the church's polity or the church's
government. And so far we've looked at, in
the last hour, we looked at that the church has been given delegated
authority underneath the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the head,
who is the authority giver, or the authority, and is the one
who gives or delegates that authority. And we've seen that churches
are governed, The way Christ governs that church is by the
Holy Spirit. And we believe here, and we believe
the Bible teaches that the church is, the government of the church
is a congregational style government. Congregation rule, I guess you
would say, government. We believe in independent, autonomous
government. And I'll kind of talk a little
bit of that here in just a few minutes, but I first wanted to
talk about there's the other forms of church government that
are out there in other types of churches besides the New Testament
church. Whenever we look at the form
of government, sometimes it kind of helps us when we understand
whether or not that church is a church or not, just by the
way that its government is running. There are basically, you can
cut some of these down into subsections, but there's basically three types
of church government that's kind of prevalent in most of quote
unquote Christianity. The first form that I'll discuss
is the Presbyterian form of government. It's the Presbyterian form of
government. Presbyterian, or presbytery, comes from the Greek
word that means elder. The Greek word that means elder,
that's where we get presbytery. That's why you see sometimes
in King James, you'll see that word presbytery there is, that
is the Greek word, behind that is the Greek word for elder. James Pendleton, I don't know
if you know who James Pendleton was. He was an old Baptist back
in the 1800s. Landmark Baptist of the 1800s. I was reading through one of
his books one time. He was giving a definition of
this. And most of church's history books and different things that
I read have pretty much the same exact definition of what Presbyterian
form is. And if you actually look at the
Book of Denominations, that they have out there, or you look just
at the churches themselves, you'll find that this is true. And if there's something that
I'm off on this, I'll stand to be corrected on that. I surely
don't want to misrepresent another church's view or polity. But just over the things that
I've studied on these things, because I've never been to So
I don't know firsthand. I only know through scholarly
reading and just observing of how their organization works. But anyway, I thought I'd go
with this quote by James Pillen because he makes it pretty concise
here. He says, Presbyterianism recognizes
two classes of elders, preaching elders and ruling elders. The
pastor and ruling elders of a congregation constitute what is called the
session of the church. So the pastor and the ruling
elders make up what's called a session. The session transacts
all the business of the church. It receives members, it dismisses
members, it excludes members, it handles all the function or
the business of the church. So just that group of men, and
I guess women, depending on the Presbyterian church, conducts
all the business of the church, apart from the rest of the church. And so from the decisions of
the session, there can be an appeal made to another hierarchy
within that organization, which is called the presbytery. Then
from the presbytery, there can be an appeal to the synod. And then the action from the
synod is then brought to the appeal of the general assembly
or to the church. So the first, the session is
the one who makes up all the rules for, conducts the business
of the church. But if anybody has an issue with
that, then they take it to a presbytery, which I would assume, and I'm
not for sure 100% of this, would be the other leaders or elders
from other churches. And then if that's not satisfactory
to somebody, then they take it to the Synod, which is the ruling
body over the ruling bodies. And if that can't be done, then
they take it to the General Assembly. So the congregation is the last
in line of authority on who makes decisions. If there's no appeal,
if nobody objects to what's being done, then the Synod has all
the power to do whatever they want to do, and people just listen
to them. Now, there's some ways that this
is in error. Presbyterianism names two distinct
orders of elders, the ruling elder and the preaching elder.
Ruling elders are laymen who are part of the session of the
church. Okay, that's not biblical. Second of all, this form of government
is not democratic. We found in scripture that the
conducting of the business of the church was always in a democratic
way. We'll look at that even more
later. Presbyterianism holds that the local church is part
of a larger structure. Okay, the Synod, you got the
Presbytery, the Synod, is part of a larger structure than the
General Assembly. That's all the Presbyterians
everywhere, not just the local Presbyterian group, but Presbyterians
everywhere. Okay, so the local church is
not the final court of appeal and doesn't hold the keys to
the kingdom. the session, the synod, so forth, are the ones
that makes the decision for that church. So we find that that
is not what we find in the word of God. The word of God is very
clear that it was the congregation who made those, and again, we're
gonna read through some of these here in just a few minutes. The
second form of government that you find in a lot of churches
today, and probably the most common one, is the Episcopal
form of government. Again, the Presbyterian form
and the Episcopal form of government. Now the word Episcopal also comes
from a Greek word that is translated Bishop or Overseer. So we have
the Presbyterians who take the word Elder. We have the Episcopals
who take the word Overseers or Bishops. Now all those words are biblical
words, and they're words that we believe, and words that we
believe have place within the local church. We'll get into
that and see where the Bible places them. Those who hold to
this form of government teach that there are three positions
in the ministry. There's the deacons, there's
the elders, and then there's the bishops. They say that the
bishop is the man who superintends an entire district of churches. Take, for instance, this building
that we meet in is owned by the Wesleyan Church. Church, okay? Not a local church, but a church
as an organization of churches, okay? And they have a superintendent,
a guy's name is Max Kowlaw, okay? And that superintendent is over
a district. And within that district, there
may be several local churches there. And Max is the superintendent
over those local churches. So he has the rule and authority
over those local churches. And they make decisions upon
what goes on in those local churches. And so he would be considered
a bishop in his local church, or in his organization. Now, probably the most famous
church that follows this form of government is the Catholic
Church. However, they have added to the Episcopal form of government
by adding other ones. They've added, they not only
believe that there are deacons, elders, and bishops, but they
believe there are deacons, there are priests, Then there are bishops,
archbishops, patriarchs, cardinals, and then finally there's the
Pope. The Pope is in charge of everybody. The cardinals only
go to the Pope. The patriarchs go to the cardinals
and to the Pope. The archbishops, they go to the
patriarchs, cardinals, and the Pope. The bishops are under the
archbishops, the patriarchs, cardinals, and the Pope. The
priests are under the bishops, the archbishops, the patriarchs,
the cardinals, and the pope. And then the deacons are under
all those. And then under that is the people. It's not those. Okay? So there's like a huge
hierarchy within that group, all of them usurping the authority
over the congregation. Matter of fact, if you talk to
a lot of Catholics, you'll find out that they think that the
church, and they see that the church, meaning all that hierarchy
is considered the church, they make the policy for every Catholic
church. And so whatever they say, or
whatever the Pope says, then that's the law. And so they don't
believe in The scriptures alone, you know, we believe that we
are guided that our only rule of faith is the scriptures alone
They don't believe that and there are vocal about that they say
they don't believe that the scriptures are only rule of authority that
also that the that the That the teachings of the church and the
Pope are on par with the scriptures and so whatever the church teaches
that's what they are to believe and whatever the Pope commands
and demands or whatever he speaks, ex cathedra or whatever, is what
they are to follow. And they put that on place of
the word of God. And they'll even have conversations
with Catholics. And they say, well, yeah, the
Bible says that, but the church says this. And we just have to
follow whatever is the best or what we think. And so it's whatever. So there is no final authority.
Because any man, and even the popes, they have contradicted
each other. Supposedly, whenever the pope
sits ex cathedra and makes these proclamations, he is speaking
as the vicar of Christ, and it's God actually speaking through
the pope. And so whatever he says is what
God has said. All right? But yet there is one
pope that would say something ex cathedra that contradicts
what a previous pope in some time frame has said. And we know
that God does not change. God doesn't change. And so one
pope may declare, this is what God said, and then this pope
over here says, no, God didn't say that. He now says this. And
how does that happen? So you don't have any final authority.
There is no standard. And also, there is no accountability. I mean, who's going to hold the
pope accountable when the pope has all authority? Who's holding
him accountable? If you get a corrupt pope in
there that has all authority, guess what? If somebody tries
to hold him accountable, all he has to do is make a proclamation
to everybody that this priest right here is defrocked. He's no longer a priest. Removed
from the church, excommunicated. You see how that works? several ways that this form of
government errs from the scripture. Number one, deacons are not ever
associated or given as clergy, okay? And actually, the word
clergy isn't in the scripture either, but deacons are not in
the order of clergy. However, I will say this, that
deacons, ought to, you know, be able or
apt to teach. They ought to be able to know
the Word of God enough to do that, but they are not considered
that part. Elders and bishops are not separate
order of clergy. An elder and a bishop are not
two different things according to Scripture. Both the elder
and the bishop are for the same office. Let me kind of reiterate
that, not by the Word of God, not by just me saying it, Turn
over to Acts chapter 20, because I know there's going to be a
lot of opposition to this, especially some of my friends on Facebook
who are not Baptist or not Congregationalist. They're going to jump at this.
Acts chapter 20, look with me at verse 17. starting verse 16, for Paul had
determined to sail by Ephesus because he would not spend the
time in Asia for he hastened, if it were possible for him to
be at Jerusalem the day of Pentecost. And from Miletus, he sent to
Ephesus and called the elders of the church. And when they
were come to him, he said unto them, you know, from the first
day that I came into Asia, after what manner I've seen with you,
I've been with you after all the seasons. serving the Lord
with all humility of mind and with many tears and temptations,
which befell me by the line and weight of the Jews, and how I
kept back nothing that was profitable unto you, but have shown you
and have taught you publicly and from house to house, testifying
both to the Jews and also to the Greeks, repentance towards
God and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ. And now behold,
I go bound in the spirit unto Jerusalem, not knowing the things
that shall befall me there. save that the Holy Ghost witnesseth
in every city, saying that bonds and afflictions abide me. But
none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear
unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy and
the ministry which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify
the gospel of the grace of God. And now behold, I know that ye
all among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of God shall see
my face no more. Wherefore, I take you to record
this day "'that I am pure from the blood of all men, "'for I
have not shunned to declare unto you "'all the counsel of God.'"
And here it is. "'Take heed therefore unto yourselves
"'unto all the flock over which the Holy Ghost "'hath made you
overseers to feed the church of God, "'which is purchased
with his own blood.'" Now back in 18, or 17, he says that he
called the elders of the church together. And so this speech
that he's given is to the elders. And in verse 28, He says that
he made you overseers, or bishops. Okay? So the elders and the bishops
was considered to be the same thing. Here Paul's preaching, gathered
together the elders of the church of Ephesus, and the church of
Ephesus, he said, listen, you're the overseers. Okay? So that term is interchangeable.
An overseer can be an elder. Okay? However, not all elders
are overseers, by the way. We'll find that out in our study
when we get to it. Okay? Elders are the bishops
or overseers of the church. So the Episcopal concept of bishops
developed, you know, after the first century church and has
been spread throughout. Another reason that this is an
error is that those that hold the Episcopal form of government
believe that the local church has been only a part of a larger
national or worldwide church. Of course, that's not, the definition
of church doesn't even fit that. You can't even get that out of
the word ekklesia. Ekklesia is a local gathered
congregation or assembly. But then there's the third form
of government that's found within churches, and that's the congregational
or independent form of church. Now, I don't know how often you
guys go on our website or even look at our website or anything
that has to do with our church on a computer, because I know
not everybody's computer savvy or all that, but if you go on
our website, I have set up on there that whenever it gives
a description of our church that we are an independent Baptist
church that believes in the sovereign grace of God and all that kind
of stuff. Same thing on our Facebook. We're an independent Baptist
church. Okay. Now, whenever we say an
independent Baptist church, that doesn't mean that we are in the
denomination of independent Baptists. The fundamental Baptist, you
know, that's not what we're saying. Whenever we say that we are an
independent Baptist church, that is basically saying that we are
a Baptist church that believes in congregational, congregational
politics. That we are a Baptist church
that believes that the authority of Christ has been delegated
to the congregation and that we function as a unity of believers,
not as a hierarchy, okay? I'm not your CEO. I'm not your
dictator. I'm not the one who lords over
you. That's not how this is set up. And neither is there a gang
of people in here that holds authority. It's the whole church
that holds authority. So whenever we say independent
form of government or an independent church, we're talking about that
we have no ties to anybody outside. We don't look to an association.
You know, I used to be a Southern Baptist for years and years and
years. And Southern Baptists claim to be independent Baptist
churches for the most part. And I will say the Baptist church
that I grew up in, Southern Baptist church I grew up in, we were
independent. We didn't, I mean, nobody dictated
to our church down there what we did or what we taught or anything
like that. Now, I would say, if we erred
from some of the things that the Southern Baptists believed,
or if we quit giving that cooperative program money for a long period
of time, or something like that, they probably would kick us out
of the convention. They would have kicked us out of the convention.
But that's another man-made thing, is a convention. The Bible doesn't
speak anywhere of a convention of churches, or an association
of churches. I know that might tingle some
of the primitive Baptist spines this morning, but it doesn't
talk about associations. Now, there's no problem having
a association or fellowship of churches that are autonomous
of each other, that don't have any control over each other,
and doesn't have the influence over each other to do what the
other one's doing. There are primitive Baptist churches that
are in associations, and if one church disfellowships from some
guy, then the whole association disfellowships with that guy
because they're in association. And if they don't, then they
kick the church out of the association for not disfellowshipping like
the rest of them. And I know that to be true. I've heard of
those exact instances by a good friend of mine and everything. Churches are autonomous. Not
autonomous from God. We know that. And not independent
from Christ. We know that. We're talking about
in this world. We are autonomous. There is no
higher body that oversees us except for Christ. We are not
beholden to any denominations. We don't even claim to be a part
of a denomination. We're not beholden to any conventions.
We're not involved in any conventions. We're not in any associations.
We do loosely fellowship with people. We fellowship with the
church in Mina, the church in Coina, the church in Choctaw,
a bunch of churches that we have fellowship with. Brother Ray
came, fellowshiped with us. Brother Tom Armstrong, they came,
fellowshiped with us. We fellowshiped with them. There
is fellowship between these churches. And we can even jointly come
together and do some things together, like maybe send some money to
some minister that was sent from another church. And we can do
that, but we are not governed by them. We are not held accountable
by them. They are not over us in any way. They don't dictate anything to
us, what we teach, what we preach, how we minister, how we conduct
our services. That's why, by the way, whenever
we have our fifth Saturdays, and each individual church that
hosts that, everything's done differently. Here we may have
it, you know, three preachers, lunch, and three preachers, and
no hymns maybe. We may go down to Choctaw and
they may have two preachers, hymns, lunch, nothing in the
afternoon. They may have it where there's,
well, whenever we go down to fellowship with the guys down
around Mena and everything on their pitch Saturday, they do
things different. They have a couple of sermons
in the morning, They have lunch and then afterwards, all the
ordained ministers, whether they preached or not, they come before
everybody that's there and, you know, allow the church people
and everybody that's there to ask questions, whether it's about
what was preached that morning, the subject matter of that morning,
or about anything. And so those men sit there and
will answer questions and go to scripture and answer questions
for anybody that has answers. They do that different than the
other churches do. So see, that's what I'm saying.
We can fellowship together, we can worship together, we can
cooperate together in some things, but no church has any say so
over the other church on how you ought to do anything. And
I remember whenever we first started doing these Fifth Saturday
fellowships that a lot of us, because Brother Royce Smith kind
of was one of the guys that kind of began to encourage that. that
we ought to have some fellowship among the other churches to get
to know each other and fellowship with one another. And he kind
of began to do that. And so they kind of started doing
that. And they, everyone, I guess, thought that he set the precedence
on how it should be done. And so every time someone hosted
the church, they would ask Brother Royce, you know, what time do
we, are we supposed to meet or when do we, you know, how do
we know who to call or what subject matter are we talking about?
And Brother Royce would always say, Hey, You guys are the church,
you make the decision, however you wanna do it. This is how
our church did it, you do whatever you wanna do. And that's because
he understands that every church is autonomous, makes their own
decisions. So that's what we mean whenever we say congregational
or independent. It means that the rule of the
church, the government of the church, the functionality of
administration is the whole group, okay? Now, as I said, the Baptists and the
Bible, I believe, more importantly, because there are some Baptists
who don't believe this, but they believe that congregational independent
form of church polity is the biblical way to do it. It means
that the power, the direction of the church lies within its
people, not within its upper class, so to speak. That's how
it's a democracy. It's a democracy in the fact
that we pray and look for the Holy Spirit's leadership, and
we do things and make decisions corporately. Okay? Now, surely it's not a democracy
between us and Christ, because Christ, as we learned in the
commission, has given us something that we are to teach all things
whatsoever He commanded, right? So His commands, His rule, His
authority is what we submit to in all things. And we don't go
outside that thing, okay? But yet within those bounds that
He has given us, we have the authority to carry out the way
that He has given us, to make those decisions. So is there proof of this in
the scripture? Do we have proof of this in the
scripture? Well, turn with me again. We've
already looked at these a few times in our study on the church,
but it's always good to remind ourselves these things. Acts
chapter one. We'll see that the very first
church, how he conducted some business
here, Acts chapter one, Look with me, if you would, at
verses 15 and 16. If you'll remember, this is where
they came down from the mount after Jesus had given the commission.
They met in the upper room. And while they were in the upper
room, they began to talk about, hey, somebody needs to, you know,
we need to do something about replacing Judas. Okay. And so in verse 15, we see And
in those days, Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples
and said, and here it is, the number of names together were
about 120. So here we see that the word disciple wasn't distinguishing
just the 12 or 11 in this case, but it was talking about all
the disciples, all those who had been made disciples from
the baptism of John until the ascension of Jesus Christ, right?
He stood up among that first church and he said this, men
and brethren, this scripture must need to have been fulfilled,
which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning
Judas, which was a guide to them that took Jesus. For he was numbered with us and
had obtained part of this ministry. He was numbered among us. So
again, he's talking collectively. Now this man purchased the field
with the reward of iniquity and falling headlong, he burst asunder
in the midst and all his bowels gushed out. And it was known
unto them, excuse me, and it was known unto all the dwellers
of Jerusalem, insomuch as that field is called in the proper
tongue, aklodama, that is to say, the field of blood. For
it is written in the book of Psalms, let his habitation be
desolate and let no man dwell therein and take his bishopric,
and his bishopric let another take. Now again, that word bishopric
there means his office, okay? Wherefore of these men which
have accompanied, okay? Wherefore of these men, which
men? Well, the men that was gathered
in that 120, remember back in verse 15, whose name, the number
of names together were about 120, they were gathered in that
upper room. Of these men, no men outside that church, of these
men, which have accompanied with us,
or congregated with us, all the time that the Lord Jesus went
in and out among us. Again, he's speaking to the whole
congregation here. Beginning from the baptism of
John unto that same day that he was taken up from us, the
congregation, must one be ordained. So the ordination of ministers
comes, first and foremost, by the congregation. Second of all,
from within the congregation. See, I had to become a member
of this church before you guys ordained me. You didn't ordain me, then make
me a member of your church. I became a member of your church,
and then you ordained me to be your pastor, upon seeing the
qualifications that I had. And it said, beginning from the
baptism of John, under that same day that he was taken up from
us, must one be ordained to be a witness with us of his resurrection. And they, who's they? The us that's been talking about.
The disciples, the 120. And they appointed two. Joseph
called Ursavus. And you think, well, wait a minute.
You mean 120 people came up with two people? How'd they do that?
Surely they had to, you know, have some direction. Somebody
had, no, the Holy Spirit did. They prayed and fasted. The Holy
Spirit did that. And they appointed two, Joseph
called Barsavus, whose surname was Justus, and Matthias. And
they, the congregation, prayed. You mean it wasn't just the leadership
that prayed? You mean the congregation is
responsible to pray about these matters as well? Absolutely you
are. It's y'all's responsibility to pray over these matters, as
much as it is mine. And they prayed and said, Thou,
Lord, which knowest the hearts of all men, Show whether of these
two thou hast chosen." So see, there it is. What was the congregation
doing? They were seeking the direction
of God by the work of the Holy Spirit. You know all of our hearts,
what we would choose, what we wouldn't choose. You may even
know our hearts and the fact that we may be biased in one
area or another. There may be some of those guys
that were more friendly to justice instead of Matthias. Some of those guys may have hung
out with Matthias more than they hung out with justice. And what did they say? They said,
we don't want to be biased in heart. You know our hearts. But
we want to choose the man that you choose. And so what did they
do? As a congregation, they sought
the Lord. They didn't place it upon Peter to seek the Lord for
them. They didn't place it upon the
12 or 11 disciples, apostles, to seek the Lord for them. No,
they, as the whole congregation, sought the Lord together to put
in their hearts who He wanted. And what did it say there? That He may take part of this
ministry and apostleship for which Judas, by transgression,
fell, that he might go to his own place. And they, the church,
the 120, gave forth their lots, their lots. And the lot fell
upon Matthias and he was numbered with the 11 apostles. So here
we see that it was a congregational decision led by the Holy Spirit. Okay, so we see that congregational
authority or congregational rule was what was practiced by the
very first church in their very first act. as the church. They chose their
leader. Now let me ask you this. If the
church chose the apostle in this case, then who was greater, the
apostle or the church? Well, you would think that the
church is greater than the apostle. The apostle was subservient to
the church because the apostle couldn't name himself. The church
named the apostle. But yet what happens once somebody,
and of course we don't have apostles today, we have pastors and teachers. So today, whenever a pastor or
a teacher is chosen by a church, that means that pastor and teacher
is subservient to the church. He doesn't rule over them. That's
why the Bible says that we are not to lord it over God's heritage.
But there's a second side to that coin. While we don't do
that, the Bible tells the congregation though that they ought to love
and respect and pray for their pastor. Although I don't have
any authority over you, I've been given an office to carry
out the dictates of my office. But because of that office and
what I have to do, then the church should support
and pray for and love and respect the man that does that, whether
it's me or anybody else. And we'll get into that as we
get into the offices of the church. I don't want to get too far into
that. But we see here that the church made that. Look while
you're there in Acts chapter 6 as well. So we see there that the apostle
was chosen by the church. In Acts chapter 6, Starting in
verse one, the deacons were appointed by the church. And in those days
when the number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a
murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews because their widows
were neglected in the daily ministration. Then the twelve called the multitude
of disciples. The twelve called for the multitude
of disciples. Hey, church, we need to get together
because there's a decision that needs to be made here. See, the
12 did make the decision and go to the disciples and say,
here, you need to carry this out. That's what the Presbyterian
form of government says. That's what the Episcopal form
of government says, that those men or groups of men make the
decision and then they go and dictate to the church what that
decision is and look for their approval of it. But what happens
in a congregational form of government? The whole church is brought together
to discuss that. Now, a lot of churches have business
meetings. We really don't have a lot of business meetings. We're
so small, we don't have a lot of business to discuss. And here
again, another side rail, if a church is following the
New Testament and doing what a church is supposed to do, there
really isn't a whole lot of business that you have to talk about.
I mean, there really isn't a whole lot of business to talk about.
Unless you're involved in 150 programs that has to be orchestrated
among everybody, then there might have to be some business. But
really, what do we come? We come here to pray, sing hymns,
and extol the Lord, preach, edify one another. And then whenever
it comes to time of ministry, we talk about those things. But
we don't have to call a special business meeting to do that.
We just talk to each other because we're already here. You know
why business meetings were made? Business meetings were made when
they start calling a business meeting. We have a business meeting
every third Wednesday of the month, or every quarter on this
certain Sunday, we have a business meeting. Or you have Robert's
Rules of Order, where it says that you have to have a certain
amount of days before you can call a business meeting, or there
has to be a quorum of people in your membership there for
business to take place. You know why that's instituted?
Because people forget about the Holy Spirit. You know why that
also was instituted? Because of church members that
don't come to church. That's why that was instituted.
Because they were getting church members that were getting mad
because, you mean you talked about that and I wasn't here?
Well, why weren't you here? My grandpa, down at the church
I grew up in and everything, He made sure, now we had a quarterly
business meeting where most of the business got conducted, but
he always said, hey, listen, anytime that the church meets
together, we can conduct business right here on stuff, especially
if it's stuff that needs immediate attention. But anytime that the
church is gathered, we can conduct business and if you're gonna
get all you know, been out of shape because you missed out
on the business of the church and didn't get your say-so in
there, you might want to think about not missing church so much,
you know. We're conducting the business
of the church, and if you're a part of the church, you ought
to be in church. So, and I'm kind of the same mindset, you
know. If you want to be part of the
decision-making of the church, you ought to be in church. Come
to church. Now, that doesn't mean people
aren't going to miss once in a while. And I try to, if we have something
to make, I'll wait until everybody's here or where I can talk to them
or call them or do something, discuss something with them. But we can't hold up the whole
business of the church because somebody's not here, that we
don't have 100% membership here every time we meet. Otherwise,
we'd never get anything done. We'd never make any kind of decisions.
Not that we make a lot of decisions around here, but we would never
get anything done. Anyway, we see here that the
church was gathered together and the twelve called the multitudes
of disciples under them and said, it is not reason that we should
leave the word of God and serve tables. We're learning something
about the offices of the church, why a deaconship was made, an
office of the church, different than the elders, bishops, pastor, teachers. He says, wherefore
brethren, That's the whole group. Look ye out among yourselves,
ye, plural, among you, plural, seven men of honest report, full
of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this
business. Now, this is where maybe the wisdom of the apostles
are coming in. Choose ye out seven. Now, why
do they say seven? Why do the apostles encourage
them to choose seven? I don't know. Maybe they knew how many people
was there and determined that seven would be enough. I don't
know. I don't know. But yet, it wasn't the apostles
that made the final decision on that. Look at this. Wherefore,
brethren, look out to you among yourselves seven men of honest
report, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint
over this business. But we will give ourselves continually
to prayer and to the ministry of the Word. So, he's saying
here that those leaders, the apostles, was not going to appoint
them by themselves. They said, that's the decision
of the church. That's the decision of the church. He said, you choose among yourselves
who you want us to appoint. But we will give ourselves continually
to prayer and to the ministry of the Word. And looky here,
and the saying please the whole multitude. So the speech was
to the whole multitude, the decision was on the whole multitude, and
the wisdom that came from the God-given leader that God had
placed within them, the wisdom of seven men, the
whole multitude agreed to. Why? Because he said so? No, because they felt that that
was right. They felt that that was good.
They agreed to that. And the saying pleased the whole
multitude. What would have happened if the
saying didn't please the whole multitude? What do you think
would have happened? What if the whole multitude said,
you know, Peter, I really think that we ought to have 10 instead
of 7. What do you think Peter would
have done? Well, I think Peter would have said, well, let's
put it to prayer and see what the Holy Spirit puts in our heart. Or maybe Peter would have even
said, well, if that's what the church thinks is best, then that's
probably what we ought to do. Why? Because Peter had learned
not to serve authority over the churches. Matter of fact, Jesus
told Peter, Specifically, after Satan has sifted you, he said,
feed my sheep. He didn't say, herd my sheep. He said, feed my sheep. And the whole multitude was pleased. And they chose Stephen, a man
full of faith, and of the Holy Ghost, and Philip, and Procurus,
and Icana, and Timon, Parmenas and Nicholas, the proselyte of
Antioch, whom they, the congregation, the multitude, said before the
apostles, and when they had prayed, the whole multitude, they, the
whole multitude, laid their hands on them, and the word of God
increased. So here we see the second act
that the church did, the first church, was a congregational
act. So the early churches had the
sole power to choose their leaders and their deacons in there. They have the sole power of disciplining. That's not, we heard in the Presbyterian
form that there were, discipline was carried out by the session,
not by the congregation, by the session. Look with me in 2 Corinthians
2. 2 Corinthians 2. Now, remember Corinth had a bunch
of problems that Paul addressed in the first letter. Look with
me, if you would, at... Let's just start in verse 1.
2 Corinthians 2, verse 1. But I determined this with myself,
that I would not come again to you in heaviness. For if I make
you sorry, who is he then that maketh me glad, but the same
which is made sorry by me? And I wrote the same unto you,
lest when I came I should have sorrow from them whom I ought
to rejoice, having confidence in you all that my joy is the
joy of you all. For out of much affliction and
anguish of heart, I wrote unto you with many tears, not that
ye should be grieved, but that ye might know the love which
I have more abundantly unto you. But if any have caused grief,
he hath not grieved me, but in part, that I may not overcharge
you all. Sufficient to such a man is this
punishment, which was inflicted of many." He's talking about
remembering the first letter, Paul talked about the adulterous
man or the man who had sexual sin that
they hadn't done anything about that was still in the church
and they didn't kick him out or discipline him. And Paul was
getting on to them for not disciplining them, the men. And so they got
Paul's letter and they went ahead and went through it. But looky
here, who was the one that carried it out? The many. Sufficient
to such a man is this punishment, which was inflicted of many,
so that contrary wise, ye, that's plural, ought rather to forgive
him and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one should be swallowed
up with overmuch sorrow, wherefore I beseech you that ye would confirm
your love toward him. For to this end also did I write
that I might know the proof of you, whether ye be obedient in
all things. To whom he forgive anything,
I forgive also. For if I forgave anything, to
whom I forgive it, for your sakes forgave I it in the person of
Christ." So here he's talking to the church, not to the pastor
of the church or an elder board, or to a presbytery, or to a session,
or to a synod, or to a pope, or to an archbishop, or anything
like that. He's talking to the church, and
it was the church who carried out the discipline of that church. Now, that was what we were looking
at there, is what Paul was talking about back in 1 Corinthians chapter
5. If you want to turn there, you
can. 1 Corinthians chapter 5, verses 4 and 5, it says, In the
name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together,
what is that? When ye gather together, that's
a congregation, that's a church. And my spirit, with the power
of our Lord Jesus Christ, to deliver such a one unto Satan
for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved
in the day of the Lord. So the instruction was to the
church. So the church has the authority or power to discipline,
not the session. Like the Presbyterians say, not
the hierarchy or the clergy as the Episcopal form says. Now there were times when in
the church they had, I tell you what, let's go ahead and just
stop there. That's a good stopping place for us. We'll pick up with
this church polity, church government, Lord willing, next Lord's Day.
But that makes a good stopping point because there's more stuff
I want to talk about about church government, but I want us to not get too overloaded this morning.
All right, does anybody have any questions or any comments? Has anybody ever been in another
type of church government besides congregation? Was the general
Baptist different? Yes. How did they do things?
They had a presbytery and then they had a convention. Oh, yeah? And then they made
decisions in that convention about the churches. Have you
ever been in anything other than congregational government? No,
I don't think so. You know, even in the Southern
Baptist Church, you know, they say that they're not, but, you
know, the dictates of the Southern Baptist Convention, you know,
weighs down on a lot of those men. And even within the local
churches, they still have all these different... And they also
ordain men. Oh, they ordain men, see that? The only ones that can ordain
men is the church. And the convention ordained them. Well, listen, there's a lot of
missionary societies that ordain missionaries, ordain men. Yeah, even within the Southern
Baptist, they have all kinds of committees within the church. We had a nominating committee,
we had a treasury committee, we had all these different committees
where men would gather together and discuss the business of the
church and then bring it before the church to vote on. and the church would vote for
whoever would be on that committee, so they seemed to think in their
mind at least, and I did, I was the same way, I believe that,
before I studied in scripture, what the New Testament taught. But they would say that, well,
even though that's a committee, the church chose the committee,
so they chose them to be our voice. Well, no, it's your voice. that is to be heard, not someone
speaking for you, but your voice is to be heard. The whole church
is, if that's the case, then choose the men that you want
and then have all the discussion out in public so that someone
can say, well, wait a minute, no, that's not what I meant. We'd have a nominated committee
that would get together and discuss the people who would be right
to teach this class or this class or this class. Well, that's not
biblical either. Well, it's not biblical to have all those other
classes anyhow, but to have someone appointed to decide who's qualified
to be the teacher of that class that doesn't have that qualification.
But anyway, I digress on that, but you see that even within
the Southern Baptist who claim to be autonomous and congregational
rule, they give up their congregational rule to committees and to conventions. So they're not true congregational
churches. They're not true independent
churches. All right, let's bow and have a word of prayer.