Latest / Reformed Thinking / Christ’s Undershepherds: Elder Qualifications That Protect, Feed, and Care for Souls

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Christ’s Undershepherds: Elder Qualifications That Protect, Feed, and Care for Souls · Reformed Thinking

• 0:00
  Welcome back to the show. We are doing something a little
• 0:02
  specific today. Usually we bounce around a lot
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  of different topics, but today we are stepping into a space
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  that we are explicitly calling reformed thinking.
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  That's right. We are grounding this entire
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  discussion in the Protestant Christian faith.
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  And to be, you know, even more precise, we're looking at things
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  through the lens of Reformed theology and the standards you
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  find in the Westminster Confession.
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  So if you're listening, you might want to switch gears
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  mentally that we aren't looking for quick hacks or, you know,
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  self help tips. Today we're looking at a topic
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  that feels like it has stakes that are much, much higher than
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  we usually realize. We're talking about leadership
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  in the church, but not just leadership in that vague
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  corporate sense. We are talking about the
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  biblical office of the Elder. And this is a massive topic
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  because the contrast between how the modern world, especially the
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  Western world, views leadership and how the Bible views it is,
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  well, it's jarring. It's like stepping onto a
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  different planet. I.
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  Was thinking about this earlier. You scroll through social media
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  or look at the business section of a bookstore and what do you
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  see? You see leadership secrets of
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  the Navy Seals or the CEO mindset.
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  The world tells us leadership is about charisma.
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  Right, it's about productivity. It's about having a massive
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  platform. Can you move the needle?
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  Can you grow the numbers? It all about metrics, it's about
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  efficiency and so often it's about personality.
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  We want the guy who can command a room, the guy who has that,
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  you know that IT factor. But when you open the
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  Scriptures, specifically the text we're looking at today,
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  Christ's under Shepherds and the under Shepherds tripartite
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  burden, you see a completely different set of values.
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  The Bible treats the appointment of elders with what the sources
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  call holy sobriety. Holy sobriety.
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  That's a phrase that just stops you in your tracks, doesn't it?
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  It does. It doesn't sound very fun.
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  It isn't meant to be fun in an entertainment sense.
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  It's heavy. It's heavy because souls are at
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  stake. Yeah, that's the premise here.
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  We aren't talking about organizational success or, you
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  know, keeping a nonprofit afloat.
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  We're talking about the care and protection of human souls that
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  will exist forever, either in glory or in judgement.
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  So the mission of this deep dive really is to recover that
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  biblical portrait. We want to move away from that
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  pragmatic manager model. The CEO pastor.
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  The CEO pastor exactly. And look at the elder as a
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  protector, A feeder, and a caretaker of a blood bot flock.
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  I think that shift from manager to shepherd is going to be the
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  hardest thing for a lot of modern listeners to wrap their
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  heads around just because we are so conditioned to think in terms
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  of org charts. So let's get right into the
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  source material. We have these two heavy texts.
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  Where do we even start with untangling the identity of an
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  elder? I think we have to start by
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  clearing up the confusion about the titles themselves.
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  If you walk into a church today, depending on the denomination,
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  you might see a senior pastor, maybe an executive pastor, a
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  board of elders, sometimes a Bishop or an overseer, right?
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  And people often think these are three or four separate job
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  descriptions, like a corporate hierarchy.
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  Yeah. The common assumption is that
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  the pastor is the CEO. He does the talking.
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  The elders are the board of directors.
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  They do the voting and the budget.
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  And the overseers are, I don't know, maybe the regional
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  managers. It gets confusing.
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  It's the corporate model just superimposed on to the church,
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  and the sources make it incredibly clear we have to
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  dismantle that thinking. These are not three offices.
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  It's one office, just described from three different
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  perspectives. One office, So the guy who
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  preaches the sermon and the guy who overseas the finances are
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  supposed to be in the same category.
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  Yes, the biblical evidence for this is really, really strong.
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  If you look at Acts chapter 20, you have this scene where the
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  apostle Paul is saying goodbye to the leaders of the church in
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  Ephesus. He calls for the elders to meet
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  him. The Greek word there is
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  presbyteros. But then in the very same speech
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  he tells those exact same men that the Holy Spirit has made
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  them overseers. That's a pista post to Shepherd
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  Poeman, the Church of God. So he's using three different
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  titles for the same group of guys in the same paragraph.
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  In the same breath almost. And Peter does the same thing in
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  his first letter. In first Peter 5, he tells the
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  elders to shepherd the flock exercising oversight.
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  So biblically, you just can't separate these.
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  You don't have a preaching pastor who doesn't oversee, and
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  you don't have an overseeing elder who doesn't shepherd.
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  It is one comprehensive office, OK.
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  That is helpful, but words matter.
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  So even if they refer the same job, presbyteros doesn't mean
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  the same thing as episcopose. They must be highlighting
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  different angles of the role. Right, that's the perfect way to
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  put it. Think of it like a diamond.
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  You hold it up to the light, and one facet flashes blue, another
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  flashes white. It's the same stone, but you're
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  seeing different depths. Let's look at Elder or
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  Presbyteros. This is where we get the word
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  Presbyterian, isn't it? It is.
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  Yeah. And historically, in the Jewish
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  context, elders were the older men of the community.
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  There were the civic leaders. But in the New Testament church,
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  this term focuses on spiritual maturity and tested credibility.
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  Now, don't get hung up on the word old in the sense of, you
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  know, needing a Walker and a hearing aid.
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  So you don't have to be 80 years old to be an elder.
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  No, but she can't be a child either.
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  Not spiritually or emotionally. Definitely.
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  It means a man is old in his steadiness.
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  He has gravitas. Gravitas.
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  That is a word we don't use enough it it feels weighty.
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  It is weightiness. It's a man whose life has been
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  observed long enough that the church can look at him and say
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  this is a man we can follow as he follows Christ.
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  It implies wisdom that comes from walking with God for a long
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  time. It implies a track record of
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  faithfulness through ups and downs.
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  That's The Who of the office, the mature man.
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  What about overseer or Episcopose?
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  To my ear, that sounds bureaucratic.
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  It sounds like a guy with a clipboard making sure everyone
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  is following safety regulations. It can sound that way to modern
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  years, but we need to recover the beauty of of it.
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  In the Greek, it's about vigilant supervision.
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  But, and this is key, it is not cold management.
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  It's what the source calls warm vigilance.
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  Warm vigilance. I like it.
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  It completely changes the picture.
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  It sounds more like a parent watching a child at a playground
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  than a security guard watching a CCTV monitor.
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  That is a perfect analogy. The security guard is just
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  looking for a violation. He's detached.
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  The parent is looking out for danger because they love the
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  child. Their heart is in it.
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  Being an overseer involves guarding doctrine, ordering the
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  life of the church, and ensuring that the ministry is happening
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  faithfully. It's active.
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  You aren't just sitting back holding a title.
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  You are overseeing the welfare of the body and.
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  Then the third one, which I think is maybe the most
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  affectionate term, shepherd or poeman.
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  This is the focus on the labor itself, the actual work.
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  Shepherding isn't a status symbol, it's a verb.
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  It involves guiding, feeding and guarding.
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  It is the essential work of tending to the sheep, and it's a
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  messy job. Oh, for sure, you're dealing
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  with animals. Or in this case, people who
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  wander off, who get sick, who get into fights, who get hurt.
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  And sheep aren't known for being the smartest animals either,
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  let's be honest. You aren't.
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  They need constant care and the shepherd has to combine
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  tenderness with firmness. You have to feed the sheep, but
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  you also have to protect them from wolves.
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  You use the staff to guide, but the rod to defend.
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  So the take away here is that Christ gives the church 1
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  pastoral office. But it's comprehensive.
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  Can't reduce it to just oh, he's the guy who preaches on Sundays,
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  or he's the guy who looks at the budget.
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  Exactly. If you have a man who only wants
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  to preach but doesn't care about the lives of the people, he
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  isn't a biblical elder. If you have a man who loves to
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  manage the organization but doesn't know how to feed the
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  soul with scripture, he isn't a biblical elder.
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  The office demands all three the maturity of the elder, the
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  vigilance of the overseer, and the hands on care of the
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  shepherd. That sets the bar incredibly
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  high and that leads us naturally into the qualifications.
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  I think most of us, when we hear elder qualifications, we think
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  of First Timothy 3 and Titus one, and honestly, in a lot of
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  churches this is treated like a hiring checklist.
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  The corporate checklist. Yeah.
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  Husband of one wife? Check.
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  Not a drunkard. Check.
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  OK, you're hired. It feels very mechanical, very
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  impersonal. And the sources are very, very
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  firm on this. We have to reject that corporate
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  checklist mentality. These lists are not a sterile
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  hiring rubric. They aren't a list of
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  competencies you can just file away in HR.
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  So how should we view them then? What's the right frame?
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  We need to view them as a spirit rock pattern of maturity.
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  Paul isn't just listing random traits, he's describing the kind
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  of man Christ uses to shepherd his people.
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  It's a portrait of character. You're looking at the whole man,
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  his life, his temperament, not just a list of do's and don'ts.
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  Let's dig into a few of these, because some of them are pretty
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  misunderstood. The source mentions an umbrella
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  qualification above reproach. Now, does that mean the guy has
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  to be perfect sinless? Because if so, we're going to
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  have a lot of empty pulpits. Thankfully, no, it does not mean
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  sinless perfection. If it did, only Jesus could be
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  an elder. We're all sinners saved by
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  grace. Above reproach means a life that
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  has no legitimate handle for scandal or accusation, no.
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  Handle for scandal. That's a good way to put it.
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  It's memorable. It means there's no glaring
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  character flaw, no pattern of unrepentant sin that the world
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  or the church can grab onto to drag his name, and by extension,
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  Christ's name, through the mud. It's about consistent,
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  observable integrity. When people in the community
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  hear his name, they shouldn't immediately think, Oh that guy
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  with the temper, or oh, the guy who's shady in his business
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  dealings, right? Now I want to ask about one that
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  always causes arguments. Husband of one wife?
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  Does this mean an elder must be married?
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  Doesn't mean he can never have been divorced.
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  What if he's a widower who remarries?
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  This gets debated all the time. It is one of the most debated
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  phrases for sure, but if we look at the Greek it literally
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  translates to a one woman man. A one woman man.
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  That shifts the focus a bit, doesn't it?
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  It does. It shifts the focus from marital
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  status to character and devotion.
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  Obviously it prohibits polygamy, which was an issue in the
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  ancient world, but deeper than that, it's about singular
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  devotion. It's asking Is this man sexually
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  and emotionally exclusively devoted to his wife?
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  Is his heart undivided? So a man could be married and
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  technically not divorced, but if he's a flirt, or he has a
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  wandering eye, or he's addicted to pornography or emotionally
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  entangled with someone who isn't his wife.
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  Then he is not a one woman man. He is failing the qualification.
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  It's about the purity of his heart and his fidelity to the
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  covenant he made. Because the logic is, if a man
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  cannot be faithful to the covenant he made with his wife
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  before God, how can he be trusted to be faithful to the
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  covenant community of the church?
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  That connects really well to the next big one, household
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  management, the text says. He must manage his own household
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  well with all dignity, keeping his children submissive.
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  Why is the home such a big deal for a church leader?
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  I mean, shouldn't we be looking at his theology degree or his
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  preaching skills? We can look at those things
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  later. First we look at the home.
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  The source calls the home the ordinary theater of life.
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  Think about it. At work you can put on a mask.
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  You can be professional for 8 hours.
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  You can be charming and impressive.
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  But at home with your wife, with your kids, when they're throwing
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  spaghetti on the wall, you can't hide who you really are.
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  That is the truth, yeah. Your kids know if you're
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  patient. Your wife knows if you are
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  selfless. You can't fake it at 6:00 in the
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  morning when the baby is screaming and you haven't had
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  coffee. That is the test.
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  That's the proving ground. The logic is, if a man cannot
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  manage his own family with patient instruction, with
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  discipline, with love, how can he possibly care for God's
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  church? The church is just a larger,
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  more complex family. If he fails in the smaller, more
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  intimate sphere, he is not fit for the larger one.
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  It tests his character when no one is clapping.
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  It's the difference between a man who is good at doing church
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  and a man who is actually holy. That's it.
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  And then there's a negative qualification.
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  He must not be a recent convert. This one seems counterintuitive
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  to some people today. You get a guy who gets saved.
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  He's super charismatic. He has an amazing testimony.
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  Maybe he was a rock star or a successful businessman and the
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  church immediately wants to put him on a stage.
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  And that is a deadly mistake. The Bible says that if you do
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  that, he may become puffed up with conceit and fall into the
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  condemnation of the devil. It's the snare of pride.
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  Why is it such a snare? Because leadership requires
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  tested stability, a novice, someone new to the faith, is
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  incredibly vulnerable to pride. If you elevate someone too
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  quickly, they might start thinking it's about their
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  talent, their story, their charisma.
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  They haven't had time to have those things humbled out of them
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  by the Holy Spirit. It's too much weight for a frame
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  that hasn't been built yet. That's a great image.
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  Time is the great revealer. Time exposes what a man truly
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  loves. Time exposes what he truly
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  fears. You need to see a man walk
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  through suffering, through seasons of spiritual dryness,
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  through conflict with other believers before you entrust him
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  with the care of souls. And then you have the specific
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  character traits listed. Self-control.
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  Gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money.
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  Why are these specific traits so critical for a shepherd?
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  Because a shepherd's sin damages the sheep.
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  That is the terrifying reality. If a shepherd is quarrelsome, he
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  creates a culture of fighting and division.
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  If he's greedy, he uses the sheep for his own gain.
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  If he's quick tempered, he will wound the very people he's meant
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  to heal. The source puts it powerfully.
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  A shepherd's sin can damage the flock as much as a wolf's teeth.
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  Wow, that really puts it in perspective.
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  It's not just about his personal failings.
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  It's corporate. His sin never stays private.
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  So these qualifications, you see, they are actually God's
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  mercy to the church. They aren't barriers to keep
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  good men out. They are filters to keep
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  dangerous men out. They filter out the gifted
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  talkers who have no character. They filter out the ambitious
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  personalities who would use the church for their own ego.
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  God gives us these standards to protect us, his people.
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  So we have the man, the qualified elder.
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  Now let's talk about the work. The outline breaks this down
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  into three main functions, Protector, feeder, and
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  caretaker. Let's start with the elder's
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  protector. The source calls this the
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  Marshall office. That's strong language.
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  Yes, Marshall, meaning military or warlike.
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  This immediately challenges that soft, sentimental image we often
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  have of a shepherd. You know the guy just sitting on
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  a hill petting a lamb, playing a harp.
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  Right, the stained glass window version of a shepherd.
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  The biblical reality is that the office is fundamentally martial
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  because there are wolves, real spiritual enemies, and shepherds
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  carry a rod to strike those wolves.
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  A shepherd who refuses to fight isn't a Good Shepherd.
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  He's just a hireling who runs away when danger comes.
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  And the scary part is where the wolves come from.
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  Acts 20 is chilling on this point.
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  Paul tells the Ephesian elders that fierce wolves will come in
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  from the outside, yes, but then, he says, and from among your own
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  selves will arise men speaking twisted things.
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  The threat is so often internal. That is the hardest threat to
• 15:02
  spot. It isn't an atheist standing
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  outside with the protest sign. No, it's someone inside the
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  camp, maybe even in leadership. These aren't people walking in
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  saying I am here to destroy your faith.
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  They speak twisted things. It sounds close to the truth.
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  It sounds spiritual, but it's distorted just enough to be
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  deadly. That is why the elder must be a
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  protector. And the primary weapon for this
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  protection is doctrine, right? The truth itself.
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  That's right, the text in Titus says he must hold firm to the
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  trustworthy word as taught. The Greek word therefore hold
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  firm is anti common on which implies A tenacious clinging.
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  He's holding on for dear life. And why?
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  So he can do two things, give instruction in sound doctrine
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  and rebuke those who contradict it.
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  So it's both positive and negative.
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  It's not enough to just teach the good stuff, you have to
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  actively fight the bad stuff. You have to.
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  If you feed your child healthy food, but you let them drink a
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  little bit of poison every day, you haven't been a good parent.
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  The source emphasizes the need for systematic theological
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  clarity. And Elder needs to know how the
• 16:04
  whole Bible fits together. He needs to use the analogy of
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  faith, letting Scripture interpret Scripture to guard
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  against all kinds of errors. The source lists some specific
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  sins of our time that elders need to be on guard against
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  things like critical race theory, liberal theology,
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  compromised sexual ethics, and even pragmatism.
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  These are the modern pressure points where the world is trying
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  to squeeze the church into its mold.
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  And the point here isn't that the elder becomes a political
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  pundit. Not at all.
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  The point is to protect the sufficiency and authority of
• 16:34
  Scripture. If a philosophy, whether it's
• 16:36
  from the academic left or the populist right, starts to
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  replace the gospel or redefine sin and righteousness, the elder
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  has to step in. He has to guard the flock from
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  moralism, from antinomianism, which is basically lawless
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  living, from legalism and from the prosperity gospel.
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  And sometimes protection looks like church discipline.
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  This is the part nobody body likes to talk about.
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  We recoil from it in our culture.
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  It feels judgmental. But the Westminster Confession
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  in Chapter 30 calls it necessary.
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  And here's the paradox. Discipline isn't about being
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  mean or punitive. It's what the source calls a
• 17:10
  difficult mercy. Difficult mercy.
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  Explain that How is kicking someone out of the church or
• 17:15
  barring them from the Lord's Table an act of mercy?
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  It's mercy because the primary goal is reclaiming the offending
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  brother or sister. If you see a sheep wandering
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  toward a Cliff or eating poisonous weeds, the most loving
• 17:27
  thing you can do is hook them with the staff and pull them
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  back. Even if it hurts them for a
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  moment, it wakes them up to their danger.
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  So silence is actually hatred in that scenario.
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  You're just letting them walk off.
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  The Cliff? Exactly.
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  If you let them wander off without a word, you're letting
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  them die. Discipline is also about
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  deterring others. It's about purging the leaven
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  that can infect the whole lump of the church.
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  Right. If you let unrepentant sin run
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  rampant, it spreads like an infection.
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  It becomes normalized. It does, and it dishonors
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  Christ. The source makes a really strong
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  point here. A church that will not name
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  error cannot guard the weak. If elders are cowards, if
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  they're afraid of confrontation, the sheep get eaten.
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  Protection requires courage. That's a sobering thought.
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  So the elder protects with a rod of doctrine and discipline, but
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  he also has to feed. Let's move to that second
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  function, the elder as feeder. The steward of mysteries and the
• 18:19
  primary instrument here is what our tradition calls the ordinary
• 18:22
  means of grace. The Word, the sacraments, and
• 18:25
  prayer. Right.
• 18:26
  And notice that word ordinary. We live in a culture that craves
• 18:30
  the extraordinary, the spectacular.
• 18:32
  We want the laser light show, the fog machine, the celebrity
• 18:36
  guest speaker, the new innovative program that's
• 18:39
  guaranteed to grow your church. But the elder is called to feed
• 18:42
  the sheep with the ordinary simple things God has provided.
• 18:46
  It's like a healthy diet. You don't need molecular
• 18:48
  gastronomy every night, you just need good meat and potatoes.
• 18:51
  A great analogy. And this is where the
• 18:53
  qualification able to teach comes in.
• 18:56
  The Greek is didacticose. This is what distinguishes an
• 19:00
  elder from a Deacon in the Bible.
• 19:02
  Right Deacons serve in practical ways, but they don't have to
• 19:05
  have the gift of teaching. A Deacon can be the godliest man
• 19:08
  in the room, he can manage his household perfectly, he can be
• 19:11
  incredibly wise. But if he doesn't have the gift
• 19:13
  of teaching, he isn't qualified to be an elder.
• 19:16
  For an elder, it is essential equipment.
• 19:18
  It's not a preference, it's a non negotiable requirement.
• 19:21
  If he can't feed the sheep, he can't be a shepherd.
• 19:24
  And the feeding happens primarily through expository
• 19:27
  preaching. Preach the work that is the
• 19:30
  command to Timothy. It's not Share your thoughts or
• 19:33
  tell some funny stories or give us 5 tips from secular
• 19:36
  psychology. It's analyzing the biblical
• 19:39
  texts structure, grammar, and context.
• 19:42
  The main idea of the sermon must match the main idea of the text
• 19:46
  you're preaching from. The point of the passage has to
• 19:49
  be the point of the sermon. I think we've all heard sermons
• 19:51
  where the preacher reads a verse and then talks about something
• 19:54
  completely different for 40 minutes.
• 19:56
  He uses the Bible as a trampoline to jump into his own
• 19:58
  opinions. And that is starving the sheep.
• 20:00
  That's giving them a stone when they ask for bread.
• 20:03
  True feeding is Christ centered. Every sermon, whether from the
• 20:06
  Old Testament or the New, must somehow preach Christ crucified
• 20:10
  and risen. We have to avoid moralism, which
• 20:12
  is. Just telling people do this, do
• 20:13
  that, to be saved, we have to ground the imperative, what we
• 20:17
  do in the indicative, what Christ has already done for us.
• 20:20
  I. Want to circle back something
• 20:21
  you mentioned earlier, the law and gospel distinction.
• 20:25
  Why is this so important for feeding?
• 20:27
  It feels like a very technical theological point.
• 20:29
  It is technical, but it's life or death for the soul.
• 20:32
  The elder must know how to use the law to expose sin, to show
• 20:37
  us our need for a Savior. That's the first use of the law.
• 20:40
  It acts like an MRI to show us the cancer of sin.
• 20:43
  But if you stop there, you just leave people in despair.
• 20:46
  Right. If you only preach law, you
• 20:48
  crush people. You create either Pharisees who
• 20:51
  think they can keep it, or you create people who give up
• 20:53
  entirely. But if you only preach gossip
• 20:56
  without the law, you get cheap grace.
• 20:58
  You get people who think sin doesn't matter.
• 21:00
  You have to use the law to wound the conscience and the gospel to
• 21:03
  heal it. The third use of a wall, right.
• 21:05
  This is a big reformed distinctness.
• 21:07
  Yes, for the believer who has already been saved by grace, the
• 21:11
  law becomes a guide for life. It's not a ladder to get to
• 21:14
  heaven. It's the track we run on in
• 21:16
  gratitude. It guides our grateful
• 21:18
  obedience. In the process of
• 21:20
  sanctification. An elder has to know how to
• 21:22
  apply all three uses. So the diet really matters.
• 21:26
  You can't just give people spiritual junk.
• 21:27
  Food. Souls cannot live on it.
• 21:29
  Fog, mysticism, emotional, That stuff gives you a sugar rush,
• 21:33
  but it doesn't build spiritual muscle.
• 21:35
  They need the whole counsel of God.
• 21:36
  We've discussed protecting and feeding.
• 21:39
  Now for the third leg of the stool, the elder as caretaker.
• 21:43
  The source calls him the Physician of Souls.
• 21:46
  And this brings the office down from the pulpit on Sunday
• 21:49
  morning and into the living room on a Tuesday night.
• 21:51
  Hebrews 13.19 is the anchor text here.
• 21:55
  Leaders, keep watch over your souls as those who will have to
• 21:58
  give an account. That phrase give an account.
• 22:01
  It implies A judgement, a final review.
• 22:03
  It does. It means one day every elder
• 22:06
  will stand before Jesus the Chief Shepherd, and explain how
• 22:08
  he cared for the specific sheep entrusted to him.
• 22:11
  And the Greek word for keep watch, Agrippenosen, literally
• 22:15
  implies sleeplessness, a restless vigilance.
• 22:18
  Wow, that strips all the romance and prestige right out of the
• 22:21
  job. It absolutely does.
• 22:23
  It means carrying the burdens of the people in your heart.
• 22:26
  It means knowing the sheep by name.
• 22:28
  It means knowing their spiritual state, their struggles, their
• 22:31
  fears. You cannot shepherd a stranger.
• 22:34
  It's personal ministry Acts 20.20 says Paul taught publicly
• 22:39
  and from house to house. Ministry isn't limited to the
• 22:41
  stage and this is where differential diagnosis comes in
• 22:44
  that. Sounds like medical terminology.
• 22:46
  It is in a spiritual sense. First Thessalonians 5.14 is
• 22:50
  brilliant here, Paul tells the leaders.
• 22:52
  Admonish the idol, Encourage the faint hearted, help the weak.
• 22:56
  Notice that three different types of people, three different
• 22:59
  treatments. One size does not fit all.
• 23:01
  Right. If you have an idle person,
• 23:03
  someone who is lazy or rebellious and you try to
• 23:06
  encourage them, you're just enabling their sin.
• 23:08
  They need a loving, firm admonishment, a kick in the
• 23:11
  pants. But if you have a faint hearted
• 23:13
  person, someone who is crushed by anxiety or suffering and you
• 23:17
  admonish them or yell at them, you will break their spirit
• 23:20
  completely. They need encouragement.
• 23:22
  The weak need to be held up you. Have to know the patient to
• 23:24
  prescribe the right medicine. Requires deep relational wisdom
• 23:28
  and the manner of care is always gentleness.
• 23:31
  Galatians 6.1 says if someone is caught in a sin, you who are
• 23:35
  spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness.
• 23:38
  You identify as a fellow Sinner who is also under grace.
• 23:41
  You aren't lording it over the flock, as First Peter 5 warns.
• 23:45
  You aren't dominating them. True authority is ministerial.
• 23:48
  It's service oriented, not authoritarian.
• 23:51
  And the means of grace apply here too, right?
• 23:53
  It's not just in the corporate worship service.
• 23:55
  Absolutely. It's visiting the sick and
• 23:57
  praying with them. As James 5 says.
• 23:59
  It's looking a dying St. in the eye and reminding them of their
• 24:02
  baptism, that they belong to God sealed by His promise.
• 24:06
  It is applying the specific promises of the gospel to the
• 24:09
  specific fears and wounds of the individual soul that is
• 24:12
  caretaking. We've looked at the three parts
• 24:14
  separately, Protector, Fear, Caretaker, but as we move into
• 24:18
  the final stretch here, we need to talk about how these
• 24:21
  integrate, because you can't really separate them in
• 24:23
  practice, can you? A good elder is doing all three
• 24:26
  at once. No, they're completely
• 24:28
  interlocking. Think about the qualifications
• 24:30
  we discussed. Able to teach obviously helps
• 24:33
  you feed the flock. That's its primary function, but
• 24:36
  it also helps you protect them because you use that same gift
• 24:39
  of teaching to rebuke error and correct false doctrine.
• 24:42
  And what about above reproach? That protects the church's
• 24:45
  public reputation, for sure, but it also makes your pastoral care
• 24:49
  credible. If an elder is known for being
• 24:51
  shady or having an explosive temper, who is going to come to
• 24:54
  him for counsel when their marriage is falling apart?
• 24:57
  No one. They won't trust him.
• 24:59
  His character undergirds his care.
• 25:01
  They all work together. It's a unified ecosystem but
• 25:05
  sadly we see so many examples today of what the source calls
• 25:08
  anti shepherds. These are the leadership models
• 25:11
  that are popular in our culture but are actually destructive to
• 25:14
  the church. Let's warn the listeners about
• 25:16
  these first U celebrity leadership.
• 25:19
  This is a plague in the modern church.
• 25:21
  It prizes magnetism over maturity.
• 25:24
  We find a guy who is incredibly gifted.
• 25:26
  He's funny, he's smart, he can draw a huge crowd and we put him
• 25:30
  on a pedestal. And then we act shocked when he
• 25:33
  has a moral failure. But we shouldn't be.
• 25:35
  The whole system leads to excusing sin in gifted men.
• 25:39
  We say, oh, he's such a great preacher we can overlook his
• 25:41
  arrogance. Or the ministry is growing so
• 25:43
  much we can't address his temper.
• 25:45
  That is a deadly trade off. The biblical qualification is
• 25:49
  character, not charisma. Then there's the pragmatism or
• 25:52
  the CEO model. This prizes efficiency and
• 25:55
  numbers over faithfulness. The motto is do whatever works.
• 25:59
  If a fog machine and a rock band brings people in, then let's get
• 26:02
  a fog machine and a rock band. If skipping difficult doctrines
• 26:06
  like sin and judgment keeps people happy and giving, then
• 26:09
  let's skip them. But the biblical command isn't
• 26:11
  do it works. It's preach the word whether
• 26:13
  it's popular or not. And anti doctrinal
• 26:16
  sentimentalism. I hear this one all the time.
• 26:18
  Doctrine divides, Love unites. It sounds so nice, doesn't it?
• 26:21
  It fits on a bumper sticker. But it's a false dichotomy.
• 26:23
  Real love, biblical love, rejoices in the truth.
• 26:27
  If you really love someone, you don't want them believing lies
• 26:29
  about God, themselves, or salvation.
• 26:33
  A Doctor Who loves his patient tells them the truth about their
• 26:36
  diagnosis, even if it's hard news to withhold truth because
• 26:40
  it might divide is not loving. It's actually a form of hate.
• 26:43
  And finally, mysticism. This is the tendency to rely on
• 26:48
  new words from God or private impressions, rather than the
• 26:51
  sufficiency of Scripture. The Westminster Confession is so
• 26:55
  clear on this. God has spoken fully and finally
• 26:58
  in His Word when we start chasing private revelations.
• 27:01
  God told me to tell you this. We unmore ourselves from the
• 27:03
  only sure objective anchor we have.
• 27:06
  So bringing this all down to the ground, let's make it practical.
• 27:08
  What is the actionable advice here?
• 27:10
  Let's start with listeners who are part of a church that is in
• 27:13
  the process of choosing new elders.
• 27:15
  What should they be looking for? Slow down.
• 27:17
  That is the biggest piece of advice.
• 27:19
  Don't rush. Test character over time.
• 27:21
  Do not be impressed by worldly success or how much money a guy
• 27:24
  makes or how funny he is. Ask the hard questions.
• 27:28
  Can he handle the Word of God accurately?
• 27:30
  Does he genuinely love people or does he just love the idea of
• 27:33
  leadership? Is his home in order?
• 27:35
  Watch his life. And what about for the
• 27:37
  congregation in general? For the members in the pews.
• 27:39
  Submit to lawful word governed shepherding.
• 27:42
  Don't treat your elders like customer service agents.
• 27:45
  They aren't there to keep you comfortable or to meet your felt
• 27:47
  needs. They are there to watch over
• 27:49
  your soul. Make their work a joy, not a
• 27:51
  burden as Hebruce says, and pray for them.
• 27:54
  Pray for them constantly. It is a terrifying weight they
• 27:57
  carry. And lastly, for the aspiring
• 28:00
  elder guy listening who thinks I think God might be calling me to
• 28:03
  this, what do you say to him? Seek the work, not the status.
• 28:07
  If you desire the office, desire the actual messy work of
• 28:11
  shepherding people and pursue holiness in private where no one
• 28:15
  sees you. Learn to manage your own
• 28:17
  household well first. If you can't serve your wife and
• 28:20
  kids faithfully and gently, you aren't ready to serve the bride
• 28:23
  in Christ. Start there.
• 28:26
  This has been a really deep dive into a significant, and I think
• 28:29
  often neglected topic. As we wrap up, let's get that
• 28:32
  final perspective. The keyword at the end of all of
• 28:35
  this is under shepherds. Elders are under shepherds.
• 28:38
  They are not the point. They aren't the heroes of the
• 28:39
  story. They serve the chief shepherd,
• 28:41
  Jesus Christ first. Peter 5.4 gives this incredible
• 28:45
  promise. When the chief shepherd appears,
• 28:47
  the faithful elders will receive the unfading crown of glory.
• 28:50
  It's all about Him. The glory goes to Him.
• 28:53
  It is, and here's maybe a provocative thought to leave you
• 28:56
  with Consider how the church's safety relies not on the
• 28:59
  strength of men, because even the best elders are flawed,
• 29:02
  sinful men, but on Christ's provision of qualified men who
• 29:05
  stand at the gate. It is Christ protecting his
• 29:08
  Church through these frail earthen vessels.
• 29:12
  The system works not because the men are great, but because the
• 29:14
  Chief Shepherd is sovereign and good.
• 29:17
  That is a beautiful thought. The system works because the
• 29:20
  Chief Shepherd is the one holding it all together.
• 29:22
  The Amen to that. We hope this Reformed Thinking
• 29:25
  deep dive helps you view your church leadership and maybe even
• 29:29
  your own calling with fresh biblical eyes.
• 29:31
  Examine your own church structures against Scripture.
• 29:34
  It really matters. It matters for eternity.
• 29:36
  Thanks for listening, we will catch you next time.