for just a moment, that probably becomes a little problematic. All right, everybody's going to preach, everybody's going to baptize, everybody's going to teach. And then you have those sneaky little Bible verses that say things like, not all of you should be teachers, brothers. But let's not bother with that right now, all right? So you get the idea that everybody should do all these things. And I don't think that's what Acts chapter 8 is saying. It is saying very clearly in verse 4, those who had been scattered went about preaching the word. It doesn't say every one of them that was scattered went about preaching the word. It's a general statement and then it comes down to a very specific example and it speaks about who? It speaks about Philip. Now if we go over again to Acts chapter 11, We have a lot to do after we look at these Bible verses, and I think I'm down to one week in the Sunday school turn here, so that means we've got to get done with this, because I still have two paragraphs left next Sunday. I'm well aware of many of my deficiencies, but I'm not aware of them all. but verbosity certainly is one of them. But back in chapter 11 in verse 19, again we have the general phrase, those who were scattered, all right? But then it gives a very specific example in verse 20. But there were some of them. Some of who? Some of those who were scattered. And then it clearly says, men of Cyprus and Cyrene who came to Antioch and began speaking to the Greeks and also preaching the Lord Jesus. The only ones that we knew were specifically preaching were men from Cyrene, men from Cyprus, and they come down to Antioch and they preach. And then it says in verse 21, and the hand of the Lord was with them. And that reference would then be to the men who came to Antioch to preach, and it says, the hand of the Lord, notice the phrase in verse 21, the hand of the Lord was with them, and a large number who believed turned to the Lord. That phrase, the hand of the Lord being with them, is very interesting. I traced that for a little while, but there's not time to do it. But basically, it's a phrase that's used often When men minister the word of God and the hand of the Lord is upon them, showing like his blessing or that he will help, end up blessing the ministry of the word going out. It's not exclusively used for the preaching of the gospel, but it is used other times regarding the idea of preaching and its success by the watch care, if you will, the provision of God. Well, news about these converts reaches the ears of those in Jerusalem and Barnabas comes from Jerusalem up to Antioch. and he comes and witnesses the grace of God that has taken place there. So here, what the confession is saying, looking at this kind of a text as a proof text, is that we see persecution, we see scattering, we see individuals go out and begin to preach the gospel and success being given to them in the preaching of these particular men, like these men that are unnamed here in Acts chapter 11 verse 20, Or like the man specifically, Philip, in Acts chapter 8, I think verse 5, where we see men who were not pastors, they were not elders. The apostles' hands were laid on the seven in Acts chapter 6, correct? But they were not laid on them to be preachers of the gospel. They were not laid on them to be pastors or elders. They were laid on them to... be carers for the flock there in Jerusalem. But here we see him doing a very distinct function. It's not a diaconal type function. In many ways, it's a ministry of the word type function. There's another text to look at, 1 Peter chapter 4. 1 Peter chapter 4 verse 10 also seems to lend itself to the idea of a general picture of those who are given the opportunity to speak or to preach the gospel. 1 Peter chapter 4 verses 10 and 11. Can I get a, Jeff, okay, thank you. All right. So each one has received gifts, and this is certainly in keeping with other passages that we've even seen in Ephesians chapter four, Romans chapter 12, or 1 Corinthians chapter 12, where Ryan was preaching from there, and 13 and 14, God does give spiritual gifts to the body. And it seems that Peter wants to divide these gifts primarily into speaking gifts and serving gifts. I always find it interesting that we find that very thing, do we not, within church leadership. We find elders who are primarily speakers, and we find deacons who are primarily servers, and we find this idea of speaking and serving that needs to happen, and it kind of divides that or distinguishes that ministry that's a whole ministry to people who are both body and soul. And my body needs to be cared for, it needs to be tangibly ministered to, but my soul needs a nourishment of the word of God. And we find this kind of nourishment provided by God in the very gifts that he gives to the church, through which she ministers to herself, and in keeping with Ephesians chapter 4, by the ministry of the body to itself, what happens to the body? It grows. With a growth that's from God. It builds itself up in that regard. But that general division of speaking and serving, what the confession here is saying is that we see here enough generality in this statement in verse 11 that this need not be limited just to elders and to deacons. And in fact, service of one member to another, is that limited to just the deacons? I mean, you know, when you see your brother in need, do you walk past him and go, man, it's a bummer, deacons. We have a need. Where's the deacon? So he can fix the problem. I've been in churches like that. There's a need, you look for a deacon. Oh, I could actually take care of it myself. It's like your kids at home. How many times do they walk over the proverbial sock on the ground? It'll just stay there until it's like petrified. It like, you know, it turns colors over the week or whatever. And the mother is like, how long are they gonna walk over it? You know, we have these stairs in our house, we've been told. They're usually covered with things. Kids can jump from the bottom step, like 10 steps up. They can leap. I don't know how they do that. And then from the top, they just basically jump off the banister because if I have to walk down the stairs, I'd have to pick something up. They're always looking for somebody else to do it. No, in the body, sorry, I digress in a parenting vent for a moment. Makes me feel better from time to time just to vent. In the body, the body needs to be caring for itself. Yes, perhaps the deacons are like model servants in many ways, but they're modeling by example that you might do what, you might see what godly service looks like, and you might model that then to one another. The same thing, generally speaking, in regard to speaking. Teaching, right? Everyone who teaches doesn't have to be a pastor. Let me just press this a little harder. If we look back in Ephesians 4, and you might think, you got your chance with Ephesians 4 last month. Well, there was more to get out of Ephesians 4 than what we did. But look back over in Ephesians 4, verse 11. And he gave some, Ephesians 4.11, and he gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers. There's two different ways, basically, that this text is read. One is seeing four offices, apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastor teachers. And the other is seeing this as five offices, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and a fifth gift here of teaching. All are not, what does Paul say in Corinthians, all are not what? All are not apostles, all are not teachers, all right? The gift of teaching, the place of teaching, right? If everybody in the church who teaches has to be a pastor, we have some real restructuring to do, don't we, in both of our congregations, all right? And Dabney would say, yes, you do. And we would say, no, we don't. But what I would argue is that, and I don't have time to argue it here necessarily, but what we're looking at here in verse 11 are five distinct gifts that are given to the church. Apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers. Three that are what we might call extraordinary, apostles, prophets, and evangelists, reserved for the time of Christ and the apostles, the New Testament period. And two that are what we would call more ordinary ministries, pastors, and teachers that serve the church in local churches. Yeah, but that's a whole other bucket of worms that we're not going to fish with today. So yeah, but yeah, verse 12 has its own problems. But an example I would give of this also, Hercules Collins, who wrote the Orthodox Catechism. Some of you are familiar with Hercules Collins. And if you're not, you probably get familiar with him. He did a Baptist version of the Heidelberg, I think is what it is, the Orthodox Catechism. He uses as an example of someone who is a preacher and teacher in the New Testament period who is not a pastor, can you think who you might use? He uses Apollos. Not a pastor, not an elder, but a preacher nonetheless. One mighty in the word, skilled in the word, right? Well, from these texts, and there's a lot more we could say there, but from these texts and others like them, the Baptists draw out the idea that preaching is not exclusively tied to the pastoral office. And that though it be, quote, incumbent on the pastors and teachers of the churches to be instant in preaching the word, by way of office, that's just right there out of the confession, they find support that the work of preaching the word is not so peculiarly confined to them, but that others also gifted and fitted by the Holy Spirit for it and approved and called by the church may and ought to perform it. Now, this is hardly Dabney's group of free-range chickens. Rather, these are men who are found qualified, They are tested and approved. They are called by churches. They're not self-appointed men that are accountable to no one. And they're not self-sent men who determine their own abilities. And that was the environment that I grew up in as a Southern Baptist. It was this idea, I remember when I was 21 and I had been involved in youth ministry by that point. I'd been involved helping out my Sunday school class and leaving music and things like that. I taught a couple of Bible studies. I'd worked with the college class for six months or something like that. And I began to have this, you know, very, you know, very touchy, I wasn't a charismatic, but I was just about as touchy feely. I didn't speak in tongues, but I had all those little internal flutters or whatever. And I had all these little feelings and I thought, God must be calling me to the ministry. And I remember One evening after church on Sunday evening, probably during the 47th verse of Just As I Am or something like that, I went down and shook the pastor's hand and said, God's calling me to the ministry. And he said, man, that's great, or something like that. It wasn't three minutes later, the songs were over, and he turned around with me standing right beside him and told everybody, God's called Jason into the ministry. Yeah. Wow. When I look back on that and I think, 30, 35 years ago, that is, that's a terrifying way to get called in the ministry. Actually, let me just say it this way. That's no way to get called in the ministry, all right? But in the context I grew up in, that was the way you got called to the ministry. Anybody have that background? Not necessarily that same experience of being called to the ministry like that or not like that. Man, what a mess. No wonder Dabney was concerned. I'd be concerned too. I am concerned. And unfortunately, it hasn't changed much in the 35 years since I was 21. And yes, that means I'm 36 and I'm holding. What the original writers of our confession were calling for was not what Dabney was arguing against. So Dabney, in one sense, was, again, in his context, in all fairness to him, a lot of that was happening. But that's not what's going on in 17th century Baptists, especially those that are working with the Second London Confession. Well, it's to the matter of qualification, with that 35 minute introduction, that I want to speak today specifically noting that these brothers, as their title indicates, are gifted. Specifically, they are gifted and fitted for the task of preaching. To me, this is a fascinating phrase. It's occupied my mind for several years. and it needs to not be passed over too quickly. It should ring in your ears with some familiarity, as you've already heard it, just a few paragraphs prior to this one, back in 26.9, chapter 26, paragraph nine. Let me read that for us. It says, this is regarding elders. The way appointed by Christ for the calling of any person fitted and gifted by the Holy Spirit unto the office of bishop or elder in a church is that he be chosen thereunto by the common suffrage of the church itself and solemnly set apart by fasting and prayer with imposition of hands in the eldership of the church, if there be any before constituted therein. And of a deacon, that he be chosen by the like suffrage and set apart by prayer in the like imposition of hands. So did you hear it there? Those chosen by the common suffrage of the church to serve her as bishops or elders must first be found fitted and gifted by the Holy Spirit. So with those who will be set apart as gifted brothers in 2611, must be found to be gifted and fitted by the Holy Spirit before they're allowed to serve as well. I think it's interesting that both pastors and gifted brothers must be gifted and fitted, or to flip it around like they do in the next paragraph, fitted and gifted. What is this language? What does it point to? What's intended by the writers of the Confession to use this very specific phrase, fitted and gifted? Well, that's what I want to talk about in the time we have. But before we do that, let's just kind of questions, comments, thoughts. Yes, Anthony. So preachers are teachers. Teachers may be preachers. Preaching can both preach and teach. Oh, that's not a good answer, is it? I'm just being silly. Sometimes you see distinctions in the text between a teacher and a preacher. Sometimes they're used interchangeably. So when you're preaching, hopefully you're teaching something. You're communicating some kind of information. I would not make a hard, fast distinction between preaching and teaching. You kind of get yourself stuck. Maybe you can say preaching as in pastoral ministry from the pulpit, exposition of texts of scripture, consists of things like reading the scripture, exposition of the text. application of the text, arguing for the text, exhorting people to respond to the text in that regard, proclamation of the gospel, things such as that. And teaching can have more of just a communication of information aspect to it. So like in Sunday school, think of a sermon. In a sermon, you know, Though every sermon may not have like a full-on evangelistic thrust or whatever where you're kind of preaching for a decision to be made or calling people to repent and believe in the gospel. Preaching should contain Christ, surely. Preaching should present Christ. Preaching should admonish people regarding sin, their need for repentance, their need to come to Jesus. I mean, so preaching should have the gospel in that regard, right? I'm not necessarily concerned today in Sunday school as we're teaching to make sure I'm stopping, pressing home the issue of, do you know Jesus? This is a great opportunity. Do you know Jesus? If, you know, so we're not really concerned with those kinds of hortatory type calling people to make decisions or whatever. I'm more concerned with the issue of have I clearly communicated particular information, we're studying together, we're talking like this, we don't do this during a sermon because doing this in a sermon will take us off track. It'll take us other little places, all right? In a sermon, we're trying to keep you on track and keep you pressing forward with the text and impress that to you. I don't know that I'm helping here necessarily, but preaching has an exhortative element It has a Christological element, it has a gospel element. Teaching doesn't necessarily have, depending on what you're teaching. Now if you're teaching John 3.16, I mean, it's like all embedded there. If you're teaching a lesson on the different millennial views, maybe not so much. Not that all doctrine isn't related to Christ, it is, but I'm not calling you right now for some kind of I'm not calling you to repentance. I'm not calling you to believe upon Christ in that regard. So there is a, we distinguish it in our ministries. For example, we have preaching, we have teaching, you know, so it's something that you can kind of almost sense the difference. Maybe sometimes they're hard to define. That's probably not a great answer for you. Matt? But pastors would do both. They would preach and they would teach. And again, the hard fast distinction between the two. I think one of the reasons I struggle to make a hard fast distinction because there's not necessarily a hard fast distinction. Are there distinctions? Yes, kind of like what I was saying a moment ago. But if we pull it to like office, when he says in James, not many of you should be teachers, he's not saying not many of you should be ordained pastors. Now, all ordained pastors need to teach. I mean, this is, for example, is it not the principal distinction between elders and deacons is what? The elders are to be apt to teach. If you look at the qualifications for elders and deacons in 1 Timothy chapter 3, it's almost identical what they're supposed to be and do. But the elder has to be apt to teach. Or if you expand that with Titus, he has to be able to exhort in sound doctrine and refute those who contradict. I don't know what that is, but clear as mud? Okay. Anything else? Okay, all right. Let's talk about this phrase, gifted and fitted. Now, paragraph nine, speaking about the elders, the elders are to be fitted and gifted. Paragraph 11, speaking about the gifted brothers, they are to be Excuse me, did I say gifted and fitted? Fitted and gifted in paragraph nine, gifted and fitted in paragraph 11. I am not making any distinction at all between these two things, these two arrangements of the words. I don't think it means, as they say, a hill of beans worth of difference, whether gifted is first or fitted is first. I think it's just a different way to write the same basic thing. I think when we get done, That may be more clear. There are two things to note about the phrase. Notice the first in verse 9, paragraph 9, fitted and gifted by the Holy Spirit. Paragraph 11, gifted and fitted by the Holy Spirit. The importance of the qualifying phrase, by the Holy Spirit. It is the view of our confession that the Holy Spirit is responsible both for fitting and for gifting men for ministry in Christ's Church. This is a work of the Spirit of God. Now how that work is carried out by him I think is going to be seen as distinct when we look at the two terms, fitted and So let's think about the necessity and the importance of these two things. I don't believe fitting and gifting are the same thing. They're not identical. He's not just repeating himself with another, it's not fitted or gifted, or fitted slash gifted, or fitted hyphen gifted, whatever. It's fitted and gifted, or gifted and gifted. The language is very specific and it is not foreign to the context of the day in which our brothers lived. Just to read to you a statement from a sermon by Thomas Manton. Thomas Manton was a Puritan. And if you have access to Manson's works, I think you can get them online, maybe you have them. This is out of volume 10, it's sermon 31, and it's on page 473 if you happen to have a copy of the book. Speaking about men appointed to office. Let me figure out where to start reading. He did not only appoint the office, but design the persons." Speaking about God, not just appointing the office, but designing the persons. Now, what is this inward call? I answer, God calleth us when he maketh us able and willing. The inclination and the ability is of God. The inclination, he thrusts out laborers into the harvest, Matthew 9, 38. Speaking of preachers here, all right? God thrusts them out, he makes them have an inclination to go. The ability, he makes us able ministers of the New Testament, 2 Corinthians 3, 6. So inclination and ability, both these are required of us. Ability, there must be. Then he gives an illustration. Look, as princes count it a point of honor when they send out ambassadors to foreign nations to employ those that are fit. So it is for the honor of God that all his messengers should be, here's the phrasing, gifted and fitted. Same phrase that we have in our confession. And this would have been written somewhere in the mid-17th century. Gifts and abilities are our, and I love this, gifts and abilities are our letters of credence that we bring to the world that we are called of God and authorized to this work. Gifts and abilities, both of them, are our letters of credence that we bring to the world. Gifts and abilities, using that right after the phrase gifted and fitted. So I'm going to make a comparison here between the idea of being gifted and fitted or the possession of abilities, all right? We're going to reference this book again, because it's just so helpful, because it helps us know the mind of the Baptists in this period. There's a letter written in 1689, and if you have a copy of this book, this is like the third week. Doesn't everybody have a copy of this book yet? All right. Maybe not. All right. In a letter that they wrote to the churches in 1689, July 22nd, 1689, sent out, signed by men like William Kiffin, Hansard Nollis, Benjamin Keech, among others. They say in this letter to the churches that there is a need that they have for an able and honorable ministry. An able and honorable ministry. They make this, this is the longer statement. There is a great neglect of the present ministry together with that of a general unconcernedness that there generally seems to be of giving fit and proper encouragement for the raising up of an able and honorable ministry. Remember the Baptists? They couldn't go to Oxford. They couldn't go to Cambridge. Those were the two principal schools there in England. This is the middle to later part of the 17th century. They can't get a public education. And there seems to be an unconcern in this. The churches don't seem to care that their pastors are not able and they're not giving themselves to an honorable ministry, all right? Now, again, there's a little context here, I understand. We've been going through this for a few weeks. I can't go back, but maybe you can go back and listen to some of those. But they say also, the assembly meets, and it discusses this issue, and it comes up with a few questions, all right? This, again, still is in 1689 at their assembly. And here are the two questions. Question number one, whether the graces and gifts, you'll hear that phrase, graces and gifts, or gifts and graces, you'll hear that over and over. The graces and gifts of the Holy Spirit be not sufficient to the making and continuing of an honorable ministry in the churches. Resolved in the affirmative. So, what are they saying here? They're asking the question, Do the graces and gifts of the Holy Spirit, are they sufficient to make an honorable ministry? Graces and gifts given by the Holy Spirit, do they make for sufficiently, do they make for an honorable ministry? And the answer that they give is yes, it makes for an honorable ministry. But again, it wasn't just an honorable ministry that they wanted, they wanted an able and honorable ministry. They wanted both things. They wanted the men to be not just gifted, but also fitted. So they ask a second question. The second question is this, whether it not be advantageous for our brethren now in the ministry, or that may be in the ministry, those that are already preaching, those that may be preaching in the future, Is it not advantageous for them, here's the statement, to attain to a competent knowledge of Hebrew, Greek, and Latin tongues that they may be better capable to defend the truth against opposers? So what are they asking for here? Would it not be helpful if these guys who are gifted and provide an honorable ministry in our churches, would it not be advantageous to them and to the churches if they knew what? Maybe some original languages, maybe a little Hebrew, maybe a little Greek, maybe even some Latin, all right? Throw in some Latin, all right? So there's a distinction here being made between fitted and gifted, able and honorable. Gifted I take as pointing to spiritual endowments that are given to a believer, sometimes captured by the phrase honorable, sometimes captured by the term honorable or the phrase gifts and graces or graces and gifts. But then there's the concept of being fitted. This I'm seeing as pointing to natural endowments given men through human learning. Now, it's not that they have no natural abilities already inclining them that way, but these are pointing more to the idea of fitting them and making them capable or able, and this would be through training. Now, there's another meeting. We're gonna jump ahead to 1692. 1692, this is on page 92 in the book. Again, if you're looking at the book or have it at home. There's a fund. They start a fund for ministers. And it says, for the better keeping up with the fund, that this method be observed. One, so there's like four things that they adopt a method on how to build the fund. Number one is this, that all churches make quarterly collections in what method they think best for the encouragement of the ministry, though it be never so little by helping those ministers that are poor and to educate brethren that may be approved to learn the knowledge of those tongues wherein the scriptures are written. So what's the fund gonna be for? It's gonna help poor ministers, it's gonna help young men who are Approved. What would that mean? A young man who's approved. Approved by the churches. Yes. But he doesn't have the, doesn't have the fundage, the funds to make it happen. All right. So, in other words, they're not just going to indiscriminately give this money to any young 21-year-old boy that walks up and tells his preacher he's been called to the ministry. Oh, let's send you to seminary. No, they're going to give these resources to a young man who's what? Who's approved. And in order to be approved, you first have to be tested. Your gifts have to be put on some kind of, you know, a table and looked at and examined. And the congregation has to make some kind of decision about you. Yes, we see this man's gifted. We see this man has something going for him in that regard. The Lord may in fact be doing a work in his life. Let's give him some opportunities to preach, maybe an opportunity to teach, and let's test him some more. And one writer I said, or that I read, he said, test him again, and then test him again, and again, and again, until there's like no doubt. There was a young man in I knew somehow I could get to Benjamin Bedham. There was a young man at Benjamin Bedham's church in Borton-on-the-Water in the mid-18th century named Nathaniel Rollins. And Nathaniel Rollins was tested, and the church was like, eh, we don't know. Let's test him again. They test him again. Eh, maybe. They send him off to the Bristol Baptist Academy in Bristol and give him some classes and stuff. And he comes back again, and they're like, eh, like it's better. And eventually, they send him off again to school, and he works with the minister there and the church that's there. They test him. The church there approves him. He comes back, but he really wants to be approved by his home church. So he comes back again and submits himself to the leadership of that church again, and they test him again, and they finally approve him and set him apart to preach, and eventually he gets sent out. There was a young man that you might have heard about who got tested and failed, was quite discouraged, came back again maybe a year or so later, tested, and in other words, he didn't just go appoint himself. He waited patiently for the church to recognize his gifts, and finally, they recognized his gifts, and they sent that young man in 1794 to India. And you might know his name, William Carey, all right? What a cool story. I mean, but can you imagine William Carey being a 20th or 21st century Southern Baptist, you know? You know, no, I'm called. I've got the call. I'm good to go. And he just gets on a boat himself and goes to India, you know? I don't know, shot by natives or something. Do what, Jeff? We're all going to find a church that will agree with me. Man, I have seen that before. I knew a guy one time, he went to six different churches where he finally found a church that would appoint him as an elder. Like, if you've got to go to six churches to get appointed as an elder, something is off somewhere here. And he had an interesting kind of aberrant view of something. And he couldn't find approval from any church until he finally found a church that didn't care about his aberrant view. And they appointed him. Well, that's a whole long story, too. But we won't get into that. All right. Clocks. OK. Let's jump ahead in the book here to 1693. 1693. Now in 1693, interestingly, this is pages 122 to 129 in the book, or maybe 121 to 129. If you wanna go read all this later on, it's very interesting. They actually have some discussion in 1693 about whether or not human learning is really needed. Because there are some guys that are beginning to say, okay, you know, this guy coming up with his spiritual giftedness, that's insufficient. He's got to go to school. And the Baptists are like, yeah, hit the brakes. Let's back up a little bit. We've already determined a few years prior that The gifts of the Spirit are adequate and sufficient to make for an honorable ministry, but human learning is also helpful. Let's not undo what we've done before and end up, you know, basically kind of becoming Presbyterians here with this. They do want to promote human learning, but they don't want to discount the spiritual giftedness. It's almost like the opposite error they were having earlier. Earlier, it was like, no, all we need is spiritual giftedness. And then they come along, no, but it would be advantageous if they would have some human learning. And now they're like, no, we don't need human learning or we don't need spiritual giftedness, we just need human learning. And they're like, we need to hold these things together. Again, the confession helps them. It points them back to them being fitted and gifted. Now, remember back in 1689, at their first assembly, they approved of a book that they recommended to the churches. Do you recall the title to the book? The Minister's Maintenance. You guys did great. That whole row came up with the whole title. The Minister's Maintenance Vindicated. Very good. Yes, Benjamin Keats, The Minister's Maintenance Vindicated. In Keech's work, he makes this comment. He said, how can we expect an ordinary way to have an able ministry raised up? That's the language of Keech, of an able ministry. Now, he's not trying to discount the idea of gifted, but he does point to the idea of able. Now, there's a reason I mention that. Take this also from, this is from Keech's book, The Glory of a True Church. And he mentions about those who have hands laid on them to the eldership being first proved and found meet and fit, that's the language he uses there, for such a sacred office. There was a young man in Keech's church. We'll just, we'll close with the story of Benjamin Grosvenor, all right? In 1689, at the age of 14, Benjamin Grosvenor was baptized by Benjamin Keech at the Horsley Down Church in London. Grosvenor would sit under the preaching of Keech for the next four years and was given during this period an opportunity to preach for Keech and some of the congregation at Keech's home. They would often have opportunities for young men to preach kind of off to the side. They wouldn't like, you know, put him in the pulpit when they didn't know what was going to come out of his mouth. They said, come to my house, let's have a meeting after service or something like that, and we'll test you, all right? They saw, that night, that he was a youth of promising abilities. And thus, with Grosvenor's desire to preach the word of God, and on the approbation of the Horsley Down Church, Grosvenor was encouraged to pursue more education for ministry. And having been taught by his parents as a boy, because you wouldn't go to public school, there were no public schools like that, Keech, quote, encouraged his going under instructions, and notice this phrase, to be better fitted for the work of the ministry. So first they recognize his what? They recognize his giftedness, he has some spiritual abilities, but he needs to grow, and so what are we looking for? We're looking for some education for him, because he needs to be not only gifted, he needs to be fitted and this is a young man in Keech's church. This happened somewhere around 1693. Now by the time we get to the 18th century especially the latter part of the 18th century I want to mention to you a book. Well it's a booklet it's a sermon and it was preached by a man named Hugh Evans and the title to the book is the able minister. It's on Google Books. You can get it online. Hugh Evans, the able minister. I would encourage you to read it. It's really good. And so the idea of fitted and giftedness, being fitted and gifted, by the time we get to about the 1770s or so, has found itself expressed in the term able. Able means fitted and gifted. Evans lays out, I think, four qualifications in his book. That he has a competent share in the gifts of nature. that he has the improvements of human learning, that he has divine supernatural gifts, and that he is an evangelical minister of the spirit and not of the letter. He's a gospel minister. It's a wonderfully encouraging little book. It's maybe like 20 pages or something like that. I think you'd be encouraged and blessed to read it. We got a couple minutes for questions, discussion. Everybody wants to go back to the kitchen and see if there's more dessert, more strawberry cake. All right, all right. Well, let's pray and we'll be dismissed. Father, we thank you for our time and our confession and in your word, considering something about history that is deeply practical for our own labors in the ministry today. We do pray that you would, by your gracious provision that you would raise up gifted and fitted men to minister your word in your churches. In this church, we pray, oh God, that you would help us to be looking for young men to come up that have gifts that are given them by the spirit of God. and think on how we might help and encourage them to be more ably fitted for the work of the ministry and the eldership or set apart as gifted brothers. We ask God that you would bless and nurture the bodies that are represented here. We pray as we continue on working toward the merging of our congregations, that you would give us clarity in regard to our understanding of the confession, that you would help us to know how to rightfully apply the truths that we gleaned from there that have been born out of the study of the Word of God. We ask your blessing as we transition now into a time of corporate worship, As we come to you to have the means of grace lavished upon our souls, we pray, O God, that you would help us as we hear the preached word, as we come to the table, as we engage in the singing of Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs as we pray and make confession before you and receive God afresh and anew that glorious declaration of the forgiveness of sins that we have in the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that our hearts would be encouraged, that we would in this hour grow in the grace and knowledge of Christ, that it would all be to the praise of the Lord Jesus Christ and the good of our own souls. We thank you for this time we've had in Jesus' name. Amen.