At the passage that we're gonna be studying today, chapter 4, verses 14 to 21, I'm gonna read this verse. Did you grab a packet for today? Okay, there's a packet right at the table in the back. There's no more left? Oh, sorry, there's no more left. Okay. Do you wanna make a call, please?

Thanks, Matt. All right. So let me read this for us, and it says, "I do not write these things to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For if we were to have countless tutors in Christ, yet you would not have many fathers. For in Christ Jesus, I became your father through the gospel.

Therefore, I exhort you, be imitators of me. For this reason, I have sent to you Timothy, who is my beloved and faithful child in the Lord. And he will remind you of my ways which are in Christ, just as I teach everywhere in every church. Now, some have become arrogant as though I were not coming to you, but I will come to you soon.

If the Lord wills, and I shall find out, not the words of those who are arrogant, but their power. For the kingdom of God does not consist in words, but in power. What do you desire? Shall I come to you with a rod, or with love and a spirit of gentleness?" Okay, let's pray before we jump in.

Heavenly Father, we wanna thank you again for your precious word. We pray that as your word continues to examine us, challenge us, and admonish us to diminish our pride and our hearts, to continue to seek harmony within the church. I pray, Father Lord, that you would convict us through the spirit.

And Lord, would you help us to glean much from today's study as Apostle Paul continues to express his heart of ministry and love towards the church. We thank you in Christ's name, amen. All right. Man, sorry if I talk slower today. I'm like mega dizzy and like stuffy right here.

So sometimes I get a little woozy. Okay, in looking at the passes that I just read, now I just read it one time through, and he's ending, he's ending his long argument about their division and the pride that they have. If you look in chapter five, he's going to change the topic and say, "It is actually reported that there is immorality among you," and he is changing the subject, right?

So in this last section, you would think typically you leave the punch to the very end. You leave the emphasis, right? In terms of the argument, a closing statement, so to speak. Now I want to ask you, what would be the main argument and reason why the church should no longer be divided in this passage?

And more specifically, I think he gives it away in verse 14 through 15. Say that one more time. You are a family. Okay, very good. What else? Any other thoughts about what this last argument can be? Okay, excellent. So I like both of those. He's been giving various analogies and metaphors about who they are.

Spiritually here, he sees himself as their spiritual father, right? And there's a sense in which, you know, when you're teaching little kids to do something, you can tell them, "You need to do this because it's good for you. You need to do this because the consequences are like this." Sometimes you can tell them, "You need to do this because it hurts them." You know, I tell Yoshi, "You have to be like this.

I know it seems unfair because otherwise you're hurting your brother." But there are times when I will say, "You need to listen to me because I'm Appa, because I'm your father." And although that used improperly would be just simply an abuse of power, but used properly, it makes absolute sense.

Apostle Paul is essentially saying there's a great difference between, let's say, some random guy trying to write you a letter to correct you, as opposed to me, I've stayed with you for many years, or about two years. I've appealed to you. I've loved you. I've shared with you. I've taught you.

Apostle Paul has sacrificed everything for this church. And so in this last one, he's telling them, "I'm speaking to you as a father. I'm speaking to you as a father." So let's take a dive in and take a look at more closely, then as a father, what are the things that Apostle Paul is doing for the church and why should they listen?

Well, in verse 14, we'll get these words, "I do not write these things to you to shame you, but to admonish you as my beloved children." And the first question I want to ask is, if you were to take that first verse and use that as almost like a purpose statement for the letter, how would you summarize that?

I know it's already a short verse, and you're like, "Huh, you're almost asking a summary of a summary statement." But sometimes it's good to put things in our own words. We do that a lot when we're studying, right? Because that way we're kind of grasping, "Hey, this is in many ways the purpose statement of the whole letter." Okay?

So just try. Yes? I write this because I love you and it's good for you. Excellent. I write this because I love you and it's good for you. What else? Dude, I'm so sorry. My mind blanked. What was your name again? Jonathan. Jonathan. Sorry. I talked with him forever the last week.

I can't believe I'm like this. Anyway. Any other summaries? It's to admonish as a father to his son. Okay. I'm writing to admonish as a father to his son. Excellent. Okay? So this is the tone of the whole letter. I mean, as in the whole book, you know? What Apostle Paul is admonishing, correcting, but he's doing it in the context of a relationship where he is their father and he loves them.

Okay? So just from this short verse, what applications can we draw about correcting or admonishing someone? How about Christine Cha? One more time? Okay. Great. To do it out of genuine care and to the best of that person, right? To benefit that individual. Absolutely. If you look at that, there's a little last phrase, "as my beloved children." You know, I really love it when the writers, whether it's Apostle Paul or other writers, they start writing to the church as their truly beloved.

You know? I remember John, as he's writing, he's an individual who writes of love a lot. And it's pretty astounding because the way that the writers are seeing the church, they're not seeing them as like, "You are my soldiers and I must break you." You know? They're not seeing them like, "You are my minions," or "You are my disciples, so do what your teacher says," which in that culture, they could.

That's a culture where they had, what, slaves and masters. That's a culture where hierarchy amongst older people and younger people and people of stature and people of low income status was really, really different. But the way that Apostle Paul and the different authors of the Bible speak to the church is one of deep, deep love and care.

And then, you know, all the commentaries made note of the fact that that term, "as my beloved children," is interestingly written. You guys have heard many, many times that there are different words for love. There's phileo, which is like brotherly love, and there's different types of love. This one is the agape love.

There is this unconditional, "I will go to any length to serve you, to do good for you," in the term agape. There is this commitment, unconditional commitment for your good in that term, agape. And so, all the things that Apostle Paul says, even the things that, remember in the last couple weeks, he was getting all sarcastic with them.

He was like, "You guys are kings and I'm just a, you know, lollipopper and you guys are wise and I must be stupid." You know, he's getting all sarcastic. But even sometimes that harsh tone, it exists in the care. It exists in the fatherly love. You see what I'm saying?

Okay. What else? What else can we derive just from that short statement, or short phrase, verse 14? Yes. John? >> Sometimes love hurts. >> Okay. Sometimes love hurts. Yeah. But we should still do the things that are necessary, right? So he mentions this idea of, over here, this whole idea of, "I don't necessarily want to shame you, but I am going to admonish you." You know?

And that correction and admonishing is going to be painful. When he says, "I don't want to shame you," we do have to think about this principle, like if we're ever in a position, let's say, sometimes on the line, you're a small group leader or just one-to-one, you have a younger brother or sister in Christ that you need to correct, that you need to admonish, right?

You definitely never want to shame them. You never want to humiliate them. You never want to make them feel like, "Oh, I'm just getting pressed so hard that essentially I'm broken here," you know? There's a sense in which it's not our job to break somebody. The breaking is going to happen by their own conviction in the Spirit to the truth of the Lord.

It's our job to give them and admonish them in the capacity God has given us, according to His Word. And so he says, "I don't mean to shame you, but what I do mean is to admonish you." And that is one of the key terms that I want to talk about.

Admonish in the Greek is "nuthetaio," and it literally means "to put into mind." To put into mind. So I'm sure a lot of you guys have heard about biblical counseling or nuthetic counseling, and the whole premise behind that approach to counseling is to say, "We're going to reason from the Scriptures and change the way an individual thinks, what the individual believes, the attitude of the heart needs to change." That's at the base or the foundation of that nuthetic counseling.

And so, from that term, there is a principle to be learned. I loved it when an older gentleman taught me this principle and said, "You know, when you're trying to help people change, you have to make them see the wisdom in it. You have to make them see the wisdom of what you're doing.

I mean, you can sit here and just be like, 'Come on, come on,' and really, really just kind of cheer them on and whatnot, but if they don't rationally, if they don't in truth see the wisdom in what they're doing, they might be performing for you, they might temporarily be appeasing you, but there's a sense in which a lasting, permanent change might not happen until they see the wisdom of what they do." So, with the term admonish, it has with it the idea that he purposed to bring about a change in their belief and understanding, right?

And that's why you see in a letter, you see a letter where he's making arguments upon arguments upon arguments. You know what I mean? So far, again, in that first verse, we learn a lot just about, one, what did Apostle Paul purpose in his heart, and two, applicationally, how do we go about admonishing or correcting people?

Okay? I want to ask you this question, though. It's a yes or no question. Is it our job as a Christian to admonish fellow Christians? Yes or no? Yes? Okay. Well, to, this is one of those trick ones. That's why even though it's a yes or no one, I put it in here.

In one sense, yes, absolutely. Galatians chapter six, verse one through two. Brethren, even if, you know what? Let me have some of you guys read this. I'm going to save my voice here. Patrick, can you read Galatians six? Really loud. - Brethren, watch the law. - Okay, thank you.

I'm going to have, how about, Mark Barless, can you read the Ezekiel passage? - When I say to the wicked, you will surely die if you do not work and speak out for more if he does not turn from the wickedness, or from the wicked way, he shall die and be forgiven, but He has delivered himself.

Again, when a righteous man turns away from his righteousness and commits a wicked deed, and commits an obstacle before it, he will die. Since you have not warned him that he shall die in sin and his righteous deeds which he has done, he shall not be remembered, but his blood I will require in your hand.

However, if you have warned the righteous man that the righteous should not sin, and he does not sin, he shall surely live because he has been warned, and you have delivered yourself. Okay, so those passages are pretty clear. Like, if you're spiritual, and someone's sinning, then you who are spiritual, you need to restore the person with gentleness.

In Ezekiel passage, if you see somebody and they're acting wickedly, you need to speak them warning, otherwise their blood is on your hands. Right? So very clearly, those two passages teach us you need to admonish the people around you. And so, I want us to think about that a little bit.

Basically, the reason why I say it wasn't as a clear-cut yes or no is because there is kind of a balancing of two things, right? For example, if you don't know a person, you don't want to just go to them in the vision and be like, "You did that wrong." It's like, "Who are you?" You know?

And also, in humility, you realize, "I don't see everything. I don't see the person's, like, the surrounding circumstance, the person's intention." So there's, on one end of the spectrum, there is, you should be careful about how you admonish people. But on the other side of the spectrum, if you don't admonish people, then you're also not heeding what God has implemented into the community of Christ.

Right? And there's a sense in which we're really not doing God and His truth, or giving God and His truth the kind of honor that it deserves. Where we are all together so submitted to the will of the Lord, that we are all together and one another admonishing each other to submit unto that.

Right? So, again, there is a balancing of the two. And then verse 15 and 16, to me, is that kind of balancing. Or 15 and 16, yeah. Of the kind of balancing of what he's saying. What I mean by that is this. In verse 15, he says, "For if you were to have countless fathers in Christ, that you would not have many fathers.

For in Christ Jesus, I became your father through the gospel." Okay? Now, it could be pretty plain what he means by this. But let me ask you, what do you think he means by saying, "I became your father through the gospel"? Is he thinking about quality of care, like, "I care for you as a father"?

Is he thinking about just, like, numerically, "There's only one dad, I'm your one dad"? What's he saying? Hmm. Okay, so my relationship to you is one as father to son, and so I have the authority over you. What else? How did he become a father to them? Yes. Yeah.

Excellent. So, more specifically, I do think he does have that relationship as an apostle, where he has authority over the church. Essentially planting the church. But more specifically, he is the one who brought them to Christ. So he is literally their spiritual father, right, through the gospel. And so there's a sense here where he is talking about the various things that I kind of mentioned, the quality of care, numerically there's one father.

He's saying, "There can be a lot of people who kind of tutor you, but there is one spiritual father, and I became that father to you." Right? And so he's kind of saying, like, "Through that experience, I'm so closely tied to you." You know, there's a sense in which, can I become a father to anybody?

In a functional sense, I can adopt and become their father. But in a biological sense, I can only become a father by actually, you know, going through the natural process. Right? And what's really interesting to me is that that tie of being a biological father will make fathers go above and beyond.

What do I mean by that? So, you know, when I was working at this academy back in Cerritos, what the academy did was they hosted a bunch of these children from Guatemala. And these children were super cute. They were Koreans who lived in Guatemala and grew up there, and they came over, and then these host families would essentially parrot them for almost two months.

Okay? Now, you know what's really interesting is a lot of the host families were Christian parents. But sadly to say, do you think the host parents treated their biological kids the same as the Guatemalan kids? Mm-mm. What's really interesting is biological children, they'll do stuff like buy them cars, they'll do stuff like drive them, like, everywhere and anywhere.

They'll pay. That academy was not cheap. It was like 500 bucks a month. 500 bucks a month, are you crazy? And these were Korean parents, so they don't want to lose a dollar, you know? But for their biological kids, they would go above and beyond. So what's weird to me and interesting to me is that tie and connection will make parents go to any length.

And you guys know that. Your parents will go any length. You need money? Okay. You need this? Okay. You need that? Okay. Education? No problem. That's the way biological parents are. You're a biological father. I'm connected to you in this way. And there's a verse that I jotted down for you there.

Mitchell, can you read that? Second Corinthians 12, 14 through 15. It speaks his heart towards the church. Here for the third time, I am ready to come to you. I will not be a burden to you, for I do not seek what is yours from you. Your children are not responsible to save up for their parents, but parents for their children.

I will most gladly spend and be expended for your soul. If I love you more, I will be the one to love you more. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you.

I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you.

I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you.

I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you. I will be a blessing to you.

There is a difference. There is a difference from a tutor to a parent. There is a difference between a babysitter and a parent. There is a difference between a hired hand, as Jesus would say, and the true shepherd. And Apostle Paul is saying that I have this heart towards you.

So earlier I asked, is it our job to admonish? Yes. But we have to always remember that job to admonish exists in the context of love. Right? If we're not willing to expend ourselves and go the extra step, if we're not willing to help them by way of X, Y, and Z, and yet all we want to do is drop them the bomb and give them a rock or something and say, here, take it.

I don't think we're doing what the Bible calls us to do. Right? So by application, that little blank is just simply, we should all have a heart of a loving parent. Now obviously we're not going to be treating each other like, oh, you're my little kid, you know, because then that's going to be taken as very prideful too.

It's like, you're not my dad, you know? But there is a sense that every person that you see and you want to minister to, you want to look at them like a parent. If they, whatever they need, I'm willing to supply. If they need a rebuking, then I will supply rebuking.

If they need encouragement and soft comfort, then I'm going to provide soft comfort and encouragement, whatever they need. That's the heart of a parent. Okay? Verse 16. In verse 16, he says, "Therefore I exhort you, be imitators of me." And so you can see him again, therefore, what is the basis of his exhortation?

It says fatherly love. But then he says, be imitators of me. Okay? And I don't know if I blanked it out, I'm supposed to. The imitators in the Greek is the word where we get the word mimic. Literally copy after me. Do what I do. Okay? Which is quite profound if you think about it.

And I definitely hope that as I parent my own kids, I could tell them, do what I do. Like, follow Appa. Follow how Appa treats your mom. Follow how Appa treats your brother. Follow how Appa is hardworking. Follow how Appa is prayerful. I hope that my character would be one where I can tell my kids, follow Appa.

You know? And Apostle Paul essentially is saying that. But I think when he says that, when he says this interesting term, mimic me, again, a lot of criticism has been given to churches and Christian faith because there's a sense in which some people don't like this idea of mimic somebody.

Are we producing clones? You know? Are we producing replicas? And we're supposed to do exactly, everybody the same way and we're supposed to follow suit? Well, obviously this is, he's not saying in every little thing I do, you know? He's not saying his temperament and everything. But in the things that are truly spiritual.

But in thinking about that, I think it teaches us something about discipleship. Let me ask you this question. By Apostle Paul saying, mimic me, what does that teach us about discipleship in general? Either like a method or a principle in discipleship? Yes. Right. Not just words, but lifestyle. Absolutely.

There's a sense in which there is a difference between challenging others directly and challenging others indirectly. And you have to realize at Berean, we give people opportunities to serve and to challenge others through their faith. And obviously in terms of teaching, teaching the Bible, we hold that as like, you have to be really qualified.

But every single one of us can indirectly be discipling others. Why? Through our own dedication, through our own commitment, through our own self-evaluation and through our own sanctification, we're constantly discipling others. You won't believe how many times I've been inspired and discipled indirectly by just watching people. So if you ever see me just staring at you, it's not because you have something on your face.

It's because I do that a lot. I kind of watch people and like, wow. You know, when people are doing things in the background. Because that's the kind of way I operate too. I always watch that. And I get inspired. I get totally inspired. So again, Apostle Paul in his exhortation, he commands them or he exhorts them to be imitators.

And in verse 17 he says, "For this reason I have sent to you Timothy, who is my beloved and faithful child in the Lord. And he will remind you of my ways which are in Christ, just as I teach everyone in every church." Okay? So earlier Christine Cha mentioned about the kind of aim that somebody has.

Apostle Paul says here that for this reason I have sent you Timothy. I just kind of, in studying I saw different views from different commentaries. So I put this question in there. It's not necessarily like a profound one or whatever. But he says, "For this reason I sent to you Timothy." Is this the same reason in verse 16 where he says, "Therefore I exhort you." Or is this a different reason?

What do you think? Some options are, was it his fatherly love that he sent Timothy? Was it for the reason of mimicking Apostle Paul? Was it for the reason of practically obeying what he taught? What was the reason? All of the above. I guess you can say all of the above, huh?

I feel like your answers are typically like that. Is it this or that? Both. That's cool though. You know, actually, I mean, I guess it could be. I don't think we have to decide, okay, it's exclusively one or the other. But does anybody have a ... Because of his fatherly love.

Any other guesses? Or why would you say it's because of his fatherly love? Well, it comes right after ... It was interviewing verse about ... Just before that, it only came after he sent Timothy because he's already about to imitate him. And so then the most immediately preceding thing that makes sense to refer to is, I became your father in Christ Jesus, who you got from.

Okay, gotcha. Just distance. Okay, just distance. So, Paul's a Paul in everything that he's doing, from admonishing, loving, being a father and whatnot, exhorting. He's doing all those things because he's motivated by his fatherly love. So even in sending Timothy, can it be because he's motivated by his fatherly love?

Absolutely. But I guess I personally took it more on the side. I basically took one of the commentaries' position and said, he says, "For this reason, I have sent to you Timothy, who is my beloved faithful child in the Lord, and he will remind you of the ways which are in Christ, just as I teach everywhere in every church." So I took it more to mean, Timothy is sent for a very specific purpose, to remind you of my ways, the way I did things, the way I taught you, how I taught you to obey, how I taught you to behave and function in the church.

So I took it to mean that when he says, "For this reason," and the reason is for your mimicking of Apostle Paul, for your spiritual growth and practicality in the expression of your faith being portrayed in your deeds, I'm sending you Timothy. Now there are other portions of scripture that speak.

For example, in 3 John, John says, "I have no greater joy than this, to hear my children walking in the truth." In Galatians 4, 19, Apostle Paul says, "My children, with whom I am in labor until Christ is formed in you." So earlier, Christine said, "To be a father, to be someone who truly loves an individual, you have their spiritual best in your sight all the time." He's kind of discouraged because Apostle Paul is like continuing to love them and the church is continuing to doubt his apostleship.

But the fact of the matter is, Apostle Paul still nonetheless had their spiritual good in mind at all times. And what is their spiritual good? To be in line with the will of God. To mature from their sin of pride, which is one of the greatest that is taught to us in the Bible.

And so I think there's a sense in which Apostle Paul, in sending Timothy, he's still pursuing that goal of causing these Christians in Corinth to mature. And so he's going to give an exhortation about that aspect, where faith needs to be mature to action. Next verses. In verse 18 he says, "Now some have become arrogant as though I weren't coming to you." We know that Apostle Paul was battling arrogance, you know, because arrogantly they're saying, "I'm of Paul, I'm of Apollos, you know, I'm of Cephas." And they're kind of having this like, "I'm better than you because of who taught me," kind of thing.

But can you try to think of why Apostle Paul would call them arrogant? Is it because it's arrogant to think Apostle Paul won't come? Is it arrogant, you know, why call them arrogant at this point? Like, I guess, what's the arrogance that Apostle Paul is, you know, pinpointing here?

Yes? There you go. I think I agree with what Mitchell is saying. What's, I guess, funny, and not necessarily funny, but what's interesting about this scenario is did the Corinthian church think they were spiritually mature? They didn't. They actually thought they were the opposite. They thought they were spiritually elevated.

And I think there's an element in which they were definitely going above and beyond, and because they thought Apostle Paul wasn't coming, Mitchell said, "They end up saying whatever they want." You know? So, good, I think you kind of hit the nail on the head. They end up saying whatever they want.

They end up saying stuff and there's no consequences to it because they don't think Apostle Paul is coming. There is this attitude of, "I'm going to say and do what I want." All right? And I think we never verbalize that in our lives. You know? Like, "I'm just going to do whatever I want." But we do that a lot, don't we?

People might advise us one way or the other. People might, you know, kind of direct us and guide us with good counsel, but a lot of times we do what in the end? We do what we want, even if someone's trying to teach you the other way. Why? Because there's this attitude in us, deep in us, an element of pride that says, "I'm going to do what I want." Right?

And I think that's the kind of idea that he's getting at here. In verse 19 through 20, oh, sorry, I wanted to tell you about the story of Eli and his sons. The story of Eli and his sons are a pretty sad story because Eli is actually seen as a very good prophet.

But there's a marr in the story, there's a bad attribute to his character because of his sons. And what happens is, his two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, they end up doing whatever they want within the temple. And the thing about it is, they not only just do whatever they want, they do things that are completely egregious to the Lord.

Things like, people come to the sanctuary to offer sacrifices, right? So they swindle them. Ladies come to the sanctuary to offer sacrifices, right? So they have sexually immoral relationships with them. They were opening up the sanctuary doors, the temple doors, to all kinds of sin and rank immorality. And so, these two brothers needed to be rebuked, but their attitude was, "We do what we want." What's crazy about this whole scenario is, Eli is judged for that.

It's like, "Whoa, wait a minute. Hophni and Phinehas were the two sons who were wicked." Yes, but God, if you read the story, God rebukes Eli. And there's an element in which, by allowing sin and his sons to do whatever they want and not stemming their pride, Eli was again, guilty too.

And there's a sense in which we can say, when an individual sees sin, but they do not address it, there is always a case in which you honor man more than God. Eli then might be guilty of honoring his sons more than the Lord. Does that make sense? So I bring that story up because Apostle Paul essentially says, "I'm not letting you get away with your sins." He says in verse 19, "But I will come to you soon, if the Lord wills, and I shall find out not the words of those who are arrogant, but their power.

For the kingdom of God does not consist in words, but in power." Now you see a contrast. The kingdom of God does not consist in words, but in power. That's a general principle. I love it when he gives universal truth. The kingdom of God is like this. It's not of words, but of power.

That's really interesting. What does power represent as he's contrasting these two things, words and power? What do you think that power represents? I guess more specifically, what is he comparing? Power of the Spirit to do what God wants. Yes, Eugene. Okay. So far we have one, power as in, I'm going to call that supernatural power.

Supernatural in the sense that maybe God has invested in the apostles power and authority to actually do something. Then we also have power as in the Holy Spirit's moving in us to do the will of the Lord. Like that? Okay. Good. Okay. So in thinking about this, let's, as we take a look at this verse again.

He says, "I shall find out not the words of those who are arrogant, but their power." So Eugene, I'd have to disagree with yours, but if you look at it, he's talking about power in them, not necessarily power in himself. So actually I like what David said. There's that repeated many times in scripture difference between power just in words as in faith that's seen only in doctrine as opposed to true spiritual power that's found in the transformed life.

Okay. Let me repeat that again. In the Bible, there is a repeated theme. Okay. A repeated theme where faith that exists in words and doctrine is contrasted with the power of a transformed life. Okay. And so the principle, we're trying to think about this for a moment, for the kingdom of God does not consist in words, but in power.

Okay. So he tells them, I'm going to examine you. Okay. I'm going to examine your words and I'm going to see if there's real power. As in I'm going to examine both what you're saying and what you're doing. Right. I'm going to examine you thoroughly. Words and deeds. Okay.

And then he gives this principle, the kingdom of God, kingdom of God that relates to what? Genuine salvation. That it relates to the eternal kingdom, the kingdom in the Lord Jesus Christ. It consists not of words, but in power. Jesus said in Matthew 7 verse 21, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my father who is in heaven will enter.

Right. So Christ himself is giving a clear principle. There's going to be so many of you who are going to with words say, Lord, Lord, you know, I'm with Jesus. I'm a Christian, but he says, but they're not going to, they're going to be sorely disappointed. Why? Because the kingdom of heaven does not consist of those who only have power in words, but it's going to be the spiritually transformed life of those who do the will of the father.

Okay. So true spiritual power is seen not in their boastful words, but it's seen in their transformed living. Why is he saying this? Why is he saying this? Because apostle Paul wants to see tangible change. Okay. Apostle Paul doesn't want to see like, here's an exhortation and then them to just agree, you're right, you're right.

And then they turn around and go on sinning. Apostle Paul doesn't want to see this kind of like mental acceptance of what he's saying without the actual life transformation that he's, he's actually expecting from them. Right? Likewise for us, there's a thing to be said like, you know, in the many ways that we grow in our Bible knowledge and the many ways that we grow in our knowledge of the Lord, these things have to have to be coupled with transformative living, like actual tangible change in the way that we function, think and do things in our lives.

And I want to challenge us. If there's some of you who feel, who feel like you've hit what are so-called plateaus, which again, I believe technically they don't exist because in a relationship you're either growing really, really far or growing really, really close. But there are times in our spiritual lives we go to the same Bible studies and church services for like a number of years.

And there's kind of almost a sense in which, Hmm, I'm not sure if there is this purposeful, tangible, goal oriented living in my life right now. Yeah. And my question to you is, has anything changed in the last several years? You know, if you've heard exhortation to go, go like share the gospel at work, has anything actually changed?

If you know, you've heard exhortation to diminish your entertainment consumption and spend more time and consume consuming the word of the Lord and prayer, has anything actually changed? If you've been exhorted and challenged to Bible studies to, you know, to reach out to brothers and sisters, get to know them, ask them good questions, learn who they are, and then minister to them if at all possible.

Has anything changed in your circle of friends? I think there's a sense in which the power, the spiritual power that Apostle Paul wants to see again is the spiritual power of transformed living. Okay. So I don't know. Some of us have been really steadily growing and we've seen just radical changes in our lives and some of us change is slow, which is fine.

But again, I want to ask you this question. Tangibly speaking, have things changed in the last several years? And if they haven't, then yeah, you're going to end up feeling like, man, I'm not really like driven right now. I'm not really goal. Like there isn't a goal that I'm pursuing.

You know, there isn't an attachment of the things that I do with my life to what God really wants and the will of the Lord, you know? So lastly, in verse 21, okay, what do you desire? He's kind of asking like, what will it be? Huh? And he says, shall I come with you with a rod or with love and a gentle spirit?

His tone suddenly changes and he speaks almost in a threatening way. He says, what's it going to be? Right? And I ask this question, as he says this, as he says this statement and asks the church this question, what does this say about apostle Paul and how he viewed them?

You know, we've been talking about it so far that he's viewing them as a father, you know, but just think about the question for a moment. It is weird that he kind of ends the letter in this basically threat, you know? Think about it. How does apostle Paul view them?

You guys can leave that as one of your discussion questions, you know? But can we learn about how apostle Paul viewed his relationship with the church and how he viewed the church, you know? All right. So today, really, to summarize, apostle Paul exhorts them to cease from this division and pride and he says multiple things.

I admonish you, I exhort you, I'm going to come and examine you, but in the end he says, I'm doing all this stuff because I'm your father, because I love you, right? I'm saying all this stuff to you not to shame you, complete opposite. I'm doing the hard stuff because I completely love you as a father with a son, right?

I think that's pretty amazing and it challenges us to think about the way we view the people around us. It challenges us to think about the way we encourage and exhort people around us too. All right. Let's pray and wrap up today's study. Heavenly Father, we want to thank you that you have used such men as apostle Paul.

Lord, we have at our church many people who love the church so much more than themselves. We have so many people in the church who are willing to expend themselves and literally die to themselves rather than to see the church hurt or suffer. I thank you Father God that you have placed such men in the life of the church, Lord.

I pray Father God that we all would be challenged, that we all would be challenged to change in our lives. God, that we might have true spiritual power and not just in word and doctrine. I pray also Father Lord that you would use us to admonish, to exhort, to comfort and to love the people around us, Lord.

As you have called the church to be truly a body that's so connected as a family, I pray Lord that that would be fulfilled in our church here. Thank you in Christ's name.