Gospel according to Mark. We're gonna be looking at verses
seven through 12. The last time when we looked
at these verses, I wanted to designate that whole lesson to
the calling of the apostles. This is who he was calling. We
call him Peter and James and John and Mark and all of his
disciples and all of his apostles. But there is a similarity between
the calling of the apostles and the calling of any man called
to the ministry. I didn't want to mix the two
together. So this week, I'm not trying to change the meaning
of this whatsoever. I'm just trying to designate
one to one thing and one to the other. And I want to go through
this morning and kind of show you those things as we go through
these verses. These men were called to the
highest office in the church. And they were chosen to complete
the full canon of scripture. A lot of those Apostles were
not only chosen to be apostles, but they were also set apart
to write the New Testament Scriptures. And they were inspired of the
Spirit of God as they wrote and they gave their testimony. This
is what we're studying this morning, the book of Mark. And if you'll
read it on its title in the Bible, it says the gospel according
to Mark. And the Holy Spirit moved in
these men, and their own personalities comes out in their writings.
After you've studied these a while, you'll be able to tell when you're
reading Matthew, or when somebody quotes Matthew, whether he tells
you or not, because their personalities shine through their writings. But they were chosen to complete
the canon of Scripture, and also to finish up with the foundation
of our faith. We're told in Ephesians chapter
one down in the last part of the chapter that we're built
upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets. Jesus Christ himself
being the chief cornerstone. And also they were ushering in
the New Testament age. In the Old Testament, There were
things, they were under what most of the writers called temple
worship. They went to the temple, there
were designated feasts, there was a priesthood separated to
minister to the people, to minister the things of God. And they went
to a certain place, they went to the temple in Jerusalem. And they observed all the ceremonies
that were laid down under the Law of Moses. And this is how
they worship God. You worship God by bringing a
sacrifice. And you would watch that priest
as he took the sacrifice and he did with it what God commanded
him to do. And at the same time, you were
being taught what this sacrifice meant. And even though they're Ideas
and understanding of these things were thwarted to say the least
by the time Christ appeared in this world, and yet this is what
Old Testament temple worship is. You had a whole tribe set
apart for nothing else but to minister to people. And in the
New Testament age, now there is churches that are gonna be
established, what we call local churches. Now we know the church
is God's elect, that's his people, that's his body, that's everybody
from Adam all the way to the end of time, that's his church.
But in this New Testament age, there are gonna be local assemblies
who are a part of that church. And so writers have come to call
them the local church. This is the assembling together
of God's saints as we're assembled here this morning. Turn with
me to Ephesians chapter 4. Ephesians chapter 4. The old temple worship and priesthood
had served its purpose. It was being replaced now by
the New Testament age. And now men and women would come
and be taught by pastor teachers. And churches would be established
by evangelists. who go into foreign lands and
preach the gospel. And these apostles were special
men who were gifted with special abilities and their calling was
confirmed by God with miracles and wonders and signs. And when
I begin to talk to you here in Ephesians 4 about pastors and
teachers, I want you to understand there's no need for those signs
anymore. We have the complete word of
God. God's already confirmed His Word with miracles and wonders
and signs. Gifts of the Holy Ghost according
to His own will. And there's no reason to redo
it, reconfirm it. He's already confirmed it. And
so it just comes down to this. You either believe God or you
don't. You either receive this as the Word of God or you receive
it like you would any other book. And you look at it and you take
what you want and you leave off what you don't want. But if it's
the Word of God, then we better take it all. So these men, God confirmed them
with all of these things. And what I want to do this week
is to show you some similarities between their calling and the
calling of pastors and evangelists. Now here in Ephesians chapter
4, all four offices are mentioned at one time. Look down at verse 11, Ephesians
4, 11. And he, that is the same Jesus
who called these apostles, but was now ascended up into glory,
it says, and he gave some apostles and some prophets. and some evangelists,
and some pastor-teachers. And I realize it says pastors
and teachers, but he's not talking about two different offices.
He's talking about one office, pastor-teachers. That's what
pastors do. They teach. They teach. They're all here listed together
so that we might understand that the same Lord that called them,
that called these prophets, also called the apostles. Or you could
put it in reverse. He that was here in Mark chapter
four calling these apostles was the same. He hadn't appeared
yet, but he still existed in glory, the Son of God, and he
called those prophets. And the spirit that was sent
to him is called plainly over in 1 Peter 1, the spirit of Christ. Appeared to him and they wrote
about it, wrote about his sufferings and his future appearing. Now
here's why these four offices were given by God and these two
are still being maintained. Here's why, verse 12. For the
perfecting of the saints. You mean a man can reach perfection
in this world? No, that's not what they're talking
about. They're talking about two things. First of all, when
he talks about the perfection of the saints, he's talking about
the calling out of the full number, the completion of the saints. This world is going to continue
to exist because God's long-suffering to usward, not willing that any
should perish, but that all should come to repentance. And all those
He's chosen and made provision for in His Son, made provision
for through these offices. He's going to call to Himself.
He's not going to lose any of them. So that's the first thing he's
talking about is the completion of that number. The second thing,
they can't be saved apart from a perfect righteousness and a
perfect atonement. This is the perfection he's talking
about. And there's only one place to
have that perfection and that is through faith in Christ. Christ
is the perfect one. The only way you can have a perfect
righteousness is to have Christ. Because He's the end of the law
for righteousness to everyone that believeth. He's the goal. This law says here's what you
have to do to be accepted. This is Christ. He's already
done it. He's already done it and He's
our righteousness. And then it tells us this. Here's
another reason for these four offices. For the work of the
ministry. calling out of God's elect by
the gospel. And also, he tells us, for the
edifying of the body of Christ that you can learn. One fellow
told Winston last week, he said, I'm just not sure I understand.
I don't understand election. The only way you can approach
election is to believe it. You ain't never going to understand
it. You're not sovereign. You're not the source of all
things. You're not the beginning of all things. You're not the
one who's purposed all these things. That's God. And when
we start challenging God by saying, you need to explain this to me. You need to, who art thou that
replies against God? You're the thing made, not the
thing who created it. You're the creature, not the
creator. And so we have to be edified,
we have to be taught. And I told him, I said, if he
ever says that to you again, he said, I know why you don't
understand, because there's none that understandeth. That's what
nobody does. They think they do, but they
don't. It has to be revealed to you. And that revelation comes through
the gospel, which brings us back to these four offices. And then in verse 13 it says,
and this is how long these things are going to continue. Till we
all come in the unity of the faith. Basically we all believe
the same thing. That's the unity of the faith. We believe God, we believe in
His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that what he tells them,
preparing them for his leaving this world? He said, you believe
in God, believe also in me. Calls him his father, said, in
my father's house are many mansions. And so all of these offices are
going to continue. Everything established by the
prophets, everything established by the apostles and the preaching
and teaching of pastor, teachers, and evangelists is going to continue
on until we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge
of the Son of God, now watch this, unto a perfect man. That's not talking about you
walking a perfect life. This is talking about the perfect
man and then he tells us what it is unto the measure of the
stature of the fullness of Christ. That's the perfect man. I'm gonna
quote another scripture for you over out of Colossians. Christ
in you, the hope of glory. That's the hope of glory. Why?
Because he's the perfect man. He's the perfect man. He said,
in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, and you
are complete in him, which is the head of all principalities
and powers. There's nothing higher than him.
It pleased God that in him should all fullness dwell. There's nothing
any higher than Christ. If you have Christ, you have
everything. Now, here's what I want you to
see. All four of these offices work in conjunction with one
another. I have nothing to say to you
apart from the prophets and the apostles. Is that right? Anything else, just speculation
on my part. I have nothing to say. He said
preach the word. That's what Paul told Timothy.
Preach the word. Don't preach your ideas and your
speculations. Don't preach things that you
don't know anything about. Preach the word. Learn, study,
to show thyself approved, a workman worthy. He's me. for the office. He has ability. God's given him
an understanding and he's able to teach. He can rightly divide
the Word of God. But apart from the apostles and
prophets, I have no idea. I don't have any information
on God. Do you? The only information we have
on God is the Word of God. The Old Testament prophets set
forth a Redeemer which they'd never seen, never seen. They were gifted with the spirit
of Christ and they wrote of him as they were moved by the spirit
of God. I don't know if you've ever thought
about this, but Moses, Moses wrote the first five books of
the Bible. He lived 2,000 years, at least
2,000 years, after the creation of the world. But when Moses
wrote about creation, he wrote about it like he was standing
there watching it come to pass. And there's only one way he could
have done that, and that is by the inspiration of the Spirit
of God. In 1 Peter 1.10, the apostle
tells us about the old prophets. He tells us that our salvation,
or more particularly, God's salvation, and it caused them to search
diligently as they prophesied of this grace that should come
unto us. And they searched what or what
manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did
signify when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ. unto
whom it was revealed that not unto them but unto us they did
minister the things. What things? Things which are
now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel
unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. What are
we going to preach? I'm going to preach what the
prophets foretold. I'm going to preach what the
apostles told me that the Old Testament prophets were talking
about. That was the purpose of the apostles.
They had the revelation of Jesus Christ. They walked with Him.
They were personally taught by Him. They were endued with the
Spirit of God. And they could take these...
Peter stood up at Pentecost and he said, this is what Joel was
talking about. Now, I challenge you to go home
in the book of Joel and read what Joel said apart from anything
else and see if that's what you get out of it. There's no way
you're gonna read that scripture and say, this is what he was
talking about. No, but on the day of Pentecost,
Peter knew. The Lord told him to go down
to Jerusalem and wait there till he'd be endued with power from
on high. And so they did. And when they
were, then they understood what Jude was talking about. So I
don't have to go back. This is the point I'm trying
to make. I don't have to go back and read Jude and then wait for
some bubble to appear before me so I know what, no, I just
read what the apostle said. And I understand because the
same spirit that foretold the Christ that would come and the
giving of the spirit after he ascended into heaven is the same
one who understood. You see what I'm saying? So these
two offices together, which have completed the Word of God, I
can study these things now and I can report them unto you. And
I can teach you from the Word of God. After their purpose was served,
the apostles were taken away so that what we have today is
two offices. Pastor, teachers, and evangelists. I don't think you'll find the
word missionary anywhere in the scripture. If there's a missionary
down there, he's an evangelist. That's what he is. And they're
all called by our Lord, enabled by the same Spirit, and all called
to the same end. The ministry that he describes
that I read to you a few moments ago, the perfecting of the saints
and edifying of the body of Christ, all four of these offices work
to that end. The first two have served their
purpose. And they're recorded, and we
can go back and read them. I don't have to have Moses here
to tell me what Genesis and Exodus and Leviticus and Numbers and
Deuteronomy and all that means. Because I have the apostles to
tell me what it means. All these evangelists and pastor
teachers are called of God. They're called of God. And the
ministry, though it may appeal to all, and the ministry, we're
told, is a good thing to desire. It's a good thing. A young man
sits here, and he hears the gospel preached, and he sees things
accomplished by the hand of God, and he said, boy, I want to do
that. It's a good thing to desire it.
But you can't call yourself. You have to be called. They're
called. There are a lot of folks who
have seen the apostles. Man, I want to be an apostle.
The problem is you can't just go
be an apostle, you have to be called. Isn't that what Paul
said? Called to be an apostle. It's
a calling. How shall they preach except
they be sent? Now don't go home and tell folks
that your pastor put himself on the same label as an apostle
or a prophet. I'm not worthy to loose their
shoes from their feet. I'm not worthy to carry the scriptures
for them. These were special men. These
were great men. These were men used by God in
a special way. I'm not saying that at all, but
what I am saying is that the same Christ and Lord who called
them called me. And if he didn't, then I'm not
called. I'm not called. Many a man has
decided to be a pastor. He's decided to be an evangelist,
only to see it end in disaster. Many a man has set his sights
on being a preacher. And so he went off to seminary
and Bible college and he got himself a degree. But he was
a total failure in the ministry. And many a young man has promoted
himself into the ministry by natural gifts and his personality
and so on, who become examples of those not called of God. Paul said, Demas. At one time
he said, Demas, my fellow laborer. He acknowledged him as a preacher
and teacher of the gospel. He's my fellow laborer. works
with me, he preaches right beside me. Next thing you know, Paul's
saying, Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world. Actually, the last thing a minister
of Christ desires is to have a hand in his own calling. I
wonder the rest of my life if I put my own hand If I promoted
myself to this office and this station, I wonder the rest of
my life if God really called me. Is my doom awaiting me somewhere? Is that drop-off out there that
I'm going to fall off of? Is God going to expose me somewhere
in time? Trust me, you don't want to deal
with that. You want Him to call you. without
your hand in it, then you'll know that you're called of God. And so those called of God, they
wait on the Lord. Paul said, I'm ordained a preacher
and an apostle. He was ordained by God. Called
to be an apostle, he said, I'm appointed a preacher and an apostle
and separated under the gospel. He just keeps saying it over
and over and over. Now when God calls a man to be
a pastor or evangelist, he burns the gospel into his heart. That's
the message he preaches. He won't preach anything else.
It don't matter. Church gets together and says,
that's not enough. We need somebody to knock on
doors. We need somebody to to build a work. We need somebody
to go out and get the children in and get professions of faith
and fill the pews. He ain't gonna do it. You can
send him on down the road, he'll go down the road. He's not gonna
change his message for anybody or anything. He's gonna preach
Christ and keep right on preaching Christ until he can't preach
him anymore. God doesn't call a man And then
for one reason or another, it don't work out. If it don't work
out, God never called him to start with. You can't show me
one person in the scriptures that God called to any station,
be it an apostle or a prophet or a preacher or an evangelist,
you can't show me one in there that ever come to naught. Our Lord prayed about these 12,
and he said, of these 12, he said, I've lost none except the
one that you purposed to, and it'd been better for him not
to have been born. Talking about Judas. When God calls a man, it always
works out. Maybe not the way people think
it ought to, but it always works out. Why? Because the gifts and calling
of God are without repentance. It's without change. God's never
gonna change. Did you know that's why he calls
them stars? Stars don't move, do they? The
North Star is still the North Star. If all of your modern equipment
and GPSs and all this stuff, if it all come to gone, for one
reason or another. When you're out in the middle
of the ocean on a ship, you can still take that old thing and
sight in that star and navigate that ship. Because that star
don't move. He goes where God sends him.
Now if God wants to move him, he can. He can. But he don't
move himself. When God calls a man to these
stations, He equips him to do the work. He enables him to see
into the great mysteries of God. He puts an aptitude in his heart. He puts a desire in his heart
to study the Word of God and to know what it means and what
it says. He reveals His Son in him. That's what Paul said. When it
pleased God, He revealed His Son in me so that I might preach
Him among the heathen. Old Brother Barnard, an evangelist
from years ago, back in the 40s and 50s, he said, a man can't
tell what he don't know anymore, and he can come back from somewhere
he hadn't been. And God arranges His providence
around His preachers. He sure does. There's no other
way to explain it. He arranges His providence around
Him, and He draws men to Him, or He sends Him to them. One
or the other. But He's going to cross their
path with His man. Another thing that God does with
these pastors and teachers and evangelists and all these men,
He attends that man's ministry with His Spirit, just as He did
with the apostles and prophets. It's the same Spirit. He works
in a little different manner today than He did with them,
but He still works, and it's the same Spirit. What the Spirit
of God does, He's God. What He does is always effectual. Always. If He calls a man, He's
called. He ain't gonna kick and squirm
and get out of it. He's called. It's effectual. It's always effectual. There's nothing in a man to fear. My soul. There's nothing in man to demand
a hearing. There's nothing in man to warrant
liability or consequences. But if the Holy Ghost be with
that man, if God attends his ministry, now there's liabilities
and consequences. And now you're not just saying,
well, I don't believe him. You're saying God is a liar because
God attended his ministry. You reject him, you've rejected
God. Now if we had time, I could show
you that over in the other gospels. Our Lord sent out the 70. And he said to them, he that
heareth you, heareth me. You're my ambassadors. You're
speaking on my behalf. And to reject that, Paul words
it this way. having trodden underfoot the
Son of God, and having done despite under the Spirit of grace. And
then John said it this way, he that believeth not God hath made
him a liar, because he believeth not the record that God gave
of his son. The record that's recorded The
record that is explained and the record that is declared to
you. You've rejected it and you've made God a liar. All right? Here's another thing. Pastor,
teachers, and evangelists are not only called of God, but they're
sent of God. They're sent. How in the world
did I wind up in Arkansas? Huh? God sent me. You know how I know
that? Because it worked out. If you ever are called of God
into the ministry, there's a few words in there that you're going
to keep reading over and over and over and over. And it'll
mean more to you than anything else. And it come to pass. And it always does, what God
purposes, don't it? It always comes to pass. Mark said He sent them forth
and Luke speaks of the 70 and said He sent them forth before
His eyes into every city and place whether
He Himself would come. When God sends a man, it's a
place where He Himself intends to be. John the Baptist was sent to
prepare the way of the Lord, so every preacher declares the
way and preaches the person and work of Christ, and then he waits
for the presence of Christ to do his work. Pastor, do you really believe
God sent you? Do you really believe? When you
stand up, when I come to church, when I prepare at home in my
study, and I come up here to preach, and I stand behind this
pole, Do you really believe God sent you? Do you really believe
in your heart that God has directed you here and that you have His
message and that you're representing Him and you're preaching to His
people? Do you really believe that? Do
you really believe that when men call you on the phone and
say, could you come over here and preach and you said, Yes,
I can. And you go over there and preach.
You really believe God arranged that in his providence and the
same thing taking place? You really believe these meetings
are arranged of God and attended by God and men held accountable
for what they hear? I do. I do. And if I didn't, I'd go home.
Or I'd sit down there and let somebody preach to me. Pastors and evangelists are called
to the same end as were the apostles and prophets. Those he calls,
he sends. There will always be a providential
direction in God's providence for his preachers. Always. Always. Brother Walter Gruber, son of
God, down to Yucatan, Mexico. He went down there and, I'm gonna
have to cut this short. He went down there and things
wasn't working out real good and they caught all the illnesses
and sicknesses that people who are ignorant of that culture
are gonna get and he actually got an incurable amoeba germ
and he'd been fighting that his whole life. But he's been in
Mexico now He has to be up close to 90. And God has established
40 some churches, native churches, in Yucatan, Mexico under his
hand and under his guidance. I'd say it worked out. It worked
out. God used him, and he always does. He just doesn't always do it
to the same extent, and he don't always do it in the same fashion. But if he intends to send a man,
he intends to go where that man is and attend his ministry. All right, I hope this has been
some help to you. Thank you.