The Model Elder

It's Timothy, chapter three, This morning one Timothy, chapter three.

It's good to be with you this morning today. As

we're walking through our study. In first Timothy, we're looking

at the model elder. Now, I don't know if you

ever heard of this name. There's a a guy by

the name of Frank Abigail. There's a movie made by

about him. It's called Catch Me if you can. Frank

Abigail is a was a con artist. He actually as

a con artist, posed to be different people throughout his life.

He at one point worked as an assistant Attorney general in Louisiana.

He did not have a law degree. He faked a

law degree. He also faked a physician's degree and worked

as a physician in Georgia. And then at one point

he faked being an airline pilot and he worked He

logged over two million airline miles, three pen m He

wrote two million dollars worth of bad checks and was

running from the government for a while, and then later

would after court, would be work for the FBI helping

them learn how to spot a fake. You know, you

hear stories like Frank, and you think there is fakes

in our world today. There are fake all kinds of

different things here from Frank's story pilots, all kinds of

different things. But you know, today even with Ai, there's

we can there's all kinds of just even more fakes

that are produced through our world. Well, as we come

to first Timothy this morning, and we've come to Paul's

letter of Timothy, Paul is concerned about fakes. And what

is the fakes that Paul is concerned about. He's concerned

about fake teachers or what we'd say, false teachers or

fake pastors, and false teaching that has arisen in Ephesus

at the time. And so Paul, for Paul, the solution

to false teaching and false teachers is to have the

real thing, real pastors, real teachers, real preachers. And so

this morning he as he's teached, as he's writing to Timothy,

who is the pastor of the Church of Ephesus, he's

telling Paul, I mean Timothy, how important it is for

us to have a model pastor, a real pastor, a

real teacher, real elder. And so he lists in today's sermon,

today's passage, what is the qualities of a model pastor

or a model elder, And so I hope today, as

we look at God's word together, we see that God

gave through his word what a model pastor should look like.

I think it's important, as you notice, as he comes

through this and we're going to look at this together,

but as we walk through this and he's talking about

a pastor, I think it's important for you to understand.

For Paul, when he gives a model pastor, he doesn't

talk about his functions, what he's to do, his role,

not his duties. That's not in today's pastors today. What

is in this passage is what is his behavior, What

does his life should look like, what his heart should

look like, what his attitude should be like. And so

for Paul, what's so important when you're looking at a

real pastor or a true pastor or a model pastor

or elder, is not just what they do, but who

they are, what the heart is like. So I pray

today that God would use this passage to speak to

you and I together. And so let's stand together and

let's read God's word. It's first Timothy, chapter three, and

we'll read verses one through seven for this morning. The

saying is trustworthy if anyone aspires to the office of overseer.

He desires a noble task. Therefore, an overseer must be

above approach. The husband of one wife, so reminded, self control, respectable, hospitable,

able to teach, not a drunkard, not violent, but gentle,

not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. He must manage

his own household well with all dignity, keeping his children submissive.

For if someone does not know how to manage his

own home household, how would he care for God's Church.

He must not be a recent convert, or he may

be puffed up with conceit and fall into the combination

of the devil. Moreover, he must be well thought of

by outsiders, so he might not fall into disgrace, into

the snare of the devil. Let's pray together, Father, we

thank you, Lord, that you call the church to be

a holy church, Lord, to be an example of what

is true, not only what is true from your word,

but what is true leaders, pastors, and so Lord, I

thank you you call pastors, you call elders, Lord, from

among us, that we might serve in this role. I

thank you Lord for your calling upon me, Lord, to

calling on the elders that are here. Lord, I know

you have a desire to raise up future elders from

among us. So today I pray would we would look

to your word, Lord, we'd understand the calling that you've

placed upon elders. Lord you, we would understand the model

that we are called to be for your church, and

Lord see that as an un vital role in combating

the false teaching of our world. Today, Lord, we love you,

We thank you Lord for your word. Lord, I pray

today that you'd use your word to speak to us

and speak to me, and Lord, that our hearts will

be moved Lord by the movement of your spirit as

you implant your word in our hearts. Today, in your name,

we pray you may be seated. So he comes from

the very beginning this morning, a model elder, model pastor.

There's many of these, and we're going to walk through.

You could see there's He just gives a list of

different things about an elder. So we're going to go

through them. Some of these we're going to group together.

I'm just going to tell you that beforehand so you

can know. But as we come to this Pastor, the

first thing is a model of inspiration. I think it's

very important for you to understand as we come to

this pastor of scripture Paul's mind when he thinks about

an elder, and he's teaching Timothy that these pastors, these pastors,

these elders, and next week as we look at the deacons,

these pastor, elders, deacons are to be role models for

the church body. You know, the church body is this

is going to encounter a lot of fakes. There are

a lot of false teaching of the world. And what

the church needs and what the church body needs is

when to come to the church is to see the truth,

to hear the truth, and not only here the truth,

but see the truth lived out in the life of

its leaders, elders, pastors, deacons. And so these elders, these

deacons are to be role models for the church. You're

going to hear that over and over this week and

next week. Role models for the church. They are to

live a life that is a model that the church

might see. That is a man of God, and that's

a man of God that I want to mimic my life.

After that is forefront for Paul's example here and as

Paul begins he kind of says this, He shows the

importance of this just in the first few words he

says in verse one, this saying is trustworthy. It's almost

like Paul is saying, Hey, what I'm i about to

say is really really important. This is really important for

the church. This is really important for you, Timothy as

you lead the church, to understand how important it is

your role is, and how important your role is as

a pastor, but also the role of the elders in

the church. There's two offices in the New Testament church

that we see throughout scripture. In the New Testament, there

were elders, or we are overseers. We would also use

the term kind of modern day English, we would use

the term pastors. The word pastor actually came from the

Latin word shepherd, and so that's who Paul's talking about here,

is pastors, overseers or elders. So I would use those

words interchangeably. But that's one office. In the second office

that we see in the New Testament are deacons deacons

or the other office that's who we're going to talk

about next week. So come prepare deacons future deacons here

for that. And so those are two offices we do

know in the second century the church would add the

office of bishop, but that was not found in the

New Testament. That was something the church added in the

second century, and bishops were respond for supervising elders. And

so Paul is talking about this model of an elder

and he says, first, this is important called this is

important for the church. It's important for you, Timothy. This

is a trustworthy saying. This is something you should hold

on too. Then he goes into the description of this elder.

He says this, if anyone aspires to the office of

an overseer, he desires a noble task. This idea, if

someone aspires this is a model of inspiration. This is

someone that the church should look up to, aspire to be,

aspire to live their life, affort, aspire to model their

life after That's the idea for Paul. And he describes

their work of a pastor as a noble task. Like

what New American standard how they translate this verse. It's

a trustworthy statement. If any man aspires to the office

over of an overseer, is a fine work he desires

to do. I think this word aspire has this Not

only are we to inspire to live our life after this,

but this individual must have a desire to do the work.

He must have a desire to surrender to the calling.

It's very similar to another pastor scripture, and I want

to share that with you. It is first Peter five

one through two. Peter the Apostle is also talking to pastors, shepherds,

overseers about their calling, and he says this, I exhort you, elders,

among you, as a fellow elder and witness of the

sufferings of Christ, as well as a partaker in the

glory that is going to be revealed, shepherd the flock

of God that is among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion,

but willingly as God would have you, not for shameful gain,

but eagerly. Here Paul is talking about the attitude by

which the elders should shepherd the flock, or pastor of

the flock, or lead the flock, and he says, you

should not lead the flock under compulsion, but willingly right.

I remember being a young pastor and pastor of my

first church at in South Carolina, and it was a

small country church, and every year we had a thing

called the nominating process, and we would get a nominating committee.

Some of y'all remember those days. And you would go

through you'd have this list of these positions that you

had to fill on the nominate committee, right, and you

would have people who work on the ground, You had

people who were doing all kinds of different things. And

then it happened every year you'd have some people who

would be willing to serve another year or whatever. And

then every year you'd have this one position, right that

nobody want to serve. Nobody wanted to serve in that role,

and we would just you start looking through the role

of the church's role, right, just who is the lucky

victim I mean volunteer, right? And then finally you were like,

I think such and such just came to the church

and they don't know any better. I mean, they may

be willing to do it, right, And you go to

that person and you were like, you don't ask them

if they call, would you be willing? Yep, yep, yep.

And the next thing you know, they're in the And

and sometimes I tell you that story because sometimes you

would find someone who really didn't feel called to do that, right,

who would do it, but just because they felt bad

that they couldn't find anybody else right, that's not the

calling of a pastor. Here, the pastors would be someone

who's inspirational. But a pastor is one who has a

heart for the ministry, whose God's given him a heart

to serve the Lord and to serve the local church.

And that's the desire. He has a desire to follow

God's card call. I remember I was seventeen years old

when I surrendered to call the ministry. I was actually

a really little I was really little in my mom

and dad told me later on, I'd forgotten it that

when I was really little, I wanted to be a pastor,

and I would tell my mom and dad I want

to do that. As I got older and got into

middle school, in high school, it was no longer cool

to be a future preacher. My parents would separate when

I was fourteen, and I went through a lot of

just running from God, very angry at God for a

period of time. And I remember sixteen, God really got

a hold my heart and I really decided I was

going to start living for the Lord. And then suddenly

I started feeling God's calling on me. And I remember

my dad at the time wasn't where he needed to

be with the Lord. At the time, and he didn't

approve of me going into the ministry. And I remember

warning my dad's approval, and because my dad didn't approve it,

and I knew my peers did not approve it, of school,

I ran from that calling. But I was seventeen years

old at first Baptist ingyn Trail. On a Sunday night service.

I was sitting at the balcony of the church and

I remember or God calling me that day to be

a pastor.

It was not what I wanted to do, not what

I thought I was going to do, but I could

tell you that night God called me, and God put

a desire in my heart to serve the church.

That's the that's the imagery here. It's a it's a

model of inspiration. Man, this is this is who we

inspire to be. But as a pastor, it is what

I aspire to do. Is God's work, and it's good work.

I want you to see. Secondly, it's not only a

model of inspiration, it's a model of blamelessness. I think here,

as you're going to see, Paul just lists the gamut

of just different qualifications, but they really all flow from

one and that really is the first one and two

it says, therefore, so he talks about this the task

that he aspires to do, he's hopefully inspires others to do.

And number two he goes into this the qualifications of

the position. Therefore, an overseer must be above reproach. And

then from there you just see these these other qualifications

that followed, But all of those kind of flow into

this first one. Above reproach. It means nothing to take

hold of. It really means the idea that nothing in

his life, Satan or the unsaved unbelievers, if you will,

can take hold of him or criticize him of is

the imagery. He is blameless, he is above reproach, free

from accusations, is the imagery. American Puritan writer by the

name of Cotton Mather used to say he had a

powerful ministry in Boston, Cotton Mather, and he said this

about in one of his letters called Student and Preachers.

He says, Student Preachers, he says, he said these words.

The office of Christian ministry, rightly understood, is the most

honorable and important that of any man in the world

could ever sustain. It will be the only it will

be one of the wonders of the employments of eternity,

to consider the reasons why the wisdom and the goodness

of God assigns this office to imperfect, guilty man. The

design of the attentions of the office of a Christian

preacher is to restore the throne and dominion of God

and the souls of men. To display the most lived

with in the most lively colors and proclamation, the clearest

language of the wonders of perfections officers, and the grace

of the Son of God. And to attract the souls

of man and to the state of everlasting friendship with God.

It's the word which an angel might wish for as

an honor to his character, yet an offer which office

which every angel in Heaven might covet to be employed

in for a thousand years to come. It's such an

honorable and important, useful office that if a man be

put into it by God and made faithful and successful

throughout life, he may look down upon the disdain of

the crown and shed a tear pity on the brightest

monoch on earth. What is he saying there at the end.

If a pastor is faithful to the end, he may

look at the crowns of the world and look down

with pity upon them at the greatness of the calling

that God has put on his life. It's a holy calling.

It's a calling to be blameless above reproach. You know,

it's interesting. I remember I've been a pastor since I

was called at seventeen, and I went into ministry straight.

I was volunteer and then part time as in college,

and then full time right after a seminary. So I've

been in the ministry for almost twenty years, twenty plus

years now, senior pastor for I don't know how many years.

And I've definitely been a part of search committees. So

church is calling me, reaching out to me. That's not

happened lately, So don't worry about that. Don't put anybody

in the panic. But that's definitely happened, and I've reached

the churches reached out to me, and I've been through

the interview process. And I remember one time I was

many many years ago, to don't fear. A church reached

out to me and they were looking at me to

come as pastor, and they sent me this questionnaire and

it was like this long questionnaire is like three or

four pages I had to do, and before they every

interviewed me, they went through this this questionnaire. And I

remember thinking, after I did this questionnaire, you're evaluating what

I look like on paper before you ever know who

my heart is. And I say that to you because

many times when we think about pastors and we think

about preachers, and we think about elders, this is what

we say. What can they preach, how do they visit?

Do they visit they go to the hospital? How are

they good about leading the staff? We think about when

we think about an effective, faithful pastor, we think first

about their duties and what they're called to do. Is

whereas Paul starts out today, and he doesn't say, hey,

when you call a pastor, and when you look for

a pastor, you must first look how good he preachers,

or how how good he is with pastoring, or how

good he is with the administrative duties. No, he says,

you must first look at his heart. You must look

at his holiness, How blameless is he, how buff approaches

he does, he does he preach, and does he live

what he preaches? Is his heart blameless and it's very

important for him for Paul above all else he's got

to be a blameless man of God. Why because he's

got to be a model. He can't be one who

stands in the bullpit and says one thing and goes

outside the church and does another. He needs to be

a model for the church. And it starts with him

being blameless. Secondly, or thirdly, I should say, he goes

into him being godly. He gives kind of four different

things here to kind of all up together, and these

all describe kind of this lifestyle of being godly. Listen

to what I says. Therefore, a receiver must be above reproach,

and a husband and one wife. I'll come back to

that one, but in just a minute. But he says,

look at these four here so reminded, self control, respectable, hospitable.

These four really give us an example of a model

of godliness. It is one who is blameless, but he

exhibits blamelessness. He exhibits that in being godly, he's godly

in his mind. Very first and foremost so reminded is

really windlessness, I guess are wineless. It means that his

mind is not clouded by taking a drink. Is it

was used metaphorically to mean he's he's alert, he's watchful,

he's he's aware, he's sensitive, he's wide awake. You think

of the imagery of he's windless, it means he's there's

nothing his mind to cloud his judgment. He's clear, thinking right,

and he's sober minded. He knows how to understand things.

He is he understands what's going around him. He is

clear in his understanding of those things. He's he's minded.

He's and I think it's important, as you think about

a pastor, of being blameless is important. He's blameless not

only his actions, but also in his mind, that he

is sob reminded. He's clear, he's aware. Second, the next

thing he says he is in this passive scripture is

sober minded. He's he's self controlled. The other qualification there

is is from the mind. It goes into our actions, right,

what we think is what we do. Not only is

he is he clear in his mind, but he's clear

in his actions. He's not a chaotic mind. Someone said

produces a chaotic life. Right. His life is well ordered.

He's he puts he's in control of different things, which

you think. See the next thing here, he is respectable.

I'm not if he's he's notly, so reminded. He's self controlled.

He controls his actions as well as he controls his mind.

He's respectable. The term could be described as orderly. It

means that he's organized in his thinking, is living, but

also is his teaching, is preaching. He's he's modest. It's

the same word here in orderly. Is that Paul used

in Firs Timothy None refer to a a woman's clothing.

It means that he is has things together. He's respectable.

He's looked at someone who is revered and respected in

the church. Not only that, I think it's important that

is the sober minded and always self control. And he's respectable,

but he's hospitable. Right, He's someone who is respectable and

he's self controlled, but he's someone who cares for other people.

I tell you, I have seen this and it makes

me cringe to see pastors who are all that. That

could be a great pastor, it could be great preachers,

but they have no desire to connect with others. I've

seen it. I think what breaks my heart probably more

than ever, as I've seen our students go to camp

and you have these speakers that sometimes are you know

they're maybe big pastors or speaking a lot of camps

and they're around it thousands of students at a time,

and hear the youth pastor who's speaking at the camp

will speak and they will really impact the life of

a child and a teenager, and that teenager will go

down at the bottom of the altar to speak to

the pastor, and the pastor doesn't have time of the

day for them. And I've seen that throughout many years

of ministries. And I think you've everything that you did

from the pulpit, you've lost in just not taking time

for an individual. A pastor is not only to be

one who's self controlled, its sober minded, and is respectable,

but as someone who cares for the concerns of his flock.

He's hospitable, He's a respective of a person. He's a

lover of strangers. He's not seen as someone that someone

opens up his life to others. I love Paul says

this and this Onians, I work with you, opened my

life to you. I taught you in your homes. He

one who shows compassion towards others not only is a

model of godliness, he's a model of the family and

that's where we'll come back to chapter two. I'm not

chapter two, verse two there, and he says he's above

approach the husband of one wife for the second time.

And I'm going to go through this very long. But

there are three different approaches to this. I will say,

I caution you here when we come to this one.

This one here sometimes has gotten more attention than any

of the others. There are three views here. What does

it mean to be a husband and one wife? Someone

just say, very simple, it means he's not divorced, he's

not been remarried. Some would say, no, polygamy. We know

polygamy was something we see in the Old Testament. And

someone would say, well, because this was a precedent that

said in the Old Testament, Paul is talking to Timothy

about he should not have more than one wife. I

think it's important for you understand at this time in

the New Testament time, you couldnot be a church member

of a church in a New Testament church and have

multiple wives. So it was something that was very frowned

upon at this time in the church. And so it's

very highly unlikely that Paul was talking about polygamy here,

because you just couldn't even be a church member for that.

It's nevertheless be a pastor. Some would say Paul's talking

about moral character a one woman man. It means that

he only has eyes for his wife. It means that

he's singlely devoted to his wife. He's a one one man.

It's not an issue of whether he's married or previous

marriage or divorce a widow. For some, it's the issue

of his attitude that he's singingly holy, devoted to the

woman who is his wife. I think it is very

important that we, when we come to this, understand that

because there are some people, I would say, who have

who've only been married to one woman. But it's not

a one woman man. What do you mean by that, pastor.

I've met many men, frankly, who've only been married to

their wife, but they have eyes for other women and

flirting and looking and lusting, and to me, according to this,

they're disqualified for being an elder pastor or a deacon.

Just because you're married to one woman doesn't mean that

you're committed to your wife. It needs to be a

pastor who exhibits he is a one woman man. He

is faithful to his wife. I want you to see here.

Not only is he to be faithful to his again,

it's a model, right. The church is looking to him

as an example. Well, what does it mean to be

a godly husband? Does it mean to have only eyes

for your wife? He's exhembited that. Not only did he

exhibit that, but look at verse four, verse four. It

talks further when he says he must manage his household

well with all dignity. Sorry, I'm sorry. He must manage

his household well with all dignity, keeping his children submissive.

For someone does not know how to manage his old household,

how will he care for God's sure? Should should he

be a model of a husband, He's also be a

model of a father. What does it mean to manage

his household? Well, he's to lead his family well spiritually.

He's to be the spiritual leader of his home for

his wife and also for his children. I think it's

important for you to understand Paul draws, and I'm going

to talk about this at the very end today. But

Paul is saying he's to be a model, right, He's

to be a role model for the church. So the

husband's in the church should look at the pastor and says,

you know, I will love my wife as the pastor

loves his wife. He only has eyes for her, he

only cares for I see how he leads her, and

I want to lead my wife the same way, and

only that he also should be the spiritual leader of

his home, that he should lead his family. Well, not

only don't want to model me being a husband like

he is, but I want to model my family as

he leads his family faithfully. He has to be a

model as a husband and a father. I think it's

important for you to understand, is you come just it's

a model? What does that mean? It's a model to

be repeated. It's a pattern to be repeated, meaning you

should also follow his example. You know you hear the story,

and I've told you this before. Some say that pastors

live in a glass house. Means that what does that mean, pastor?

A pastor lives in a glasshouse. It means he lives

in a house that is the walls. And it gets

metaphoric clear or clear in that everybody looks into the

house of the pastor and the examine everything the pastor does.

And I would say that's true. Everybody examines throughout my ministry.

They examine how I live my life, they examine how

my wife lives her life, they examine how my children

live their life. That's the way it's been my whole ministry.

Some say that's not fair. The pastor should not come

under that much scrutiny, he should not be raised to

that kind of pedestal. I would say I disagree, because

according to the Word of God, he is to be

a model for the church. And that is the calling

I knew. I call that God called me to, and

I pray every day that God holds me to that standard.

He's to be a model. He's to be a model

of the family. Want you see, he's to be a

model teacher. Three Chapter three, Verse two. Therefore and overceee

you must be above approach, hosband one wife's sober, minded, respectable,

hospital able to teach. He's to be a model teachers

if we teach the word of God. I want you

to just note here, as we look at these same qualifications,

I mean of these are going to repeat next week

as we look at deacons. But this is one that's different,

that's set apart, different than the deacon. The elders all

be teachers. Deacons will be servants, and we're going to

see that next week. And this is what sets elders

apart from deacons. Is there called to be the teachers

of the church to lead the church and the teaching

and instruction of the Word of God. Therefore they are

to be Scripture says able to teach. This gives not

only the understanding of the ability. They must have the

ability to teach the word of God, to rightly divide

God's word, to rightly understand God's word, the right, the right,

the ability to rightly interpret God's word. It also means

that they are to protect the church from false teaching.

They need to be able to teach, to be able

to deliver it faithfully, but they also must understand it

rightly in order to guard the church against false teaching.

Like what John MacArthur says about elders, he says elders

are wardens of the word. It means there are are warders.

They're protectors of God's Word and they are to guard

the church against the false teachings of the world. There

to be a model of teacher. John Wicklow said in

the fourth century about teaching. He says the highest service

that men may attain on earth is to preach the

word of God. This service falls peculiar to priests and pastors.

One of the highest callings that we as elders have

is to preach the word of God, to teach the

word of God, to know it. And that is a model.

They be model teachers. There be model of discipline. This

is what verse three says. Here in verse three he

gives many things that described here are descriptions of things

that you could fall in access of. These are things

that extreme cases of access. Let's look at there's not

a drunkard, not violent, not quarrelsome, not a lover much drink,

much violence, much fighting, much a love of money. All

these are excess of things, right, and so he's not

to be He's not to be this in any way.

He's to be what instead of a man of discipline,

he's disciplined in these areas. He's not a drunk, He's

not contentious. If you will, I'm not violent, but gentle.

He's not materialistic, right is the imagery here. Not a

lover of money, not quarrelsome is the idea of contentious.

He's not violent but gentle. This describes a man who

is disciplined to discipline himself against these areas of his life.

He's disciplined in his attitude. He's disciplined in his what

he values of material in this world. He's disciplined in

his actions and how he fights against arguments and not

being contentious. So he's a model of discipline. He's lastly,

he's a model of maturity. Look at this passage of scripture.

In verse six, he says he must not be a

recent convert, or he may be puffed up with conceit

and fall in condemnation of the devil. He's supposed to

be a model of maturity. The imagery there is that

he's not to be a new convert. He's someone who's

been a mature believer. And what's the reason why Paul

gets the reason why that he may not be puffed

up with Conceit is the imagery there that he could

be puffed up with pride if he's a young believer.

He's not mature. He could be prideful for his position

and then fall into temptation. You know, as we come

to this today, I want you to understand this is

a model for the church. Elders, pastors, teachers to be

a model. There are a model for you to follow,

you know. I remember being a young pastor of my

first church in Conway, South Carolina, and I remember working

with a youth leader one time there and we were

talking about I don't remember exactly what it was, but

we were talking about we had set a standard by

which our leaders should live, and we were trying to

tell our leaders like, hey, you're leading these teenagers. These

teenagers are watching what you do, your actions, what you say,

how you say it, what you're doing in your life,

personal life, they're watching. And so we asked them to

sign a leader's covenant saying, if I'm going to be

a youth leader at Hickor Grove Baptist Church, I will

agree to live my life according to these standards. And

I had one of a youth leaders kind of pushed

back and says, I'm not going to do that. I'm

not going to do that. I want to be a

youth leader, but you're not going to tell me how

to live my life. And I remember saying to her,

and this is what she said to me. She said,

that's okay for you, pastor, That's okay. For you. But

I'm not a pastor, so I don't have to do that.

I want to. I'm telling you that story because this

is what many times, this is my biggest fear for today.

My biggest fear today is you walk out of this place.

I say, and that was a good sermon for preachers. Yep,

that's good. I'm glad Jonathan's called to do that. I'm

glad he's called to be blameless. That's good. I hope

he keeps on doing that. You know. I'm really I'm

really glad God called him to be sober minded. I'm

really glad God called him to be a godly husband,

a godly father. I'm really glad God called Jonathan to

be respectable, self control, hospitable. I'm glad God called Jonathan

not to be a drunk and these different things. I'm

glad Jonathan. God called Jonathan to do that. But that's

not what God called me to do. This is not

for me, that's for him. No, no, no, no, understand this morning,

for Paul, the solution to false teaching is a godly pastor.

For Paul, the false teaching is not only a godly pastor,

but a godly church who follows our pastor and living

as he lives. You see that this is not just

a calling for me. This is a calling that i'm

to live that you might say, I want to live

like that God. I want to be the man of

God that you called me to be. I know, God,

I fall short in so many areas and God as

I fall short in so many different things. But God,

I want to be that godly man you call me be. God,

I want to be that godly woman you called me

to be. And I fall short. But Lord, you are

calling me to the holiness, to Godliness, because my life matters,

and my holiness matters to God. Blameless before God and

blameless for others matters to God. Lord, help me be godly.

Will you pray with me this morning? Lord, We thank

you Lord for your word. Today. Lord, as a seventeen

year old boy on a Sunday morning or Sunday evening, God,

I knew you were calling me. Lord. I had so

many things in my life at that time that were

not honoring you, God, and I had no idea how

you would work in me. But Lord, that day you

called me to surrender my will to yours. Lord, I

thank you Lord for that you're still working on me. Lord,

I pray that as the pastor, but that's the Baptist Church. God,

I would be the model that you called me to be. Now.

I would lead my life well and from this pool pit.

But outside this poolpit, God, I need your spirits work

of sanctification in me. But Lord, not only do we

need it as a church. God, you call us all

to be godly holy above reproach. So Lord, help us

as a church body the Father. Lord, your word, your

model you're calling or I pray you for this time

of invitation. I pray you'd lead us to respond to

the Lord your word now. Or if some need to

come to this alter and pray, I pray maybe they

just come and lay down some things before you say, God,

today I need your help to be that godly husband,

to be that godly dad. Some would say, God, I'm

really having struggle with my temper, I'm having struggle in

this area or whatever it may be. I pray it

would be those who'd be honest with you, God, and

what confess their sense before you, and know that Lord,

You're faithful to forgive us when we confess. So Lord,

I pray this that you lead us that we might

lay there's things that you're this altar, if that's what

you cost to do, or if I can pray for

some Lord, I pray you'd lead us to respond to you. Now, Lord,

we love you. We thank you Lord for today. We

thank you Lord for this church, this ministry, this calling,

this body. Lord, it is that active body. And I

thank you Lord for just the community that we have here.

The Lord is so special, and we thank you Lord

for your work here. Lord. May you continue to do

something here in this place. In your name. We pray, Amen,

you know, to