Pastors and People (Part 2 of 2)

The way Christians met for church in the first century is very different than the way we meet for church today.

But the reasons we gather and the respective roles we fill, that hasn't changed. Today on Truth for Life, Alistair Begg continues a study introduced yesterday in 1 Thessalonians 5. It's here we find timeless biblical direction for leaders and members alike. Now, quite simply this morning, I want us to consider, first of all, the activity of the leaders and then the attitude of the members. First of all, then, the activity of the leaders—these individuals who are working hard, who are over you in the Lord, and who admonish you. In other words, these are the elders or the pastors of the church. Secondly, who are over you in the Lord—who work hard and who are over you in the Lord. In other words, they exercise leadership. They do so as men who are over others, but they are under Christ. And it is the fact that they are under Christ to give an account that gives them the characteristic of leadership.

Because really good leadership is not about authority or credentials. It was about humility. It was not about power.

It was about gentleness. And when you read this phraseology here, you read it wrong. We read it wrong if we take the phrase, who are over you in the Lord, somehow in a way that is regarded as autocratic. Authentic servant leadership demands management. You cannot lead without managing things. Ultimately, a pastor is not a manager, but a pastor must know how to manage.

An elder is not called to read management consultant books, but an elder will do well to read management consultant books. Why? Because you have to manage things. Now, where are the chairs going?

How many chairs are there? Will the walls be pulled back, or will the walls stay in for the Christmas Eve services? Somebody has to manage this stuff, in the same way that you have to manage your family. If you don't manage your family, it's chaos.

And, of course, the mismanagement of family life is there for us all to see. And not least of all at the present time, as young mothers and young fathers despising the instruction of the Bible concerning what it means to have respect for authority and so on are in the process of trying to carve out an entirely new landscape for themselves. And that's why in the New Testament there is a constant correlation from the lesser to the greater, to the management of those who are under our care, to the exercise of those responsibilities in the framework of the church. And the greatest joys in physical parenting are not in issuing orders but in establishing the parameters so that our children might grow up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. And the same is true in terms of, if you like, spiritual parenting or fatherhood or leadership within the church. Notice that you are to recognize that this is in the Lord, who are over you in the Lord. In other words, it is within the framework of Christian relationships, it is as it relates to the matters of spiritual life. And thirdly, who admonish you.

In other words, who seek to keep you on the path. That's really what it means to admonish. There's nothing negative in the word except the warning aspect of it. Oh, don't go there.

That's too close to the edge. Oh, don't listen to this person. They'll tell you the wrong things. The same thing, again, as a parent. Delighted to see your children walking in the truth. Hence, there is hard work. Hence, there is leadership. Hence, there is admonishment.

And Paul gives us the flavor of that kind of admonishment when he describes his relationship with the Ephesian elders in Acts chapter 20, and he says, I never failed night and day to admonish every one of you with tears in my eyes. In other words, it's not heavy-handedness. It's brotherliness.

It's big brotherliness. Tender enough so as not to shame those who are under our care, firm enough so as not to allow those under our care to wander into by-path meadow. And as in family relationships, so in the church, getting that balance is absolutely crucial. Because to go on one side is to become heavy-handed and to break the spirit of our children.

To go on the other side is to become so lax as to deprive our children of the very benefits that they require for wholeness. Well, that, then, is something concerning the activity of the leaders. We turn now to the attitude of the members. To the attitude of the members.

And just three things concerning them. First of all, what have they to do? Well, they're to show respect. Verse 12, now we ask you, brothers, to respect those who work hard among you. In other words, to appreciate the value of them. To appreciate the value of them.

You see, that's what it means to teach your children respect for a dollar. I'm reading Warren Buffett at the moment, The Snowball. Someone gave it to me. It's a very kind gift. What a fat book!

But it is not as daunting as it looks. It's actually a page-turner. And it was fascinating for me to discover young Warren Buffett, at the age of six, selling chewing gum and refusing to break a pack of five sticks of chewing gum for a lady who wanted only one, because it severely affected his profit margin and left him with four sticks, which were then a responsibility, so he had to find four more people who only wanted one.

So he refused at the age of six, No, I never break up my packs. No surprise that by the age of fourteen he was already filing his first tax return and that by the age of seventeen he had already established five small companies under his jurisdiction. It is a quite fascinating book. And he understood from the get-go the value of a penny and the value of a dollar and the value of compounded interest. He had respect for it. We might say an undue respect, but nevertheless, he understood what it was to respect it. Well, it is that notion that is here—to appreciate, to respect the value of leadership. God has given leadership to the church because he cares for the church, because he intends the church to enjoy the benefits of that leadership.

It is therefore incumbent upon the members of the local church to make sure that they are submitting in the Lord, under the Bible, to the guidance and nurture and admonishment of those who are set in positions of responsibility. Now, it is a very, very apt word, isn't it, to respect them? To respect them.

To respect those who work hard among you. In other words, not to flatter them or to fawn over them. No, Mr. X is so wonderful. I've never heard anyone like him, never met anyone like him.

Oh, please, be quiet. Mr. X can do no wrong. You have never met him.

Talk to his wife. Mr. X is the key to this. Yeah, well, he may be the key to that, but God just changed the locks on that door. And what you find traditionally in the church large and in the church local is a pendulum swing between adulation and denigration.

You know? In the first few years, they idolize you. You know, in the next few years, they criticize you. In the next few years, they ostracize you. And then if you stay long enough, you can actually—people's memories go, and they come back around, and you have another little idolized time, another little special honeymoon, like the children have left, and you can go off for a weekend by yourself.

So he goes back around, says, Oh, where are you now? Idolize, ostracize, criticize, marginalize, whatever it is. But it's true in leadership in any case, isn't it? If you're a schoolteacher, you know that. One day you're a hero, the next day you're a bum. One day the parents are all in, sending you chocolate chip cookies. The next day they're in, telling you they're gonna go to the board of governors, and you'll never teach for a day in your life.

It's the same lady that was in. Last week, it was chocolate chip cookies. This week, it's something entirely different. Well, the same is true in the church.

And so what you find is that people flatter or they despise. They either regard you as indispensable or as totally dispensable. Oh, we could never do without you. Oh, we don't care if you ever come back again. That's how it goes.

And sometimes it's like the weather in Scotland. It's all in the space of twenty minutes. That's why the New Testament says again and again, Don't forget the leaders who taught the Word of God to you. Don't forget them. And if you don't forget them, you'll remember to pray for them, and you'll remember that they're just like you. They have a different responsibility, but they still have the same challenges, they still have the same temptations, they still have the same things that wake them up in the night, they still have the same dilemmas of family life, they still have all of that stuff, and they will give an account for every word spoken from the Bible and every counsel given in response to a telephone call and every word spoken harshly and unwisely and every time they fobbed off the responsibility of taking a stand when they couldn't face the challenge that was there.

All of that as well. Respect them. Secondly, hold them in the highest regard.

That takes it up a level again, doesn't it? Hold them in the highest regard. In other words, the attitude is not simply one of appreciation, but it's one of affection. And the affection, you will notice, this love is not on the basis of personal liking. It doesn't say, hold them in the highest regard because they are such wonderful individuals.

No. Hold them in the highest regard in love because of their work. Not because they champion our personal causes. Not because they stroke our egos. Not because they tickle that which is our fancy. My experience in thirty years of pastoral ministry is this, that people who follow and support leadership on that basis will as quickly desert it.

They come in on the crest of a wave, and they go out in the undertow, and sometimes within the shortest period of time. Why? Because they come in with wrong expectations. There is only one perfect leader—Jesus. There is only one authoritative shepherd—Jesus.

There is only one foundation for the church—Jesus. And every other person under Christ will only on their best day be an approximation to that to which all of us are called by the New Testament. So the church member needs to learn to say, It's not my personal preference that matters here but the good of the church, which is the important thing. And this is especially important when it comes to issues of personal preference as opposed to something which is a biblical mandate. In other words, it is a biblical mandate to pray. It is a biblical mandate to celebrate the Lord's Supper. It is a biblical mandate to baptize. It is a biblical mandate to worship God.

All of those things are not even in question. It is a biblical mandate to exercise discipline. But how many times do you have to pray? And when are you supposed to pray? One of my friends a long way from here is having a very, very difficult time at the moment, because he's trying to change the time of his church prayer meeting. He's trying to move it from Saturday night to Wednesday night, and he has a royal circus on his hands. He's not shutting down prayer.

He's just trying to move the night. Well, I think we ought to sing using those hymnbooks, because I like it when they all bang down again into the pew, you know. I don't think we should have screens and so on. Why do you have strings? Why are they not going away?

Why doesn't that organ play all the time? Why don't you have a big cross up in the middle here, or two big crosses, and get your face out of the road? Why don't you do all these things?

I understand people have all kinds of personal preferences. But if they're not biblical mandates, they're not worth arguing about. And so many local churches end up in deep difficulty, because they take what is peripheral and they make it central.

And as a result, what is central becomes peripheral. They fail to remind themselves again and again that the main things are the plain things, and the plain things are the main things. Neither in business or in church life can people exercise effective leadership if those on their team are continually critical of them. "'It is small wonder,' wrote one of my colleagues, "'if we are continually critical of our leaders that are set over us, it is small wonder that they cannot perform the miracles we demand of them.'" Leaders can never do their best work when they are subject to the carping criticism of those who should be their followers. Respect them, hold them in highest regard in love because of their work, and finally—and just a sentence on this—live in peace with each other. Many of the commentators, I noticed, move that final sentence into verse 14 and put it in the realm of fellowship. Well, it does act as a bridge. There's no question of that. But I wonder whether Paul is not just tipping his hat here to 1 Corinthians chapter 3.

Make sure that you respect them, make sure that you hold them in high regard, and make sure that you live in peace with one another. Remember when he wrote to the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians 3? He said, "'I couldn't address you as spiritual but as worldly, mere infants in Christ.

I gave you milk, not solid food, for you weren't ready for it. Indeed, you're still not ready, you're still worldly.'" Now, what is he going to say? "'You're still worldly.'" What is coming next? When I was growing up in Scotland, "'You are still worldly,' what came next was cinema."

Or whatever else it is, that was worldly. And there's no question that it's more of a concern now than it was then, and sadly, now it isn't a concern, and so anyway, that's another day for another subject. "'You are still worldly, for since there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly?'"

So here's the indication that the church is beginning to crumble. Jealousy and quarreling. And what is the basis of jealousy and quarreling?

Are you not acting like mere men and women? And how is that? For when one says, "'I follow Paul,' and another, "'I follow Apollos,' aren't you not mere men?" What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Interestingly, he asks it in the neuter. He doesn't ask it in the masculine. He doesn't say, "'Who is Paul and who is Apollos?'

He says, "'What? What is Paul? What's Apollos?'

They're only servants through whom you came to believe, as the Lord has assigned to each his task." In other words, this was God's plan from all of eternity. He just decided to use Apollos here. He just decided to reuse Bill. He just decided to use Fred.

He just decided to use the individual. I planted the seed. It's true, Apollos watered it.

But I'll tell you what. God made it grow. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who makes things grow. Because the man who plants and the man who waters have one purpose, and each will be rewarded according to his own labor, not according to his own success.

You think about it? Many of my colleagues are in tiny, tiny little congregations. And if they said here that they will be rewarded according to their apparent success, how amazingly discouraging!

No, they will be rewarded according to their labor. In Scotland tonight—and it's already almost four in the afternoon—in Scotland tonight, there will be congregations in remote parts of the Highlands where only a cluster of people gather, where twelve or twenty or maybe twenty-five show up for church, but still the pastor is there, still he has done the study, still he is teaching the flock. And he will be rewarded according to his labor, for we are God's fellow workers. You are God's field. You are God's building.

Well, our time is gone. But here's the coda, and it is vitally important that you hear this, especially if you're here as a visitor this morning, because you perhaps have come in, you said, Wow! I don't know what's going on, but there was the sermon about leadership, and apparently there's some rebellious commando group at Parkside that is just emerging from somewhere, and the elders of charge beg with the responsibility of trying to whip these boys into shape. No, actually, nothing could be further from the truth, at least as far as I know.

It's always possible that it happens not on my watch. But no, I want to encourage you in the way in which Paul encourages these Thessalonians as he starts these instructions. Look at 1 Thessalonians 4.1 as we finish. Finally, brothers, he says, we instructed you how to live in order to please God—now, notice this next phrase—"as in fact you are living." Now we ask you and urge you in the Lord Jesus to do this more and more. What a privilege it is this morning, church family, to come to this instruction regarding the activity of leadership and the attitude of membership, knowing that in the mercy and goodness of God we do not address it to correct a problem as much as to continue a pattern. But we must never rest on our laurels. We must never take these things for granted. We must always be aware that we're engaged in spiritual warfare, that the evil one is a roaring lion seeking those whom he may devour, that he is an expert at infiltration, that he is masterful at sowing the seeds of bitterness and disgruntlement. And therefore, let us hold on to what we have. Let us affirm constantly that Christ is the only foundation of the church. Let us remind ourselves entirely that while one may plant and another may water, and we may be thankful for this individual or for that, ultimately it is only God who makes things grow.

And therefore, it is to him that we will constantly turn as we give him thanks for the past and as we trust him for the future. You're listening to Truth for Life with Alistair Begg and the conclusion of the first message in a new series called Pastors and People. Today's message represents just one sermon in a collection of eight full volumes in the Pastors Study series. And at Truth for Life, we are grateful to be able to offer all eight volumes in this series for free thanks to the faithful giving that comes from Truth Partners.

If you're on the website or mobile app, you can download the audio files. Just search for the title, The Pastors Study. For your convenience, you can also purchase the study on CD or USB. It contains all eight volumes.

Both are sold at our cost without any markup. We're deeply grateful to Truth Partners and anyone who financially supports the ministry of Truth for Life. And today we're pleased to offer an exceptional book written by pastor and blogger Tim Challies. It's called Epic and Around the World Journey Through Christian History.

Tim logged more than a hundred and eighty thousand miles. He visited over 80 museums to photograph artifacts that tell the story of God's faithfulness over the centuries. The book again is called Epic. It's a collection of photographs. There are 33 in total. Each is paired with the story it tells about Christian history. Tim went to places like Scotland and France, Ecuador, Zambia, Israel, on a scavenger hunt of sorts.

Epic is part history book and part travelogue. And it comes with our thanks when you give a one-time donation to support Truth for Life or when you become a monthly Truth Partner. You can do either of those by visiting our website truthforlife.org or call 888-588-7884. October is set aside as Pastor Appreciation Month. It's one of the reasons why we're featuring the Pastors Study series. And as a service to those in leadership, we've curated a list of highly recommended books for you. These are not only for pastors, also for those in youth ministry or those who serve as elders or deacons, maybe Sunday school teachers.

Visit truthforlife.org to view some of our favorite books or look for the list on the Truth for Life mobile app. Now here's Alistair to close with prayer. Father, look upon us in your mercy, we pray, so that your Word might dwell in us richly, enabling us to sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs as we give thanks in our hearts to you, our sovereign God, to your Son Christ, the great foundation of your church, and to the Holy Spirit who enables us to both understand and to do that which the Scriptures teach. Try you in God, we bless you. In Jesus' name, Amen. We are grateful you've joined us for today's study. I'm Bob Lapeen for Alistair Begg and all of us at Truth for Life. Hope you have a refreshing weekend and hope you can join us again Monday as we continue the pastor's study series. Today's program was furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.