Godly Leadership is No Accident (1 Tim. 3:2) | Pastor Rod Gomez

Speaker: Godly leadership is, is no accident.

We started last week with the idea that, uh, last month rather, the idea that

being a godly man, being a qualified man starts with being above reproach.

And we're gonna expand on that today.

A lot of little things that make us the kind of men that God can find useful.

In fact, that's what Paul says to Timothy.

He says, uh, in a, in a, in a great house, there are many different kinds of vessels.

Some for honorable use.

Some for dishonorable and he says, you ought to be Timothy, the kind

of man that pursues honorable use.

And he says the part, the way that you do that is that you're

set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house and ready for

every good work, useful set apart.

Um, Paul encouraged Timothy to pursue those ends as part of what it means

to be a qualified and godly man.

It got me thinking about a lot of little things in our lives, and it started me

on this track of what happened almost, I don't know, 30, 40, 40 years ago.

January 28th, 1986, seven astronauts loaded into the space shuttle challenger,

and they took off with success, but it was only after 73 seconds in their flight

that something catastrophic takes place.

A small rubber o by small I mean relative to the size of the spaceship.

It was actually about 36 feet wide in diameter, but it was in rubber.

O-ring.

Meant to secure the joints, seal the joints from leaking any fuel

into the combustion chamber.

That rubber O joint started to leak 73 seconds into their launch.

And of course, the results of that is exactly as you'd expect.

All seven astronauts lost their lives because of the failure

of its rubber O-ring, which was meant to seal the engine.

Didn't work, didn't happen.

That rubber O-ring was supposed to seal and keep it safe and secure,

but it failed because of the weather.

The weather, it was too cold, and so the seal didn't work properly.

Little thing resulting in massive catastrophe.

And this was nationally televised.

And so of course there was a, a great, uh, there were shock waves and all

throughout America saying, we can't believe what we just saw on tv.

We saw seven people lose their lives, presumably.

And of course they were right.

The lesson for us is easy here.

There's a, uh, uh, an easy neglect of small things that

we might be quick to overlook.

We might say, well, the big things are in place.

The rockets are working, and the space shuttle is, is

sound and it's infrastructure.

It's secure.

Let's just launch a thing all the while overlooking the little things

that really make the big things work.

We're gonna look at three little things in First Timothy chapter.

Three, three little things that really will make a big.

Difference in the totality of your life.

These three little things you might be quick to overlook, but Paul doesn't.

He says, if you're gonna be a godly leader, a qualified man, you

have to have these three little comparatively little things in place.

Otherwise, if you're unintentional with these things, if you overlook

them, if you allow them to just be, uh, glazed over, there's potential

for catastrophe in your life.

Three little things I wanna point out to you today.

Leadership is no accident.

And these three little things are gonna have to be something on your

part that you take intentional strides toward to say, I wanna do these things.

Right.

Let's read first Timothy three.

We're gonna read the whole seven verses here 'cause we haven't done that yet.

But I wanna give you a gist of what's happening here and hopefully help

orient you to our three little things that we're gonna talk about today.

One Timothy chapter three, starting at verse one.

He says, this saying is trustworthy.

This is a good saying that the church should continue to say this

is something that should be repeated.

If anyone aspires, they desire the office of overseer.

Titus chapter one calls 'em elders.

He desires a noble task.

This is a good thing.

We talked about this last week.

Paul goes on to describe the qualities of this man.

He says, therefore, because he desires a noble task, because this is God's church.

God's enterprise and overseer then must be above reproach.

He must be the husband of one wife.

And now let me just orient you here.

As Paul unpacks these verses, everything underneath what we're about to say

here fits under the umbrella of above reproach, therefore an overseer.

Verse two must be above reproach, which looks like this.

He's the husband of one wife.

First little thing.

He is sober minded.

Second little thing, he is self-controlled.

Third little thing.

And of course there's several more down the list here, but we're

only gonna look at those three.

Let's continue reading.

He's respectable.

He's esteemed in his community.

He's hospitable.

He welcomes people into his home.

He loves people he's able to teach.

This is uniquely, uh, this is unique for the Office of Overseer.

This is the unique for the Office of Elder.

He has to be able to say something and to teach it clearly and also

defend and protect the doctrine.

That's what he's talking about here.

He's not a drunkard, he can't be given too much wine.

He's not violent, but gentle.

He is not ignatious, not quick to fight with people.

He's, he's gentle in his demeanor.

Uh, he's not quarrelsome.

Again, not quick to fight, not a lover of money.

He's not greedy.

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 household, how

will he care for God's church?

Also, verse six, he must not be a recent convert or he may become

puffed up with conceit and fall into the condemnation of the devil.

The devil will be quick to capitalize on someone's nascent faith who's

catapulted into leadership quickly, and he says, don't be quick to lay some

lay hands on somebody if he is young.

Uh, whether spiritually or uh, age-wise, make sure that you're

not gonna lay hands quickly.

He'll, later on, say verse seven.

Moreover, he must be well thought of by outsiders.

This is interesting.

We'll get to this in a couple weeks, a couple months.

Uh, he'll say that your neighbors have to have a good opinion of this guy.

Uh, his coworkers have to think well of him.

He can't just be thought well of in the church, as pastor PJ said recently in

a sermon, anybody can be a Christian for a couple hours on a Sunday.

It takes a, a certain kind of man with special graces to be a Christian

all the time, such that people on, on the outside outsiders look at

him and say, he is well thought of.

He's, he's not a liar, he is not a thief, he's not an adulterer.

Those kinds of things.

And he says that so that he may not fall into disgrace.

A pastor doesn't want to be disgrace in front of the

congregation and to snare the devil.

So there's first Timothy chapter three.

If you were to look at it, um, if you were to look at it syntactically, if

you were to diagram it grammatically, it might look something like this.

Paul starts out with the renouncement.

This is a trustworthy saying.

Anyone aspires to this office?

Noble task.

It's a good thing.

And then as I mentioned before, everything underneath the above

reproach, uh, sits right below that.

So this is the kind of man he must be.

Notice that the must is imperative.

I I, I alluded to this the last time we talked, but I didn't really

capitalize on it the way I should have that must is a divine must.

It's the same must that Jesus uses when he says, I must go to the cross.

Same idea.

So the weightiness of the must here is important.

These are the qualities of a man and what he must be if he's going

to be in the office or the, the position of a pastor, an overseer.

The characterization above reproach, uh, I think grammatically fits

all these things underneath it.

They control the imperative there, what an elder overseer must be.

Okay.

So now that we have our, our sense of bearing here, I wanna point your

attention again to the three things that we want to pay attention to.

The three things we wanna look at, starting with the husband of one wife.

This can be confusing because some might think that this means, oh, he

can't be, uh, he can't be divorced.

Uh, it maybe means he can't have a polygamous marriage.

And certainly some of those things are true, but I don't think Paul's goal

here is to say whether he's polygamous or not polygamous, or whether he's

divorced or anything like that.

Literally the word means a one woman man.

He's a one woman man.

He's faithful to the woman God has entrusted to him.

And this is also what Titus says in first Titus.

Chapter one, not first.

Titus DTUs, chapter one, verse six.

He's the husband of one wife.

So both, uh, Timothy and Titus have the same, the same wording

about the role of this man.

Now, remember, the office of overseer, the pastor, the elder, the overseer, is

called to be this, so that the men of the church have an example to follow.

This is exactly why we're talking about this.

This is not about whether all of you are gonna join the pastorate.

This is not all about you guys joining seminary.

This is about saying.

This man is to be this way so that you and I are all this way.

This is what the church is supposed to look like, the husband of one wife.

So this man is to have a faithful marriage.

He, he's a one woman man, speaks to his integrity, his commitments, and this

is where we are called as Christians, to live the kind of exemplary life

that the culture sits up and takes notice and say, this man treats his

marriage and his wife differently than how we see our culture, generally.

Think about marriage.

Exemplary.

Now, this is meant to be something standing out.

Marriage is an important qualification for at least two reasons.

The first reason is that marriage reveals the man.

Marriage reveals us probably like nothing else does.

Because you're with someone every day, all day.

They see the best of you.

They see the worst of you.

They see the, the unguarded moments of your life.

And so marriage, uh, rightly is used as a measurement.

Notice that this is the first thing Paul wants to look at.

He says, Timothy, I want you to look at, well in, at least

in first Timothy chapter three.

Now here too.

Um, look, I want you to look first, if you're gonna discuss whether

or not a man is above approached, I want you to look first at his

marriage and look carefully at that.

How does his marriage operate?

If his marriage is operating the way it should, then we would have reason

to believe, oh, probably the rest of his life is at least working in order.

'cause he cares about the first things.

First things first.

Marriage reveals the man.

In Ephesians chapter five, Paul says to Timothy C or, uh.

Ephesians chapter five.

Yeah, this is Timothy actually.

Ephesians chapter five, he says, the church like you're

supposed to men lead your wives.

In fact, he tells his wife, tells the wives there, submit to your husbands.

In other words, men are leading.

Men are leading, women are to follow.

And then he says to the husband's, husbands, love your wives.

Does Christ love the church?

He adds a really high bar for all of us.

And the idea here is that your marriage is meant to reflect Christ in the church.

So not only does marriage reveal the man, marriage reflects the gospel,

those are two big reasons why marriage has to be at the top of your list.

When you think about whether a man is qualified, whether a man is

truly a one woman man, the hardest place to be a Christian, the hardest

place to be faithful is home.

This is where your, your faith is constantly tested, where little

annoyances can become big stumbling blocks in your marriage where it's

evident that you're either walking by grace or you're walking in the flesh.

Your home, you're unguarded.

There's someone, put it this way, there's no other place where high expectations.

Love your wife as Christ loved.

The church meets a desire to be unplugged.

Think about it, you're working all day.

Or if you, if you, if you live outside the or if you work outside

the home, you're working all day and then you come home and in your mind

you're saying, man, I wanna rest.

I've been working all day.

I wanna just kinda let my guard down, kick my feet up, watch the Mandy Griffith.

But there's dishes to do and there's kids to take care of and there's

honeydew items to fulfill and all these things that you have to do.

There's no other place that's like it.

You can be a Christian in a lot of venues.

But if you miss it at home, I think Paul here says that you're missing

what it means to be above reproach.

Two reasons why he looks at this.

Again, marriage reveals the man more than anything else, and also

marriage reflects the gospel.

Your marriage is meant to be a picture of Christ's relationship

with his church, which means your marriage is bigger than you.

Your marriage exists as one way that God speaks to the world.

Your marriage is a sermon.

That's meant to be heard by a watching world.

Your neighbor should hear the sermon that your marriage preaches.

Your kids should hear the sermon that your marriage preaches.

The world is meant to see a reflection, however faint it may be of the gospel.

The question is not whether your marriage reflects the gospel.

The question is whether it's a good reflection or a bad reflection,

which is again, why Paul's gonna say, make sure the man is above reproach.

And by the way, let's first look at where he, where, where his marriage

is, how's his marriage going?

Your marriage is a picture of Christ's relationship with this church, and

every marriage is whether good or bad.

Marriage reflects the man Marriage, reflects the gospel.

It reflects the man and, uh, reveals the man rather and reflects the gospel.

There's also a, an important text.

I want you, I want you to turn there.

This is an important one.

Hebrews 13, four.

On the heels of this, the reason this is such an important feature in the church

life and a feature of ma male leadership.

Is because Paul wants the whole church to have a kind of opinion about

the, about the church that is high.

We talk about having a high view of God and part of having a high view of God.

It means having a high view of the things that he has a high view about.

And we'll notice here in Hebrews chapter 13 verse four, that one

Hebrews 13 · chapter mention

of the things that we should have a high view about is marriage.

Take a look at Hebrews 13, verse four, and it says this, let marriage be held

in honor among everybody in the church.

Everybody, all, all people.

And let the marriage bed be undefiled for God will judge the

sexually immoral and adulterous.

And so even though the reason is different here, he's saying God's gonna

judge the church, especially those who are sexually immoral and adulterous.

But his goal is that marriage be esteemed held high.

Let it be held in honor.

Let it be exalted.

Let it be something that people say, this is exceptionally valuable.

Let it be respected.

Let it be a cultural institution, both in the church and outside the church,

that people say this is a good thing.

When it comes to the kind of intentional leadership that God calls you to, part of

your intentional leadership means being an intentional husband who intentionally

respects and honors his wife.

And the reason why is because we respect and honor marriage.

Why, again, reveals you and it reflects the gospel point number one.

I want you to be deliberate about this.

I want you to deliberately display great respect for marriage, to have

the kind of opinion of marriage, the kind of approach to marriage that

says, man, I am, I esteem marriage.

I value this institution.

It's so valuable that God has decided to attach the gospel to your marriage

and to marriage as a whole, which is why it's so esteemed in our culture,

at least within our church culture.

It should be.

What's interesting is that we all have this way of going about life

where we think that our normal is normative for everybody else.

I recently got new glasses, you guys might see me wear them more often.

These glasses are, are, are a correction from my astigmatism.

I got used to seeing things a little blurry and so, you know, you could

look at certain things or people and, and you could look, I dunno,

I like, I'd like people watching.

It's kind of my thing.

I, you know, you go to the, you go to the mall or you go to the airport.

I just kind of watch people.

I find people fascinating.

I now realize that they could probably see me very clearly.

I was looking at them and they're like, why is this guy looking at me?

I think they're far enough away where like they probably can't even tell

that I'm looking at them 'cause it's, I, they're kind of blurry to me.

But my blurry doesn't mean that they're blurry.

They could, what if they have perfect vision and they notice that I'm

staring at them and now we have a really weird situation happening.

Why is this guy looking at me?

Yeah, my normal was not their normal, at least presumably your

normal is not everyone's normal.

And that's what's interesting because now we all have to say,

okay, what is supposed to be normal?

I grew up in a pretty, I grew up in a family that I thought was normal.

I thought it was normal for, for moms and dads to fight.

I thought it was normal for there to be yelling.

I thought it was normal for a dad to bang on the wall and for a, a mom to be crying.

There was not domestic violence in the strictest sense, but there was

a really tumultuous upbringing.

I didn't know it.

I didn't know any better.

I went to, I went to all the things school and went and did my thing, not

realizing how abnormal my life was.

It really wasn't until I made my way into the church and began to be surrounded

by people like yourselves who taught me that things are supposed to be different.

And in fact, I, I, I started thinking about all the people that God used

to draw me away from what I thought was normal into a new normal.

I remember Jack and Theresa Angel, a godly man and a God

that woman married for decades.

I talked about Jack before, but him and his wife, I mean, they were just

faithful, faithful people to attend the church, faithful to do their thing.

They were always there, always smiling, always taking care of people.

Calvin and Brenda, Kelly, another couple that God used these.

In fact, these people adopted my brother and myself, not in a literal

sense, but they took us over.

They drove us to church, drove us home for church, took us to lunch

after church, and they began to teach us a new normal by their life.

And I, I realized.

My life is not the way things are supposed to be.

Don and Debbie Metcalf, I could talk about more couples and more men

that have showed me a new normal.

Part of what they showed me is that marriage is something special.

Family is something special.

Family is something good.

Their abnormality in my mind, rev was abnormal for all the right

reasons and so should it be about your life and your marriage.

Your life should be abnormal in our culture, your marriage, your life.

Even if you're not a married man, I re recognize that some

of you're not married in here.

I'll get to you in a second.

Your faithfulness to your wife and to the institution of

marriage ought to look different.

It ought to look like you're doing something out of the norm on purpose.

And that's my goal here on purpose.

A lot of you guys are faithful men.

I get that you guys are faithfully married to your wives and you're

doing what you should be doing.

You're not going around sleeping around or doing things like that.

But I wanna take it a step further and say, how does a church, how does a

church properly exalt this institution?

Faithfulness is a good start, but I don't think it's the finish line by any stretch.

We ought to be different in our approach, which is also gonna have implications

for single men, because if you're a one woman man, if you're faithful

to marriages, that means that you're protecting and guarding marriage.

Even in your singleness, you're thinking about, I don't want to even get close

to the line of, of soling the gospel by, so what marriage is, I want to

be sure that I'm treating marriage in a respectful way, and you could just

look at our culture and find lots of reasons why it wouldn't be that way.

We could talk about porn use, we could talk about the way that men can, can

automatically gaze at the female figure.

Those are ways that we could dishonor marriage easily, right?

We're we're saying that we're not one woman men, and in fact, that's

probably a disqualifying event.

If a man is com if a man is in any way, uh, addicted to pornography,

probably not fit for ministry.

He's not able to serve in that capacity 'cause he's living a

life of unfaithfulness, violating the one woman man qualification.

Again, he must be this thing, but again, he leads in that way because this is

what the church is supposed to be.

One woman, men who are not given to pornography, addiction, or

even looking at the female gaze.

Remember, years ago, one of the first books I read in high school was, uh.

Every man's battle, and you guys read that book, they taught me

that one of the things that a man should do when he sees an attractive

figure is to bounce the eyes.

I remember highlighting that, remembering that specifically bounce the eyes.

And what you're doing is training yourself not to allow even a hint

of lust to penetrate the heart, because we know how quickly that can

erupt deliberately displaying great respect for marriage means more than

just being faithful to your wife.

It means conducting yourself in a way inside the home and

outside the home that showcases.

I'm not about what you guys are about the world that is, I'm about my wife.

I'm about Christ Church and his glory.

It starts with your marriage.

Think about the way that Christ pursues his church.

Is there ever a time where you could say, oh, Christ has let

the gas off, doesn't care about his church as much as he used to.

And of course it's absurd.

He pursues us day in, day out.

He pursues us in the way that he serves us through His word serves us in the church.

He serves us through worship.

Christ pursues us.

We know what it's like to pursue our wives before marriage.

I wonder if you're still pursuing your wife post-marriage.

This is a way that we display great respect for marriage.

We show great respect for God and his gospel, by the way that we say,

I'm setting a deliberate example to pursue my bride, and I can look

like a lot of different areas.

Pastor PJ often talks about dating your wife and and doing things with

her and for her, and that's great.

That's great.

What I wanna encourage you to do is to be purposeful in the demonstration of

your faithfulness, purposeful in the demonstration of your faithfulness.

Here's what I mean by that.

O One of the things that I, I think would be good for you to show your

kids, to show the church is how much you are committed to your bride.

Show them on purpose, intentionally, deliberately displaying

great respect for marriage.

That will mean that you, I mean, I don't wanna put 'em on blast.

You're just gonna be embarrassed that I bring it up and I'm

gonna bring it up anyway.

One of the things that I often see as I prepare for leading worship is that David

will take Priscilla and he'll find a place with her, and he'll, he'll pray with

her before they start leading worship.

Just sit with her and he'll pray.

That, that's intentional.

It's not an accident.

He's not accidentally, oh, hey, let's pray.

I guess we're here.

You're here.

I'm here.

Let's pray together.

He, he purposefully takes time to pray with his spouse.

I think what a, what a beautiful display of what it looks like to lead your bride

and deliberately in a way, and it's in front of people, not all the time.

He's not trying to be ostentatious about it.

You understand?

But he's just doing it.

I think that's the kind of mentality a godly man has.

He's intentional about displaying his love for his bride.

Something as simple as holding her hand, pursuing her physically, obviously.

Not that physically in public, but pursuing her physically and,

and telling her what you think about her and communicating

your verbal affection for her.

These are all areas that I, I know that we struggle with, but it's such

a good thing for you to practice such a good thing for your kids to see.

I I, I wanna set an example for my kids where they see me pursue their,

their, their, their mother all the time.

I want them to say, Ew.

I want them to recognize that I love their wife, their mother, rather.

I love their wives.

I love their mother more than I can, than words can say.

I also want them to see that I love their mother more than I love them.

My commitment is to her first.

I love them, but I love her first.

She's my first commitment.

I would love for you to demonstrate your commitment to her, your

wife, in public, and in private.

Think about the way that your, your kids are gonna see you interact with her.

They're gonna see your life as normative.

Just how we started this conversation.

They're gonna see your example as normative.

This is the way things are supposed to be.

So you're not just loving your wife for her sake and for the gospel's sake.

You're loving your wife for your kid's sake and your future grandkid's sake.

Your grandkids are gonna benefit from the way that you loved

your wife or adversely suffer,

extends your church.

I want you to imagine a church of men who are pursuing their women.

Fastidiously.

They do it in a way that's obvious, evident.

Think about men that are setting a deliberate example to say, I wanna

display my commitment to my bride.

I mean, we talk about cultural displays.

Obviously you wear a wedding ring, hopefully keep that on all the time.

You're not taking that off, but you wear a wedding ring to display

your commitment to somebody else.

But I want you to display your physical affection.

I want you to be deliberate to say, my wife matters to me.

She's my wife.

I wanna sit next to her when I have the opportunity.

I wanna hold her hand.

I wanna put my arm around her.

I want to display to my wife, my kids, my church.

I love this woman.

He who finds a wife finds a good thing Scripture says, and I want you to let

your wife know that you know that.

Why?

Well, because ultimately, it's a reflection of your character

and it's a reflection and representation of the gospel.

I care about my marriage because I care about the gospel.

And maybe in your mind that that could go the other way.

I care about the gospel.

Because they care about my marriage.

But I want you to say, man, the gospel is so important.

Jesus lordship and leadership in my life is so important that I gotta make

sure that I am protecting my wife.

I'm protecting my marriage, I'm respecting it, and I'm showing it on purpose.

I want the world to see that I love my wife.

Extends to the church, starts in your family, starts with your

marriage, um, in your, in your small groups today, and perhaps even

on as a regular concern of yours.

I think you should start to ask your brothers, how's your marriage going?

I know it's a, a sensitive question, but it's something that

you guys should constantly say.

Now, I, I care about my brothers.

I know how quickly things can dissolve.

It doesn't take a lot of thinking to say, when can I imagine

a marriage not going well?

Sure.

You have examples that you can readily think about, that you

can count on your hand right now.

This is struggling.

This is struggling.

This is struggling.

Protect marriage.

Hold it in high esteem.

It's what it means to be a man above reproach.

You're a one woman man, but that means you're also guarding the institution

of marriage because of what it represents and what it reflects.

Malachi chapter two, uh, God says to Israel, look, I, I wanted you to

have faithful marriages so that you could produce God the offspring.

Be faithful.

Don't cover your garment with violence.

That's the first small thing, not that small after all is it.

First small thing is to guard and protect and display great

respect for your marriage.

But Paul carries on.

There's another small thing that I want you to see.

That's something that we can easily overlook.

Take a look with me at one Timothy chapter three, intentional about marriage.

Here's another thing to be intentional about.

One Timothy chapter three.

Let's start at verse one.

Just to get the gist here.

The saying is trustworthy.

If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task.

Therefore, an overseer must be above reproach.

He must be the husband of one wife.

He must be sober minded.

He must be a sober minded man.

This word, uh, this word appears three times, and two of those times are found

here in one Timothy chapter three.

It's found once in Titus chapter two.

Um.

And here, uh, and, and here and in, uh, let me show you the

other one, one Timothy three 11.

Uh, here it's applied to the, the deacon's wives or the deacon nesses.

So, so mindness, as we see again, is not only a qualification of the elder,

it, the pastorate, but it's also a qualification for the people of the

church who are serving and leading.

Notice here, the deacons, those who are serving the church or their

wives are called to be sober minded.

This, this, again, tells us these qualifications are meant to be

normative in the life of the church.

Sober minded here, then.

Oh, lemme show you Titus chapter two.

Here's another one, Titus Chapter two.

Who else is supposed to be sober minded?

Look at this.

The older men.

Older men are to be sober minded.

And also, later on we're gonna see self controlled.

Those are both the same words that we're gonna see in one Timothy chapter three.

Sober minded and self controlled.

I.

Focus on sober minded for a second here.

It means to be restrained in conduct, sober minded, restrained in conduct,

self-controlled, level-headed.

The word balance kind of comes to the fore here.

Someone who's balanced in their approach to life.

They're not extreme either on the left or the right.

I'm not making a political statements.

They're not extreme in their personalities.

Again, they're not alistic, and so they're kind of calibrated.

They're able to navigate life with a sober sense of who they

are and what they're about.

They're not easily frustrated.

They act in a restrained manner.

Someone cuts 'em off.

They're not flying off the handle.

Someone says something offensive to them.

They're not quick to take offense.

They're just, they're subdued.

They're not subdued because they're passive men.

You understand?

They're subdued because they're deliberate men.

They're intentional.

They're unwilling to lose control because they know what's at stake.

It's a small thing that has major implications.

They don't want to have their life wrecked because of their lack of

self-control or self restraint.

Sober minded speaks to the way they think about themselves

and the world around them.

They're restrained in their understanding.

They're restrained in their approach to life.

They're not given to excess.

Um, it also speaks about the way that they think about their whole life.

In fact, I couldn't help but think about Ephesians chapter five, when

it comes to a sober minded man.

I think Ephesians five really encapsulates the idea.

Here's what it says.

Ephesians chapter five, starting at verse 15.

The words look carefully are so important.

Um.

It talks to the, it's a careful, thoughtful, focused

attention to how I live my life.

The word for walk peo often used in scripture to talk

about the way that you live.

So the way that you walk, the way that you live.

Paul says, be very careful about the way that you allow yourself to live.

Look carefully, pay attention, be, I like the word the new King

James, puts it as be circumspect.

I'm looking around to make sure that how I'm living, how I'm walking

is fitting to my station in life and to my call in the gospel.

So he says, look carefully.

How you walk given your station, given your position.

Be careful, think carefully about how you walk.

Not as an unwise man, but an a wise man making the best use of the time.

Notice he's saying, I want you to capitalize on the season because

of what's of what's true about you.

You're a Christian.

You've been saved by grace through faith.

Therefore, be careful about how you walk and make the best use of

this season of life that you have.

'cause the days are evil.

The world is against you and therefore, don't be foolish, but understand

what the will of the Lord is.

In other words, you have a, you have a choice to make.

Here you can choose to be foolish and live in blissful ignorance, or you can

understand what the will of the Lord is.

It's up to you.

You get to make a decision here.

Don't get drunk with wine.

See how I'm making the connection?

We have a connection about drunkenness and, and sober mindedness.

Don't get drunk with wine.

For that is debauchery, but instead of being controlled by the, by the by

the intoxicating effects of alcohol be filled and controlled by the

intoxicating effects of the spirit.

Of course you're not gonna be staggering.

You're not gonna be slurring your words.

The effect of the spirit is self-control, sober mindedness be filled with the

spirit such that he controls the way that you think, the way that you live.

What's that gonna look like?

Well, verse 19, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and

spiritual songs, or singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart.

They're always giving thanks, not complaining for uh, and for everything

to God the Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, the kind of effect

that the Spirit has on a man, possessed by him is a man who's controlled.

He's still reminded, he's often thankful.

He's often so filled with joy that he's singing and making melody.

He can't stop the guy because he's constantly thankful

about his station in life.

He's thinking about what God has done and consequently the rest of his life,

he's thinking he's being delivered about.

I'm thanking God for what I'm about.

I thank God I'm gonna go to Men's Bible, so I'm gonna thank God

that I get to be around these men.

What a great privilege and a blessing.

This man is vigilant about his life.

He's not, he's, again, he's not accidentally falling into godliness.

A godly man doesn't accidentally fall into a devoted life.

No, he's vigilant about this.

He looks carefully.

Point number two, if you're gonna do the same, I want you to vigilantly.

Think about your life vigilance, that word I was trying to find the

most aggressive word I could use to say, men, think about your life.

Think about the moments in the minutes that you have.

Think, just be, be the kind of guy that says, I'm gonna take

a step back and just reflect.

How am I doing?

How did that conversation go?

How did I do at the table today?

Was I loving my brothers?

Did I give him adequate attention?

Was I being selfish?

Was I talking too much?

Was I talking too little?

It, it's kind of like the, the, I don't know, when you're wearing

a dress shirt and you tuck it in, sometimes I have these certain

shirts that just keep on coming out.

No matter what I do, I, I just have to keep an eye on.

I just keep tucking it back in again and do the, in a private place where no

one's looking to try to quickly tuck it back in and be, be, uh, subtle about it.

But no matter how much I tuck it, it keeps on untucking one of those

problems that we have in the, in the.

In the 2025, although there are solutions to that, uh,

I'll tell you about that later.

Not important.

Um, tucking in a shirt that keeps tucking at you, you just have to

pay constant attention to that.

Be vigilant.

Can't let your guard down.

Otherwise, the shirt just comes and tucked and looked like a slot.

Several years ago, I went, I went horseback riding in Norco in California.

Before I left, I thought what a romantic gesture for me to

take my wife horseback riding.

And it certainly was great.

We went to this ranch, uh, uh, next to the Santa Ana River.

So I thought it was perfect.

Uh, we get to the ranch and at that point I was a little heavier than I was now.

And, and so the, the, the attendant looks at me and says, oh, that's

not a pleasant starting place.

Oh.

Starts looking at their horses and says, okay, I better, I'll be right back.

I need toll.

Get the big horse, whatever buddy.

I think it was actually a woman.

But anyway, she goes, she comes back with this horse, and I can't remember

the horse's name, but I do know the horse was not named like docile.

Uh, he wasn't named Peaceful.

It was named like, I don't know, something like ferocious or something.

Okay.

So I get this really aggressive horse who's really strong.

I was, oh great.

I'm not gonna fall off the horse.

Probably he's not gonna drop me.

And Kristen gets his basically pony looking horse, this

really chill, laid back horse.

I'm on this big horse 'cause I was a bigger guy.

And so the way they do it, they lead you.

She's leading the pack and then Kristen's right ahead of me

and I'm in, I'm in the caboose.

While sometime near the Santa Ana river, as we're making our way through,

I'm taking all the pictures I can and enjoying the scenery, and it was awesome.

It was one of the best times in my life, but my horse just

started getting kind of cranky.

He just starts kind of bucking here and bucking there, and it's just

this moving and then he just gets his wild desire to start sprinting.

So I, I don't know what I'm doing.

I'm gonna, this is the first time I've ever ridden a horse.

Well, second, the first time it was one of the pony photos where

you take a picture on the pony.

So the second time I've been on a horse, this guy just starts bucking

it, and I'm sure he's not full speed.

I, 'cause I don't, I'm sure this guy could run much faster, but

he was going, I was terrified.

This guy is moving.

He's gotta be 600 pounds.

I don't know how he's a big horse.

He's just moving my, uh, my, my trainer, my leader, she gallops up to

me and starts talking to the horse.

Like she's trying to reason with the guy like it's a horse.

Slow down.

Bloody your shoes.

I'm like, one of those things ineffective.

Try harder.

I kid you not, she says just let him get it out of his system.

What do you mean I'm about to die?

I, I'm ging, I'm trying to keep on the horse terrified.

I'm running ahead of everybody.

I I'm losing it 'cause I'm thinking this guy's gonna kill me.

I'm gonna die.

It's gonna be the Christopher Reeve situation all over again.

I was not looking forward to it.

I was holding on for dear life.

She said, pull back on the reins.

I'm like, what do you think I've been doing this whole time?

I mean, pulling, he is not responding even with the bit in his mouth and

the, and the halter on his face.

He was just going for it.

Eventually, for whatever reason, he decides he wants to slow down.

This guy just slowed down.

My heart stopped racing, and then I enjoyed the last,

I don't know, 10 minutes.

The guy just sped through the whole, the whole track.

Uh, she said later on, he was just, he was, he didn't want to, he didn't

want to go on the trail again.

He was bored of the trail.

He wanted to get it over with, so he sped it up.

Thanks guy.

Appreciate that.

One of the problems with our flesh is that like the horse,

it can just get out of control.

Our flesh can just kind of rr start going, and you might be trying to pull

on the reins and pull on the halter and do everything you can to bid it, uh,

to, to move the bit in your direction.

But sometimes our flesh is unwilling to cooperate with us.

Your job is to not let it get to that point.

My mistake when I rode that horse is I wasn't even paying attention.

I wasn't thinking that the horse is gonna go into full gallop.

I'm just trying to enjoy the scenery.

I'm looking at the Santa Ana River.

I'm saying this is amazing.

I'm with my wife, I'm with the horses.

This is wonderful.

Wasn't paying attention.

And so even though I had my hands on the reins, I was pretty loose about it.

And so when he started to gallop, I was caught off guard.

And I, now I'm, I'm reacting to his acting.

And so now I'm unprepared.

And so I'm trying to get a hold of the horse after the fact.

That was the problem.

I wasn't ready.

I wasn't ready to slow him down when he throw any signs of getting

ready to gallop outta my control.

The same thing is true with your flesh.

You need to make sure that you're always on top of your life, observing

and being suspicious in a healthy way of your flesh and saying, I don't

wanna let this thing get outta control.

I like the way Paul puts it in one Corinthians 9 27 in the

LSB, he says, I disciplined my body and I make it my slave.

My body is my slave, not my master.

My appetites might say, Hey, I want food.

I want water.

I want this.

I want sleep.

No, you're not my master.

I'm the master.

I will tell you when you will get rest.

I will give you though, go ahead.

I'm paying attention though.

I'm making my body my slave.

One Timothy four 16.

Paul says this to Timothy.

He says, keep a close watch on your life.

Pay close attention to your life.

He'll also say, and on the teaching, but he wants you to pay close

attention to what your life is.

To what you're doing with your time, to what you're doing, with your words,

to what you're doing, with your energy.

Keep a close watch on yourself.

This means, man, that we have to be vigilant about the way

that we look at our lives.

This is what it means to be sober minded.

I'm constantly alert.

I'm constantly paying close attention to what I'm, what I'm doing in my life.

I'm observing and I'm evaluating.

I'm developing a healthy suspicion about my inclinations.

Uh, does that make sense?

Healthy suspicion.

I've, I've talked about this before when we talked about being

watchful, but it's so important.

Psalm 1 39.

David prays this.

He says, search me oh God, and know my heart.

This is the posture of a sober minded man.

He's saying, search me God and know my heart.

Try me and know my thoughts and see if there be an to be any grievous way in me,

and lead me in the way of everlasting.

He's asking God, expose my heart.

Show me me so that I'm not self-deceived, so that my horse

doesn't get outta control.

I don't wanna be surprised when I fall in sin.

I want to know circumspectly.

Oh, if I allow myself to do this, and this is the, this is the

inevitable end of that, so I'm not gonna allow myself to do that.

I'm not gonna allow myself to get outta control.

Search me in Noo.

God.

A sober minded man is constantly vigilantly looking at his life,

looking at his marriage, looking at his parenting, looking at his serving,

looking at his Bible, reading his, his devotional life with the Lord.

He's vigilantly, guarding and searching.

How am I doing?

How's this going?

Is there anything in my life, any habits that I have that are gonna

lead me in the wrong direction or be a disservice to my family?

Or a disservice to my church or a disservice to anyone that I,

I'm called to love vigilantly.

Think about your life vigilance.

Oh, man, there's so much more to say about this, but let's

just leave it with this here.

It, it's like weeding your, your lawn.

You see one, you see one weed.

Easy to go and pick it up.

Pull it out.

It's also easy to leave it alone, right?

It's easy to say.

Well, I'll get to that later.

Next thing you know, day two, there's three weeds there.

Day five, there's 30 weeds there.

Day six or Hal is weeds.

I've seen some of my neighbors, they have their whole lawn covered, covered with

weeds and thought, how did it get there?

It started with one.

One weed showed up one day and they just thought, well, I'll get to it eventually.

Don't allow your life to grow in weeds.

It's better to kill sin in infancy rather than to wait till

it's strong enough to kill you.

So a reminded reflection allows you to, to see what's happening and to kill

sin in your life before it kills you.

Qualified leaders are intentional leaders.

Qualified men are intentional men.

That's what we're calling ourselves to.

Okay.

Beyond sober mindedness.

We have one more small thing to look at.

Take a look with me at one Timothy chapter three, starting at verse two.

Actually, let's do it at verse one again.

No.

Verse two is good.

Therefore, an overseer must be above reproach.

He's the husband of one wife.

He's still reminded, he's self controlled.

Titus chapter one, verse eight also says the same thing.

It's self control.

So there's the corresponding section here, self controlled,

something we've talked about before.

This is to be literally control over, control over yourself.

Uh, someone who's prudent, someone who's thoughtful.

Um, this, this word is used.

The ATI form is used four times in Titus and Timothy, two times in our passage.

And once regarding older men.

We saw this earlier.

And also one time regarding young women.

So this ATI of form of the word for self-control appears four times we

see it, all of them in the pastoral epistles, which is interesting.

Self-control.

This is something we've talked about.

It has lots of overlap with everything that we're saying.

So let's just understand here that self-control is something

that you should exemplify for your family's sake, for the sake of the

gospel, for the sake of Christ.

Qualified leaders are intentional leaders and therefore they

intentionally grow in self-control.

No one accidentally becomes more godly in this category unless you

point number three, induce it.

Induce, that's a very specific word.

I chose that on purpose, induce it.

Maybe you, you maybe your wife, like mine had a baby.

They had to induce the labor.

We got to the hospital, long Beach Memorial with Jacob ready to pop out.

She's already, she's ready to go.

She's having contractions.

But as we're sitting there, long Beach Memorial, I, I don't know

if they're renting a hospital or if they're renting, uh, a farm.

They're trying to get us through quickly.

So they're like, you know, this is going too slow.

We're gonna induce you with some Pitocin.

They put some Pitocin in the iv, dripped it into her veins, and

suddenly she is contracting like she's never contracted before.

Boom, boom, boom.

Just ready to shoot the thing out.

Jacob makes his way out in record time and it was amazing.

What was interesting is that even though these, she, she says,

reflecting on the event, this was some of the most painful experiences

she's ever had having, having a baby.

Uh, but the Pitocin, I took it to 11 and Pitocin just.

I respect it.

I don't wanna do that.

Maybe your spiritual life needs some Pitocin.

Maybe you need to induce some contracting so that you grow in

spiritual and spiritual maturity and particularly self-control.

I.

Uh, I would love for you to think about the way that your life is going.

Again, sober minded reflection allows you to say, okay, now, Lord, now that I see

what my life is doing, how I'm living, where can I take control by the power of

the spirit to see a better outcome, to grow in godliness, to grow in maturity.

I alluded this when I got on that horse.

I was in the ballpark at 2 50, 2 60.

That's a lot of weight.

It's a big dude, several years and just between us here.

Several years of my life, I really wrestled with my weight.

Really.

I still, I still wrestle with it.

I think about it all the time.

Not because I'm vain, but because I know it's such an evident part of my godliness.

Evident in a positive way, or evident in a negative way.

The height of my weight.

I was two 60, somewhere in that ballpark and, and when I was riding the horse, and

then she's like, oh, big boy, big horse.

I was ashamed and I was embarrassed.

Wasn't ashamed and embarrassed enough to really do a lot yet.

But it got me thinking, okay, why should I exercise self-control

over this part of my life?

And I wrote some stuff down in my journal at this point.

Lemme lemme just read a couple items of things that I wrote down

the why I thought it was important.

Um, I, I, I, if I did this, if I lost weight, I would have more energy.

Losing weight will allow my body to regularly have more

energy for the day's tasks.

Second, I put number two, glorify God on my body.

One Corinthians six, 19 and 20, I quoted that there and I said, it's important

to know that the context is sexual morality here, but I am in the same way.

Property of the Lord Jesus.

My body is not to be used for the sin of gluttony or sexual morality,

but for him, I put live for my boys.

Um, and I put stuff there.

I wanna live to, to, to serve my boys without have any girls.

At that point, I wanna honor Kristen with my body.

Um, here's something I put again between us.

I put, this is shameful.

Kristen married me nearly a hundred pounds ago.

This is unloving of me.

She married me with a certain physical appearance and it's almost as if I

tricked her and now letting her, letting my true fat and lazy man come out.

This cannot be.

Um, that's what I wrote to me inside, into my head.

Uh, be physically healthy and therefore better able to serve others.

Uh, I I put here, I can assume easily that my physical health will have an

impact on my spiritual health as well.

Fun fact, I found that to be true.

Be an example to everyone that sin is to be fought in all areas of life.

Here's another one.

Stop being ashamed of myself in public.

This is particularly special in my heart.

I'm out of control in my eating and everyone can see that.

If I am overweight, I'm not taking care of myself.

This brings me a healthy and gracious dose of shame.

Lord, help me love the gift more than the giver.

I love food so much.

I often will find happiness in eating it more than I find

happiness in joy in Jesus.

I need to remove this idol.

I also put having less pain in my knees 'cause my knees were hurting.

I was getting so much weight, my knees were starting to, to struggle

under the weight of my body.

I, I bring this up to you and I expose this very vulnerable information

that I wrote about a decade ago, a little over that actually, because I

want you to see the way that I think this, this works in practicality.

I know it's dangerous to use itself as an example, but this is what God did for me.

This is how God showed me myself.

And this is one evident area where people can honestly see, okay, is that

guy, is that man caring for himself in the way that God wants him to?

This is not true for all of us.

Obviously, this is not anyone who's overweight is not automatically a glutton.

Anyone who's underweight is not automatically healthy.

We all understand that.

What I'm using this for to say, look, this is what sober minded reflection can look

like and how it results in self control.

Eventually, God got ahold of my heart and gave me the grace to say, okay, it's time.

No more messing around.

But every day I still have to think, okay, am I loving food or

am I loving the giver of the food?

I think to myself, am I allowing myself to eat in such a way so as

to give honor to the food or give honor to the giver of the food?

And I want you to do the same with your life.

Food might be it for you.

May not be.

It might be the way that you spend your free time, the books

that you read, the shows that you watch, or even how much you watch.

It might be a lot of different things for you.

Whatever it is, self-control ought to be the way that people

characterize every aspect of your life.

You're being above reproach and being above reproach, being self-control,

and it's not gonna accidentally happen.

You have to take responsibility for it.

So I want you to think about the why.

If you're gonna start taking self-control, if you're gonna induce it in your

life, let me just encourage you, think about why it matters that you do it.

Whatever it is that you think God's encouraging you to grow in self-control.

Why does he want me to do this?

How does it affect my family?

How does it affect my life?

How does it affect my witness?

Ask the why and answer to the best of your ability.

Maybe you need to be as vulnerable as I've been in my journal a decade ago.

Maybe not, but ask the why.

If you wanna induce growth in self-control, you gotta give

yourself a motivating reason why to do it, to suffer the penalty or to

suffer the pain of the discomfort.

I was listening, listening to a song the other day, uh, from, from Switchfoot.

I like Switchfoot.

Uh, they, they have this song called Live It Well, and the chorus is simple.

It's kind of, it's kind of hokey, but here's what the chorus is.

Life is short.

I wanna live it.

Well.

One life, one story to tell.

Life is short.

I wanna live it.

Well, and you're the one I'm living for.

He's talking about God there.

Awaken all my soul.

Every breath that you take is a miracle.

Life is short.

I wanna live it.

Well, like if you wanna live your life well, I can guarantee you're

not gonna regret saying, man, I worked really hard to be a godly man.

You're not gonna look back at your life and say, man, did I live it?

Well, well, you, you, you'll know that you lived it.

Well, if you're taking steps toward faithful godliness and obedience,

you're gonna be able to say, I, I, I made the best use of the time.

The days were evil.

But man, God gave me grace and I got to impact lots of people because of my life.

I got to serve my family well.

I got to love my bride for as long as God gave me to enjoy her.

And by the way, you don't have a guarantee of 70 years.

You know that, right?

I don't get to love my bride with the idea that I'm gonna

carry her all the way to 80.

I'd like that, but man, I don't want to take my bride for granted.

I don't wanna take my life for granted.

Take marriage for granted.

I wanna live life.

Well, if you wanna be a qualified leader, it starts today.

Where do you need to be more intentional?

Where do you need to say, I'm not gonna let things accidentally happen.

Maybe it's your marriage.

Maybe it's your thought life, your discipline, whatever it is.

I encourage you think long and hard about this because no one

accidentally drift into godliness.

We take that bull by the horns, by the grace of God, for the glory of God.

Let's pray.

God, we do thank you for the opportunity to think carefully

about these three things.

We don't want a small O-ring to get in the way and cause distraction in

our, or destruction in our lives.

So help us Lord, to be circumspect, to think carefully about our lives, to highly

regard marriage, because it represents so much for us as a church, as a people.

It's something that you care about, is something that you invented?

Help us therefore to esteem it.

Help us also, Lord, to be sober minded about the way that we live our lives.

To constantly think about what we're doing, how we're spending

our money, the foods that we're eating, the way that we're leading,

the way that we're interacting with others, how we're mentoring

others or being mentored by others.

The books that we read, the music we listen to, the, the, the verses that

we memorize or don't memorize, help us to be circumspect about the way that we

live, to be disciplined, intentional, and thoughtful about our approach to life.

Finally, Lord, we want to exercise self-control.

When we see those things, it's one thing to notice it as another, to act upon it.

Help us to act upon these things with self-control.

Empowered by your spirit for the glory of King Jesus.

He's the one that we live for.

So help us to recognize life is shortened.

We wanna live it.

Well, for your sake, we ask all this in Jesus' name.

Amen.