E13 - The Pastoral Epistles: Biblical Ministers & Biblical Ministry - Properly caring for the family of God: Part 1

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learn from God's Word together. If you would like more

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Amen. May that be our prayers as we

live our life. Glorify Your name and me and

every thought and in every deed. May we take that principle as we

learn the Word of God today and as we apply it.

May it not just be something that we do for the sake of doing

it. May we actually study the Word

of God and then leave here and apply it that God would receive

glory and honor and praise through our lives.

Give your Bibles if you would turn to First Timothy chapter 5,

1 Timothy 5 · chapter mention

First Timothy chapter 5 as we continue walking through this

1 Timothy 5 · chapter mention

pastoral epistle known as First Timothy, as we continue to look

at biblical ministers and biblical ministry and how is

this supposed to look according to the word of God?

We come to a little. Mini series portion of this

text, and I want to begin this morning with this section

entitled Properly Caring for the Family of Gods is the first part

of this, as you will see in the next few weeks.

But Paul has just instructed Timothy to stand up and to lead

the church and and to serve as an example to all the people

there in Ephesus. And he commands him to not let

anyone look down on you because you're young, or to despise you

for that. Fact.

And he's now. Going to instruct him how this

is to be done. How can you keep those people

from looking down on you? And he's already told him to be

an example in life and love and speech and in purity.

Paul's going to get a little. More specific here this morning.

And that's what I want to do. I want us to get to the

specifics of this. And Paul is going to use an

analogy that's used throughout Scripture to compare the church,

and that is the analogy of the church and the family.

And he's going to compare the two.

And he's going to teach us from that viewpoint.

And when we learn to view the church, the body of Christ, as a

family, we we're then really viewing the body of Christ as

the Scriptures would have us to do at a church, that family

being made-up of fathers and mothers and brothers and

sisters. If we see the.

Reality of that and if we apply that property properly, it's

going to cut down on a lot of sin and a lot of dysfunction and

disharmony in the church because this principle is not being

taught nor accepted very often anymore, right?

We, we live in the mega church age where people come in, they

don't want to be seen. They don't want to have any

relationship with anybody. They come, they sit on the back

row, they leave before the service is over, never having

any familial interaction with the family of God.

They shouldn't be that way. And so Paul is going to instruct

Timothy on the proper care for God's family first, seeing it as

a true family and seeing the actual sections of the family

properly and how a leader ought to approach these things, how a

leader ought to approach caring for those older men and

correcting those older men and caring and counselling and.

Caring for those. Older women and, and the younger

men as well as the younger women, he's going to include all

of this. And so let's just jump right in

today and let's read this First Timothy chapter 5 as we begin

1 Timothy 5 · chapter mention

our journey on learning to properly care for the family of

God. He says this.

He says do not rebuke an older man harshly, but exhort him as

if he were your father. See the parallel that he's

making there? He says, treat younger men as

brothers, older women as mothers, and younger women as

sisters with absolute purity. Let's pray together.

Father, in the name of Jesus, we come to you.

We thank you for your word. We thank you that your word is

clear, that your word is concise.

Lord, I pray today as we see this lesson, that the clarity of

this lesson would cause us to be obedient to the things that we

see both as leaders and as lay people.

As this lesson is laid out for us in these two verses.

God, I pray through it you would be glorified and your church

would be what you desire for her to be that family operating

properly for your glory. And when I pray for that person

who's here, who's lost, who's not in Christ, who's not yet

surrendered to him as Lord and Savior, being forgiven of their

sin and reconciled to God the Father, I pray that they

understand that they are not a part of this family.

In fact, they are alienated and isolated from this family

because of their sin. And I pray that you make known

to them in the depths of their being just how sinful they truly

are and how in need of Christ they are now today, by your

spirit, you would draw them out of darkness and into your

marvellous light, bringing to them salvation, forgiveness of

sin, and promised eternal life. To those who believe God, we

thank you for this time. We thank you for your word and

how you're going to instruct us and how you're going to teach us

and how you're going to change us and set us apart for your

glory. We give you all the praise for

it now in Jesus name, Amen. So Paul instructing in these two

verses the proper care for God's family and how that will

actually be displayed. You all know this.

It's it's not enough just to say.

That you care. You have to show that you care.

And he begins like this. He says that we are to show

gentle encouragement for the older men.

Watch verse 1. He says do not rebuke an older

man harshly. Now what he doesn't say, he

doesn't say do not rebuke an older man, do not correct an

older man. He doesn't say do not lead an

older man. He says when you do rebuke an

older man, there is a proper way in doing this.

He says do not do it harshly, but exhort him as if he were

your father. It's about the approach that

Paul wants Timothy to take. He wants him to approach the

older men in the church as if they were his own father.

Again, Paul is going to use in these two verses 4 familial

terms. Here he chooses the term father.

He is relating the church now, relationships within the church

with the relationships inside of the family.

That's why we can confidently say that as a church, we are the

family of God. And in the family of God there

are those older men, and those older men are to be viewed as

our fathers. In the faith, respect them, show

them the respect that they are due.

This is not a new idea, is it in fact, Paul?

Knows that this is not a new idea, and he knows how effective

this analogy will be. When Timothy hears it, he's

going to say, OK, I know exactly how I am to respond and to react

to the fathers, the older men in the church.

And Timothy knew this because he knew the word of God, and he

knew that the word of God commands that we are to honor

our fathers and our mothers. And so Paul quickly grabs a hold

of this, and he wants Timothy to understand how important it is

that even when we have to rebuke, because that is the

direct context of this rebuking and correcting and counseling.

And don't we know that Scripture is useful for all that, for

correcting, rebuking, rebuking for teaching and for training

and righteousness? And he's telling Timothy to use

this idea of your father to keep your mind right when you have

to, and sometimes your mouth when you have to rebuke those

who are older than you. And the church.

Remember, he's just spoken to him about don't let people look

down on you because you're young.

Now, if you don't want people to look down on you because you're

young, you can't go around harshly rebuking the elderly.

It's not going to work out for you.

And so gentle encouragement in this context would be this,

avoid disrespect and avoid disrespect completely.

If you're going to gently encourage older men, you have to

go into it with that mindset. I am not going to disrespect

this man because that would be equivalent to me disrespecting

my earthly father. Now, I know we live in a time

and in a culture where when we disrespect earthly fathers, it's

no longer a big deal. But can I just tell you this?

In the Hall House where I grew up, when you disrespected your

earthly father, it was a big deal.

There were consequences. And you know what?

I wish, I wish families would bring back the consequences of

disrespecting their earthly father, that they would view his

position properly. Why?

So that when we get to the context of the Church, we now

view those older Christians as our fathers properly.

So we approached them even in correcting them, avoiding any

disrespect at all. Remember Paul didn't say don't

rebuke them, don't correct them. He said don't do it in a harsh

manner, don't do it harshly. It should be done with the

utmost respect, as if you are approaching your elderly father,

and you should respect him and show that respect even in your

correction, even in your rebuke. Let us avoid any disrespect.

In order to do that, what do we have to do?

We. We have to show and to have an

attitude of humble respect for the elderly men in the church.

I know this is a foreign concept to so many, right, because so

many churches have fallen into the trap of making themselves

attractive for the younger generation.

And then you have a church full of young people who know

nothing, who have no wisdom, who haven't lived life long enough

to that you could glean any insight from them.

You say, well, Kirk, what do you know about that?

I know about that. I pastored a church full of

young people before it was difficult.

Why? Because there was a an absence

of wisdom that comes from someone just simply being a

little bit older, but also being a little bit older and mature in

the Lord. And so we have to approach these

men in the church with respect for their position, who they

are. Leviticus 19 speaks about having

respect for the elderly in verse 30.

Two, it says. Stand up in the presence of the

aged, show respect for the elderly, and Revere your God.

And he says, I am the Lord. Now let me show you what God

just did right there. He put respecting the elderly in

the same sentence as revering your God.

Why is that so important for us to understand?

It's important because when you disrespect the elderly, you

disrespect God in a sense. Why?

Because He has told you to give them full respect.

So we need to see the seriousness of that and to avoid

any disrespect toward them at all, right?

They may not be able to walk like they once walked.

They may be slower in mobility, they may be slower in speech,

but they are far more worthy, because of their age, of our

respect in the Word of God. God himself demands that we

respect them, so avoid any disrespect toward them at all

First, Peter, 55, says. In the same way, you who are

younger submit yourself to your elders.

Now, he doesn't say the elders. He's not talking about the

elders of the church, the presbyters.

He's talking about older men and he's talking about gaining

wisdom from older men. I can tell you this, most of my

close friends in this world are older than me and that is on

purpose. I learned a long time ago by

reading through the Proverbs that if I walk with the wise I

will grow wise, but if I walk with fools I will become a fool.

I'm thankful for the men and the men of God that God has put in

my life to teach me that I may glean wisdom from them.

However, if I would have approached them with some

haughty know it all attitude, I would have never learned

anything from them. And so I have to show humble

respect for the elderly men in this church.

As the leader of this church, I pray that you would hold me to

that. Why?

Because anything else is of my own pride.

And, and we know first Peter continues in in verse 5 of

chapter 5. God opposes the proud, but he

shows favor to the humble. May we, as younger men, humble

ourselves before those older men.

Giving them the utmost respect, avoiding any disrespect toward

them, even if we are correcting and rebuking and training them,

May we show them the same honor that we would show to our

earthly fathers. And we show them the same

obedience that God requires in Exodus 20, verse 12 when He says

Exodus 20:12

to honor our earthly fathers, may we honor the older men in

this church as our fathers. Now I can tell you this, I

didn't always fully practice what I'm preaching right here.

In fact, I was unaware of the magnitude of this teaching when

I was a young minister. I was 21 years old.

I knew everything as all 21 year olds do.

I was God's gift to ministry. And all those older people

should just shut up and listen to me because they they've

already expired. They've got nothing to offer.

I remember in a deacon's meeting in a Baptist Church, our pastor

was casting his vision for the next thing that God would have

us to do as a church, or so we thought.

We had a meeting with the leadership of the church and one

of the elderly leaders in the church stood up and basically

said, pastor, we don't think this is a good angry.

And I still to this day don't think that those men were right.

But it wasn't my place to correct them or to rebuke them

harshly. I just simply took that upon

myself and I stood up in that meeting and I, as the know it,

all 21 year old that I was, got up and I harshly corrected that

old man, that outdated carton of milk who was no longer useless,

useful. I corrected helmet in an

inappropriate, unbiblical manner.

I said, who do you think you are?

Trying to decide for this church what they're supposed to do.

You need to listen to your pastor.

And that's disrespectful to him. And I sat down and

unfortunately, that man probably never ever respected me again.

If if he had ever respected me, which he probably shouldn't

have. Little did I know I ruined I

ruined her or hindered that relationship that I could have

had with this man. I remember that next Monday

morning I came to church and I got there and soon as I got to

the office the secretary buzzes me and says the pastor, Brother

Brown, would like to see you in his office.

I thought, yeah, he's about to give me a high 5 because I stood

up for him in that deacons meeting when they were running

all over him. And I walked in that office and

he said just like this, sit down young man.

I sat down and he actually pointed me to this passage of

scripture to which I'm very thankful that he did because I

was young and stupid and didn't know a thing.

And he said, do you see? We're not to rebuke an older man

harshly. You did more harm than you did

good. He said I don't need you to

defend me. God and his word will defend me.

I don't need you to fight my fights.

And I learned that day or I began to learn the importance of

not rebuking an older man harshly.

Then I had to avoid any disrespect for those who are

fathers to us in the Lord. I have to show them honor and I

can't have a haughty attitude towards them in my pride because

God detests that. In fact, Proverbs 30 verse 17

Proverbs 30:17

says the eye that mocks a father that scorns an aged mother will

be pecked out by the Ravens of the valley, will be eaten by the

vultures. What is God saying there?

There's consequence when you disrespect those.

Who are fathers in the Lord? Just as there are consequences

when you disrespect your earthly fathers.

Instead, what we ought to do, we ought to value their wisdom.

We ought to see it for what it's worth.

We had to look at every older man in this church and we ought

to ask ourselves, what can I gain?

And what can I glean from someone who has had more years

on this earth, more years walking with Christ, than I ever

could begin to think about having?

What can I gather from them? Job says this in Job 12/12.

He says it's not wisdom found among the aged.

Does not long life bring understanding?

He's asking rhetorical questions.

We know that it does. Those of you who have lived 40

years longer than I have, you have 40 years more of wisdom.

And for me to take the attitude of you're just old and dumb and

I'm young and smart is for me to air and me to disrespect God and

his word and me to disrespect those who God has given to us as

a church to be fathers. And guides and leaders for us in

the area of. Wisdom and so we have to avoid.

Disrespect. When we do confront or rebuke or

counsel, we should admonish gently.

Again, Paul's not saying that an older man shouldn't receive

correction. He's not deserving of

correction. He's simply saying there is a

proper way of doing this. There's a proper way that you

can give a sound counsel and a gentle, non threatening manner.

Colossians 46 says let your conversation be always full of

grace, seasoned with salt so that you may know how to answer

everyone. It is about gently conversing,

giving sound direction and sound counsel in a way that is non

threatening, non obtrusive, not disrespectful, but God honoring

Second Timothy 2. Verse 24 says, And the Lord's

servant must not be quarrelsome, but must be kind to everyone,

kind to everyone. You know what that means as a

pastor and as the pastors of this church, the elders of this

church. We are responsible to be kind to

everyone, to the smallest child in the nursery and to the eldest

person that we may have to help out to their car every Sunday.

We are to show kindness and respect and when we have.

To correct, we are to do that with the same kindness and

gentleness, never treating them as if they're stupid or

insignificant as members of Christ's body.

Don't we see that far too often in the church, right when the

elderly get to a certain point where seemingly they have

nothing to offer the Lord? And it's not that they don't

have anything to offer the Lord. They just can't offer the same

things that they once offered in their youth.

They can offer so much more in the area of wisdom and guidance.

So many times in the church. When they get to that point,

they become to us insignificant and useless.

And you know what? They're already struggling with

that to some degree anyways, aren't they?

Right. The older man who could at one

time do many things that he can no longer do, someone has to

help him get dressed, someone has to help him get to the car.

Someone has to help him get out. Or a quick to say that that

person doesn't have a place in the Kingdom of God if we're not

careful. However, what Paul is saying is

they have a very important place in the Kingdom of God and you

need to gently encourage these older men.

You need to modest them and encourage them even if you have

to. Correct them.

Let me just tell you, there's nothing more difficult to deal

with than a cantankerous old man.

It's true, and there's an easy fix from both sides.

Don't be cantankerous. And if someone is cantankerous,

don't give them that in return. Give them gentle rebuke.

Admonish them gently because there's too much of this going

on in the church. When you handle it correctly,

you know what you do, you evade any further controversy, any

further anger, any more division that could happen.

You approach it the way that you should.

You actually strive for unity and you promote unity.

And is that not what we're supposed to do as leaders in the

church? We are to to promote unity.

That that is part of our job. That is a very important part of

our job. And what you don't want to do is

you don't want to cause dissension because you speak to

an older man harshly. Even if you are correcting them

and rebuking them. There's a way to do it.

How? Proverbs 15, one very simple.

A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up

anger. If I learned anything in law

enforcement, I learned how true that scripture right there is.

We apply it in our lives, right? I would get on scene, someone's

upset, they want to fight everybody.

They're mad, they don't, they don't want to go back to jail.

This is about to be a bad situation.

And you know what I learned? Instead of running up there and

telling them that I'm the police and they better do what I say,

when I would see they were out of control, when they were in

their emotions, I would walk up and say, hey, man, are you

having a bad day today? Why don't you tell me what's

going on, man? We're, we're going to get this

all sorted out. Everything's going to be fine in

the end. Just calm down, dude.

There's no sense in any of us getting upset.

You know what I learned very quickly?

A gentle answer turns away Wrath.

So. When you have to confront even

the elderly in the church, that old man, that cantankerous old

man, confront him gently so that there's not any further

escalation. Because right, many times we

approach a situation and the situation is escalated and then

we jump in there and we escalate it more with our attitude or our

words. The best thing to do is, hey,

man, let's just calm down. We're all on the same team here.

And for the sake of Christ, we're going to handle this like

Christians. We're going to handle this like

men of God. Let's talk about this.

Let's work this out. And there's no sense in any one

of us getting upset. And when we're done, we're going

to pray and we're going to unite in Christ and we're going to let

this be the end of this. May we see the older men of the

body of Christ as fathers, and we're to honor and we're to

respect even while we're rebuking and correcting them.

He moves on secondly, using the second term to describe the

family he's talking about, the young men here and concern for

young men he says treat younger men as brothers.

So, he says gently encourage the older men as our.

Fathers, but then treat younger men as brothers.

When I think about brothers I I think of how many times in life

I desire to have a brother. I always thought it would be

cool. I was sandwiched in between two

sisters and I always thought it would be cool to.

Have a little brother so that I could teach him the ropes right

so that I could pick on him and then I could beat other people

up who tried to pick on him and say I can pick up my brother but

you can't. But I never had the privilege of

saying that or doing that. But I, I have been able to

observe families that are brother rich and, and, and I

what I mean by that, they're full of young boys and I'm very

thankful. For the Macmillan family and I'm

going to. Embarrass them right now.

Brad is even here and I'm I'm thankful for him because he's a

good Big Brother. Now watch him he he will line

his pesky little brothers out very quickly, but he will also

defend them just as quickly when someone else comes after them.

Of course, I'm only talking about playground stuff.

They're not gangster, but I love to see that.

I love to see that brotherly love.

It gives me insight into how I am to love the young men of this

church as a pastor and how we as pastors and leaders in the

church are to do the same, to relate to them with real

compassion. I think that's important,

especially, again, this is in the context of possibly

correcting or rebuking or giving wise counsel to these younger

men. And we have to see them as

brothers. And and in.

Order to be a good brother, you have to relate to your younger

brothers with compassion. Remember what it was like when

you were in their? Shoes so, so often we forget

that, don't we? We get a little older and a

little wiser and we forget what it was like to be that young man

way back when. We have to, we have to

recollect, recollect the the difficult struggles of being a

young man, right? The lusts of our youth, so

quickly we forget about that right We just look at the

younger generation and we say man, what is wrong with this

younger generation? Let me help all of you older

wiser people, same thing that was wrong with you.

Their propensity to sin it may come out in different.

Flavors, it may have different takes in our culture now, but

it's still the same. And So what do we have to do?

And those of us who are leading in the church and having the

proper concern and compassion. For the young men in our church,

we have to view them as brothers in need of someone to to nudge

them along and to help them through the same struggles that

just a few years ago you were. Going through the same

temptations, the same battles were to help them, Colossians 3

Colossians 3:12

verse 12 says. This, therefore, is God's chosen

people, wholly and dearly loved. Clothe yourself with compassion,

kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. 13 says.

Bear with each other and forgive one another.

If any of you has a grievance against someone, forgive as the

Lord forgave you. And over all these.

Virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect

unity. Now, if that's instructions that

Paul's giving to the church at Colossae, in general, those are

instructions that fall upon us in viewing our younger brothers

in Christ, the younger brothers in the church.

We are too. Clothe ourselves with compassion

and kindness and humility and gentleness and patience.

I told you before that I pastored a church full of young

people. It required great patience.

Why? Because they are learning how to

live. They are learning how to live

life, and they are learning how to live the Christian life.

And we have to be very careful when someone is learning this.

Just as that Big Brother does with his little brother.

Just a few years ago, Big Brother was struggling with the

same thing. He can't just slap little

brother in the back of the head and tell him how stupid he is.

Big Brother can now take the role of leadership in his life

and he can show them this is the way to do this better.

Let me help you out. Let me have some compassion on

you and where you are. Let me encourage you without

condemning you. 1st Thessalonians 511 and Ephesians

429. They both speak of building our

brothers up through encouragement.

Where's this in the church? It is.

It is almost non existent in many churches.

I'm thankful it's not here. I get to see it all the time.

I get to see the older men in this church encouraging the

younger men as brothers, and it is encouraging to me as a

pastor. But so many times we see the

opposite of that right? The older men in the church, the

leaders in the church, often looking down upon those young

men in their struggles instead of encouraging them to be what

Christ died for them to be and desires for them to be.

So in order to do this, we have to resist the urge of being

overbearing or self-righteous, especially those of us who are

leaders. I can tell you this.

When we go through the pastoral epistles, as as you have seen,

I'm preaching to myself a lot, and that's OK.

I preach. I preach to you guys all the

time. Thank you for letting me preach

to myself for a moment, but I have to be.

Very careful so that I don't become overbearing or over

righteous, my approach to these young men.

But I can still maintain what Ephesians 42 says to be

completely humble and gentle. Be patient again, bearing with

one another in love, just as we saw him say there in Colossians,

humble and gentle. If we're going to truly show

concern for the young men, we have to relate to them with

compassion. And we can't have compassion

until we walk in humility. So I would encourage all who are

in any place of leadership to see these young men as their

brothers and to do what Scripture has pointed us to do,

resisting theirs to be too overbearing, too self-righteous,

but approach them in truth coupled with love.

Does that know what scripture tells us to do?

Ephesians 4-5 to tell the truth in love.

Now I know the trendy thing to do now in the church is to be

bold. And there is a.

Lack of boldness. I'll be the first one to tell

you that. But I want to also make very

clear to all of us this morning, boldness does not have to be

brutality. I can be bold and I can tell my

younger brother in the faith, the truth, and love, and I don't

have to beat him up in doing it. I can simply come alongside of

him and say this right? I'd have to get honest and

transparent, and I'm OK with that, though many people aren't.

Hey brother, not too terribly long ago I struggled with this

same thing. If you don't mind, can I share

with you how the Lord showed me and how He empowered me to

overcome this struggle? You know what?

That's non threatening, isn't it?

That's not brutality, that's actually using some wisdom to

help. Care to show compassion for your

younger brother in Christ? Approach them.

Truth and love. Here's the truth.

I'm going to do it in a manner that's loving and compassionate

to you. Again, boldness does not have to

be brutality and I wish people would understand that.

You can be bold without being brutal, but you must learn to

tell the truth in love. We must do this with our younger

brothers, those young men, if we're truly concerned for them.

Treating younger men, as Paul says, as brothers, relate to

them with compassion. Secondly, we see this about the

younger brother. Redirect them with care.

They need redirection. But use wisdom and how you do

this. Use wisdom and how you correct

them and how you rebuke them. It's crucial that you do.

Why? Because if you don't use wisdom,

you will actually drive them away from the church.

You will actually drive them away from the family of God.

You will offend them and you will in fact, at times embitter

them. Proverbs 2512 says like an.

Earring of gold, or an ornament of fine gold, is the rebuke of a

wise judge to a listening. Ear a wise judge.

We're to be those wise judges to those younger men, those

brothers in Christ. We're to give them wisdom that

they value, wisdom that they value.

That can help them and carry them through whatever situation

they're in. Now, you may say I don't have a

whole lot of wisdom. Well, the good news for you is

James says if you lack wisdom, ask and God will give you the

wisdom that you need. When that younger brother is in

need of wisdom and perhaps you don't feel that you possess that

wisdom, go to God in prayer. God, I know that you've promised

to give wisdom where wisdom is lacking.

Lord, I admit I lack wisdom. Give me wisdom from your word

that I may instruct and encourage my younger brother in

the faith, redirecting them with the proper care, being careful.

Please listen to me, being careful never to belittle them

or act as if you've never been in their shoes or if you are

above stumbling in the same manner.

Never, ever act like that. That is nothing but pride.

Never talk to them as if they are stupid.

Never make them feel small. Let them know that we are all

tempted with sin and there are occasions when we fall to sin

and redirect them with the same care that you would want to

receive if you were being redirected from your temptation

or from your sin. Galatians 6 verse one says

brothers and sisters, if someone is caught in a sin, you who live

by the Spirit should restore that person gently.

Gently, but watch yourselves, or you also may be tempted.

Carry each other's burdens, and in this way you will fulfill the

law of Christ. What is the law of Christ?

Love the Lord you got all your heart, soul, mind and strength.

Love your neighbor as yourself. He's saying to us, when we see

that brother who is caught in sin, we ought not to glory in

the fact that they're caught in sin.

And perhaps it's a sin that you've never been caught in and

you need to stop. And you need to humbly thank God

that you weren't caught in the same sin, because you know full

well that you were tempted with it.

And then to come back and to. Gently, as Scripture says,

gently restore that person. Lead that person out of sin by

the power of the Holy Spirit living in you, carrying his

burden, just like that big brother's going to carry the

burden of that little brother. Carry his burden, he says.

In this way you'll fulfill the law of Christ.

You'll show that you love the Lord your God with all your

heart, soul, mind, and strength. And you love your neighbor as

yourself because you're willing to bear with them when they're

burdened, always taking the greatest care and the greatest

concern for their soul, leading them out of their sin, leading

them out of their struggles, pointing them to Jesus over and

over and over again. How many times should we point

to this? Struggling brother to Christ.

I don't know how many times if your younger brother was about

to walk off a Cliff, would you point him the other direction?

This. The answer is simple, isn't it?

Until he gets it. Until he turns around and if he

refuses to turn around, you grab him and you drag him back until

he understands. That's how we're to treat the

younger brothers in the church, always taking the greatest care

and the concern for their soul because we don't at the end of

the day know exactly where they are spiritually.

James 5 speaks on this verse 19. My brothers and sisters, if one

of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring

that person back, remember this. Whoever turns a Sinner from the

error of their way will save them from death and cover over a

multitude of sin. Remember in dealing with these.

Professing believers that we see as brothers, we could

potentially by being that Big Brother to them, we could

potentially rescue them eternally.

Now we know this, that ultimately Jesus is the one who

rescues us, but it is our duty to continually point them to

Christ, to continually remind them that yes, maybe you have

felt 1000 time. But God's grace is sufficient,

Brother, I'm going to help you back up.

We're going to get back up, and we're going to keep marching

forward. We're going to keep our eyes

fixed on Jesus, the author and the perfector of our faith

together. You never want to push them

away. You never want to push them away

by embittering them, looking down on them, making them feel

as if they can never get it right for you to continually

urge them toward Christ with the greatest encouragement and care

that you can give them. I pray that we care about our

brothers and nothing. Again, I know that much of this

sermon I am preaching to the choir.

Much of these things we already do, and we already do them well.

And here's the thing, we can never settle for that.

We can never say, OK, we're just going to become complacent.

We have to keep thinking on these thing nurturing that

younger brother. So Paul covers here concern for

young men, gentle encouragement for the older men.

And now as we continue in verse 2, Paul's going to transition to

the females in the church. And he says this in verse two,

older women as mothers. Here's how you ought to care.

For and to view the older women in the church and he says

mothers, this is our relationship to the older women

in the church. He begins with older women,

again using that analogy of a mother and a mother who deserves

honor and respect. That is what we are to give them

in the church, honor and respect toward the older women.

This is our Third Point and that third familial relationship that

we're talking about that Paul is discussing here.

Proverbs 2322 says listen to your father who gave you life,

and do not despise your mother when she is old.

Do not despise your mother when she is old.

Now we know that it's talking about our earthly mother, but in

what Paul is teaching here to Timothy, who will then teach

this to the Ephesians, he is talking about mothers within the

church, those older women. Now we are to.

View them with that kind of honor and respect, the same

honor and respect that we have for our earthly mothers now.

I know. Again, just as the fathers and

our day and culture, it's hard for us to understand because we

don't see that as a position of respect, right?

But it is many people. Have forgotten the position of

mother as a position of honor. You would not be here without

her. Be thankful for that.

If for no other reason, she deserves that honor.

And here's how we're to approach the older women in the church

with honor and respect, seeing them as our mothers.

And I can tell you this, I didn't have a great relationship

with my earthly mother. My earthly mother was not a

follower of Christ, My knowledge.

Other than maybe a mere profession, I didn't have a

great relationship with her. But I am.

Thankful for the mothers that God has raised up in my life, in

the churches that I have been a part of, those ladies who I have

been able to honor and to respect as my own mothers.

Those ladies who have. Cared for me and cared for my

family and poured in to us far more than they should.

What I mean by that is there was a time in Arkansas where I

started a lemon icebox pie competition and it cost me about

£25, right? Because those mothers in the

church and one of them made me a lemon icebox pie and I am either

a lemon icebox or a Key Lime guy.

I don't like a whole lot of sweet.

Stuff I like a tart pie, so that's just for free.

But this lady made me a lemon icebox pie and I told her I made

a mistake and I said that was the best lemon icebox pie that I

had ever had. Now, the mistake was not a lie

because I didn't lie to her. It really was.

But she went back, obviously, and told the other ladies in the

church that Pastor Kirk likes lemon icebox pie.

And he told me that I made the best one that he had ever had.

So you know what happened to all the moms in that church?

They were going to prove otherwise.

So I received. An abundance of lemon icebox

pies and felt that often at times forced to lie, though I

never did. But there was a lot of pressure

to tell all of them that theirs was better than the last.

However, in that I saw the love and the kindness and the care.

Those mothers in the church who would just bake a pie or cook a

pie or whatever you do with a pie, I guess you bake it.

I would bake a pie and give that to me and to my family.

Sometimes I would share. And I began to value them and to

see them as mothers because there were times where I would

pray for my own mom when she was still alive and I could have a

godly mom and a mom who loved Christ.

I never got to see that, and I'm OK with that.

Lord has healed me. I have come to grips with that.

But you know what? One day I came to this, that

where my earthly mother was deficient, God was sufficient

and he gave me many mothers. And I'm thankful for that.

I'm thankful for those of you who are here who are older than

me in life and in faith that you do serve that role in my life.

And I pray that I would honor you and I would respond to you

even when I have to correct you. Then I would respond to you

properly in tenderness because that's what the scriptures

require of us. If I'm going to honor you and

respect you as my mother in the church, I have to respond in

tenderness. Do the respect that you deserve

that. And that is how I ought to come

to you even when I am having to correct you, right?

Maybe there's a theological difference or there is a an

issue of sin in your life. And from time to time, we as

pastors just have to do this undertaking.

We have to correct others. May we do it wisely.

May we do it as we respond in tenderness, due to the honor

that the older women in this church deserve and that older

women in general deserve. He says see them.

As mothers and honor them just as you would honor your earthly

mother. God thinks this is important.

In fact, it is the command that he gives.

Honor your father and your mother that your days may be

long upon the earth. It's the command that is

attached to a promise. So that command applies in our

familial relationships in the church if we're to show proper

respect to everyone as Peter commands us to do in First Peter

1 Peter 2:17

chapter 2, verse 17, this surely applies to the older women in

our congregation, those mothers who pour into us and who love

us. We should show them that love

and that honor and that respect in return.

Paul exemplifies this, doesn't he?

If you think back with me to Philippians, when we went

through Philippians verse by verse not too terribly long ago,

and we saw in chapter 4 a little discrepancy that was going on

between two women, Yoda and Senta Key.

And there in Philippians chapter 4, Paul actually shows us how we

Philippians 4 · chapter mention

can respond in tenderness even when there's conflict and

there's a need for correction. He says, Therefore, my brothers

and sisters, you whom I love and the Lord and love and long for

my joy and crown, stand firm in the Lord.

In this way, dear friends, I plead with Yodia and I plead

with Sentaki to be of the same mind in the Lord.

Yes, and I ask you, my true companion, help these women,

since they have contended at my side in the cause of the gospel,

along with Clement and the rest of my Co workers whose names are

in the book of life. You see what Paul does there?

He responds in complete tenderness to the fact that

these two ladies. Are causing dysfunction and

disharmony in the church. And you know what he reminds

them of? We're all on the same team here.

He reminds them that you're a Co laborers in Christ with me.

You're Co laborers in Christ with me and with Clement, with

those there at the church, at Philippi.

There's no need for this division.

So he shows honor and he shows respect while correcting them.

What wisdom we can glean from that.

He corrects them while at the same time being tender and kind

and gracious to them. We are to respond in tenderness,

and we are to reflect God's grace as we honor and respect.

The older women in the church as our mothers, what does it mean

when we show them grace to to graciously honor them above

ourselves again, So often we think that then they're old,

they don't matter. They're not not contributing

much. They're insignificant.

We forget what God tells us to do.

He tells us in Romans chapter 12, verse 10 to be devoted.

Romans 12:10

To one another in love. Honor one another above

yourselves, even if that one another is an elderly woman in

the church. Love her and show honor and

respect to her, just like you would your earthly mother.

You can bet Timothy, who received this, who had a

grandmother and a mother who loved him.

Paul's already testified to that in his writings.

You can bet this meant something to him.

That I am to love these women at Ephesus, to honor and to respect

them like I honor my mother who raised me and raised me to know

Christ and to know the word of God, showing them grace,

constantly treating them as Jesus said what the golden rule,

the way you want to be treated in Matthew Chapter 7, verse 12.

Matthew 7:12

Do everything. Do it to others in everything.

What you would have them do to you.

This sums up the law and the profits.

Everything you do. Treat people the way you want to

be treated. Now I know this when I'm old, I

don't want treat people treating me as if I'm insignificant and

can no longer contribute. You already feel like that on

your own to some degree anyways, the older that you get.

I know instead what we ought to do as they age.

We ought to grow in our honor and our respect toward them,

offering them grace upon grace upon grace, exemplifying God's

goodness to the body of Christ. Relations 610.

He says, Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to

all people, even the elderly, even the elderly women, seeing

them as our mothers. He says especially to those who

belong to the family of believers, especially in the

church, especially here, Paul says to honor and respect and to

show that honor and respect toward older women.

We are to view the older women in the church as mothers.

Our perspective is right that will allow us to give to them

the proper honor and respect that they deserve.

Why do they deserve it? Because God says it is a

position of respect and go back all the way to to, to Exodus

Exodus 20:12

chapter 20 verse 12. He doesn't say honor your mother

and father. If they do honorable thing he

says honor them. And the same goes in the church.

We're to honor the older women in this church as our own

mother. Lastly, Paul will here complete

the family order in the church. He says verse 2, the second part

and younger women as sisters. He says view the older women as

mothers and the younger women as sisters with absolute purity.

So he has said. Be gentle as you encourage the

older men. Show concern for the younger men

as if they were your younger brothers.

Give honor and respect to the older women.

And now he's saying have moral purity toward younger women.

Paul now turns to this category of the younger woman, and he

uses this term absolute purity. You know what Paul's saying?

He's saying see them as women with all of their femininity and

all of their emotional weaknesses, acknowledge them as

women, as sisters, and have 0 inclination or thought as

pertaining to them sexually. Now, I know that there are many

churches who they're not even going to entertain even

discussing this portion of the scripture here.

They're going to somehow figure out a way to jump over it.

We're not going to do that. That's why I love about

expository teaching. You get to it.

You have to preach it. Here it is.

What is he saying? That you have to view the

younger women in the church from a morally pure mindset?

He gives instruction on how to do that.

Rightfully viewing them as sisters.

Rightfully viewing them as sisters.

Why is this important? It's important because the

disgusting nature of incest ought to be a deterrent for

anyone of sound mind in their relations to other and

especially here younger women. Scripture condemns incest in all

forms. Leviticus 18-9 it specifically

says do not have sexual relations with your sister.

Don't have sexual relations with your sister.

This is the forbidding of incest.

It ought to be. Disgusting because it is

despicable. He's reminding us that no one of

noble character would ever entertain sexual flirtations or

make sexual advances on their little sister.

We would all know that to be disgusting behavior.

You say, Well, pastor, do you really think that a pastor or

leader in the church would have a sexual desire toward a younger

woman? Absolutely.

Not too long ago, a man that I respected in the Lord, who I

gleaned from his teaching in his 70s, he had an inappropriate

relationship with a 27 year old girl simply because he refused

to see her as a sister. Now I can tell you this, every

man in this room, every man, I am not an exception.

Every man in this room could have a sexual temptation.

Is that not true? He could lust sexually after

someone else. We all could and we all have.

And I can tell you this, even in my younger years when I had all

of these new hormones that I didn't know what to do with and

and didn't know how to control them, I lusted sexually after

females. And all of you who were honest

here today would say, me too. Now, I'm not going to ask you to

do that because some of you are sitting next to your wives and

she's going to ask a whole bunch of questions over lunch and you

don't want to answer. But I have never one single time

looked at my sister and lusted after her sexually.

Why? That's not normal.

So Paul is wanting to make this point, and he's wanting to make

this point very clear, that if we'll view younger women in the

church as our little sisters, we will have a whole different take

on it. If that sexual thought pops into

our mind, we must rightfully view them as those sisters,

avoiding that incest within the body of Christ.

And isn't proper perspective the key to purity in all the?

Areas of our life, right? If I view sin as sin and I view

sin as offensive to God, and if I love God, I am going to resist

that sin because I love God. Why?

I had the right perspective. So Paul's giving Timothy

perspective here. He's saying, you know what, yes,

that younger woman is far more attractive than the older woman

in the last part of this lesson, and so you're going to be more

prone to be sexually tempted with her.

But in absolute purity, see her as your little sister.

And when you see her as your little sister, things are going

to change. In your mind you were going to

see her as a potential for incest, not a potential for self

satisfaction. Rightfully view them as sisters,

refusing to entertain any appropriate desires toward them

at all, he said. Absolute purity.

That is in thought and in deed. Absolute purity.

I remember hearing a preacher, I don't remember exactly who the

preacher is, but I remember hearing a message that was very

impactful on me as a young minister.

This preacher shared of an instance where he had a young

lady, a young married lady in his office and he was actually

counseling her, giving her marriage counseling.

And he was just going about his normal business of going through

the Bible and instructing her on how she used to be the wife that

she needs to be and helping her through her problems that arise.

And yes, they do arise, don't they?

Married couples have problems, and sometimes we have to seek

the advice of pastors. Now, pastors and leaders in the

church, please pay attention to this.

For people who may be a pastor down the road, you know, not yet

that you're even going to be, that God's going to call you

into that. And this is a helpful tidbit for

you that I learned from this man.

And he said as he was there, he was talking to this girl all of

a sudden in his sinful mind, because his sinful mind is still

existing just as mine is, just as yours is.

He began to notice how beautiful she was and then it went from

the fact that she was beautiful to sexual faults.

And as he's telling the story, he said that I couldn't get her

out of my office quick enough. And he said she left my office.

I scheduled appointment with her and her husband.

And he said he cancelled the rest of his appointments that

day. And he locked himself in his

office with a sign on his door, do not disturb.

And he devoted himself the rest of that afternoon to praying

that God would help him with this lust that he had in his

flesh. What wisdom we can gain from

that type of attitude. One who refuses to entertain

inappropriate desires. That because that's really what

got King David, isn't it? He looked out on the roof.

And that was not the first time that he had seen a woman bathing

out on the roof, but he began to entertain it in his mind.

Over and over and over again. Then lust took over.

Then the next thing you know, a man after God's own heart is

summoning another woman to have sexual relationships with him

that he is not married to. He commits adultery and we know

ultimately murder and why? Because he refused to see her as

the sister that she was. When we see them as.

Sisters, our whole perspective ought to change.

It ought to help us to refuse entertaining any appropriate,

inappropriate, or sexual desires that we may have.

It ought to cause us to watch our conduct and our conversation

with younger women closely. Isn't that important?

Why? So that they don't get the wrong

idea. Did you notice there are younger

women in the church who could come to any of our pastors for

sound advice? I pray that they would find

sound advice. And we invite you to comment, to

talk to us about things. But sometimes they get the wrong

idea. And here's how they get the

wrong idea. This woman's struggling in her

home because her husband is not the godly man that she knows

that he ought to be or that she desires.

Him to be as I've said it before and I'll say it again, the thing

that a woman who loves Christ wants more than anything is a

man who loves Christ she. Didn't care about your muscles.

She didn't care about your money.

She wants you to live for Christ.

And so this woman comes and she doesn't have a man who lives for

Christ. And then she sees as you're

counseling her and you're giving her this good advice from the

Scripture, she sees you as attractive because the one thing

that's missing from her life is a godly man.

And then she sees this as an opportunity to have for herself

a godly man. You think that it doesn't

happen. It happens all of the time in

churches. Pastors fall because people have

the wrong idea. A woman comes with the wrong

idea. She comes for counseling and he

goes beyond that and goes to her own.

Desires for this man of God, and so we have to be very careful of

that. We have to be very wise in that,

making sure that we don't relay the wrong message.

Pastors, in our counseling, what do we need to constantly do?

When he's the need to constantly point her to Christ and her to

her husband and her to her husband in Christ, treating her

as that little sister who no way in the world would we ever

entertain any kind of impure relationship with her at all.

Now, I know for some of you this is uncomfortable stuff to talk

about in the church. And I think because the church

is so afraid to talk about it, it's an epidemic in the church.

So we're going to talk about it. We have to refuse to entertain

any appropriate desires so that no one gets the wrong idea, so

that the wrong message is not relayed.

We have to maintain a healthy distance in our interactions

with the opposite sex, both in conversation and in conduct,

right? For instance.

When we think of them as little sisters.

Is there anything wrong with hugging my sister?

No, I'm not going to kiss my sister in the mouth, right?

It's just not going to happen. Now, you might do that.

That's just weird. I'm not doing that.

And so it's all about that. Perspective and seeing that so

that we can watch our conduct, so we we can maintain healthy

distance, we can maintain a godly relationship.

So we have to refuse to entertain any appropriate

desires that we may have. Guys, the worst thing that you

can do is pretend like you don't have desires.

When you do have desires, that's the worst thing you can do

because you know what? You don't address the desire.

You just pretend like it's not there.

And things that we pretend like they're not there, those are

usually the things that sneak up and bite us.

Acknowledge it and go to the Lord Lord, as that pastor I

share with you a moment ago, Lord, I have a problem.

My problem is this. I didn't intend on lusting.

My sinful flesh began to lust after this woman.

And instead of being afraid to admit that to a God who already

knew, he got on his face and said, God, you know, and I need

your help with this because I cannot resist this on my own.

And he waited until God supplied him the help that he needed,

until the Word became alive in his life, until he began to see

her as a sister again, not as something that would fulfill his

sexual longing. We have to safeguard ourselves

from any and all impure temptations and attacks because

they're real and they do come Job 31, one Job took this

attitude. He said, I've made a covenant

with my eyes not to look lustfully after a woman.

Job knew this by by the time it comes into my eyes, I'm in big

trouble because it's going to go into my eyes.

It's going to go into my mind. And if I'm not careful, this is

going to root in my heart. So jokes and I've made a

covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully after a woman.

I don't even want to give it a second glance when I see

something that I know could lead to this.

I have to safeguard myself against it.

I have to resist it. Matthew 26 verse 41.

Matthew 26:41

The Lord taught, taught it like this.

He said, watch and praise so that you will not fall into

temptation. The Spirit is willing, but the

flesh is weak. Don't think for a second that

any of you in here, in your flesh are strong enough to

resist the temptation of sin. And especially for men with

young women and the temptation to sin sexually, don't think for

a second that you're above that. None of you are.

None of us are. Must watch and pray so that we

will not fall into this temptation.

Ephesians 611 says for us to put on the full armor of God so that

you can take your stand against the devil's schemes.

You think the devil's not scheming against the church

leadership, trying to get church leaders to think of young women

as something other than little sisters in the Lord?

Of course he's scheming. Of course he's plotting.

He seeks to destroy all that God is doing through His church.

Therefore, we must see the importance of guarding our own

hearts. Proverbs 423 It says, above all

else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.

Protect your heart, because once this temptation seeds in your

heart, you're in trouble. Psalm 11911 You know what?

I have hidden your word in my heart, that I might not sin

against you. It didn't say I've hidden your

word in my heart that I might not be tempted sexually by a

younger woman. He said, no, I've hidden your

word in my heart so that when I am tempted with sin, I won't sin

against you. And what does this word say

pertaining to this? See the younger women as

sisters. So when your mind goes to

anything sexual, all of a sudden default is now.

Oh no, gross. That's incest and that's

despicable behavior and it's unacceptable.

According to God's Word, set yourself boundaries and rules.

1st Thessalonians 522 says reject every kind of evil, even

the appearance of it. Reject every kind of evil.

Set yourselves boundaries so that you don't do anything that

could potentially lead to evil or do anything that could

potentially look like evil. The pastors here, they've all

been taught when you're meeting with a female by yourself, you

should close the door and black out the window so that no one

suspects anything going on. No, should never meet with a

female behind closed doors. In fact, I'll say this, I won't

ride with a female who is not my family in a car alone with her.

I'm sure not going to go to lunch with you.

It's funny that there are people who actually do that, right?

We have some salespeople who calling us females.

Would you like to go to lunch with me?

Absolutely not. I don't want to go to lunch with

a female. Why?

Because I'm not above temptation.

But besides that, it appears to others as something that could

be potentially. Evil.

We have to avoid that, and leadership has to take that

seriously and to safeguard themselves, setting biblical and

realistic and wise boundaries. And then as we refuse to

entertain appropriate, inappropriate desires, we have

to constantly be mortifying any impure thought or lustful desire

that should come about. If lustful thoughts happen,

don't be surprised if they do. Let me say that again.

Don't be surprised if they do. That's it causes to long for

glorification all the more. I'll be thankful when these

thoughts are no more, but when they do and if they go unchecked

as they did in the life. Of David, you can rest assured

that more often than not, they're going to lead to sin,

and so safeguard yourself by mortifying your impure desires

the moment that you have them. 2nd Corinthians 10 verse 5.

What does it say to do? Take every thought.

Captive. Take every thought captive to

make it obedient to Christ. And what does that look like in

looking at First Timothy 5 verse 2 when you have that lustful

1 Timothy 5:2

thought? Take that thought captive.

Process it. This is not from my new nature,

this is from my flesh. And I must die to my flesh.

I must crucify my flesh. This person that I had this

thought about is my sister in Christ.

Take that thought captive. Make it obedient to Christ.

Christ, I'm going to obey you. I need strength from your

spirit. You said that sounds like you're

admitting weakness. You are.

Stop thinking that you're strong.

He who thinks he stand, take heed lest he fall.

When that thought enters your mind, remember this.

You're capable of fulfilling that thought.

Run to God and say God, I cannot do this on my own.

Let me see this woman as a little sister.

Let me avoid incest and impurity in any way.

Why? Because that's what Your Word

says that I am to do. Guard your hearts and your minds

in Christ Jesus, taking every thought captive, making it

submit an obedience to. Christ Galatians 516 says this.

It says so. I say walk by the Spirit.

And you will not have any desires of the flesh.

It doesn't say that. It says walk by the Spirit and

you will not gratify or fulfill the desires of your flesh as

long as you are in this earthly tent, this fleshly vessel it is

going to have. Desires.

What should you do? Walk in the Spirit and if you

walk in the Spirit, you will not fulfill the lust of your flesh,

but you will fulfill the will of God as you take every thought

captive, making it obedient to Christ, mortifying the impurity

and the impure thoughts and lust of your flesh, taking them

captive, crucifying your sinful desires.

Galatians 516 says it, Walk in the Spirit, you won't fulfill

the lust of your flesh. Colossians 35 gives us

instruction. To put to death, therefore

whatever belongs to your earthly nature.

What's the things that belong to your earthly nature?

In case you think you're above this sexual immorality,

impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.

All of the things that we would think of as despicable, our

flesh is capable of leading us into.

So we can't give any room to the flesh.

We must put it to death and then we must do as Paul says in

Romans 13, verse 14. He says rather, instead of

Romans 13:14

entertaining your flesh, he says, rather clothe yourselves

with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not.

Think about how to. Gratify the desires of the

flesh. Don't think about how you can

gratify the desires of the flesh.

Remember when you were lost and all you had was your flesh, and

you would think of new ways to gratify your flesh.

How can I gratify my earthly cravings?

How can I make this happen? Paul Giving.

Instruction to the church instead of that because you've

been freed from that life, he says.

Clothe yourself with the Lord Jesus Christ and don't think

about how to gratify the desires of the flesh.

What are you to do? You're to focus on Christ, to

fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and the perfecter of your

faith. Walk and moral purity in your

life, especially in regard to what he's saying here, moral

purity toward younger women in the church.

And so may we have that proper view, and may that proper view

of younger women in the congregation direct our

relationships with them as our sisters in Christ.

I receive them for what God says that they are.

And may that deter us from any temptation to go outside of

God's will and to enter into a wrongful sexual relationship

with them, whether that's just sexually in the nature of

flirtation, or if that is further deviation into sexual

immorality and adultery. Let us be aware of that.

Let us be safeguarding ourselves and wise and handling these

things. So Paul has outlined for us the

family of God. And how do we care for the

family of God? Even in our correction and our

reducing and our counseling, What are we to do?

But we're to gently encourage the older men, to not rebuke

them harshly or have concern for younger men, as we have for

younger brothers. We're to honor and respect older

women as our mothers. We're to have moral purity

toward the younger women in the church.

That's our responsibility as leaders.

I told you as we open this morning, hold us to this.

This is our responsibility as leaders.

But it's also your responsibility in your life to

view each element of the church the way that you ought to view

it so that you don't fall into any sin or any temptation.

So to the leader here today, any of our pastors that are present,

any of our elders, any of our reach group leaders, I pray that

you pay attention to this. I pray that you obey the truths

that we have seen today. May that even in leading a

reach. Group, you would gently

encourage the older men, even when they get it wrong and you

have to correct them. Do it gently and you would see

that younger man who's struggling, not as a young kid

who just can't get it right. Just seem as that younger

brother where you once were. You'll give him that direction.

To that older woman in your group who is hard sometimes to

deal with, I pray that you see her as your own mother.

You remember the words of Christ when he spoke to John and he

pointed to his own mother as Christ was leaving this earth.

And he said, here is your mother, here's your son, take

care of her like your own mother.

And then to the younger women, don't think for a second that

you're above temptation. Make sure that that relationship

is morally pure as the word of God has demanded to the believer

here. Accept nothing less your life

and from the lives of your leaders to the unbeliever.

Perhaps you realized today talking about all these family

terms that you're just not part of the family.

You're not, You're not part of the family of God.

And I want to make that very clear in a day, in an age where

people say that we're all just children of God, you're not.

You must be adopted into this family and you're adopted into

this family only through the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus

Christ. Now I pray today that you who

are an illegitimate child wandering through the world, a

son of Satan and the Son of sin, see your great need because you

are a Sinner and you need to be forgiven and washed clean clean

of your sin, to be cleansed from head to toe, inside and out

through the precious blood of Jesus Christ.

I pray that you see your need for that today, that God in His

mercy and His grace would do only what God can do, and that

is to turn your sinful, unbelieving heart unto Him.

That He would give you faith to believe, and that belief would

be marked by true repentance. As you turn away from sin and

unbelief and you turn to Christ. I can promise you this, Everyone

who turns to Christ, whosoever shall call upon the name of the

Lord, shall be saved. I preach today.

And if God would grant you that grace, that God would grant you

that mercy, that you would obediently follow Christ as your

Lord and Savior and be saved, saved forevermore.

Let's pray together. Father, in the name of Jesus, we

thank you so much for your word. We thank you, Lord, that it

doesn't have to be entertaining, It doesn't have to be exciting.

It's true. What I pray that today truth

would hit us or it needs to hit us, that Your word would do

exactly what You have designed Your Word to do for this

specific service at this specific church, at this

specific time, for Your glory and for Your honor.

But I pray if there'd be someone here who does not know Christ,

that you would graciously draw them to yourself to receive

mercy and forgiveness today. We'll be careful, careful to

give you all the praise for it. We pray these things in Christ's

name. Amen.

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