Well, first brothers, let me just say I'm thankful for you men. And I appreciate each of you and your being a part of our faith family, our church. Thanks for coming out eight o'clock on a Sunday morning or Saturday morning. Please come out tomorrow morning as well. There's no food, but that one's even more important than this one. So what I want to do today is we've been talking about the idea of for the fall, just having some discussions regarding the topic of leadership. And this morning might surprise you a little bit because it's less six principles for organizing your calendar, seven ways to do push-ups more effectively, those kinds of things, which can be helpful, which a lot of Sites geared towards men and even leadership, we'll talk about. What I want to talk about this morning is what we've sort of said over the last few weeks in the bulletins, that I'm going to categorize our discussion under four categories. And just for memory's sake, they all begin with the letter G. Sorry, it's just I can't take the Baptist out of the little boy that grew up in a Baptist church. But they all begin with the letter G. And I'm going to walk through the pages of scripture kind of quickly. And we're going to cover a lot of scripture. So what I want to do is you are welcome to try to write all this down, but I'm going to give everyone, or if you want it, there are going to be one sheet copy of all of this. So when you leave today, every passage of scripture that I referenced just about will be there for you. You're welcome to grab that. But I want to give a few caveats. It is helpful sometimes to have times of going through the Bible when We're looking at what does the Bible say in a variety of places about a specific topic. Almost concordance style, if you will. Looking up a word in a concordance, here are all the verses that have it. We don't regularly do that in our sermons because we want to dive into a passage in context and mind the passage without taking something to the passage. But in a setting like this, what does the word of God say about the idea of men and who we are, who were called to be 80% maybe 81.6% who knows what it is of the passages that I'm going to read to you today are not masculine passages. They're not for men only. They're for believers. But what I want to do is try to, as we think moving into our next time together, where we're going to look hopefully Lord willing at making wise decisions. What does it look like for us as men who are believers to just in life to make wise decisions? Does the Bible speak to that? What I want to do is set the stage for just some general principles for any believer, but apply them particularly to us as men. So that's caveat number one. We're going to kind of just quickly mine the passages that we look at and move quickly, and I will make this available to you. In fact, it's not the prettiest sheet, but I would actually encourage you take one and just over the next week or two, just think about it, pray about it, meditate maybe on a passage or two. But the second caveat is this, and then we're going to jump in. The goal of the preaching of the word, the goal of reading the word is to see Christ. We want to always have the gospel present in what we do. And one of the dangers of looking at the word and saying, what does the Bible tell me to do? Is that if we're not careful, we'll walk away with a list of a lot of things that we're doing. And quite frankly, if we're honest, a lot of things that we realize, oh, I'm not doing that too well. And then it becomes a burden. So we can go to one ditch or the other. We can say, I'm in Christ. No command in the scripture applies to me because Jesus is my righteousness. I'm good to go. I think that's a danger. The other ditch is mining the Bible for all the things that I need to do without a view toward Christ. Right? Does that make sense? that okay, I've got to do these things as a man, the preacher just said, I should care for my wife. I should do this. I should do that. I should do that. And now our lives are, if we count the number of verses here, full of things to do. And we're slowly taking our eyes off of Christ, who is the scope of scripture. These passages that we'll talk about very briefly are meant to point us, connect us, help us to see Christ, our need for him, our lack in ourselves and how he is our righteousness and how when we seek as believers to pursue these things, we have to do that with a view towards Christ. So that's the other caveat. It's rare that anyone preaching from the pulpit will say, okay, look, look at all these things that we should consider doing without a bold proclamation of the gospel. And so, That's the caveat is that as I kind of walk through guarding and growing and guiding and giving these things that we should do as men, that we have to have that based in the gospel, right? That Christ is our standing before God and that now is believers clothed in his righteousness. The spirit is working within us to produce fruit and to produce increasing holiness. So I just want to give that caveat. Um, and so the backdrop for us this morning as we think about this are, is the garden and the gospel. That's our backdrop. Let me tell you what I mean. If you turn to, um, Genesis chapter two, verse 15. Why is this discussion this morning largely about men and not believers? Well, because there are men in the room. Um, and again, a large portion of what we're going to do is think about what does it look like to be to be a Christian man? And are there any particular things that we should consider? Let's start with the garden for a minute. You remember that God created all things in the space of six days. On the seventh day, he rested. He declared all things good. The sixth day, the pinnacle of his creation, humanity. He created male and female. And there is an important part of Genesis chapter 2 that we need to consider and it can be abused and we don't have time to get into the abuses other than to say they are either we no longer observe any difference ontologically between male and female, right? We see that in our world today. The other is every aspect of the Christian life must come through a man. And I, if I'm a woman, only have access to Christ through my husband. Like that is a that is another ultra error, right? We have to avoid both of those ditches. But in Genesis chapter two, verse 15, we read this simple description. Everything's being made. There's a garden. Genesis 2 15. Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to tend it and keep it. The Lord commanded the man saying of every tree of the garden, you may eat freely, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat for in the day that you eat of it, you shall surely die. I wish we could camp out here for the next 30 minutes and talk about what it was like for Adam to be a worker in the garden, pre-fall, a priest in the garden, Temple of Eden, if you will, the one who was to make sure that the word that God had given was spread, the one who was supposed to crush the head of the serpent, right? I mean, all of these kinds of early Genesis themes that are traced through the Bible. But the garden lays out for us the reality that I think, some would disagree with me, that human beings, male and female, are equal. But there is a principle that we see early on of the leadership that a man is to have specifically over his own life and over the life of his family. And we won't debate today the aspect of male, female roles in society. I just want us to look at our own lives and our family. So we've got the garden. But before we move to our four words, we've got to have the gospel. So you know what happens. The tree was eaten from. Adam did not take the Word of God in the face of temptation and apply the Word of God to Satan's temptation. That would not happen until the Book of Matthew when the second Adam would do that. Right? Adam did not crush the head of the serpent. Adam did not protect, guard, lead his family. Right? I mean, again, I don't want to make too much of a small detail, but brothers, Adam was there when Eve was deceived, right? He was there. And so you have this picture of an application of a spiritual role, but application of just a role in general. So the garden is there, but Christ in the gospel has fulfilled all righteousness. Christ has become the true and better Adam, the second Adam, right? And in Christ, the commands that we see for God's glory to be spread from one end of the globe to the other. In Christ, that is being done. The mandate to take dominion over things in Christ that has been done right. And so we've got to have the gospel as men who are now filled with the spirit, thinking about how it is that God has saved us and how he's working in us by his spirit. Everything that I'm about to say assumes it assumes that you need Jesus and that you will not do perfectly the things we're about to talk about. Please hear me say that because today is not meant to be. I've got 16 things now that I realized I'm not doing very well. You've got to have that resting on the gospel. But the garden provides a little bit of a picture of who we are as men, right? And some of our roles as men that will see through the scripture, assume that we need Christ after the fall. So let's look at four words today. Guarding, growing, guiding and giving. And again, I'll give all this to you at the end. There'll be a sheet for you if you like it. Guarding, growing, guiding, giving. I'm gonna go very quickly, okay? But I'm just looking through the pages of scripture If we're going to think about who we are in Christ and the things that we should do based on principles of wisdom, based on explicit command, because they're both here. How do we need to think about doing those things? Many of you work in jobs where there is leadership training. And there are some wonderful leadership books out there. And so I don't want to cast dispersion on any of them. And we pay experts. Some of our corporations pay experts thousands, maybe even millions of dollars to create leadership training for men, leadership training for workers. And there are some wonderful principles in God's common grace. There's some great leadership books out there, right? Great ways to talk about you know, communication skills. Probably half of you in this room have read the book, Good to Great. Right? Anybody read that book? Right? So there's some wonderful things. What I'm about to say, you're going to think, we didn't really talk about like major leadership principles. What I want to do is go internal for a moment before we think about the things that we should do externally as a part of a company or staff. Guarding. I would submit to you that there are many things that we are called to guard as men, as believers, but as men, in our lives. I'm just gonna give us five and I'm gonna do that quickly. We are called to guard our heart. We will not be able to lead our families, lead our lives if we're not guarding our hearts. So I'm gonna read these passages of scripture to you, but you're welcome to turn their Proverbs four Proverbs chapter four. Just the principle. This is a leadership principle. Most of the world may not say that, but there's something that we are to take leadership over. In essence, if we're going to use that language, Proverbs 4 23, keep your heart with all diligence, guard your heart with all diligence for out of it spring the issues of life. We need to guard our hearts from the things that arise within them. and from the things of the world. Jeremiah 17, 9 and 10. The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? I, the Lord, search the heart. I test the mind, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings. Now, these are not the only two passages about keeping the heart or guarding the heart. But the first thing we need to think about when we think about leadership is thinking about how we are to kind of take a lead by God's grace through his spirit, even in our own lives. Typically, when we hear the word leadership, we think I'm leading others, family, I'm leading, you know, company, I'm leading a church, I'm leading a battalion. But there are principles for us that talk about how we need to be focusing even on ourselves. So we are to guard our hearts. What is speaking to your heart? What drives your heart? What inflames your heart with passion? Right? That word passion we use typically in our day means it often is used romantically, right? Or I'm passionate about world peace. I'm passionate about ending world hunger. The word passion originally comes from Aristotle who argued that there were multiple states of being and one of the states of being was passion. And passion is when you are acted upon. So something outside of you moves you. And it was called passions, which is why our confession says there is one being without passions. God. God is not changed or shifted based on something outside of himself, right? So we have appropriated that word rightly. But we kind of associate it with, well, kind of romantic passion. Well, sure, but passions are what moves you, what outside of you drives you, right? You long to connect with it. So a question for us as we think about who we are as men is just how are we guarding our hearts? Some of you are guarding your heart quite well, and you're in Christ, clothed in his righteousness, heaven bound. Some of us right now are not guarding our hearts, and yet we're clothed in Christ and his righteousness and heaven bound. But we have to ask the question, how are we guarding our hearts? For from it flow the wellsprings of life. A second thing we're to guard is our walk. First Peter 5, 8. First Peter 5, 8. Listen to what Peter says. We just recently talked about this verse because we're in Luke and Peter has gone through what he's gone through. But Peter, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, writes this. First Peter five, eight, be sober, be vigilant because the adversary, your adversary, the devil walks about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. Now, by implication, then we should be guarding our steps. We should be guarding our ways spiritually. Right. And sometimes that's a very earthy thing, right? You spend a lot of time on Netflix or Amazon Prime and you never think about what you're going to see till you're sitting in front of watching it. That's a very physical thing, right? Satan does not wait for you to decide that you want to sin in order to entice you to tempt you, right? But there's also internal things about guarding our walk, right? Spending time speaking with the Lord, spending time listening to the Lord, right? You know all of these things. But as a part of guarding, are we guarding our hearts? Are we guarding our walk, right? The beauty of it is some Christians go. True believers go weeks on end without guarding well, and yet Christ is interceding. So again, we've got the gospel brothers as our foundation here, but There are things we're told to do. So guarding our hearts, guarding our walk, guarding our eyes. I won't even turn here, but Job 31 one, right? I've made a covenant with my eyes. I mean, one of the first steps that we're gonna need to think about, let's just say the men in the room that are married, right? We're gonna lead our families. We gotta lead our own eyes first, right? What are we looking at? What are we casting our gaze upon? And you know, obviously whenever we have this discussion, typically the biggest item that we go to is the, you know, the pandemic, if you will, of pornography in our culture. So yes, that's an appropriate thing for us to consider. But there are other things that we set our eyes in front of that we don't really guard our eyes over. And we're told to guard our eyes. Another passage, so Job 31.1, but Psalm, Psalm 119, 37. Psalm 119, 37. Think about this passage for just a moment. There, the psalmist writes, turn away my eyes from looking at worthless things and revive me in your way. Don't have time to flesh this one out other than to say sometimes we need to turn our eyes away from evil things, things that are just blatantly sinful. But then sometimes, We just spend a lot of time looking at things that are worthless, right? They may not in and of themselves be evil, but we just stare at them hours and hours a day, right? So guarding our hearts, guarding our walk, guarding our eyes. Fourthly, guarding our time, right? Ephesians five, Ephesians five is passage here. Hopefully by now you're seeing that we're not diving into any one of these passages in particular, so I wouldn't necessarily call what we're doing here the best of sermons. We're not mining the text as much as we are saying, let's just get a lay of the land topically. Ephesians 5, 15-17. See that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Within the last six months, our brother Andy preached a sermon, I believe, touching on this passage. And I would commend it to you, because we really mine a little bit that phrase, redeeming the time. Okay, just sermon audio, scroll down, it's there. But, redeeming the time because the days are evil. Therefore, do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. Isn't that interesting? Connecting how we use time with the will of God. Colossians 4, 5 speaks similarly of that, as well as Psalm 90 verse 12. Psalm 90 verse 12. Let me just read that one to you. Psalm 90 verse 12 says this. Yep. So let's pick back up. We're finishing our conversation of guarding, right? So we've talked about guarding your heart, guarding your walk, guarding your eyes, guarding your time. Psalm 90 verse 12. Teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom. Now these are broad. Notice that number our days. Just consider the amount of time that you have. Redeem the time for God's purposes. Now that's broad. This does not tell us how we ought to schedule our days. I mean, there are principles one day in seven. That's clear. But we ought to think we ought to consider What do we do with our time? Right? So a potential question here, what might we take on that is unnecessary? It's a big question for us, right? What might we take on that is unnecessary? And then lastly, I would say, if you're married, I think there's an implication in first Peter chapter three to guard your wife. Right? First Peter chapter three. And I would just say to the single brothers in the room, they're still guarding a future wives that can occur one wife per single person, hopefully. Right? So there are more, there's more than one single person in the room. So I use the plural, but you, yeah, that's, that's true. Guard your future wife. I mean, the thing, the decisions that we make do impact our marriage down the road. First Peter chapter three can be misused, but listen to what it says. Husbands likewise dwell with them, meaning wives, with understanding, giving honor to the wife as to the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life that your prayers may not be hindered." Obviously that phrase, weaker vessel, calling it a spade a spade, feminists hate that phrase. And sometimes Men who are a little bit more jazzed about testosterone than about proper biblical exegesis love to make too much of that phrase. But there is a principle here that as men, we ought to lead in a way that understands the need that we have as caretakers of the garden, so to speak, to guard our wives. So a question here might be, how often do we take the hits? This is not unique. This is not mine. I can't even remember where I've heard it, but many people have said it this way, that one of the principles for us as men is that we take the hits for our family, right? The most basic level would be someone breaks into our house. We're going to go, right? But that usually doesn't happen to most of us by God's grace, and we're thankful for that. But emotionally and in decisions that don't go the way that the family wants them to go, all of these kinds of things, how often are we putting ourselves out there sort of as the ones to say, hey, I'm going to take the hits here, right? I'm not going to let my wife be out there by herself on her own. Well, you know. So. Do we take the hits for our family, for our wives? So just, there are more we could say. We could talk all day just about guarding verse after verse after verse. And I would encourage you with this list, look these up in context. We don't want to write anything into them that are, it's not there, but just guarding, guarding our hearts, guarding our walk, guarding our eyes, considering how we use our time. A busy person can still guard their time, right? Guarding our wives. Right? This is not to say that women are less. You know this, right? We're ontologically equal as it relates to our image bearing, but there are roles we have in God's economy that are good and right. And we ought to consider how do we guard. So a question might be, what has God given you to guard? Yourself, obviously. Your wife, children, if you have them. Time. How are we practically considering these things? If we were to say, one of the things that I need to do in my life, just as a Christian man, is to consider things that I just need to guard. Right? Again, the gospel is a foundation. What are they? A second area would be growing, right? And you probably know where I'm going to go here. Let me just give them quickly, right? Deuteronomy 6, 6. having the words of God kind of written on our hearts and minds. So growing in the word, how do we do? We think about that? Is that something we think about? Um, not that I'm overly biased towards our church, but in a church like ours, where in Sunday school and the various men that that preach and teach there, there is a primacy placed on the scriptures. We don't make any bones about the fact that we want to be word saturated. We might have a little bit of an edge in being forced at least weekly to think about it. But how are we using the Word of God in our lives? Are we meditating on sermons that we hear? Are we able to read the Bible? Do we listen to it? Do we pray through it? Just a general principle, right? Are we growing in the Word? But secondly, growing in the faith, right? They're very similar, but turn over to Colossians chapter 2. Colossians chapter two verses six and seven. As you therefore have received Christ the Lord, so walk in him, rooted and built up in him and established in the faith as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving. So the faith is different in this sense than faith that I have in Christ. They're very much united, but there is a sense in which there is a faith that has been passed down to us, that has been taught to us. Are we growing in it? And is it fueling our faith in Christ? Our faith in what he's done and who he is? Here's perhaps another practical one, or perhaps more tangible for us. Growing by receiving counsel. How are we at that? Some men are much better than others. Probably for the first, I don't know, I'm 41 years old. So to some of you, a baby. Others of you, getting close to the end. I don't know. probably for the first half of my life, it was hard for me to ask for help, right? I mean, I took counsel, but it was just one of those things where I, you know, I just wanted to figure things out. I wanted to not be seen as not knowing. But I learned very quickly that the more that I let other people teach me and speak into my life about things that I don't know how to do, I will actually be bettered, if that makes any sense. How are we growing by receiving counsel? Proverbs 15, 32, Proverbs 19, 20. Let me just read that to you. Proverbs 19, 20. These are principles of wisdom, right? Proverbs 19, 20. Listen to counsel and receive instruction that you may be wise in your latter days. Are we growing in the willingness to hear, particularly with other godly brothers, when rightly applying the Word of Christ, are saying to us, are we growing in our receipt of counsel? And some of us have personalities that are less open to that. Some of us have, quite frankly, past baggage that make us less open to that. And then perhaps the opposite extreme is some of us are paralyzed until we get everyone's counsel on something. Can't do that either, right? But are we growing by receiving counseling? So we've got guarding and we've got growing brothers. We could take take the topic of growing and just keep going through the scriptures. It's it abounds, right? But these are more internal things. Notice we haven't talked about Seven ways to move the corporation to the next level. Those are helpful things sometimes. But just as we are men of the scriptures, as we look through this, as we think about it, there are things that God has given to us in his kindness to guard. And there are things that we are told to grow in the word, grow in faith. One practical thing growing by receiving counsel. One potential diagnostic question might be this, is there anyone in your life that actually is able to counsel you? And I don't necessarily mean psychotherapy counsel, okay? I mean just give you counsel. Is there anyone in your life that might be able to say they know you well enough? Because if you meet someone on the street, it's hard to give them counsel beyond very strict generalities. You're a sinner and you need Jesus. And don't walk out into the street because you might get hit by a bus, right? These are very easy things to counsel because they're clear. But when people know us well enough to be able to actually say, hey, have you thought about this? Is there at least one other, right? I think sometimes we can make too much of the discipleship buddy and accountability partner. I'm all for that. and neglect the ordinary means of grace, right? Preaching's okay, Lord's Supper's okay, prayers with the body's okay, but I really gotta have my Bible study buddy. And I would just say, swap those in priority. But, do have someone or a group of someone that is actually in your life enough to say, hey, have you thought about this? And it may not be corrective. It might be encouragement. It might be a Barnabas kind of thing, you know? So, guarding and growing. because we're continuing with the theme of G's here. Let's look at guiding. These are simple. You probably know where I'm going to go here. Let's just go to Galatians for just a moment. Excuse me, Ephesians. Go to Ephesians. Guiding our homes, right? We've had holes. We've had whole theology conferences here simply on the topic of guiding the home family worship, right? What does it look like to lead your family in the Bible? We want to create, by God's grace, a generation of kids who grow up saying, the Word of God was regularly mentioned in my house. I don't know how many of us could say that about our own lives growing up. But wouldn't it be great if, not for our own glory, but for Christ's? The next generation, it's just commonplace that pretty much most days. I know there are soccer and football and baseball games and then some nights where you get home late in the evening. That happened to me one time this week. You know, we get home, it's 10 o'clock at night, not the best time to circle the family up when two are already asleep and saying, we're going to do family worship, right? So, yeah, we're going to use wisdom here, but just generally, how are we guiding our home? Ephesians 6, 4, right? We looked at this several weeks ago and Sunday evening service. But and you fathers do not provoke your Children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord, speaking the words of Jesus to them and their decisions and their hurts and their emotions in our correction of them, guarding our homes. I'm going to say this in another context, guiding the church and typically would say, well, that's that's the elders. And yes, it is. But turn to Galatians chapter six verse one. There is a sense in which every believer shares, not necessarily positionally by way of office, but every believer does share in the broader guiding of God's church. Galatians 6-1. Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself, lest you also be tempted. Bear one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ. Now, again, there's much we could talk about about this Galatians passage, but there's a implication principle here that we all have a role in being a part of bearing burdens and restoration, which is why if we as a church have to get to the point where the elders present someone to the body that is in unrepentant sin and we as a body have to pray for them, we as a body have to potentially discipline them by way of censoring them or excommunication. Unless we are physically incapacitated, we should be here, right? A lot of times we think, ah, church is, the deacons do this, the elders do this, I go. You don't go, you have a part in going and the general movement of the church. And let me just say, we're congregationalists in this sense. The elders aren't appointed from above by a bishop. The body as a whole has a hand in it. Now, certainly we are right to say there is a chief role position office that God has created called eldership pastors. But just notice what is said in Galatians 6.1. So when I know that the elders have said, Hey, we got to pray for this person. Am I praying for them? Do they come to mind? Write them down and say, Hey, I need to pray for so and so this week, right? There's a sense in which we as men will have a role in guiding. So let me ask this. Is it a regular priority for you to guide your home in the ways of God? I would imagine statistically in most churches, 51% or more of the men are sitting there hearing that question would honestly say, not really. Okay. The beauty of the gospel of grace is that Christ has done everything necessary to save you. So you are always free, always quote unquote, to use a word empowered to go and make change. By God's grace and through his spirit, just okay. You know, Lord, I was asked this question by the speaker at the men's breakfast and for months I've not been guiding my family as I ought to. Repent, move forward, right? This doesn't need to be a paralyzing question for us. This doesn't need to be a weight that we carry, right? Other people have said, you know, I'm at men's breakfast and I hear that and I'm now in the grandparenting stage and boy, do I wish I could do it differently. As long as you have life and breath, you are empowered by the Spirit of God to repent and change. It's wonderful. It's wonderful, right? Guarding, growing, guiding. Obviously, there are more things we could talk about as it relates to guiding. But we'll move on. The last one would be giving. Just three simple things regarding the word giving. Let's take a look at Ephesians 5 verse 25. I put here giving by sacrifice. I'm using this one is an example because I think it is one of the most blunt examples in the Scriptures for men, particularly for married men. But giving by sacrifice. Listen to what the Spirit writes through Paul. Husbands love your wives just as Christ also loved the church. and gave himself for her. And then there's a explanation that he might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word that he might present her to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she may be holy and without blemish. So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies. Now that's a pretty bold statement, but I think the one before it is even much, uh, more startling, it's weighty, that we're to love our wives as Christ loved the church. And we obviously, we know how Christ has loved the church. We know in part, we know in a finite way. But a question for us is how are we giving of ourselves for the women, but in each case, the woman that God has put in our lives if we're married, right? How are we giving there? Is there a word that marks us as husbands that begins with the word S? Sacrificial, right? Think on that. It's a part of giving. Obviously, And I love that every time that I mentioned this, I can say to you, this is not an appeal from the elders to give money. But there is a principle in first Corinthians 16 to that we're to consider our finances and we're to give to the church. Yes, giving financially. That is a part of leading your family. One of the sweetest things that I see is a pastor. It's not the sweetest thing, but it's one of them. It's when I see little kids bringing coins to the offering plate. And it's sweet to me because in some cases, that little boy or that little girl has decided all on their own that they're going to give some allowance money. And that's just, it's just cute, right? But there's also the reality that some of those little boys and little girls are doing that because they're in a home where they've been taught, hey, we give, and let's start doing that, right? And so nickels and pennies, perhaps a slight nightmare for whoever the counters are that day, they're showing up in the offering plate And it's because parents are saying, hey, I'm going to lead here. You need to see how we lead with money, right? And so giving by sacrifice, but giving financially is is a discipline, right? I would not encourage a person to think about giving to the church because the church needs money. I mean, that might be something we need to think about in various stages of a church, but I would think about it simply as a discipline which God has called me to. So I've sat down with college students before and I've just said, you know, as new believers, people that are new to church membership, hey, let's talk about this discipline. Five dollars a week, one Starbucks drink a week. There's a principle here. You're a church member, right? Being a member of a church means that you have a hand in expressing this discipline, right? So giving financially, certainly, but then this brothers broadens out to do this The implication in first Corinthians 16 is that we're thinking broadly about our own finances, right? We're thinking broadly about how to leave the purse of the family, leave the wallet of the family giving by working. I don't think I have to convince any man in here that we need to work, right? So I want the labor this, but I mean, I don't know how long it's been since you've read second Thessalonians, but flip over there for just a moment. Second Thessalonians chapter three. There are reasons why the Thessalonian Christians were being idle and we won't get into all of that other than to say some scholars argue that they were some of them anyway might have been overly expectant of the Lord's return such that they were not even gonna live right now. Just kind of sit on the mountain and wait. But there were reasons. But notice what Paul says in second Thessalonians 3 6 and following. But we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you withdraw from every brother who walks disorderly and not according to the tradition which he received from us. For you yourselves know how you ought to follow us, for we were not disorderly among you, nor did we eat anyone's bread free of charge, but worked with labor and toil night and day, that we might not be a burden to any of you, not because we do not have authority, but to make ourselves an example of how you should follow us. For even when we were with you, we commanded you this, if anyone will not work, neither shall he eat. For we hear that there are some who walk among you in a disorderly manner, not working at all, but are busybodies. Now those who are such we command and exhort through our Lord Jesus Christ that they work in quietness and eat their own bread." Plenty of passages about sharing bread. Wonderful. But there are passages about working for bread, right? And so working and this takes us back to that original discussion in the garden, right? Working is a good thing. And we give of our energy and time. And one of the ways that we lead is by working. First Timothy five, eight has strong words to say about a man who will not care for his own family. Right? Okay. Now do you see why I said, hey, let's have a gospel foundation for a moment? Because there's a lot for us to think about. There are a lot of things either by way of command or by implication of wisdom that we need to consider doing. And very few of them have to do with here are five leadership principles that are going to make you a better person. But actually, if we consider these things, we meditate on them, we consider how we ought to apply them. And we then begin to ask implication questions of them. They are leadership principles. Do I give myself to unnecessary things? Who is catechizing my children? Am I really working or am I just playing? Am I guarding my wife or have I amassed a family of people to take the hits for me? Right? I mean, on and on it goes. These are principles for us to consider, but only as we rest in Christ guarding, growing, guiding and giving. Now, I've put all these on a piece of paper for you. I'll make these passages available, but I think this is best aided for us. If we then over the next couple of weeks, just pull this piece of paper out of our Bible. Think about pray about it a little bit. Some of these things are things that some of us may need to consider less than others. We move into another area and perhaps it's different. But as we think about who we are as believers, but then even who we are as men, how God has designed us. Thankfully, in our church, I don't have to convince you that men are called to lead their homes. Men are called to lead the church, right? That's not a debate that we have here. I'd be glad to have that discussion if you need me to, but that's not a debate that we have here. But brothers, our world is increasingly hostile to what we've just said. increasingly hostile. And I think sometimes we think our opposition to the hostility is say that I don't agree, but it also needs to be. But every time the world says that men aren't the leaders of their homes, men don't need to be the only leaders of the church. I am right to disagree, but I also should put my head down and say, how am I doing? Right? They're hostile to God's truth. And if I'm not existing in it and living out of it, then by implication, I'm kind of moving over into being hostile to God's truth. Right? Does that make sense? So one of the things that I think we can do as we think about who we are as brothers is to consider these things. There are more things to consider. But with these things as a foundation, then in the next couple of months, we can move into the topic of, well, how do we think about making wise decisions? Right? What does it look like for a Christian man to make a wise decision? Let me just say, what we just laid out could be said in a women's breakfast. Most of it, 80% of it, 90% of it, whatever the number is, because these are truths for believers. But I think if we go back to the garden, there is a principle that God has given us. That in some ways, it's okay. It's right. It's God glorifying to say, hey, God has made me male. And there are things that I'm going to be called to do, or at least to lead in, in these ways, because of that. So brothers, That's what we have this morning. The man is a leader. Gardening gospel. Four simple things to kind of organize our thoughts. Gardening, growing, guiding, giving. If you're me, let me put it this way. This is how I think about it. Let me close. If I were here listening to one of you say this, there would certainly be things that I would say, oh man, yeah, I've got to do that better. I probably would be thinking, okay, now I've got a checklist of I think 16 or 17 things. How many things did he say? And it's not meant to be that. It's meant to say, hey, look at all of these things that God can and will be growing in us and that we should consider as we meditate on His Word. For the good of our children, for the good of our wives, if we're leaders in the church, for the good of the church, right? And we see these principles running through. I mean, look at the qualifications for elders and for deacons. There's sort of this assumption of managing things well, right? And that's weighty for those of us that are in a biblical office, but I present these to us for consideration. Let me just, uh, I don't want to linger long here. We've designed this to be, uh, today at least, uh, more lecture versus discussion, but any questions or thoughts, and I'll limit us to maybe five minutes here. Um, feel free and stay in the fellowship as long as you want, but just any questions or thoughts this morning on these things.