Open—Joe Countouris
DISCLAIMER: The following has been auto-transcribed. We hope it will help you to find the section of this audio file you are looking for.
I'd like to talk to you about.
A danger that I see, that I feel.
And.
Where Tim took up with people being offended.
And that is the danger of appealing to authority.
Appealing to authority in the world today.
We have governments and those governments are set up and as we all know.
Over the last 2-3 years we have seen over and over again.
Laws and restrictions that have come about that are upheld, and they're upheld with an appeal to authority.
And so you'll have.
Experts in an area.
Medical experts, doctors, scientists.
And a government will say you need to do X. And somebody will say, well, why do I have to do X? And the government says because.
These people say you have to do X.
And and the government appeals to authority of those who know best.
Government says that we need to reduce emissions.
We need to drive electric vehicles. We need to use less fossil fuels. Why? Because the scientists tell us that we are going to go past the brink of no return and we're going to burn up the planet.
And so the appeal to authority is to these scientists, and the result is that you must do X.
So in spiritual things.
What is our authority and is there a danger?
In appealing to authorities. So let's just look at some verses. First, let's look at Ephesians chapter 4.
Patience, Chapter 4.
It says.
In verse nine. Now this he ascended, what does it mean but that He also first descended into the lower parts of the earth? He who descended is also the one who ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things. And He He himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers for the equipping of the Saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ.
Till we all come to the unity of the faith.
And of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men, and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting.
But speaking the truth and love may grow up in all things, and to him who is the head of Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by that, by what every joint supplies, according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself and love.
Let's look also at Hebrews chapter 13.
Verse 7.
Remember those who rule over you and have spoken the word of God.
To you whose faith follow, considering the outcome of their conduct, just two more second Timothy one.
13 Hold fast the pattern or outline of sound words which you have heard from me. It's Paul and faith and love which are in Christ Jesus. And then just two chapters over.
Second Timothy 3 verse 14 But you must continue in the things which you have learned and been assured of knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from a childhood you have known the Holy Scriptures which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus all Scripture.
00:05:00
Is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction and righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, thoroughly equipped for every good work.
So God, in his infinite wisdom, creates the Church on the day of Pentecost.
By his Spirit we could read in Acts chapter two He, through the baptism of the Spirit, joins roughly 120 believers, creating one body.
Every believer who puts their faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ thereafter is joined to that body.
In that body, the way in which God, through His infinite wisdom, chose to have that body be edified, built up, grow, is that the members would have gifts.
And that through those gifts, it would function just like a human body. And the blood pumping from the organs to the arteries, the vessels all working together.
All growing that body.
Those individuals are men that he put into those positions.
Men who have the flesh. Men like you and I.
Men who?
Can fail, can speak bad things, can use cunning, can use trickery.
Can cause ones to be tossed to and fro.
Or.
They can.
Minister from the word of God alone.
To the edification of the body.
The danger we have is that.
When we look at a joint of supply or an actual gift to the church, which is probably the most dangerous of all, someone who actually is a true gift to the, to the the body at large. Not just somebody who is a help in a local assembly, whatever gift they might have, private or public, maybe somebody's a help and just a couple of assemblies even.
But these are ones who affect the body at large.
He gave to the body some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers. These ones have an effect on the body at large, and we can look at these ones.
And we can set them on a pedestal, and they can minister to us the word of God, and they can minister to us their thoughts, their opinions.
And the danger is that we appeal to that individual instead of how that individual illuminated the word of God.
Those gifts that God gave to the church.
Or to point us to the Word of God. That's it.
An evangelist doesn't go out and tell somebody just some random story.
He tells them about Christ and what this Bible says. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of Bob, no, the word of God, God's Word.
That evangelist appeals to the singular authority of the Word of God.
Same thing for an apostle, Same thing for a prophet. Same thing for a pastor, same thing for a teacher.
If we appeal to anything beyond that.
It rises only so far as human wisdom. It's just my thoughts.
So what happens is you have a man who has, let's say, tremendous gift. He speaks the word of God. He speaks from the word of God.
But he also has different ideas, different thoughts, different opinions, things that he can't necessarily prove, but he holds himself.
Nothing wrong with that. It's good that all of us are exercised in regards to what the Word of God says to me, even if it goes beyond what I can say that you must do.
00:10:03
We all have to be exercised to see what is the Lord saying to me. I'll give you an example. Tim and Joy, they went to Malawi. They don't have a verse that told them to enjoy go to Malawi.
And it would be wrong for them to say, Joe, the Lord told me to go to Malawi, you must go to Malawi.
That would be beyond what the Word of God said.
They were.
Sensitive to what the Spirit of God was saying to them as all of us needs to be, and their personal exercise was to take a take a step of faith and to do something. All of us need to do that on our day-to-day basis.
The difficulty is that sometimes what we do when we're confronted with something or we're holding something that's being challenged.
Instead of appealing to the word of God and saying this is what the word of God says.
And I know I got that because there was a brother who was a gift to the church and he helped illuminate what the word of God says.
And when he wrote what he wrote, and I read what he wrote, I saw what the word of God says, and I see what the word of God says. And I can say this is what the word of God says, not because he said it, but that he was a help by the Spirit of God to show me what the word of God said.
But sometimes.
When I'm confronted with something that I hold.
That I think as a doctor and a teaching a commandment, I don't see it from the word of God. And So what I do is I say, well, Brother J&D or Brother Kelly or brother whoever, I want to fill in the blank, set it.
And since this brother was such a gift to the church, I appealed to authority.
Even though I can't find it in the Word of God. You can't find it in the Word of God. But since he said it, it must be true.
But that isn't the Word of God. Now, it's possible that he is right, and it's possible that it is in the Word of God, and I simply can't see it at the moment. And it's possible somebody else will be able to show that, yes, the Word of God definitely says this is what we should be doing.
But absent that, for me to hold up any man, no matter how gifted that man is, or how used of the Lord he is.
As an appeal to authority absent what the Word of God plainly says.
Is going beyond the word of God and it's setting up a man over God's Word. We can't do that. Where that ends is somebody being offended that somebody didn't wash their hands.
Even though the Bible never said it, at some point some guy said we should wash our hands before eating. And then not only should we wash our hands, but that's a spiritual thing to do. Not only is that a spiritual thing to do, but everybody needs to do it to be spiritual. And pretty soon everybody had to do it to the point that men were actually getting offended that God and the person of the Son didn't do it.
And they appealed to.
Their own authority.
Their own law. But we have said this. This is what we have said this. These are our traditions.
But it was just the traditions of men. It was just man usurping God and His Word.
So what do we do? What is the? What is the? What is the antidote?
Every single one of us needs to look at gift in the church as being just that, gift, gift given by the Spirit of God to help us understand this book. Not to just read the collected writings as a cool thing to do to then be able to tell other people what Darby said. If you want to read the collected writings, go ahead. I'm not saying you can't. But don't read it as if this is the pinnacle of Christianity. The pinnacle of Christianity is knowing Christ.
From this book.
Find your answers to the questions that you have.
From this book use helps only so far as they can illuminate the word of God.
If they can't instruct you and what the word of God is, leave it at that. Was that brother's?
00:15:03
Thoughts or that brother's exercises? There's nothing wrong with the brother having a thought or an exercise, but don't take it beyond that. If you take it beyond that, the place where you'll where you will get is going to be offended that somebody didn't wash their hands before they sat down to a meal.
Sing #211.
Oh Jesus Christ.
The Savior.
We only love to be.
Our souls are never burdened when Satan six to seven our timeship right with my fear.
It is a sorrow will be tossed that the work ever near.
Danger spares blind and dark force of doing.
And trying hard tears our hearts. With Russia burning the family, shall we dress when our souls are learning?