Well, please open your Bibles this morning with me to Job chapter 1. Job chapter 1. I'm not really good in the kitchen beyond making ice cubes and popcorn, but I marvel at those who have skills. not just my wife, but I think of our associate pastor. He has significant skills. And have I ever made a chocolate chip cookie in my life? I can't remember ever doing that. I've eaten everyone's. But let's just imagine, let's just imagine that I gave you an assignment this morning. And the assignment is I want you to make chocolate chip cookies. And here's what you need. These are the ingredients. You're gonna need the finest flour. You're gonna need the sweetest sugar. You're gonna need the coldest milk. You're gonna need the freshest eggs. You're gonna need the most expensive butter. And that's it. And you're like, wait a minute. Something's missing. What's missing? Chocolate chips. Their absence would stand out to absolutely everyone. You can't leave out the chocolate chips and get something you're going to be excited about. Alright, that was an easy part of the assignment. Let me give you another assignment. The assignment is a little more challenging. Here's the assignment. Are you ready? I want you to build a local church who is having a profound impact both within her walls and outside her walls in her community and the communities that surround her. And here are the ingredients you need for that local church. You can even throw in renovated facilities. You can throw in a discipleship emphasis. You can throw in evangelism training and opportunities and Irish concerts. You can throw in parenting training and seminars. You can throw in expository preaching and teaching. You can throw into all this another ingredient, cutting edge children and youth ministries. And then another ingredient that's really important are really busy and committed ladies. But what's missing? What's missing if we want to have a local church that will have a profound impact both within her walls and outside her walls? What's missing? Don't answer it yet. Don't answer it yet. I'll give you another assignment. The assignment is to build a home. To build a home that absolutely radiates Jesus Christ to a watching world. And here's the ingredients you need. It's nice if you can throw into this a stable income. It's nice if you can throw into this good education options. It's nice if you can throw into this sufficient square footage and three weeks vacation. But what's missing? In the ingredients. Let me give you one more assignment and then I'm going to answer. I'm going to give the answer to what's missing. This third assignment is, I want you, if you are married, to strengthen your marriage. I want you, if you're married, to tighten the knot. Now here are some helpful ingredients. You can throw into this good books on marriage. You can throw into this frequent dating in marriage. You can throw into this long weekends together. You can throw into this even a series on the home. But what is missing? I would like to suggest to you that what is a key missing ingredient, whether we're building a local church, whether we are building a home, or whether we are investing in marriage, A key missing ingredient in what I've explained to you this morning is this. What's missing are men who accept the mantle of spiritual leadership. Men who embrace the challenge through example in their lives. Not perfect men, there's no such thing, but men who stand in the gap. The absence of spiritual male leadership stands out to everyone, just as much as chocolate chip cookies without the chocolate chips. I'm not saying that there can't be good homes and good marriages and good local churches. I'm not saying that we're not grateful for the hard-serving women. I'm not saying anything about that. As a matter of fact, the whole reason I had Pastor Ernie speak on what he spoke on last Sunday is because I wanted you to see the beauty of what we call complementarianism that comes from Genesis 1 and 2. And that though created equal, God has put in the creation order a wonderfully functioning structure. And he's laid the ultimate responsibility for spiritual leadership over that structure in the home and in the marriage on the shoulders of the man. It stands out when it's missing. It's nothing new, though. As a matter of fact, hear the echo from Scripture through both Testaments. Ezekiel 22 verse 30, I searched for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand in the gap before me for the land so that I would not destroy it, but I found no one. Isaiah 59.16, and he saw that there was no man and was astonished that there was no one to intercede. Jeremiah 5.1, roam to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem and look now and take note and seek in her open squares. If you can find a man, if there is one who does justice, who seeks truth. Psalm 53 verse 2, God has looked down from heaven upon the sons of men to see if there's anyone who understands who seeks after God. Now I just want to be clear, in every passage I just read from the Old Testament, man is referring most likely to mankind. But I also must hear the searching of mankind to be a searching of his created order where he should be able to find men who are leading people to Christ. They are leading people to worship the one true God. Psalm writer says in Psalm 12 verse 1, help Lord for the godly man ceases to be for the faithful disappear from among the sons of men. In Proverbs 20 verse 6, many a man proclaims his own loyalty but who can find a trustworthy man? You see, our Lord's eyes in both Testaments, and particularly here in the Old Testament as I've relayed to you, are roaming to and fro, looking to lay the spiritual mantle of leadership on men who are supposed to lead in His created order. There's an old English Methodist preacher named William Sankster, and he once wrote these words, the church is painfully in need of leaders. I wait to hear a voice, and no voice comes. I would rather listen than speak, but there is no clarion voice to listen to." What is the need? What is the need in our church, in our homes, and in our marriages for people like us and churches like ours? And the need is to see God raise up what I'm calling pace setters. Pace setters. And I have this in your notes. Pace setter. What do you mean by a pace setter? Define a pace setter. Here's what I'm meaning this morning. A pace setter is, spiritually speaking, a man who gets out front, stays out front, and leads out front. That's a pace setter. One of the best books on spiritual leadership you can read is a very simple one and it's been around for many, many decades. It's called Spiritual Leadership by J. Oswald Sanders. And he writes these remarks on page 28. Listen to this. Quote, we can lead others only as far along the road as we ourselves have traveled. Merely pointing the way is not enough. Can I paraphrase him? Merely driving the minivan, merely buying the books, merely praying in restaurants is not enough. And he continues, if we are not walking, then no one can be following and we are not leading anyone. End quote. That's a pace center. That's the missing ingredient. You say, well, what does a pace setter look like? Can you show us one? Can you give us a map what to follow after as men if we're going to lead spiritually like this? Sure. Let's look at an example this morning. And it's going to be in the Bible, no surprise there. You're probably thinking I'm going to go to Paul. Paul was an amazing example of spiritual leadership and initiative. But we're not going to do Paul. I want you to go back a little further, and you're thinking, okay, we're going to go to Peter, right? Well, that was an interesting study in leadership. He ends up well, but it was a bumpy road getting there. We're not going to do Paul. We're not going to do Peter. You say, well, let's go to the Old Testament. Let's go to Nehemiah. Nehemiah is a great book and study on leadership. We're not going to do Nehemiah. You say, OK, well, let's do some kings. Let's go to Hezekiah. Or how about Josiah? Let's study David. Let's go back further, all the way to King David. And David is a great study in leadership. Not only leadership qualities, but leadership failures and rescues. But we're not going to do David. You say, well, we can't go back much further. Are we going to do Moses? There's a great study of a pacesetter. No, we're not going to do Moses. You're saying we're running out of Bible. Are we going to do Abraham? That would be a good one. Abraham, as Chuck Swindoll says, going not knowing was his theme, right? We're not going to do Abraham. We're going to go all the way past all of these amazing displays of pacesetter spiritual leadership in these men And we're going to become reacquainted with one of the men who is one of the oldest records we have in the Bible. And his name is Job. what a study Job is. You say, when did he live? He lived during or before the time of Abraham and the patriarchs. Job would live a life of just probably a little over 200 years when all was said and done. He was very wealthy. His wealth was measured not by coins, but by livestock, which is another reason we put him back around the time of the patriarchs. At his time, the Chaldeans were nomads. They weren't ruled over in an orderly way as a kingdom. And as we read through these chapters in Job, we see no hint or awareness or accountability to any kind of Mosaic law. And in all of the talk of inheritances and sacrifices, nothing from Moses' pen shows up. So this is pre-Moses that this story happens, that it unfolds. We do know this though, that even though it was pre-Moses and even though it was back at the time of the patriarchs or maybe even slightly before the patriarchs, the living God was present. And 31 times we come across in these chapters the name of God. Geographically, we have different descriptions from that period that allow us to place this very ancient story in its setting. We're going all the way back as far as we can to study a pace setter. We're introduced to him, this man named Job, in Job chapter 1. A little background here, look at verse 2. He had seven sons and three daughters were born to him. His possessions also were 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, 500 female donkeys, and very many servants. And that man was the greatest of all the men of the East. His sons used to go and hold a feast in the house of each one on his day, and they would send and invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them. And when the days of feasting had completed their cycle, Job would send and consecrate them, rising up early in the morning and offering burnt offerings according to the number of them all. For Job said, perhaps my sons have sinned and cursed God in their hearts. And thus Job did continually." I mean, this is quite a guy. As we're getting his background here, he was blessed with a large family and significant wealth and significant land to hold all of this wealth, significant employees to man it all. And on top of that, in verses four and five, he had an amazingly sensitive conscience to the things of God. It's quite a guy. You say, well why though is he an example of a pace setter? Why should we as men look to him as our example of spiritual leadership and initiative? And here's my answer to that question. The answer is because in spite of what he's going to go through in this book, he still comes out the other side leading spiritually. You know what he's going to go through, right? We just read verses 2 through 5. You know what's coming. He's going to be the object in chapters, in this chapter and the next, of a heavenly debate that Job will never be aware of in this life. A debate between God and Satan. In one day, he will lose his children, all of them. His wealth, all of it. And his servants, every one. He'll lose all that in one day in chapter 1 verse 22. In chapter 2, he's going to have his health completely broken. You say, well, how old was he? Well, we know at the end of the book he's going to have more kids, so he's young enough to still be involved in that. And his health will be utterly shattered. And if that weren't enough, in the middle of chapter 2, he's going to lose the support of his completer in wife. his wife, his completer in life. Chapter 3 through chapter 37, he's going to totally lose his testimony with his friends in their mind. And then in chapters 38 to 42, he's going to be fine-tuned by God himself. This is all in front of this man we just met. Yet when all is said and done, when the smoke clears and the whirlwind passes, I read in Job 42 these words. You can turn there if you want with me or just listen to me, if I can find it here. Job 42 verse 7. And it came about after the Lord had spoken these words to Job that the Lord said to Eliphaz the Temanite, My wrath is kindled against you and against your two friends, listen to this, because you have not spoken of Me what is right as My servant Job has. God's still looking at him saying, He's My servant. In verse 8, He says twice, My servant Job. Three times He says it. My servant Job. Verse 9. They obey the Lord and humble themselves in front of Job. Verse 10, the Lord restores the fortunes of Job when he prayed for his friends and the Lord increased all that Job had twofold. Verse 12, the Lord blessed the latter days of Job more than the beginning. What do I see at the end after all this is going to happen and crush this man? He's still walking with God. God restores him. You say, well, what's behind a man like that? What's behind a man like that is the work of God in the heart. It's called grace. You say, what does it look like? Well, God himself tells you what it looks like. He does this in the opening verse of chapter one. Look in verse one. There was a man in the land of Uz whose name was Job. And that man was, watch this, blameless, upright, fearing God, and turning away from evil. Who's that to? That's to us, the readers. But so impressed is God with His servant Job at the beginning that He introduces him with these words to us, the readers, that He also uses these same words to introduce him to someone else, the enemy. Look at verse 8. I'll go back to verse 6. Now, there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came among them. And the Lord said to Satan, From where do you come? And Satan answered the Lord and said, From roaming about on the earth and walking around on it. The Lord says, well, did you notice someone down there? Verse 8, the Lord said to Satan, have you considered my servant Job? For there is no one like him on the earth. And here it is again, a blameless and upright man fearing God and turning away from evil. This, my brothers, is a pace setter. So much so that this is what God says as he leads in to introduce his friend to us. He's blameless, upright, fearing God, and turning away from evil. Let me give you a little hint here though. A pace setter like Job doesn't happen on accident. No one just kind of phases in to being a spiritual pace setter like Job without a plan. Let me put it into our vernacular today. A pace setter, a spiritual leader like Job, whether it's in a local church or in a home or in a marriage, a spiritual leader like this wakes up every single morning and he issues to himself in the mirror four ultimatums. And these are the four ultimatums, the four categories that we see, that we hear from the mouth of God in verse 1 and verse 8. If you will, verses 1 and 8 are God's life verse for Job and for every spiritual leader. Fascinating. And where my preference is to move through a portion, a paragraph, or a chapter of scripture, today it's one verse, men, and I'm talking to us. We're in a marriage series, but I'm singling out the men of all ages in our church, the young people, all the way up to our senior saints. Men, I'm talking to us this morning. Before you and I press the razor on our face as we're looking in the mirror in the morning, what ultimatums do we need to make to ourself by God's grace every single day to be a spiritual leader like this guy? Well, here they are. Let's just rattle them off here. First ultimatum, my dedication to God will be complete. My dedication to God will be complete. Again, look up at verse 1 or down there in verse 8, you'll see the same wording. It says, that man was, and here it is, blameless. Blameless. You say, what does this mean? Well, I mean, technically you could translate it perfect, but be careful going there. It's better to look at it as the word complete And it's not just a complete portion, but a completeness that permeates the entire being, if you will. It's the same word used in 1 Samuel 16, 11, this way, when Samuel said to Jesse, David's father, are these all the children? Have we seen everything when it comes to how many kids you have? Have they all been here from the youngest to the oldest? That's the idea here. It's everything. It stretches across. We read the same word in Deuteronomy 31, 24. It came about when Moses finished writing the words of this law in a book. He put the words of the law in a book until they were, and here it is the same word again, complete. All the words are in there now. It spans across the entirety. That's the idea of being blameless. Something is stretched out across the entirety of your person. What does this mean? Well, it doesn't mean that Job, listen, it doesn't mean that Job was perfect. He himself will erase any doubt about that. Hold your finger here and look with me just for a few examples. Look at chapter 7 of Job, verse 20. Chapter 7, verse 20, Job's saying, Have I sinned? What have I done to you, O watcher of men? Talking to God. Why have you set me as your target so that I am a burden to myself? Listen to this. Why then do you not pardon my transgression and take away my iniquity? For now I will lie down in the dust and you will seek me, but I will not be. He's saying, I know there's sin there. I know there's sin. You want another example? Look over a few chapters to chapter 9, verse 20. Job says, though I am righteous, my mouth will condemn me. Though I am guiltless, he will declare me guilty. Let me show you another one. 13.26. He's not perfect, and he's not saying he's perfect, and God's not saying he's perfect. 1326, for you write bitter things against me and make me to inherit the iniquities of my youth. Job is not saying he's perfect, neither is God. Well, what are we talking about here when you say my dedication to God will be complete today? What does that mean? It means that by God's grace at work in your life, You will chart your course through that day without allowing a moral blemish. You want to be morally whole across the entire face of your existence that day. I don't want to have any area unaffected in my dedication to God today. No area untouched. Every part of my life is open to God's scrutiny. I want to live for something bigger than myself today and I want to be all in. My dedication to God will be complete. You say, what does this look like? What does this look like? Well, as New Testament believers, as we speed ahead to the New Testament now, and we're asking the question, what would this look like? What would this sound like? What would this sound like is what Paul wrote to the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 6, 19, and 20. Do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own? You've been bought with a price. Therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's." Or as Paul would say also in Romans 12 verse 1, when you look in the mirror, that is to be a living sacrifice today. You. As one preacher said, the problem with living sacrifices is they tend to crawl off the altar, right? And you get back up there. My favorite definition of dedication when it comes to discipleship is simply this. Dedication is not our giving anything to God. Dedication isn't our giving anything to God, but rather, dedication is taking our hands off of what already belongs to God. Amazing definition. Many of you know the name David Brainerd, the American colonial missionary to the Indians who died at the age of 29. We still have his diary, and his diary reveals an amazing depth and an intense dedication to God. He was a deep man for a young man. He was acquaintances with Jonathan Edwards, you know that name as well. And David Brainerd once said these words to Jonathan Edwards, I quote him, I do not go to heaven to be advanced, but to give honor to God. It is no matter where I shall be stationed in heaven, whether I have a high seat or a low seat there, my heaven, listen to this, my heaven is to please God and glorify Him and give all to Him and to be wholly devoted to His glory." That's a pastor. That's a man in a church like ours, filled with men like us, who by God's grace say, He's got it all. I'm giving myself an ultimatum today that my dedication to God will be complete across the entirety of the face of my existence today and across the entirety of my waking hours. I am going to follow unto the Lordship of Jesus. And not just as I'm by myself in the day, but in my marriage and in my home. If I'm dedicated as a man, as a spiritual leader in the home, I should therefore be the first one to obey God in a difficult decision. I should be the first one to serve others as Jesus serves people. When he said in Matthew 20, I didn't come to be served, but to serve and to give my life a ransom for many. I must be the first one as a pacesetter with my love, with my words, with my actions, and even with my attitudes in failure or success to demonstrate a radical commitment to the Lordship of Christ in my life. That's what being blameless is. It's not perfection. It's saying, God, I take my hands off of what already belongs to you. It's like what the angel of the Lord said in Genesis 18-19 about Abraham. For I have chosen him so that he may command his children in his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice so that the Lord may bring upon Abraham what he has spoken about him. This is being wholly devoted to the glory of God. With no area unaffected, every part of my life is open to God's scrutiny. As a psalm writer says in Psalm 37, 37, mark the blameless man and observe the upright for the future of that man is peace. So in the morning then, you look in the mirror, by God's grace you make this ultimatum, my dedication to God will be complete. That's your outlook for the day. But there's another question then, what is the specific outcome of such an outlook? And this brings us to the second ultimatum in the mirror. And here it is, number two, my commitment to God's standard will be faithful. My commitment to God's standard will be faithful. It says here in Job 1, verse 1, that man was blameless. And look at the next word, upright. upright. What does this mean? And this one has more of a picture to it. It's beating something out flat like a metal to remove obstacles. It means to make something level or straight. And this particular word in the Hebrew, if it was used to describe a road, it's describing a road that used to be difficult to travel on, but now it's easy. Because obstacles have been removed. So what does this mean? This means when we see Job as being upright, it means that his aim is to bring all his behavior in line with God's will for him. So we, as New Testament Christians, should be asking a question now. What does this mean for me? If being upright means that I'm going to remove Any obstacles in my life that come between me and walking with my Lord in an obedience way, what does that mean? It means that I have to know God's will. A New Testament Christian's asking the next question, how do I know what God's will is for my life? And again, Paul breaks the silence. In 2 Timothy 3, he says, all scripture is given by inspiration of God, right? and it's profitable for doctrine. That's what's right. For reproof, that's what's wrong. For correction, that's how to fix what's wrong. And for training in righteousness, that's how to keep right what's right. Or we could go over to James and ask his opinion. What does it mean to be upright? And James would say in James 1, 22 to 25, which we studied several months ago, he would say, well, it means you need to spend a lot of time in front of the mirror of his word. And don't just marvel as to what needs to be changed. By His grace, change. I'm reminded of a Philadelphia police chief who was tired of constantly bringing in and arresting and incarcerating the same town drunks every weekend. And so he decided to start taking a lot of pictures of them while they were inebriated and showing them to them when they were sober. Look at this picture that I took of you when you didn't know what was going on. And it actually started to jolt some of these guys and make them realize something's got to change. You know what? That's the effect that God's Word graciously has on us men and women. We look into the mirror of His Word in James 1 and we're like, wow. Not only am I not that practically, but I don't know how to get there. And then we're reminded that that's why we needed rescued. That's why we needed Jesus to save us. And the same Christ who saves us, the same gospel that transfers us from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of his dear son, the same gospel that transfers us is also the same gospel that transforms us into the image of Christ. And we can only find what that's going to look like as we open this book, men. And not just when Pastor Ernie or I or your teacher tells you, let's open our Bibles this morning. I mean, this is you in the morning with coffee or in the evening with, I don't know what you drink in the evening, Diet Verner's, I don't know. But you're like, I must have this. If I don't have this and see this and look in this mirror and have myself be vulnerable in front of it, I cannot lead in this church. I cannot lead in this home. I cannot lead with my peers spiritually. There's an urgency, men, where we become self-starters to get to this book. My commitment to God's standard will be faithful. As a matter of fact, I like to tell men, here's the order of doing this. Here's how you do this. You obey it first, and then you open it and find out what you've committed to obey. You don't open it and say, I'm going to look at what I'm supposed to do and see if I'm going to do that. And see if I like it. No, it's like, Lord, I'm going to open this in a minute. And by your grace, I'm going to need your help. I want to obey it. Now let's go to work. Obey it, then open it, if you will. There's no hesitation to bring behavior in line with God's will. This is being a self-starter. The psalm writer says in Psalm 119, 24, your testimonies are my delight. On the morning we make the second ultimatum, my commitment to God's standard will be faithful. But that leads to a question. Why? Why? That question leads to the third ultimatum that a pace setter makes every morning. My awareness of God's presence will be constant. My awareness of God's presence will be constant. Look again at verse 1. It says, and that man, Job, was blameless. We got that. And upright, we got that. But look at the third designation, fearing God. fearing God. Now we've spent five weeks in our Wednesday night study on what does it mean in the book of Proverbs to live in the fear of the Lord. In short, there's a reverential awe, there's a fear of even, can I put it to you this way, being undone in the presence of a holy God. There's this reality of being utterly blown away when you realize He's in the room You fall on your face, but that same reverential fear turns into an affection of awe and love. I got into some trouble in ninth grade in our Christian school up in Clarkston at Springfield, a couple friends and I. And you say, what did you do? Well, it's not edifying, so I won't tell you. But everyone in grades over us, beyond us, were expelled. My friend and I in ninth grade got to stay. We were spared in what happened, but we were close enough still to have consequences. And I remember going home from that day, having, of course, to tell my parents. I was gonna be suspended for five days and I don't know how you did suspensions here but if you were suspended at Springfield you went to school still but in work clothes and you worked hard for every day of the suspension. And I was on that team and I had to tell my mom that which was hard for her to hear but I also had to tell my dad. My dad was a businessman here in the Detroit area, Hazel Park area and the Troy area. A man of significant influence in his little niche. But my dad, I don't believe, was saved. At least he didn't live like that. He liked the product of the Christian schools, so he put us into Christian schools and universities, but he didn't go to church. I remember being in church twice growing up. And I didn't think he was saved. I didn't know. There was no indication. And I had to tell my dad this. And my dad had a good, strong personality. He was a great, actually a fantastic father. Provided for us, loved us, had no doubt about that. But how am I gonna tell him this? And how am I gonna absorb whatever's coming? I went to my dad and I talked to him and my mom. I said what had happened, what I'd done. Asked their forgiveness and there's consequences at school. It's gonna be embarrassing for not just me but for you guys and for you dad and I was just fearful because I loved my dad and I've disappointed him deeply and that was a right feeling to have but I wasn't ready for what happened next my dad over 250 pounds of him started shaking and he started weeping and never got all the reasons behind the tears from him. There were tears of disappointment, but also tears of something going on in his own heart. And seeing that, having such a reverential awe for my dad, but then also having that mingled in with an affection and a love I had for him, I didn't want to disappoint him. And the fact that I was in the same room with him right now, if you can follow me into that illustration, you have some glimpse of what it means to fear the Lord. He's awesome! He's resplendent in His glory. And He's fully here. And a man who's going to lead spiritually in the privacy of his home, or his car, or in his local church, is going to walk through his days with an ultimatum that my awareness of God's presence is going to be constant. And there's going to be a reverential fear in all of him, but also affection and love when I see his affections for me. That's living in the fear of the Lord. Matthew Henry defines it this way. The fear of the Lord is a reverence for His majesty, a regard for His authority, and a dread of His wrath. Proverbs 9.10 makes it simple. The fear of the Lord, it's the beginning of wisdom. And in order to fear the Lord, you must be aware of His presence. Where can I go from your presence, the psalm writer says in Psalm 139 verse 7. What does this look like in the home or in your marriage, this fear of the Lord, husband, dad? It's an awareness of the presence of God in the conversations you have. You're not free to rant and rave and intimidate, nor are you free to disengage. God's here. It shows up not only in your conversations, but in your decision making. You're not making decisions based on merely a career path or an account goal. This is playing a part in every purchase that you make and in your response to the struggles and tests of life and marriage. There's an awareness of God. That's what it means, fearing God. My awareness of God's presence will be constant. You say, well, if that's true, what will be the result of such an awareness? And this leads us to the fourth and final ultimatum. Here it is. My rejection of God's enemy will be clear. Look at verse one again. Blameless, upright, fearing God, and look at the last phrase. and turning away from evil. Turning away from evil, literally just turning off, turning aside. Evil is anything that's opposite of God's character. Noting it. It's going to stand out. And I turn away from it. After all, God's in the room. I just had an amazing time, amazing date with my wife last night. We got to go to the Eastern football game. Just had a great time. She's actually starting to worry me how much she's getting into these games. Her language isn't getting salty yet, but it got close a couple times yesterday. No, I'm just kidding. But I remember, you know, I wore the hat and I had a green shirt on and under the fleece and we were sitting on the Eastern Michigan side. On the other side of the stadium, the factory there, they have a smaller section for the visiting team. And they were in a different color than we are. They were in red, I think, and I was in green. And those are my foes for the next four quarters. And it was just fun. And we lost a nail-biter in three overtimes. But I remember, it was during halftime, I think, I saw some guys walking to where I was sitting in the stands near the top in the middle. There were guys coming over in Northern Illinois University shirts. I was like, hey, man. I didn't say this, but I wanted to say, hey, man, you guys go over there where you belong. This is our side. This is our yard, man. And they were walking past me to get to some, I guess, some boxes up at the top of the stands on our side of the field. But I just noticed, because there were three or four of them, and they just stood out. And they stood out, I wanted to say, uh-uh. No, this is our side. Now, that's a simple illustration to point at this last phrase. When something doesn't match the very character of God, it needs to stand out. And I will say this, first of all, to the leader in the room, the spiritual leader in the relationship. He's the one that is the watcher at the gates, if you will. He's not waiting for his wife or his kids to speak up first. The psalm writer says in Psalm 119, 128, Therefore I esteem right all your precepts concerning everything. I hate every false way. James writes in James 127 that the believer must keep himself unspotted from the world. Peter says in 1 Peter 1.14, As obedient children, do not be conformed to your former lusts. which were yours in your ignorance. You're the gatekeeper, dad, husband, male, leader at Calvary Baptist Church. When Paul writes about washing of water with the Word, it means something. When Paul writes, bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord with regards to children, it means something. You see, a pacesetter is going to pray this way for their children, and for their spouses, and for the local church family that they're a part of. They're going to say, Lord, please keep in body, mind, and faith these people within my realm of influence innocent. I must be part of this answer, Lord, today. My rejection of God's enemy will be clear. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 8.13, if food causes my brother to stumble, I'll never eat again so that I will not cause my brother to stumble. I mean, there's just a constant awareness of a responsibility I have for those around me, even in the church. So what is a pace setter? A pace setter is a man who gets out front, stays out front, and leads out front. He wakes up every morning, and he looks in the mirror, and he issues himself four ultimatums. He says, my dedication to God will be complete by God's grace. My commitment to God's standard will be faithful by God's grace. My awareness of God's presence will be constant by God's grace. And my rejection of God's enemy, that will be clear by God's grace. Remember that book, Spiritual Leadership, by J. Oswald Sanders I quoted earlier? He continues, quote, the Bible shows us, listen to this, that when God does find a person who is ready to lead, to commit to full discipleship, and take on responsibility for others, that person is used to the limit. Such leaders still have shortcomings and flaws, but despite them, they become spiritual leaders. You say, well, I'm looking at these four ultimatums. And yes, that's spiritual leadership. Yes, that's pace setters. Yes, that's Job way back then. I can't lead like that. I can't, left to myself, lead like that. There's only failure time and again. There's a wake of failure behind me. I fear what's in front of me. I know myself. I won't lead spiritually. And I just would like to say that what you just said is true for all of us men. There's failures in spiritual leadership behind us, around us right now, and definitely in the future. We can't left to ourselves. I mean, we have to kind of admit how poor we are and mourn that spiritual poverty. Does that sound familiar? Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are those who mourn. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness outside of themselves, because then those people will be satisfied. God has his design and it's clear. Men, our church needs you to lead spiritually. Your marriages need you to lead spiritually. Your children need you to lead spiritually, to be a pace setter. Get out front, stay out front, and lead out front. You say, I'm not worthy. No, none of us are. You say, I can't. No, none of us can. You say, I'm already in trouble. Well, Jesus already died for your failures, and you get credit for his perfect leadership. You say, but I still can't. Well, no. Every day you've got to make the ultimatums. You don't make them once here and now and then they hold for three months. You make them every morning because you're desperate. Some of you that enjoy church history know the name St. Francis of Assisi. I love saying his name. He was confronted by another Christian who repeatedly asked him, why you? Why you? Why do people follow you? How come you get to be a spiritual leader? And he raised his eyes to heaven, and then he knelt in praise to God, and he turned towards this man who was saying, why you? And these were his words to him. You want to know? It's because the eyes of the Most High have willed it so. He continually watches the good and the wicked, and as His most holy eyes have not found among sinners any smaller man, nor any more insufficient and sinful, therefore He has chosen me to accomplish the marvelous work which God hath undertaken. He chose me because He could find none more worthless. And he wished to confound the nobility and grandeur, the strength, the beauty, and the learning of the world. So just when you feel small and like you can't lead, God says, you're right where I want you. I got you where I want you. Now be a pace setter. And let me just tell you this about pace setters. Leadership like this, spiritual leadership like this happens, listen, one day at a time. It happens one step at a time. It happens at one point of obedience at a time. It happens at one conversation at a time, one victory at a time. And so we're not just talking about spiritual leadership in this church, but I want to keep talking about that. Well, we're technically in a marriage series. So men, if you're married, And men, if you're not, listen in, because you don't know the rest of God's chapters for your life. But if you're married men, God's telling you today, through the example of Job, that you grab a hold of that end of the rope and tighten the knot of your marriage. Don't wait for your wife to chase you down and make you lead her. Just listen to what I just said. How much sense does that make? Our wives are of different strengths and personality. They have different characteristics and personalities, like I said. But every last one of them is starving for the men that God has assigned to their lives to lead them spiritually. Well, we know what happens at the end of Job's story. God says, he's my servant. And for the rest of the history of man, when I introduce my servant Job, I'm going to say he was blameless and upright, fearing God and turning away from evil. By God's grace, at the end of our story, may God be able to describe it the same way, men. And then who gets the glory, you? Go look in the mirror again.