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Welcome to First Works Baptist Church. If you could, go ahead and please stand with me. Make your way inside. Get ready to start. Psalm number 127. Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus. Psalm number 127. Psalm number 127 in your hymnals. Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus. On that verse. Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus. Just to take him at his word. Just to rest upon his promise. Just to know the saith the Lord. Jesus, Jesus, how I trust him. How I proved him o'er and o'er. Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus. Oh, for grace to trust him more. Oh, how sweet to trust in Jesus. Just to trust his cleansing word. Just in simple faith to plunge me. Meek the healing cleansing flood. Jesus, Jesus, how I trust him. How I proved him o'er and o'er. Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus. For grace to trust him more. Yes, tis sweet to trust in Jesus. Just from sin and self to cease. Jesus, simply taking life and rest and joy and peace. Jesus, Jesus, how I trust him. How I proved him o'er and o'er. Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus. Oh, for grace to trust him more and the last. I'm so glad I learned to trust thee. Precious Jesus, Savior friend. And I know that thou are with me, will be with me to the end. Jesus, Jesus, how I trust him. How I proved him o'er and o'er. Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus. Oh, for grace to trust him more. Great singing. Let's pray. Father, thank you for this wonderful, beautiful night that you've given us. Father, thank you for allowing us to be here in church and given the weather and the circumstances. I just pray for your Holy Spirit upon the preacher to come as well as please just bless the singing. May he glorify you in Jesus' name. Amen. Please be seated. Your next song, song number 139, I know whom I have believed. Song number 139. Song number 139 on the first verse. I know not why God's wondrous grace to me he hath been known. Nor why unworthy Christ in love redeem me for his own. But I know whom I have believed in and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed unto him against that day. I know not how this saving faith to me he did impart. Nor how believing in his word brought peace within my heart. But I know whom I have believed in and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed unto him against that day. On the third, I know not how the spirit moves, convincing men of sin, revealing Jesus through the word, creating faith in him. But I know whom I have believed in and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed unto him against that day. I know not what of good or ill may be reserved for me. Of weary ways or golden days before his face I see. But I know whom I have believed in and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed unto him against that day. On the last, I know not when my Lord may come at night or noonday fair. Nor if I walk the veil with him or meet him in the air. But I know whom I have believed in and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed unto him against that day. Great singing. All right, great singing. Thank you for being here this evening. Just a few announcements here before we sing our next song, which will be the sheet here. Until then, if you did not get a song sheet, go ahead and raise your hand and one of the ushers can get one for you. Brother Israel needs one right there. Our Sunday morning service, of course, is at 1030 Sunday evening at 5 p.m. Thursday night Bible study is at 7 o'clock. And we are currently going through the book of Matthew on Thursday evenings. So hope to see you then. You see the so many times and teams, the list of expecting mothers, all that important information right there on the left hand side. And then some of the upcoming church events. We have the men's prayer night coming up on Friday, September 1st. 7 p.m. at the church building. Want to encourage you to be here for that. Men, bring your sons to pray with you. We will have dinner for everyone who shows up and do want to encourage you to be there. Prayer works. And so we want to pray for some specific things and also some imprecatory prayers as well. And so I want to encourage you to be there for that. And then on Monday, September 11th, we have the TJ Soul Winning. If you'd like to participate in that, we do need you to be a Spanish speaker who could preach the gospel in Spanish. Make sure you have your passport. It's a lot of fun, very receptive. And so you can talk to brother Ulysses for more details about that. And then our sixth year anniversary is coming up on Sunday, September 17th. And we're going to have a soul winning marathon the Saturday before, but we'll give you more details as we approach that date. And then you see the regular reminders there at the bottom. Please make sure that your phones are silenced during the preaching so as to not be a distraction during the service. Let's go ahead and take some soul winning numbers from this past week. Salvations from Monday to Thursday. Salvations from Monday to Thursday. Seven. Anybody outside of those soul winning times? How about Friday and Saturday? Two. Okay. Three for the Paul. Anybody else outside of those soul winning times? And this afternoon? One. Okay. Anybody else? Two. Okay. Yes, sir. Three. Okay. Anybody else? Did I miss anybody? Okay. Keep up the great work on soul winning. Let's go ahead and sing our next song until then. Put your hand out until then. Very powerful song. On that first verse. My heart can see when I pause to remember A heartache here is but a stepping stone Along a trail that's winding always upward This troubled world is not my final home But until then my heart will go a singing Until then with joy I'll carry on Until the day my eyes behold their city Until that day God calls me home The things of earth will dim and lose their value If we recall, they're borrowed for a while And things of earth that cause the heart to tremble Remember there will only bring us But until then my heart will go a singing Until then with joy I'll carry on Until the day my eyes behold their city Until that day God calls me home Now in that last verse, we're all excited to see that city. Let's change that to see the Savior. Amen. One day on that last verse. This weary world with all its toil has struggled May take its toll of misery and strife The soul of men is like a waiting falcon When its release is destined for the sky But until then my heart will go a singing Until then with joy I'll carry on Until the day my eyes behold the Savior Until that day God calls me home Great singing. As the ushers come forward for the offering, please turn your Bibles to First Timothy chapter three. First Timothy chapter three. Good evening. So now we're in First Timothy chapter three and the Bible reads. This is a true saying. If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober of good behavior, given to hospitality, apt to teach, not given a wine, no striker, not greedy filthy lucre, but patient, not a brawler, not covetous, one that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity. For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the Church of God? Not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride, lest he fall into condemnation of the devil. Moreover, he must have a good report of them which are without, lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil. Likewise, must the deacons be grave, not double tongued, not given too much wine, not greedy a filthy lucre, holding the mystery of the faith in a pure conscience. And let these also first be proved, then let them use the office of a deacon being found blameless. Even so, must their wives be grave, not slanders, sober, faithful in all things. Let the deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own house as well. For they that have used the office of a deacon well, purchased to themselves a good degree, and great boldness in the faith which is in Christ Jesus. These things write unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly, but if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth. Without controversy great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the spirit, scene of angels, preached unto the gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory. Let's pray dear Lord God, thank you for this church Lord that you've given us Lord, and the people within it Lord. I just pray right now that you bless pastor and fill him with the Holy Spirit Lord as he preaches your word unto us Lord, and that we're edified by the preaching Lord. So just bless this time and keep us safe. We pray this all in Jesus name. Amen. Okay we're in 1 Timothy chapter 3. I want to apologize ahead of time for some reason on Sunday nights I start losing my voice and so if my voice starts giving out please forgive my throat and so tonight I'm preaching the second installment of the Office of a Bishop. It's part two. I was going over the the qualifications of a pastor last week and let me just give you a little bit of introduction and a little bit review from last week just so we're on the same page here. We were talking about the fact that when you look at the qualifications of a pastor we see that there's two unbiblical ways to approach these qualifications. A lot of times that people approach and number one is that people often view it as a checklist to become a pastor. So sometimes young men or men who are aspiring to become a pastor of a church will think well if I can only fulfill this particular these qualifications this list right here if I can just check off all these that I'm automatically qualified and obviously that's not true. This is just the base level the foundation that every pastor should have. Now why is that? Well because of the fact that this list is basically how a good Christian just should behave right and the second unbiblical way to approach this is that people often view it as the list that only pertains to people who want to become pastors. So they think to themselves well this doesn't really you know it doesn't apply to me I can't really work on these things. This is for someone who wants to be a pastor of a church so therefore I don't necessarily have to adhere to it but really at the end of the day like I mentioned the list that we see here is just for all Christians and how to be a good Christian and in fact to prove that look at verse 15 after he gives the qualifications of a bishop and a deacon he says but if I tarry long that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God which is the church of the living God the pillar and ground of truth. He's basically saying you know this is the way you should behave yourself this is the way you should conduct yourself as a Christian and so when you have a young man growing in the Lord he fulfills these qualifications per se okay at that point he situates himself to be considered right to become a pastor but obviously based upon whatever congregation you're in the pastor might have different stipulations on top of what God has already put in first Timothy chapter 3. So at base level you got to have these things but even above that it's at the discretion and the preferences of the pastor what else he wants to impose upon someone who's potentially going to be a pastor but at the end of the day these are qualities that all of us as Christians should want to have and work on and let me just go over some of them by way of review we talked about a bush a bishop being blameless meaning he's guiltless or innocent of wrongdoing he's above suspicion okay and this is not saying that we should be perfect Christians sinless Christians but you know you should be a Christian who's above reproach you're not involved in you know suspicious activity in the church you're not someone whose people are constantly you know you're constantly getting in trouble in church you're constantly having conflict with others you should be an individual who is just blameless okay and then of course he says they're the husband of one wife now two things that we can gather from this is that only men can become pastors amen notice this thing is women pastors in the church or in the bible you know a lot of times you have these churches where you have like the pastor the pastorate or something you know or it's just like the both husband and wife they share the title pastor but that's abominable it's wicked that's not something you see in the word of God and when you look at the qualifications of a pastor one of the qualifications is they have to be a husband of one wife how are you a woman to be a husband of one wife if that's the case you're in the wrong church okay you know no lesbian pastors here in the bible okay no dyke pastors or anything like that husband and one wife meaning that the the bishop has to be a man it cannot be a woman there's no example in the bible of a woman preacher excuse me a woman pastor there are examples of women preaching the word of God you know knocking on doors soul winning and that's definitely permissible amen but when it comes to holding the position the office of a bishop that does not include women okay so that's one way you can apply this but another way you can apply this is that a pastor should only be the husband of one wife meaning he can't be divorced okay so the reason why is because if he is divorced got himself a new wife he's basically showing that he does not know how to endure or have his house in subjection with all gravity he can't keep his household together therefore how is he going to exemplify endurance and you know having a godly marriage before a church who you know that he's leading if he's getting divorced and quitting on his marriage you know the one of the qualities of a pastor should be the ability not to quit right to endure to have patience as we're going to look at in just a bit so married and not divorced so this completely disqualifies a single person from becoming a pastor a single young man single man period because if you can't get a woman to follow you and to marry you and to like you and to want to spend the rest of her life with you if you can't trick a woman into doing that then you no one in the church is going to follow you okay and i'm being facetious about tricking although you know there might be something like well actually that that does happen from time to time but at the end of the day you know you have to have someone who actually you know reverences you and follows you because essentially that's like your resume for the pastoring okay the next thing we see there is supposed to be vigilant and sober what does that mean aware keen not careless circumspect just constantly spiritually aware not aware of what's going on in the news not aware of what's going on in the weather channel or anything like that you know aware spiritually right they're awake to the spiritual dangers of this world they understand what the word of god says they are awake in christ okay the bible tells us uh awake thou that sleep is going to rise from the dead and christ shall give thee light awake to righteousness and sin not for some have not the knowledge of god i speak this to your shame and often when the bible talks about being awake it's not necessarily referring to you know being awake literally like you're falling asleep in church or something like that it's referring to being awake spiritually in other words you are aware of your spiritual surroundings you are aware of biblical truths you're walking in the spirit you're winning souls to christ you are essentially someone who is spiritually minded not carnally minded okay the next one there is good behavior meaning conduct becoming to a christian conduct that can be followed and one of the examples that i gave last week is that one way you can determine if you have good conduct is or excuse me if you have good behavior is do you have behavior that if someone were to follow that particular conduct they would become a successful christian can someone look at your walk with god and and and mimic that and have a successful walk with god can they mimic your soul winning and become a really good soul winner can they mimic your faithfulness to the lord and become a successful faithful christian hey can they mimic your church attendance and become a faithful member of a church this is good behavior right behavior that is becoming to a faithful christian the next one there is given to hospitality and i mentioned that last week you know sometimes we read that and we think to ourselves well that means you know just having people over to our house which obviously that definitely it can be included but hospitality just means treating others with generosity you're you're accommodating individuals you're being generous with people specifically the brethren right the bible says to do good into all men but especially those of the household of faith so obviously we're supposed to be a blessing to everyone whether saved or unsaved but obviously we're going to be around god's people far more often than we're around unsaved people and so most of our relationships as christians are in a church and when that happens you know opportunities will arise needs will arise in a church in the brethren and it gives you an opportunity to be a blessing to them you know the bible says that we should be given to hospitality look for an opportunity to be a blessing to someone else when the need arises and then the last quality that we went over is being apt to teach what is apt to teach it means that you are capable you're disposed you're inclined you're willing to teach obviously the word of god and this is applicable for both male and female due to the fact that you know everyone in this church should be ready to preach the gospel to the unsaved at any given moment right you know often in church it's like well preaching the gospel is only for the pastor it's only for the deacon it's only for the the the the leaders in church but we don't see them in the bible in the bible everyone was responsible to preach the gospel okay everyone has been given the great commission and everybody everybody in a church who is saved should be capable and ready to preach the gospel at the drop of a hat and when i went over some of the practical things on how to do that i was explaining that you know at the end of the day you should get so um good at preaching the gospel that you don't even necessarily need a bible although it's good to have a bible so you can show them from the verses in the bible but you should be able to preach off the top of your head right you know sometimes christians can become so dependent on their soul winner's new testament with all the tabs and all the notes and everything that they don't take time to actually memorize the locations of these verses or even memorize the verses period right whereas as christians we should just be able to shoot from the hip and just the verses should come to us and one of the best ways to practice this is just first and foremost just memorize the roman's road and once you memorize the roman's road branch out outside of the roman's road to verses that essentially confirm what the truths in the roman's road are saying and then also when you go soul winning you're just going to run into issues all the time you're going to run into people who contradict you you're going to run into people who stump you and therefore you'll have an opportunity to go back study that out and be apt to teach when that question comes up again okay and so be apt to teach be someone who is ready to as the bible says be of a ready mind ready to preach the word of god ready to preach the bible ready to preach the gospel this is an important quality to have now look at verse number three here he goes on to say not given to wine now you could honestly apply this in two ways but i believe this is actually just referring to luxurious living and pleasure but you could also apply this to alcohol because of the fact that you know in general not in general just in the bible period the bible condemns alcohol consumption okay so if the bible condemns alcohol consumption obviously pastors should not be drinking alcohol you know the bible says wine is a marker strong drink is raging whose service deceived thereby is not wise oh wait except for the pastor he can drink a little bit but yet you have calvinist pastors out there churches that promote drinking beer in their services they have a bar in their services you have for example we want to consider them to be christian by any stretch of the imagination but you have catholics who drink alcohol in their services by taking communion you know they actually drink the wine i remember when i was a catholic uh we would we would go take communion they never let me do it though i don't actually i don't know why but when i would go up there they they would tell me to cross my arms or something but they would never give me of the wine and so i mean thank god for that but you know you do have kids like 10 years old 12 years old and they do partake of the wine i've seen kids like you know and in fact i remember uh there's a there's a catholic church that i used to go to when i was 13 and it was called saint barnabas it's in long beach and i think i told the story before but uh we're going to mass because it was required for us to attend mass like on a sunday or something like that and we went there and the mond senior was there and he was conducting the services the mass and then you know he performed the the the communion and this guy was drunk i'm just gonna be on the guy was drunk okay because when he when he you know he killed the cup it's all it's all gone he cleans it out and he kind of doesn't even know where he's at and then he just like walks off stage and he just goes to his room and everyone in the mass is like is mass over like he'd even dismiss he didn't pray he didn't say nomad of the poverty equals you know he said none of that he just he just killed that cup of wine and got inebriated and we just walked off stage i mean what an embarrassment and after you know i don't know after about like 10 minutes people are like okay think mass is over you know and what probably happened is that he was probably drunk before that you know he's probably doing his own little private communion he probably got his own little sesh going on in the background making sure that you know he's he's uh cleansed or whatever and then he's performing the lord's supper in the mass and then of course you know he's getting drunk but you know we make fun of that but you know there's christians who also get drunk there's christians who try to justify drinking alcohol and what a shame it is when christians not only christians but pastors of christian churches think it's okay to drink alcohol they try to justify it's like if you're a pastor who's advocating for alcohol consumption you need to get your pastor's license revoked not that that one exists but you should step down because how are you going to be vigilant and sober you know the bible commands you to be vigilant and sober but you're drinking alcohol well you know i'm not getting drunk though it's a sin it's not a sin to drink it's just a sin to get drunk well think about this when a person drinks alcohol for the first time they get drunk immediately because that substance is foreign to their body okay so even if they have a little bit of beer or a little bit of wine because it's foreign to their body they're not necessarily accustomed to drinking that you know they're gonna get drunk now after a certain period of time of drinking they build up a what tolerance right at which point maybe they can have a beer or a glass of wine and not get drunk so what you're trying to tell me is that in order for you not to sin you've got to make sure you're not drunk but you've got to sin a whole bunch of times before that before you build up the tolerance to drink and not get drunk i mean you see the logic in that it's like well i got to build up this tolerance i can get to a point where i'm not sinning when i drink so let me just get drunk like five times ten times so i could build up this tolerance i mean it's nonsensical and here's the argument that people often bring up be not drunk with wine we're in his excess you know but rather drink responsibly drink in moderation because that's how they read it that's literally what they say it's just like well the bible just says be not drunk with wine we're in his excess oh that's right the second part says drink in moderation right no it says but be filled with the spirit the answer to not being drunk with wine we're in his excess is that you're filled with the spirit not that you drink in moderation and i don't consider drinking jack daniels drinking in moderation which is what a lot of these calvinist churches do they're taking shots and you know i mean this stuff is stupid you know and then you have these bozos out there it's just like it's not sinful okay if drinking alcohol isn't sinful then give it to children if drinking alcohol isn't sinful then give it to a pregnant woman then of course you wouldn't do that because it's wicked you'd be thrown in jail for giving alcohol to a child it's child abuse and you know what you know the bible doesn't give us an age limit either is that you can as long you know if you're once you're 21 you can start drinking alcohol you know why because it's always wrong to do no matter what age you are right i mean as clear as day and so i think not given to wine obviously is referring to luxurious living and pleasure because wine in the bible can also be referring to not just alcoholic beverages but just pleasure luxury it's a picture of oil and wine which is also a picture of just pleasure okay uh excess you understand but this can also be applied to alcohol and it's sad that in 2023 we'd have to like make that application but you know you have pastors out there to try to justify drinking alcohol and so they need to get rebuked but there it says not given to wine and the only reason i would think that this is referring to luxurious living and excess is because when it's talking to the deacons it says not given to much wine so in other words they can have they can partake of a little bit but not be excessive about it so therefore it's obviously referring to some sort of excess reveling banquetings type things where it's just like every day is a party now it goes on to say they're not given to wine no striker now what is a striker someone who wants to fight okay which is interesting because in this particular passage it's kind of mentioned twice in two different ways right it says no striker and then it says what no brawler now what is a striker well we can describe this as being someone who's easily provoked someone who's temperamental they got a short fuse you gotta you gotta like walk on eggshells around them because the moment you offend them they just want to fight or something well you know what christians should not be easily provoked the bible specifically tells us um when it comes to charity also described as love is that it's not easily provoked okay because it doesn't think it's it doesn't behave itself unseemly it doesn't think highly of itself therefore it can't be easily provoked a person who's easily provoked is someone who has a big ego they have pride they have an ego and they're easily offended you know and so god doesn't want us to be strikers where it's just like oh man you know this guy cut me off pull over you know pull over you know see if you can see it in my face or something you know and as a christian you definitely don't want to do that obviously it's just not wise but i've just always felt like because i'm a christian if i ever allow myself to get involved in that situation god will work against me and either i'll get my butt whooped you know or something worse can happen to me because road rage is no laughing mattering man i mean people pull out guns they pull out all kinds of stuff you know and so don't be a striker don't be a brawler someone cuts you off don't give them the thumbs up the uh the other thumb is what i'm referring to you're like well it was kind of like a thumbs up it was just kind of sideways you know what i mean just no just you know just let it be out of like water off a duck's back don't be a striker don't a person who's given over to conflict and this again this is not just for a pastor this is for christians period right go to proverbs 16 hold your place there in first timothy let me read to you from titus 1 7 it says for a bishop must be blameless as the steward of god not self-willed not soon angry not given to one no striker not given to filthy lucre it says in titus 3 1 titus 3 2 excuse me to speak no evil of no man to be no brawlers but gentle showing all meekness unto all men look at proverbs 16 and verse 32 it says he that is slow to anger now notice it doesn't say he that is never angry because god wants us to be angry sometimes and anger is definitely a valid emotion we're not jedi's here you know anger is the path to the dark side or something you know actually god gets angry with us if we don't get angry at sin at abominable things at the things that god gets mad at so obviously he wants us to get angry but he wants us to have meekness which is strength under god's control right meekness is not weakness it's strength under god's control so you can be angry and be meek at the same time because you have self-control you have temperance you're not you don't have a short fuse he says he that is slow to anger is better than the mighty and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh the city don't be this person who's in public and as soon as someone looks at you cock-eyed you're like what's that guy looking at why is the guy looking at me like that well maybe because you're ugly i mean you ever thought about that or just maybe because you're not smiling maybe because you got an ugly face you know i was going to say it's a face it's a certain phrase that i learned in this church actually but i can't i cannot use that phrase here but the based upon the laughs you guys know exactly what i'm talking about it's the our face and i'll just end it right there you guys know what i'm talking about yep rule your spirit amen have humility have meekness rule your spirit be slow to anger don't have a short fuse oh he just got it right now don't be a person who just had the drop of a hat listen up don't be a person who just had the drop of a hat you just want to throw hands now look don't mistake this when it says no strike or no brawler it doesn't mean you have to be some sort of pacifist christian that if someone's taking advantage of your wife your kids or another innocent person that you just don't do anything okay it's like well you know we got to be all gandhi now and just not you know throw hands or whatever because if some dude's trying to lay hands on your wife or is violating your wife in any way your job is to protect your your spouse and i will gladly throw hands to protect my spouse i will gladly throw hands to anybody who's messing with my kids and i would gladly throw hands with anybody who's messing with some innocent person from our church or anybody for that