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  IMPORTANT EXHORTATIONS FOR CHURCH ELDERS
  by Zac Poonen
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Lord Jesus, we want to acknowledge your presence in our midst. We
believe we have gathered here in your name with a good conscience, to
the best of our knowledge. And so we believe you are in our midst.

It is your church that you have called us to build, but you are the
builder. Help us to be sensitive to your voice and equip us to serve you
better. We want to glorify your name in each of our locations and be
united together to fulfill your purpose in the place where you have
placed us.

We want to be anointed with the Holy Spirit and equipped with gifts to
serve you. We want to build families that glorify you. We want to walk
in lowliness of mind, Lord, before you and in fellowship with one
another.

Give us an open heaven at this time and speak to our hearts, we pray.
Thank you. We believe you will.

Amen. I'd like to turn to Philippians chapter 2. There are some chapters
in the New Testament which are very unique and very valuable, like
Ephesians 1, here's another one, Philippians 2, because I believe we are
told here the main secret of a Christian life and service, and the two
greatest sins that we will have to battle to the end of our lives. Some
of the sins mentioned in Matthew 5, 6, and 7, the Sermon on the Mount,
are in a sense easier to finish with if you are faithful, but there
Jesus said at the end of it that if you listen to these words of mine
and do them, you will build your house on a rock.

That's my personal life, my family life, and my church. That's the end
of the Sermon on the Mount, and any person who doesn't take those words
seriously will find something or the other shaky, his life will be
shaky, his home will be shaky, and his church will be shaky. So maybe I
should begin there before we go to Philistines 2. Please turn with me to
Matthew 7. We are called to proclaim something which most of Christendom
is not proclaiming, and that is primarily the Sermon on the Mount.

And that is the reason so many churches are shaky, so many families are
shaky, and so many individual lives are shaky. And that's why you have
pastors falling into adultery, that's why you have divorce rampant in
evangelical churches, and remarriage, and pastors divorced and
remarried, all types of things. And here in the United States, that's
more rampant than in almost any other country in the world.

So if you're building a church in this country, we have to be careful
that these forces overwhelm us. And so this passage, Matthew 7, 24 to
27, is important because that shows why a personal life or a family life
or a church life can be solid and unshakable or can be shaken. Matthew
7, 24, everyone who hears these words of mine and does them is like a
wise man who built his house on a rock, the rain fell and the floods
came and the winds blew, and whatever that means, circumstances,
contrary winds and everything, all the attacks of Satan, attacks of men,
name it, it did not fall.

But then there's another group of people, verse 26, these are not non-
Christians. These are not unbelievers. They are people who hear these
words.

Who are the people who hear the words of Jesus? These words of mine
means Matthew 5, 6, and 7. Who are the people who hear these words? Who
are the people who read these words? Most Christians. But they don't do
them, and that doesn't apply only to Matthew 5, 6, and 7, but to many
passages in Scripture. I believe we should be alert to be aware what are
the teachings in the New Testament that are being preached but people
don't follow.

I remember years ago when I started preaching more about the new
covenant, I felt the teaching of Jesus was like, let's imagine the
picture of the face of Jesus. None of us have seen it, but whatever he
looks like, a perfect face, and there's a picture of it, and you know
these posters sometimes are stuck on the wall of a person's face and
then somebody's torn it and the face is disfigured. That's how I see the
face of Jesus in most churches.

A lot of what he's taught, if you take the whole counsel of God as the
face of Jesus Christ, it's disfigured. Maybe there's a bit of an eye
there and a bit of an ear and you don't even know who it is. This is the
gospel and the message being preached in most churches.

And the Lord has raised us up to proclaim the full counsel of God and to
see what are the parts that are left out, and that's what the Lord told
me. You've got to listen to what other people are preaching because
that's what your flock has been influenced by, and then read the
scriptures and see what are the parts that are missing. What are the
parts of the New Testament that others are not preaching or emphasizing?
That's why if you've heard me for a few years, you know that I almost
always speak on certain subjects because the other things everybody else
is talking about.

So here's this foolish man who the winds blew and the slam of it, great
was its fall. So if you look at that, as I said, a picture of a personal
life, family life, and church life, all three to be unshakable,
especially family life, severely attacked these days, to be absolutely
unshakable. And I believe this is something we should work towards, our
children unshakable, founded on the Lord, growing up in godliness,
husband-wife relationship in godliness, not shaky like on sand.

Then we have to take everything in Matthew 5, 6, and 7. I repeatedly go
to it again and again and again to see, Lord, is there anything missing
out in my life, my family life, or in the church that needs to be
emphasized? People need to be reminded of it again and again, especially
some of our churches, many new people are coming in and they have not
heard these things. I've asked numerous people who have come to our
church, for example, let's look at verse Matthew 5, 20. Unless your
righteousness surpasses the righteousness of the Pharisees and the
scribes, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.

The earthly expression of the kingdom of heaven is the New Covenant
Church. And it says, what we need to proclaim is a righteousness that
exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees. And the scribes
and Pharisees kept the letter of the old covenant, they were very
particular about that.

And then, I hope you have all seen that the rest of the Sermon on the
Mount is an explanation of Matthew 5, 20. Your righteousness must
surpass the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees. And then the
Lord says, okay, I'll explain it to you.

The righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees is, number one, don't
kill, don't commit murder. That's good. It's one of the Ten
Commandments.

You stop there, you come to the level of the righteous and scribes and
Pharisees, but yours must exceed that if you want to enter the kingdom
of heaven. Remember, as you read through this section, Matthew 5, 20,
this is the qualification to enter God's kingdom. And this is what we
proclaim in the church.

The church is the kingdom of heaven. You want to enter here, your
righteousness must exceed. This is what we teach in the church.

Not just don't kill. What is the new covenant equivalent of that? We
speak about new covenant church. Old covenant is don't kill, new
covenant is don't get angry, verse 22.

Now we need to ask ourselves, first of all, have we, are we even seeking
to fulfill that degree of righteousness, which exceeds the righteousness
of the scribes and Pharisees consistently? We must not be satisfied
until unrighteous anger disappears from our life. There is a righteous
anger and the righteous anger, I mean, I always say the, this is the
written word, but the living word is Jesus Christ. So when I want to
understand the written word, I look at the living word.

When was Jesus not angry? When was he angry? That's the easiest way to
find out whether, which is righteous and which is unrighteous. When they
slapped him, called him the devil and Beelzebul and spat on his face,
zero anger. Ignored him, zero anger.

But when he saw the two instances, I see particularly when he saw people
making money in the name of God, he was angry. And if you see a
television program of some preacher asking for money and you don't get
angry, you're not like Christ. Let me tell you that plainly.

You are not like Jesus Christ. You don't get, you don't burn with anger
when you see that, or when you see some advertisement or an article,
people asking for money, completely contrary to what Christ taught and
we don't get angry. We are not Christ-like, even though we think we are
Christ-like because we have been gracious to him.

Jesus was not gracious to those making money in the name of God. So
that's what I mean. There is an anger which is righteous, there is an
anger which is unrighteous.

You know, in Ephesians 4 it says, be angry with sin, which means there
is an anger with sin and there's an anger without sin. So this is the
difference. In other words, whatever people may say or do to me
personally, if I get angry, I sin.

But Jesus never got angry. That is the living word. The written word is
explained in the living word.

So let me emphasize that we need to examine ourselves if we do get angry
in the place where Jesus was angry. And the other place where Jesus got
angry was where he saw, you know, a man with a withered hand, I think it
was in a synagogue and Pharisees were waiting to see whether Jesus would
heal him. He was angry because of the lack of compassion that the
Pharisees had towards the suffering man.

That's the other thing I must be angry with. When people, I don't care
if it's in the church, somebody is not compassionate, it's hard hearted
towards another person who's suffering in some way or a family that's
suffering in some way. It's hard hearted.

A lot of preachers are very hard hearted. They are kind to those they
love and are their favorites, but hard on others. Many preachers hit out
in their sermons, it's maybe someone sitting in the congregation and
they don't like or want to be exposed.

Jesus never did that. You know, the devil can make a person change the
word the Lord gave him to speak by just sending into the meeting someone
whose weakness, you know, or someone you don't like, or if you're
against people wearing a lot of jewelry, somebody coming in a lot of
jewelry, the devil can make you change your subject and you begin to
preach against that person. That's one example I'm giving how our
message must not be influenced by we see this person sitting here and
that person sitting there, therefore I change my message, no.

I must be in touch with God. He'll give me the word to speak. There may
be times when he gives me a word to speak with someone, but that's
different.

So that's just one example. And then said your righteousness will exceed
the righteousness of the Pharisees. The other thing he said, the old
covenant standard was, was 27, you shall not commit adultery.

But the new covenant is, if you look at a single woman, verse 28, and
desire her, you've already committed adultery. We must not only live by
that, we have to proclaim it. Because I feel that in these days of
abundance of pornography, there are probably a lot of men sitting in our
churches who are defeated by that and who need to be delivered.

It's just like if you're in the old covenant and you were Moses and you
saw a whole lot of people in your church were just committing adultery
regularly, like Eli's sons were committing adultery with the people who
came to the temple and Eli just kept quiet or said, Oh my son, you
shouldn't do that. God said, you're finished Eli, you and your tribe
will never be priests again. For the Lord said in the Old Testament, and
when we see the new covenant standards, I should not imagine that
everybody sitting in front of us are living a holy life, they're not.

We have to proclaim this. Otherwise, you're burning. You're talking to a
man who doesn't have a kingdom, to a man who doesn't have a wife.

You've just got to put up with it. Jesus said, as I said, in the whole
message of Christ Jesus said, Christ was made flesh in Jesus. That means
this thing that is written here, where the righteousness exceeded the
righteousness of the Pharisees.

This new covenant righteousness, this idea was made flesh in Jesus. And
when it says, he who says he abides in him must walk as he walks. This
is our calling.

To demonstrate that word has become flesh in our life or is increasingly
becoming flesh in our life. And these are areas where we have to battle
continuously. Never give up, never given a small place to the devil.

But it's interesting that these are the two primary sins that Jesus
mentioned. Some of the others are a little easier to follow. But the
number one and two was anger and lusting in our minds.

And interestingly those are the only two sins that he mentioned in the
Sermon on the Mount where he said you can go to hell, not just miss the
kingdom of heaven. If you read the entire Sermon on the Mount, the word
hell comes only twice. And it's in relation to these two sins.

Matthew 5 22, you get angry with your brother you be guilty and if you
call him some bad name you go to Supreme Court and if you say something
more than that you will go to hell. Verse 22. I don't know how many
Christians believe that.

And it's because their pastors and preachers don't preach it as strongly
as Jesus did. Nobody preached about hell as much as Jesus. Not even
Paul.

Jesus spoke about hell more than anybody else. And that's a subject
that's almost not preached on today. The second mention of hell in the
Sermon on the Mount, only two places.

The second is if your right eye, verse 29, makes you stumble better to
tear it out otherwise your whole body will be thrown into hell. And if
your right hand makes you stumble. Now remember this is speaking in
relation to adultery.

And there are two ways you can commit adultery in the New Covenant
standard. One is with your eyes and one is with your hands. I believe it
refers to masturbation.

What is the other connection? I don't see any other connection between
the right hand and the right eye and lusting. And if you do, verse 30,
you're thrown into hell. Now it's a very high standard to preach and
since most pastors and preachers don't live that standard they feel
guilty about ever preaching it.

If you were to ask the people in your church, how many of you before you
came here to our church were taught that anger was a sin? Serious sin.
Serious enough to send you to hell. How many of you were taught that
lusting with your eyes is a serious enough sin to send you to hell? Yeah
and then you'll see how how much the face of Jesus has been disfigured.

And then we have to say what they're preaching is another Jesus. There
are many other things mentioned here and I'll just mention one or two of
them and then move on. Loving one's enemies.

Yeah I think we can, that's a little easier. Not seeking honor, chapter
six, when we pray or fast. And when you come to fasting, notice Jesus
did not say if you fast but when you fast.

You understand the difference between the two? There were a lot of
difference between saying if you fast and when you fast. Jesus expected
every one of his disciples to fast at some time. How much is up to you?
He didn't specify how much.

I don't understand the full reason for it. I think partly it is to
discipline our bodies. You know Paul says in 1 Corinthians 9 that every
athlete trains himself to win a race and he relates it to the discipline
of his own body.

In 1 Corinthians 9 the last verse. To paraphrase Paul's words there is,
I don't let my body tell me what I should be doing. I tell my body what
it should be doing.

And fasting is a help in that direction. At least now and then it's good
for us to, when we have some time off, maybe begin with fasting a meal
or two meals and then go on to have a full day of fasting and just have
liquids. I remember in my younger days I did it regularly before I left
my job while I was working.

And it really helped me to conquer the desire for food. Now you know
Jesus was called a wine whipper and a glutton. People saw him eating
heartily and he may even taken a second helping.

But remember this is a person who could fast for 40 days also. So he was
not against, he was not like John the Baptist eating locusts and wild
honey. He enjoyed good meals but he knew how to discipline his body.

I believe it's right you can enjoy a good meal but if you don't know at
other times to discipline your body and without other people knowing
about it, the times you should fast are when nobody knows about it. But
one of the most important things here is forgiveness. More and more the
Lord's emphasized this to me in Matthew 6 verse 14 and 15.

If you forgive others your Father will forgive you. If you don't forgive
others your Heavenly Father will not forgive you. This has to be
emphasized tremendously because I don't think that most Christians even
believe that.

I've asked people this question. Supposing there's somebody you just
haven't forgiven, somebody who did something against you maybe 10 years
ago, and you just don't forgive him. This is terrible what he did to me.

And you die in that condition. I ask you where do you think you'll go
even though you say you're a separate Christ. This is where some people
say that I'm an extremist in teaching.

I say you go to hell. I don't have any doubt about it. I don't care how
many years you call yourself a believer.

I believe what Jesus said. If you have not forgiven your brother your
Father will not forgive you. And if you can, if you're not forgiven, can
you go into God's kingdom? Can you go to heaven? Can you go into the
Father's presence? Is there another place after death where we can be
forgiven? It is appointed unto men once to die after this is the
judgment.

This if you hear my words Jesus said and don't do them your house is
shaking. These are the passages I quoted with most Christians who read.
You ask them, have you read it? Yeah, we have.

You do it? They never take it seriously. You know the story of David in
1 Kings chapter 2. Read verse 8 and 9. You see there how he's giving his
closing instructions to Solomon. He says, you remember Shimei who cursed
you? I want you to notice these are the last words that David spoke
before he died.

Verse 10 says, then he died. What were his last words to Solomon? He
charged Solomon in verse 1, chapter 2, 1 Kings 2 verse 1. Be strong in
the Lord. Keep the charge of the Lord.

Verse 3, walk in his ways. Keep his commandments and the law of Moses so
that you can succeed and the Lord will carry out his promise. This guy
Shimei who cursed me, I had promised him, verse 8 last part, that I
would not kill him.

But Solomon you didn't make that promise. See how David escapes. He's
got a bitterness against that man who years ago cursed him when he was
running away from his son Absalom.

Don't let him go unpunished. His gray hair must come down to hell with
blood. This is the man after God's own heart, David.

Then David died. Did he forgive Shimei? Next question is, is David in
heaven? Have you ever thought of it? He was under the old covenant, the
righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees. He kept it.

And he said in the new covenant, it's not going to be like that. In the
new covenant, if you don't forgive others, your father will not forgive
you. You know, it's one thing to say, we talk about the new, we teach
the new covenant, but we don't explain what it means.

And this is one example of the difference between the old covenant and
the new covenant. The old covenant, a lot of people got angry. Moses got
so angry.

You know the story. I don't have to turn there. And the Lord told him,
speak to the rock.

The second time they needed water. The first time Exodus 17 hit the
rock. The second time in Numbers 20, 21, he said, speak to the rock.

And Moses was so angry with the people that, you know, there's a warning
there in that passage. Maybe I should show it to you in Numbers, because
it can apply to us that sometimes you can go into the pulpit with some
anger in your heart against some situation or something or something
that happened in the church or whatever it is, and you can speak in a
way which is, you know, Numbers 20. The Lord spoke to Moses in verse 7.
Verse 8, take the rod and speak to the rock, because they were thirsty.

There was no water there. Why speak to the rock? Because the rock is a
picture of Christ, and Christ is to be crucified only once. There was a
tremendous symbolism there.

You spike the rock once, and the next time you only speak to it. Even
though Moses may not have known the symbolism that was fulfilled in the
crucifixion of Christ, yet he was to obey what the Lord said. This is
what can happen, you know, after we have become a little senior, or
imagine ourselves to be senior in the Lord's work.

We can begin to be a little slack in obeying God's promises, thinking we
can get away with it, because we're not like these newcomers. We're sort
of senior. We're elders, but you can't get away with it.

And Moses took the rod, and listen how he speaks to the assembly in
verse 10. You rebels, shall we bring water for you from the rock? Look
at the arrogance with Jesus, as if Moses is going to bring that water,
and he lifts up the hand, and verse 11, strikes the rock twice. He's
clearly angry.

And immediately, of course, the water came forth in abundance. You know
there were two million people there, 600,000 adults, plus so many women
and children. It was not trickles of water.

How much water do you need for two million people to drink? It was
rivers that came out of that rock in many directions. And the Lord
immediately told them, you have not believed me, verse 12. You have not
treated me as holy.

Therefore, you will not bring this assembly into Canaan. You know, that
was the most severe punishment you could have given Moses. If you said
you'll get leprosy, this is nothing compared.

This man, for 40 years, he had wandered in the and just at the door of
Canaan, the Lord said, you can't get in. You mean, Lord, just for one
little mistake? To whom more is given, more is required. Please
remember, dear brothers, that God is going to require much more from us
than from every single person in our churches.

And if I preach to you all, he's going to require much more from me than
from you. Whoever you preach to, God's going to require more from you.
Your standard is not the same as theirs.

It's way higher than theirs. And so he, this is the reason why he did
not enter Canaan. God allowed him to see it.

This man would be faithful to God for 40 years, leading his people. At
the last moment, he missed out. But I see God's graciousness in one
thing, that years later, he allowed him to stand with Jesus inside
Canaan's land on the Mount of Transfiguration.

God is so merciful and kind, but he could not lead him in there at that
time. So that is Old Covenant. Even there, it was strict.

But I just mentioned that, that if we don't forgive others, we will not
be forgiven. Just one or two other things, and we move on. Matthew 6,
again, here's another thing which we have to preach in the New Covenant,
Matthew 6, 24.

There are two masters in the world. It's not God and the devil. Almost
no, Jesus never spoke about God and the devil as two masters.

The only two masters that Jesus spoke about was God and wealth. And he
just said you cannot serve God and wealth. You cannot live for money and
live for God at the same time.

It is impossible. But Matthew 6, 24 is another verse that hardly anybody
ever preaches on. I have, in my own life, discovered that the love of
money is like an onion with many, many layers.

And it's not a question of how much you own or how much what your bank
account is. Billionaires love money, and the homeless man on the street
loves money too. The homeless man's got nothing, but he still loves
money.

And the billionaire's got such a lot, he loves money. So it does not
depend on the size of your bank account at all. It's something quite
different.

It's a question of where your, you know, like Jesus said, where your
treasure is, there will your heart be also. Or we can put it the other
way and say where your heart is, that's where your treasure really is.
And what do I, where is, what is my heart set upon? See, this is a very
difficult area to be absolutely honest, but we have to be honest before
God.

And we have to earn our living. We got to care for our children,
especially those of you little children growing up. There are many needs
and cost of living keeps going up.

We need to perhaps find a better job where we can earn more because what
they're getting is not enough. There's nothing wrong in all that.
There's nothing wrong in seeking a higher salary or finding means of
earning more and absolutely nothing wrong.

But here is an area where we can, we can only know before God. And it's
really contrasting. Do I love Jesus more than I love money? In other
words, is Christ supreme in our life? Can you think of at least one
instance in your life where you sacrificed money for the sake of obeying
God? Just one.

I often say to people you should have had at least one time in your life
where you made a choice. And as a result of that choice to follow the
Lord and serve him, you lost some money. If you have not even had one
instance like that, in other words, he chose to go to someplace to serve
the Lord or sacrifice some opportunity to make a little more money
because you went somewhere to build a church or to do something for the
Lord or go somewhere, an opportunity to serve the Lord somewhere, maybe
in just some situation.

I've desired that for all of God's servants, that you should be able to
look back to say, here's one time Lord, I chose you. I want to keep
that. And you'll never be a loser.

That I can tell you. What Jesus said, you'll get a hundred times is
absolutely right. I know that my own life, the last 56 years that since
I quit my job, I've served the Lord and he never left me down.

Never. He's taken care of me abundantly. So, but we can, it's precious
to have such experiences, but I don't look back to that time I left my
job and say, well, that proved that I love God more than money because I
say, I believe my love of money is an onion.

And I'll tell you honestly, I'm peeling it off even now. There are
layers. The only man who can say I finished with it is the man says I've
become like Christ in the area of money.

And I publicly say I have not. It's a pretty bold man who can say I have
the same attitude to money that Jesus had. And if you don't have that
attitude yet, we should be working on our salvation with fear and
trembling.

And I do. As far as I know, I'm not pursuing money in any area in all
these years of full-time Christian where I've never sought money from
anybody, but I still say, Lord, I can't say that my attitude is 100%
like yours. I want to have light in every little corner of my heart
where there's any lurking little snake called the love of money because
it will hinder my service for God.

I won't be able to serve God if I have any of that. So it's not a
question of convincing others that you're free from love of money, but
because of some action you took in some situations more than that. This
is something so individual and personal that even your wife will not
know.

I don't believe my wife knows whether I love money or not. By some of my
external actions, it may look like I don't. But only I know.

God and I know. Even the devil doesn't know because he doesn't read our
thoughts. God and you know whether.

And the more you work out your salvation from it, you don't have to
reduce your bank account even $1 to be free from the love of money. It's
rare cases where the Lord tells a man, sell all that you have like he
told the rich young ruler. He never said that to anybody else, only to
one person.

For some people, he says that, but 99% of people, he doesn't say that.
But he still tells them to be free from the love of money. 99% of
Christians, he doesn't tell them to give up their jobs.

1% he does, like Peter and the fishermen who followed Jesus. But the
rest of you, 99%, he doesn't ask you to give up your jobs when he says
you must be free from the love of money. And that's an individual,
personal thing between you and God.

And I urge you, don't condemn yourself. Let's say, Lord, give me light,
walk in the light. And the other area which we don't think about much is
anxiety.

In the space of 10 verses, verse 25 to 34, the Lord says, don't worry,
don't worry, don't worry, three times. Those 10 verses takes about only
two, three minutes, or maybe two minutes to read it. And in a sermon, in
a two-minute period, if one truth is repeated three times, it must be
very important, especially in Jesus repeating.

You read verse 25 to 34, how long does it take? Maybe two minutes. And
he says, don't worry, verse 25. Don't worry, verse 31.

Don't worry, verse 34. Or verse 28, why are you worried? Three, four
times. So this is obviously another thing which I don't know how much we
take that seriously.

Your righteousness must exceed the righteousness of the Pharisees. There
was no, in the 10 commandments, do not worry was not a commandment. Do
not get angry was not a commandment.

Do not lust after women was not a commandment. Forgive others was not a
commandment. That is the difference between the Old Covenant and the New
Covenant.

So we have to ask ourselves, when we talk about New Covenant church,
victory over sin, these are the sins we have to overcome. Anxiety. I was
a slave for anxiety.

Anxiety leads to discouragement. I don't believe we should be
discouraged. I remember reading Hudson Taylor's statement once where he
said, I refuse to be discouraged.

I will only praise. It was a choice of his will. It's not feeling.

Even when I'm feeling like discouraged, I exercise my will and say, I
will only praise. That's what helped me years ago because I was a
tremendous slave to discouragement in the early years of my Christian
life before the Lord baptized me in the Holy Spirit. And one of the
results of the baptism in the Holy Spirit was to be free from
discouragement.

And I learned it's not a question of feeling. I choose in my will to
say, I will only praise in this situation. My feelings are irrelevant,
like the old parable of fact, faith, and feeling walking on a wall.

If you haven't heard that, fact is God's word. Walking on a narrow wall.
Fact, faith, feeling.

Faith was only looking at fact, which is God's word, and feeling
followed along. But faith turned around at one time to see his feeling
following him and fell down. And feeling fell down to him.

Faith would not have fallen if he had kept looking at fact alone.
Feeling would have automatically followed. There's a great parable which
has helped me.

I had heard it many years ago. I said, I'm going to keep my mind and my
thoughts on God's word. And feelings will follow.

It may take time, but it'll follow. It'll catch up. But I'm not going to
look at feelings.

No, I refuse to be discouraged. I will. I will only praise.

So anxiety is something you need to. And yeah, I see that, you know, the
primary person in the old covenant, the man who proclaimed the old
covenant, was Moses. And the one who proclaimed the new covenant was
Jesus.

Do you know in the Bible, there are only two people who are stated to be
the humblest people on the face of the earth. One was Moses and the
other was Jesus. We know that Jesus was the humblest person on the face
of the earth.

But it says about Moses, you know, this passage in Numbers 12, verse 3.
The man who proclaimed the old covenant was the humblest man on the face
of the earth at that time. Numbers 12, verse 3. Moses was very humble
more than any man who was on the face of the earth. Now that verse is
put in brackets just to say that Moses never wrote it because the five
books of Moses, I think Joshua inserted it there under the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit.

The man Moses was the humblest man on the face of the earth. So I
mentioned that, now we can go to Philippians 2, which I wanted to come
to finally. That the old covenant and the new covenant were both
proclaimed by the humblest man on the face of the earth, which teaches
us the primary quality to be able to proclaim this new covenant is
humility.

And that's another area. It's like an onion. Pride is like another
massive onion.

You got to keep peeling it off and peeling it off and peeling it off. So
turn now to Philippians 2. There are two sins. I told you about these
other things which we looked at in Matthew 8. Anger, lusting with the
eyes.

I believe we can come to the level of our conscience where we are free
from anger that we never raise our voice at our wife even once. Under
any situation, no matter what she does or what she doesn't do. I mean
she forgot to give you some very important information which caused a
lot of problems for you or made you lose a lot of money.

You don't get angry. You say, darling, let's be a little more careful in
the future with this. This is going to land us in a bit of a soup.

I believe that should be our attitude because we make mistakes
ourselves. But I believe we should work towards that. Home life is so
important.

When it says a man cannot bring up his own children in godly ways, where
is he going to bring up a whole church? Very important, dear brothers.
I'm so happy when I see elders in our churches whose children are all of
them following the Lord and all of them in your church. Not just
following the Lord, but committed to the church you planted in your
collection of churches.

And particularly if you have any of us are young, we've come to the Lord
young, then there's no excuse. We got married after we understood some
of these truths. Older people who understood these truths much later, it
may be a little more difficult.

God is merciful. But if we proclaim the new covenant from a young age
and our children are small, we have a great opportunity. And it's very
clear in Philippians, sorry, 1 Timothy 3. It says man cannot bring up
his few children in a godly way.

He's not qualified to be an elder. There are cases in India where I've
removed some people from eldership because their children were wayward.
I don't mean after they left home while they were in that home.

I believe 1 Timothy 3 refers to children who are still in your home,
young children. Not those who have left and got married. But I mean if
you really brought them up well when he's old, he will not depart from
it.

That's what God's word says. So coming back to Philippians 3, there are
two sins which we will battle till the end of our lives after having
overcome all the sins mentioned in Matthew 5, 6, and 7. Those two are
mentioned in Philippians 2 verse 3. Selfishness and conceit or pride.
Selfishness and pride are two areas where it's very, very difficult for
us to get light on if you're not ruthless with yourself.

Lord, show me where am I selfish? Where am I conceited? The conceited is
a very subtle thing inwardly. It's not open manifest pride. It's a
little feeling of superiority over others.

Even your wife may not detect it. Selfishness and conceit. And so he
puts the opposite of that there with humility of mind.

All the time, my attitude must be humility of mind and considering
others. This is a very important verse. Some people misread it.

Not considering others as more spiritual than yourself. No. Jesus never
did that.

He didn't consider Judas as more spiritual. He didn't even consider
Peter as more spiritual than himself. Jesus would say, who of you
convinces me of sin? He could boldly say that.

He knew that he was the most spiritual person in all of Israel. He had
no doubt about it, yet he was the humblest man on the earth. You can be
aware of your spirituality and the fact that you're qualified to lead
others because you are more spiritual than them and yet be the humblest
person in your whole church.

Jesus is our example. But here it says more important than others. Very
important to notice that.

People don't read it. Many people have misread it. Consider others as
more spiritual.

Garbage. It's hypocrisy. Nobody does it.

It says more important and that's why on the last day of Jesus' life, he
washed their feet. They were more important. See, when you walk the
streets where the roads are not tarred.

I mean, when I go to the villages in India, I don't wear shoes. I wear
sandals and the feet get dirty very easily on those dusty roads. And you
walk into a home, your feet is all dirty.

And the Jews, many of the rich Jews have slaves who'd be at the door
with a bucket of water to wash the feet of the guests. Very refreshing
when you walked in sandals and dusty roads. But when Jesus was having
the Last Supper, he had told them, I don't want any outsiders there.

It's a private dinner I'm having with my disciples. But they kept the
bucket of water, but no slave. So who's going to do that? Who's going to
consider others as more important than myself? He said, well, I'm the
slave here.

And he took the bucket and washed their feet. Remember this, that the
one whom we follow, the last day of his life on earth, he was not a
chairman or director or senior class for any of that garbage. He was a
slave washing the feet of others.

He came all the way down from heaven to the feet of others. And there
was only one step more beyond that, that was to die like a criminal. And
this is the direction we are to go.

We are not to be today as humble as we were a year ago, but much more.
We should be working our way downwards towards the feet of others.
Consider others as more important than yourself.

It's a very serious challenge. This is a new covenant. Don't look out
just on your own personal interests, verse four.

As I said, this is one of the most important chapters in the New
Testament, but also the interests of others. A true elder is like this.
He takes it seriously.

Am I looking out only for my personal interest? He's not saying you
shouldn't do that. He says, don't merely look at your own personal. We
have to take care of our families.

Sure. But think of others in our church, especially the circle we have.
I don't have to think of the interests of all the homeless people in
town, but the ones whom God, if I claim to be an elder, a shepherd,
there's certain sheep committed to me.

I must know who are my sheep. A lot of people who come and sit in our
churches may not be our sheep because they don't submit to your
authority. They don't accept you as their shepherd.

But if someone does accept you, you have a responsibility towards them.
The reason we have more elders is because as the church increases in
size, we need more elders. Not elders who are preachers.

This is another area where we think every elder must be a good preacher.
No. I believe in primary requirement of an elder.

Very few people have the gift of preaching. I'll tell you honestly, I've
discovered throughout my lifetime that it's a unique gift that God gives
to some people. I don't know why.

I wish he'd give it to everybody. But in God's great wisdom, he gives
the ability to explain scripture or challenge scripture in a clear way
to very, very few people. But an elder is primarily a shepherd.

He must have the heart of a shepherd that cares for the sheep, even if
he can't preach for them. You need only one good preacher or one or two
good preachers in a church. That's about it.

But as the church grows in size, there needs to be shepherds who care
for people who can think about the needs of the flock and sense
somebody's drifting. I remember in the early days when I retired from
eldership in CFC Bangalore about 25 years ago. But before that, when the
church was much smaller, I knew everybody by name.

I even knew the name of all their children. As the church grows today, I
hardly know anybody. But in those days, I knew everyone.

And also, I remember telling them, I cannot stop you from backsliding,
but I'll tell you, I'll keep watch over you. And three months before you
fall away, I'll warn you. I told them all that because I'll sense that
you're drifting.

That I'll warn you. That's how I'll keep watch over you. I won't stop
you.

You may still fall away. I have even gone to some people after observing
them for a long time in CFC Bangalore and said to them, brother, you are
not born again. I don't see evidence of that in your life.

Your wife is, but you are not. He got offended and left the church. I
said, fine.

What can I do? And the subsequent behavior went from bad to worse. We
have to keep a watch. Don't glory in the fact, oh, my church is
increasing in size.

God have mercy on you. Is your flock increasing from a hundred to 200
sheep? A man who had a hundred, one got lost and he had such a concern
that he left the 99 and went after that one. What will happen if your
flock becomes 200? You'll need more shepherds.

And shepherds don't grow overnight. And shepherds will not grow. You are
such a boss over the church that you don't allow people to grow.

So how that works out in each, I believe there's a tremendous lack of
shepherds. You remember what Jesus said, Matthew chapter nine, Matthew
chapter nine. It's a great verse.

I've often, you know, I read scripture and apply it to myself. And when
you read scripture like this, it's good to apply it to yourself. Verse
36, put yourself there and see whether you are the spirit of Christ.

Seeing the people, he felt compassion for them because they were
distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd. It's a good
verse to think about when you look at your flock. I see this church
sitting in front of me to whom I'm preaching.

Do I feel a compassion for them because they are distressed? The margin
of my Bible says harassed, harassed by the devil or harassed by the
circumstances. There are people like that in our churches, dispirited.
The margin of my Bible says thrown down, harassed and thrown down
because there's no shepherd to care for them.

And then he said, the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.
That verse is used by many people to send people out as missionaries to
unreached areas. But he's not, I think it's got nothing to do with
unreached areas.

This is a classic example of scripture is taken out of context and
misquoted. Harvest is plentiful. Brothers out there in Africa and India
and Mongolia, workers are few.

That harvest is right in our church. The workers are few, the true
shepherds. The workers he referred to, they were not missionaries going
out to unreached areas.

See the context. Never try to understand a verse out of its context.
Anyone with a little bit of common sense, read 36 and 37, knows that the
worker he's talking about is a shepherd.

The shepherds are few. So pray to the Lord of the harvest. Here's
another verse that's used for missionary work.

This is not talking about missionary work at all. Beseech the Lord of
the harvest that he'll send out shepherds into the harvest. Harvest is
right there in the church where the sheep are, not where the goats are.

He's not talking about the goats at all. He's talking about the sheep.
There's a harvest among the sheep because they are harassed and thrown
down by the devil, shepherds.

A great need in our church is a shepherd. They don't have to be great
preachers. As I say, there are one or two preachers who can say about
the gift of the word in a church.

It is more than enough. Even in a large church of 600 people. See in CFC
Bangalore about 600 people now come to the meeting.

We're scared to tell you honestly. How many of them are disciples? I,
it's very difficult because Jesus said make disciples. And we don't want
to turn away him that cometh to me.

I'll not cast out. Jesus said they come. You can't say don't come.

But we see the numbers increasing. A lot of people come because many
reasons. One, many people tell us we come here because every other
church we go to they're asking us for money all the time.

There's one church they never ask us for money. And that's not always a
good reason to come. But that's the condition of Christendom today.

But I find there's a church within a church. That's what I look for. See
like Jesus had a number of concentric circles.

One was the big multitude of more than 600, 5,000 men alone and he fed
once 10,000 people perhaps including women and children. Huge crowd. And
he spoke to them.

He had a burden for them. Within that was a very small circle you read
in Luke 10 of 70 disciples. You know they were such good disciples that
he sent them out two by two in Luke 10.

They are the ones who came back and said Lord even the demons are
subject to us in your name. And that's a smaller group than this big
multitude. And within that crowd of 70 or group of 70 was another group
of 12 his inner circle.

And then within the 12 was 11. You know one was a crook. Even in that
small group of 12 one was a thief.

And then within that were three Peter, James, and John. So Jesus had
concentric circles and sometimes he was only with those three. For
example in Gethsemane when he went to pray why not have 12 people to
pray with you? Isn't that better? Not necessarily.

We think the more people at a prayer meeting the more powerful it'll be.
No Jesus went to pray in Gethsemane. He said I take only three.

This is a serious business. And even those three went to see. But he
called only three.

If two people are agreed. You know that verse in Matthew 18-19. If you
don't know it please look at it.

Two. I've often used that in relation to me and Annie my wife. I said
Lord here are two of us.

We want to always be agreed. We would pray concerning our children. And
we would take Matthew 18-19.

If two of you that's me and my wife are agreed about anything they ask.
And we would ask often for our children. Shall be done.

Physical sickness. A need in the school. Some problem with the teachers
in the school.

Some problem with other mischievous naughty students in the school.
Anywhere. And as I grow up we never stop praying.

They need to find partners in marriage. Two of you take three. You see
the importance dear brothers of being in agreement with your wife.

Whatever the cost. I'm not saying compromise. I'm not saying go down to
her standards.

No. You must be the leader. You must be the head of the house.

Husbands be like Christ is to the church. The husband is the head of the
wife. There's no question of yielding that position.

Don't let your wife run the house and decide how the children should be
brought up. That's not love. That's foolishness.

If there's something which is there's a more godly way you can bring up
your children. And you need to say that darling. You must do it in a
more godly way.

These children I always thought of my children as they're going to leave
my house by the time they're 18 years old. And then they'll go off to
some college. And nowadays the college much worse than it was 30 years
ago or 25 years ago.

And you all have a much tougher task than I have. But within those few
years when they're at home I was determined about one thing. They must
know the word.

At least I'm not saying they become preachers. I'm not interested in
that at all. But they must know what we teach in the church clearly.

What we stand for. The elementary truth of the new covenant. And they
must have a longing for it.

And they should have accepted the Lord and taken baptism before they
leave home for college. That is my goal. And I encourage all the people
in the church to have that as a goal.

And that they've developed the habit by the time they leave home of
reading God's word regularly. I would start off by giving them the
children's Bible with pictures and all that. And ask them questions
around the dining table to encourage them to study God's word.

So we're two of them. My wife and I would go to this verse. Two of you
agree Lord we are asking particularly for this.

Sometimes one of your children may have a particular problem. A health
problem perhaps. It happens.

It happened with our children. It can happen in any family. We live in a
world.

The dust of our body. Our body is made from dust. And that dust was
cursed in Genesis chapter 3. Don't forget that.

The dust. The Lord didn't curse Adam. He said this dust is cursed.

And his body was made of that dust. And that is why he's dying. If there
was no curse on this body he would never die.

And that's why we get sick. So people who claim that Jesus will heal
every sickness in this earth. First of all they're not honest.

They're not speaking the truth. And they haven't understood that it's
because we are made of cursed dust that we get sick. Because if that
were true logically we should not die either.

But Jesus the Lord told Adam you shall return to this dust. It's part of
the curse that our spirit is delivered from the curse. Galatians 3 13.

Christ became a curse for me on the cross. So that I may never be under
the curse. But instead it says in Galatians 3 the curse is replaced by
the blessing of Abraham which is I will bless you and you will be a
blessing to every family that you meet.

That's how I understand the blessing of Abraham. Galatians 3 14. It's
connected to the curse being removed from my spirit.

Christ not only took my old man on the cross. He became a curse for me
on the cross. That's why he had to hang on a tree.

That's why he couldn't be killed with somebody stabbing him to death.
Because the old testament law was cursed is everyone who hangs on the
tree. You read that in Galatians 3 13.

And therefore I recognize the fact that till the end of my life sickness
is possible. That's just honest truth. Isaiah 53 verse 4 says Jesus was
acquainted with sickness.

That wasn't a sin. He had to be acquainted with sickness. He had
headaches like we have.

And our children can have that. And we need to be united in prayer as
husband and wife. It's a tremendous passage that requires husband and
wife to be always united in the home.

And work towards it if it's not true right now. Because their children
will suffer otherwise. And it's in that context.

See I read Matthew 18 verses 18 to 20 backwards. Starting at verse 20.
Because these are all connected.

Verse 20 says four. Four means because. So it's going backwards to verse
19.

Again I say to you going backwards to verse 18. So you really got to
read it from verse 20 backwards. First of all if two of you husband and
wife are coming in the name of Jesus.

You're both born again. You love the Lord. The Lord Jesus is in the
midst.

So that's the first step. Like I told my wife even before I married her.
I said you will never be first in my life.

You'll always be second. And I want to be second in your life too.
Christ must be between us.

Then we'll have a wonderful marriage. That must be very clear. That
Christ tells me something and my wife tells me something.

I'm going to do what Jesus said no matter how much my wife gets
offended. He is first. And I tell you there are many Christian husbands
who do not take that place.

They love their wives more than they love Jesus Christ. And that's why
the married life is shallow. That's why the blessing of the Lord is not
on their home.

Because the Lord says you've got an idol in your life. You shall not
have an idol. Your wife is your idol.

Two are gathered together in my name. It means the Holy Spirit brought
you and your wife together. I am in the midst.

That's where it begins. Christ is in the midst of husband and wife. And
then now Christ is in the midst.

Now two of you must agree. I'm not saying you're perfect in your unity
but at least you must agree on the one thing you're asking now. Agree
about something that they ask.

It'll be done. We shouldn't think well it may be done. It is Satanic
powers that are seeking to invade your home and hit your children.

So coming back to Philippians 2. Selfishness and pride. The two sins
that we have to be very careful about. And then this beautiful passage
in Philippians 2 verses 5 to 8. Have the same attitude in yourself at
all times that Christ had.

Same mind. This is where I you know you've often heard me say the three
secrets of the Christian life are humility, humility, humility. Here it
is.

Number one. As God he became a man. Humility.

Number two. Verse seven. Verse six first of all.

Number seven. As a man he became a bond servant. Again humility.

And number three. As servant of a slave. I thought that is the lowest.

No. He went to the point of being treated like a criminal. He's even
lower than a slave.

Verse eight on the cross. Humility, humility, humility are the three
secrets of the Christian life. And it says have this attitude in you all
through your life.

Just keep going downwards, downwards, downwards. Therefore God has
exalted him. And I tell you if any of us go this way God will exalt you
over what? Not over your flock.

I have no interest in being exalted over my flock. I want to be exalted
over the devil. That God at peace will crush Satan under your feet.

There's a place the devil is. God is appointed for the devil. Matthew 6.
Sorry.

Romans 16 20 says under my feet. I believe as we keep on pursuing this
life more and more we find we're not oppressed so much by the devil. I
remember in the early days of my Christian life even while I was serving
the Lord.

Oppression of Satan was there. But it's less and less and less because I
know my position. This place is under my feet.

Scary dreams. I don't believe Jesus had scary dreams. In the beginning
we do.

And if God gives you at least one co-worker in your church one is
enough. Two of you agree. First of all in the home husband and wife.

And in the church we find one other person who's in complete agreement
with you. Not because he's like you. Maybe different from you.

Paul and Barnabas were completely different. But the devil got between
them. It's a very sad story there.

Because of family relationships, family friendships that Barnabas had
towards his family member Mark. Division came between two whom the Lord
said in Acts 13, separate me Saul and Barnabas for the work to which I
have called them. And the devil came between them.

So that can happen there. It can happen in your church and mine. So if
you fight for that battle, we've been tremendously blessed in Bangalore
that the work started with me and another brother and I've tried to
retain my unity within all these years.

If this are differences, we speak about it openly. We can have
differences with our wife. But we must remain united.

We don't have to agree on every single thing on earth. But it's very
important to seek that unity. And so the devil doesn't get a foothold on
our church, doesn't get a foothold in our home.

That's our main object. Because if there's a gap comes between husband
and wife, that's what the devil's waiting for. He sees that gap, he
comes right in and you know who gets attacked? Your children.

Or a gap comes between these two elders who are totally united with each
other in a church, something affects your church immediately. Or the
children of some important member of your church. Not just your children
you have to protect, you have to protect the others in your church as
well.

You don't want the children in our church to be affected. It's so
important, so important. We must care not only for our children if you
have the heart of a shepherd.

Even care for the children in the church of others. I want to encourage
you, be like Jesus. Make friends with some of the children in your
church.

I sent you that article which there's a Christian research team, means
called Barna or something. They do research for years. They did a
research among children and said that about 39 or 40 percent of them
said that.

One adult in our church made friends with us, apart from parents. That's
made a tremendous difference in our life, brought a loyalty to us in
church. You are that adult who has to make friends with somebody other
than your own children.

Because that's how Jesus was. I've always felt that the more I become
like Jesus, the more I'll be friendly with children. I try to make
friends with them, let them know that I'm not this distant creature up
in the pulpit, but your friend.

Do that brothers. We have a responsibility of a generation growing up.
Selfishness and pride.

I have a few things just to read out to you now. It's from this book. As
you all know, God's work done in God's way.

This was actually a series of messages that I gave to elders through the
years in India. In the early days, we had elders meetings. Every
conference, we'd have elders meetings and I shared some of these things
with them.

This is just a little edited version, essentially that. In one meeting,
I said, brothers, can you all, a number of our elders there, write down
what are the qualities that will make you have confidence in somebody?
Not just submit to a person as an elder, but you have confidence in that
person. What are the qualities that will make you lose confidence in a
person? So we sat together and made a list and that's here in chapter
seven of some qualities of Buddhism.

I'll just quickly go through it. Here are some of the qualities that you
should seek to have if you want others to have confidence in you. Number
one, it's clear to people that you seek the approval of God and you
don't seek the approval of men, even of godly men.

Number two, the kingdom of God and his righteousness are your first
priority, not your job. Number three, you are a totally committed
disciple of the Lord Jesus and people can see that. You fulfill the
conditions of discipleship, the three of them in Luke 14.

You love Jesus more than anybody on earth. You take up the cross every
day, number two, and you don't hold tightly to material things. You have
things, but you don't possess them.

Then next, you are humble and broken in spirit. You make godliness
attractive. You know, there are many people who preach holiness.

It's what is very repulsive, the way they preach it. It's not beautiful.
Holiness must be beautiful.

The life of Jesus was beautiful. There's a repulsive holiness, which is
the higher sacred righteousness, which majors on minors. Have you washed
your hands? Why do you pluck grain on the Sabbath day? And the
equivalent of that today can be some little thing.

Your head covering is not fully covering the head, fully up to here.
Don't measure all these things. You make godliness attractive.

You're zealous to preserve the church in purity, and you're not ashamed
to proclaim that you're zealous about that. You're bold to proclaim the
truth without fear. You live according to your convictions, and you
practice everything that you preach.

Next, you control your temper, and listen to this, you are never in a
bad mood. I believe it is possible by the grace of God to come to such a
life that we are never in a bad mood at home or anywhere. Is there a
situation where the Lord says, I will not be with you? I'm with you
always until the end of the age.

If you're calling him, particularly Matthew 28, if you're calling is
you're going around making disciples and teaching them to obey
everything Jesus commanded, the Lord says, I'll be with you till the end
of the age. It's a conditional promise. A lot of people who hang it up
on the wall, I say that's not for you.

Are you making disciples? Are you teaching people to obey everything
that Jesus commanded? That's the condition. You try to claim a promise
without the condition. I believe all of you are seeking to fulfill that.

I hope so. To make disciples and teach people to obey everything Jesus
commanded in Matthew chapter 5, 6, and 7, then the promise is I will be
with you always till the end of the age. I can stand before God's face
and say, Lord, to the best of my knowledge, that is what I'm trying to
do.

Make disciples and teach people to do everything you commanded. You have
to be with me till the end of the age. I believe you'll be with me.

It's a promise you can claim. Then you're never in a bad mood because
the Lord takes care of everything. So many things may go wrong.

I may not know what to do in certain situations. That's fine. Okay.

I'm confused. Sometimes I'm struggling in different situations. I still
am, but I will not be in a bad mood.

Never, never, 365 days of the year, 24 hours a day, my wife who sees me
all the time will never, never see me in a bad mood, not when I get up
in the morning, not when I go to bed at night. Never, never, never. Make
that a goal.

I mean, if you haven't got there, say, Lord, so many things can go wrong
in life. Your wife may not be as much of a disciple as you are. Some
people, unfortunately, have that type of wife.

It's not serious about discipleship. Happy to come along to the church.
I'm not serious about discipleship, but there's no excuse for you being
in a bad mood.

Absolutely no excuse. Your wife is a weaker vessel. You can allow her to
have a bad mood now and then.

I'm not saying it's right. I mean, it's really God needs to get over
that too. But the Bible says, live into your life in an understanding
way, recognizing she's a weaker vessel.

So don't demand that she should not be in a bad mood. You must never be
in a bad mood. And you're compassionate in your dealings with all
people.

You're natural in your behavior. True spirituality is natural, and you
don't put on airs of spirituality. Another one, you never make anyone
feel inferior to you by your actions or words.

You always conduct yourself as an ordinary brother and not as a big
brother. Another, you are easily approachable at all times. All times.

Easily approachable. You're warm and friendly and make people feel at
home in your presence. You're hospitable in your home.

You're not only godly but fatherly as well towards people. It's one
thing to be godly. It's to be fatherly towards people.

It's also important. You seek the eternal welfare of your brothers and
sisters at all times. I'm going through it quickly because you can read
it later on on your own.

You're totally impartial. Very important in your attitude to everyone in
the church. This is one thing I have been ruthless with myself.

Am I partial towards somebody? Or am I completely impartial? Can I stand
before God and say, Lord, I treat everyone the way you, Jesus, would
treat me. There's no special friend of mine towards whom I'm partial.
No.

We are close to some people. Jesus was close to Peter, James, and John.
I have to say I have these circles in my own church.

The outer circle of 70, the inner circle of 11, and then inner circle of
three. I have them. Naturally, I'll spend more time with the inner
circle of three than I do a little more time with the 11 and a little
more time with the and many others I hardly ever meet.

So there's nothing wrong in that. But I'm totally impartial in
decisions. I don't care who does it.

If it's wrong, it's wrong. And I have spoken straight to senior most
elders in churches. I say, brother, that is wrong.

I don't agree with it. You can disagree with me. I'm not asking you to.

I don't compel anybody to agree with me, but that is wrong. What you did
that was wrong. What you said that was wrong.

And I'll tell you, I mean, you can say that you disagree with me.
Welcome. But I will not say that you're a special friend of mine or
you're some type of senior elder, so I'll overlook it.

No, I will not do it. This, you know, I believe that one of the greatest
sins among elders is partiality. I've discovered through that through 47
years.

Elders are partial. Even, you know, that Paul says to Timothy, have you
noticed that? Timothy was his coworker for 25 years and he writes to him
in 1 Timothy 5, do nothing in partiality. And I say, Hey, Paul, do you
need to tell what Timothy that? Yes.

Even Timothy needs to hear that. Do nothing with partiality. Yeah.

It's very important. I've seen through the years that many elders are
partial towards somebody, some favorite of theirs. Yeah.

Read the letters. I often tell the elders, read the letters of Timothy
and Titus, because those are letters that Paul wrote to senior elders,
coworkers. Very important.

I usually tell elders to read 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, and
Revelation chapter 2 and 3. Those are the letters written, especially to
elders. Okay. You are not prejudiced against anyone because of family or
for anyone because of family connections or community.

It's also very important. Supposing somebody is a family member of yours
in your church and you are prejudiced in favor of that person in a
situation, you are not prejudiced. Or somebody in the same community or
some type of connection like that.

You uphold the dignity of all people, whether young, old, child, or
servant. There's a dignity about a human being, even if a child must
never humiliate a child before others. If a child misbehaves in the
presence of visitors, I will not punish that child in the presence of
those visitors.

I'll make a record of it. And once the visitors go, I'll deal with them.
And I would not even punish one child in the presence of the other
children.

I take them into another room. There's a dignity even about a small
child. You must not humiliate a child in the presence of others.

You speak respectfully to all people, especially to those who are older
than you. The other thing I want to say, I noticed this in the United
States particularly, respect for older people is virtually disappearing
among the young children. They go and call older people by their first
name.

Can you believe it? Even the Hindus don't do that in India. Even as an
old stranger, they're respectful to someone who's older. Christianity
has sunk below the level of Hinduism in this area.

I know there's people who call themselves this. You have a concern,
especially for the poor and for young people and children. They must
have a concern.

You carry your brothers and sisters in your heart. You base your
authority on God's word and not just your experience. If God's word is
above the level of your experience, you say, fellas, I haven't reached
that yet, but that's what God's word says.

God's word says, be anxious for nothing. I want to confess, you say in
the meeting, I haven't reached there yet, brothers, but that is God's
word. You and I are going to climb this mountain, whatever the cost, be
anxious for nothing.

Rejoice always. In everything, give thanks. These are high mountains to
climb and there's nothing wrong in saying, climb with me.

I haven't reached the top, but I'm working my way upward. Join me in
this pursuit. People will appreciate you if you're honest, you're
careful in your speech and never hasty to express your thoughts.

A foolish man expresses his thoughts very quickly and you're visibly
growing in Christ-likeness and the best judge of that is your wife. You
lean on the Holy Spirit in making decisions and not on your own reason.
Here's another important thing.

You need to be trusted to keep all matters confidential that are shared
in confidence, not even diverging them to your wife. When people tell me
something in the church, something which I know is confidential, they
know that I don't even tell my wife. I don't even tell my closest co-
worker that unless it is essential for the church to know it.

They must respect your confidentiality. You can be totally dependent to
keep your word and if in some situation you cannot, you go to that
person and say, circumstances have changed. I'm sorry, I cannot do that
now.

There's nothing wrong in going back on that and explaining, but don't
just quietly ignore it without telling that person. You're very exact in
fulfilling your responsibilities. You're straightforward in telling the
people the truth in love.

You never deceive anyone. You're patient with all men and you do not
hide the fact that you're an earthen vessel with human infirmities. You
get tired.

You may be sleeping in the middle of a meeting. You're honest about it.
There's nothing wrong in that.

It's straightforward in telling the truth. You never deceive anyone. You
don't hide the fact you're an earthen vessel.

You're flexible and willing to yield. This is not rigid. You know, one
thing about the Pharisees, they're very rigid.

You know, if you discover something later on that you felt you were too
strict on that earlier on, be honest about it and change your mind. I'll
tell you one example. The early part, you know, when we start out in our
pursuit of strictness and new covenant, we're very strict and I was
sometimes a bit foolish.

I said once in the church years ago, I think it was the early days of
CHC starting, we must not allow our children to play with dice in a game
because it'll make them gamblers one day. Over a period of time, I
discovered almost every children's game has got dice in it. So I changed
my mind and I admit and somebody came up to me, what's this brother, you
change your mind on this? You allow children to play with dice now? I
said, I'm growing.

It does not make them gamblers. I played today with dice. I'm just
giving you one example.

You not rigid, flexible. I was using that example in relation to Abraham
killing his son, told to kill his son. He takes Isaac to the altar,
Mount Moriah and lifts up, Lord, you told me to kill him.

Here I am. The Lord says, stop. No, no, no.

I'm not going to stop. I'm going to do it. Foolish.

And the Lord says, stop, even if you're, be flexible. And don't say
yesterday you told me to kill my child. That's just one example.

Okay. And you ensure that no pressure is put on others, either by your
personality or by your gifts. I've seen this with some elders.

They have a very forceful personality. And especially with your fellow
elders, you can make them submit by the force of your personality. Say
we are one in the, we elders are always one with each other.

Really? Do they all have an individual conviction or you, your
personality so strong that I've heard the story of an old Indian. Our
first Indian prime minister was a man called Pundit Nehru. He was a very
strong person.

And I heard that some of the cabinet ministers going back to 1948, 49,
they would say, we got to go up to the prime minister and tell him this
thing is not right that he's decided. These were some ministers in the
cabinet and the cabinet meeting would come. Nehru would come and sit
down and everybody was silent like a lamb.

Nobody grew up with that power. Yeah. That's called soul power.

That can happen with some elders. I've seen it. Soul power that
dominates the other elders.

It says about Jesus in Isaiah 53, he poured out his soul to death. We
have to pour out our soul power to death. It's part of the cross that
nobody feels intimidated by my presence there.

So don't, by your personality, don't put pressure on others. Never force
your advice on anyone. Give freedom to them to disagree with you.

I've had people come to my house and ask me for advice. And I say, okay,
here's what I think I'll do in this situation, but I don't want you to
do it. I want you to go home, pray about it.

And if the Lord leads you to do it, do it. And if you tell me tomorrow,
brother Zach, I didn't feel free to do it. I'd be delighted.

That means you're listening to the Lord. I want you, I can only point
you to the Lord. I'm not like, you know, I love that verse in John 1, 29
about John the Baptist.

They heard him speak and they followed Jesus. I said, boy, that can be
written on our tombstone. They heard him speak and they followed Jesus.

They didn't follow you. Great. That's how it must be.

You don't force others by your personality. You never force your advice
on anyone. You don't make you what you practice, what you practice to be
a law for others to follow.

There's certain areas which are not clearly, there's no law in
scripture, but you have decided to be a little more strict in yourself
on certain areas. Fasting once a week, some type of thing you do maybe
to discipline yourself. Good.

Don't force it on others because there's no such law in scripture. And
you may practice it yourself. You enter into the problems of others with
a sympathetic heart.

You're interested in individuals and not just in a crowd. And I have to
rush through this. And here's another thing.

You don't keep on reminding people of their past failures. Finish with
it. If God says, I don't remember it, you also don't remember it.

You can bear with the weaknesses and mistakes of others. You try your
best to see the brothers and sisters of God sees them. Therefore you
never give up hope for any of them.

You give people hope for the future, even when they have failed. You are
a true friend to the weak members in your church. You never have any
malice, even when speaking about your enemies.

You give strong exhortations against sin, both publicly and privately.
You stress only what God's word stresses in your ministry. You are
willing to share your responsibility with others, even if they are less
mature than you, your fellow elders.

You do not, this is very important, you do not allow your wife to
influence you in church matters. She's not an elder. I tell you, there
are many wives I have seen, even in some CFC churches in India.

The wife is a fellow elder behind the scenes. Like that wife said, my
husband may be the head, but I'm the neck that turns the head whichever
way it is to look. Or don't let your wife be the neck that turns your
head.

You don't allow your wife to influence, you take life seriously, and you
don't want to be known as a joker. That's another thing, you know, I
don't know if any of you are like that, but some people, they're jokers.
They're all the time joking.

Nobody takes them seriously. Well, I believe in humor. I believe Jesus
had a sense of humor when he said about having a log in the eye and
swallowing a camel and things like that.

But he wasn't a joker. I believe we must have a sense of humor. It makes
people feel at ease with us.

You never hurt anyone. If you crack a joke, crack it on yourself, never
on somebody else. That's a law I'm always trying to follow.

You connect people to Christ the head and not yourself. And now just a
few points about this is how confidence can be won by these qualities
and how confidence can be lost. Others will lose or not have confidence
in you if you're a busy body in matters that don't concern you.

If you pretend to be spiritual and behave in an unnatural manner to act
spiritual, if you act with false humility, if you seek to advance your
own name and interests, if you take advantage of the brothers and
sisters and make them do odd jobs for you and your family without paying
them for their service. I've had different brothers who have helped me
in Bangalore, younger ones from the CSE office. I've always paid.

I have not treated them like people who can take advantage of. I mean,
in some way, make up for it. Or I do something for them so that I don't
make them feel you're my servant.

Nobody's my servant. I am their servant. If you value your friends and
relatives more than your brothers and sisters in the church, people lose
confidence in you.

If you're insincere, crafty and deceitful in your ways or if you're
unwilling to listen to advice from other people, if you're unwilling to
listen to the advice of elders who are your fellow elders, but maybe
they're less mature than you, why did you make them elders if you don't
want to listen to their advice? If you justify yourself in a situation
where you know you're wrong, if you keep a distance from brothers as
you're one superior to them, if you believe everything that you hear
about others without verifying the facts, very, very important. You
believe something and you've heard about somebody without verifying the
facts. I've made that mistake a number of times and I've had to repent
drastically.

Oh, Lord, I'm sorry I believed that without verifying. I should have
gone and verified the first before acting on it. Yeah, I'm telling you
from the mistakes I've made.

If you're quick to pass judgment, but not quick to show mercy. You know
the great verse on that? I'll show it to you. Isaiah 61.

It's the verse that Jesus quoted in Nazareth when he got up to speak.
Isaiah 61 verse 2, the spirit of the Lord is upon me. Verse 1, the Lord
has anointed me.

One, to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord. Two, mercy and the day
of vengeance of our God judgment. Let me paraphrase it.

To proclaim 365 days of mercy and one day of judgment. Got it? That's
exactly what I said. 365 days of favor.

Isaiah 61, 2 and one day of judgment. So I've seen that myself that I
must be 365 times more willing to show mercy than to act in judgment. Be
merciful and God will be merciful to you.

People lose confidence if you're untruthful, if you love only those who
love you, if you platter people to get some advantage from them, if you
praise a brother unwisely and ruin him, if you visit only the rich
people and the influential people in your church, but not the poorest of
the poor believers in your church. I've made it a very strong point in
Daniel Orpheus. Make the poorest believers feel I'm their friend.

If you compromise in spiritual matters, if you tell jokes at the expense
of others, if you're unforgiving and retain judge grudges, if you make
decisions concerning church matters in certain situations to suit your
family's convenience, very possible. You arrange a picnic according to
your family's convenience or an outing according to your family's
convenience. You make it look as though you're interested in the church.

If you cannot overlook small mistakes that other people commit, but
instead make big issues out of them. If you don't look people straight
in the face when talking to them. I'm always wary about someone who's
looking here and there when they talk to me.

In this connection, I want to say, brothers, we must pray for
discernment. When you look at particularly newcomers or someone who is
in the church, their face and their eyes will tell you something. You
know, Proverbs 6 speaks about haughty eyes.

Pride is in a person's eyes. Second Peter 2 speaks about eyes full of
adultery. Two things, pride and adultery are in a person's eyes.

We mustn't be suspicious, but if you're judging yourself severely in
these areas, over a period of time, you can have discernment that you'll
be able to see in a person's face and his eyes a lot. He can't cover it
up. Pride and impurity, especially, and that'll help you.

And the last of all, people lose confidence in you. If your messages,
your sermons are long and boring, and you don't realize it. I've heard
numerous cases like that.

They don't realize they are long and boring, and it's okay to be long
and boring. At least you realize it. You do something about it next
time.

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Video: https://sermonindex2.b-cdn.net/hqWmK9xdJeA.mp4
Source: https://sermonindex.net/speakers/zac-poonen/important-exhortations-for-church-elders/
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