Bible Study 4/12/23

Good evening, everybody. All right, let's gather ourselves at the tables, take a seat, and then we'll begin our Bible study time with a brief moment of prayer and praise. OK. All right, please bow with me for a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, we want to really thank you for the week that we had during Easter to join together in remembrance, in meditating and thinking about all the events of history, but more so just to celebrate, God, the power of the resurrected life of Christ.

And I pray, Lord, that through the knowledge of the Son, through Father God, the appreciation that's in our hearts, you continue to empower us to live day to day in faith. Lord God, we want to ask that as we walk week to week, help us truly to be aware and conscientious about it and not to forget.

And then, Lord God, we thank you for opportunities like tonight coming back to study your word and be in fellowship. And I pray, God, that as a body, the collective faith that we exercise and, God, the worship that we lift up to you would be truly something desirable and pleasing in your sight.

We lift this time up to you, Lord. It's in Christ, and we pray. Amen. Word of every age. Word of every age. Author of our faith. The first, the last, the same. The name above all names. Crowned in majesty. Glorious prince of peace. Throne at God's right hand. The world at his commands.

The world at his commands. Jesus, lamb of God, how great you are. There is no other savior. Every knee bows down at your renown. There is no other savior. Merciful high priest. Merciful high priest. Mother of the least. Generous and meek. Protector of the weak. Sacrifice to death. For us, your final breath.

You died the world to save. To overcome the grave. To overcome the grave. Jesus. Jesus, lamb of God, how great you are. There is no other savior. Every knee bows down at your renown. There is no other savior. You will reign forever... Jesus, Lamb of God, how great You are!

There is no other Savior! Every knee bows down at Your renown! There is no other Savior! Jesus, Lamb of God, how great You are! There is no other Savior! Every knee bows down at Your renown! There is no other Savior! There is no other Savior! There is no other Savior!

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away. Cast me not away from Thy presence, O Lord, and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me.

Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation, and renew a right spirit within me. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away. Cast me not away from Thy presence, O Lord, and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me.

Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation, and renew a right spirit within me. Cast me not away. Cast me not away from Thy presence, O Lord, and take not Thy Holy Spirit from me. Restore unto me the joy of Thy salvation, and renew a right spirit within me.

Amen. All right, amen. Just a few announcements for us, just of the things that are happening soon. This weekend, for those of you who are thinking about church membership, is the first class of our membership series. It's eight weeks long and starts 9 a.m. up in the-- Actually, this time it's going to be in the youth group room.

Please make sure that if that was something you were interested in joining, to sign up for it so that we can prepare enough binders. You can sign up by going online to beroeancc.com, looking at events, and then it has the link there, or you can just message Pastor Nathan directly.

Additionally, for all the members, on the 23rd, we have our membership meeting plus service fair. And that will be an opportunity for you to visit with our service team leaders, connect with some of the people who are already serving, and even if, let's say, you're not ready to jump on a team, just find out what's happening within various ministries.

So please make sure you mark that on your calendar. That day, there's going to be a fundraiser lunch where the summer team is going to prepare a quick lunch for us, and then immediately after at 1.30 is going to be the members meeting. The last thing I want to emphasize is please do sign up for retreat early.

So we've made it so that the early bird special, so to speak, is ending in April because we have to book and reserve all the rooms early on, and because we're taking up so many of the rooms, we have to give them our head count. So then once April ends, per person or per participant, the price is going to go up $35, $40, which is quite a bit.

So look at your calendars. Make sure in August 11 through--I think it's 11 through 13, you take a look. Make sure you're clear on those dates and register early. All right, have the time of discussion, and we'll be back at 8 p.m. Thanks. >> Is there a way to make it show up on here?

Because I don't have it in front of me. >> No, I just have nothing on here. And I actually don't know my password. >> So that I could control it from up here. My, these slides. So these slides, I guess, are on that computer, but not on this one.

>> No, that's, so usually it's already on here. >> Where you just have it come from this? >> Okay, thank you. All right, if I can have your attention up here real quick. Let me pray for us, and then we'll get, we'll wrap up 3rd John. So that we can do a seven-week intense study on Philemon.

All right, so let me wrap up 3rd John for us. Let me pray. Father, we're thankful that you've allowed us to just finish up these twin apostles, or twin epistles. And we thank you, Lord God, for causing us to think of the importance of hospitality. And we pray that tonight, as we just do a little wrap-up walk-through of this epistle, help us to really glean much from it.

And whatever it is that you want us to remember, would you etch into our minds tonight? So would you help me to communicate clearly, effectively? And would you leave an indelible impression on our minds through your word? So we lift this time into your hands, and we pray this in Jesus' name.

All right, so I included a little bit of last week's, last couple of verses there. Okay? And so this is pretty much up to verse 12. Verse 13 and on, it's God's inerrant inspired word. But I'm just going to focus up to verse 12 for now. And then the first thing I did was just organize it and then look through just different categories.

Okay? So the purple bold, just the good guys. I just titled it "Good Guys," so that my eyes would go there. And then the green are the bad guys. Now, the Gentiles technically are neutral, but I just put them as bad for now. And then anything that is related to truth or anything that's related to God or of good, I put it in the blue highlights.

And then everything that is green or anything evil, I highlighted in green. And a lot of what Diotrephus' actions entailed, we can see as evil. So I actually just kind of highlighted it like that. And then the red words are like significant words, like "therefore"s are important, "so that's" are important, "for this reasons" are important whenever you see them in the Scripture.

And there's only one command in the whole chapter that's important. There's a "greet the friends there by name." That's a command, but I don't think that's as significant to the context. So the "imitate" is the only main command in this whole chapter, in this whole letter. So that's pretty important.

And because that's important, I just highlighted it, let it stand out. And I'm looking at the imitation of good and then the non-imitation of evil. And there's evidences of this, and there's consequences of this, so I just put those in yellow. So that's how I kind of just organize it visually.

And then the first thing I will hone in on is actually the "imitate" part. So here's the main command and the main imperative of 3 John. It's verse 11, and it's kind of a two-fold command. It's giving you a "do" and a "don't do." So John writes, "Beloved, do not imitate what is evil, but do imitate what is good." That's the main thrust.

You guys tracking along? There's only one command here. So you want to make sure you're imitating the right thing and not imitating the wrong thing. And the consequences are pretty severe here, right? Because he's saying, "The one who imitates good, who does good, is of God. The one who does not imitate good, but imitates evil, who does evil, has not seen God." If I were to say, "Raise your hand if you want to be categorized in the first category," 100% of us would raise our hands.

If I said, "How many of you guys don't want to be categorized as you've never seen God?" You wouldn't want that. So this command "imitate" is a very--it's like a hinge command. You got to get this one right. So that's the main imperative. And here are some questions that come to my mind.

Is John speaking of evil and good generally or specifically? Is he talking about feed the hungry, tithe to the church? If you see an empty toilet paper roll in the bathroom at church, go ahead and refill it. If the trash is full, don't put stuff on top of it.

Some of you guys do do that, right? Just throw it away. Good in general, is that what he's saying or is this very specific? It's a very important inductive question I will apply to this verse. The second thing is, is this imitation natural or is it supernatural? I can't imitate a cat.

I can pretend a little bit. I can go--I can--I can do all of that. But it's not a good imitation. So is an imitation of God something a non-Christian can do? That's a question I would have. Is an imitation of Satan something a Christian actually is possible of doing?

So is this a command or is this a description of a symptom of someone who's in line with the will of God, someone whose soul is prospering? So that's another important question. And similarly, are these things either prescriptive, meaning do this, or are these descriptive? Because you actually have both elements in this verse.

Are you guys tracking? Don't imitate, do imitate. The one who doesn't imitate is of the devil or who hasn't seen God, or the one who does imitate is of God. So these are some pretty severe ramifications depending on how you imitate or don't. So here's the context. There's people that have gone out for the sake of the name, and we should support them.

Good job, Gaius. I pray that your soul is getting along well, you're doing good, and you're helping them, because they went out for the sake of the name, receiving no help from the Gentiles. And so we want to be fellow workers of the truth, so great job. But diatrephas.

So that is highlighted and brought to the front for me because it's very important, because this is a dude. John never calls him evil, he never calls him a non-Christian, but I feel like it's implied. But diatrephas is a context. So don't be like diatrephas, because that man hasn't seen God.

Do not be like that is the implied context, is what I would glean. So he's putting this dichotomy. There's the good, and there's the not so good. Gaius would be good. Diatrephas would be evil. Good does stuff for the kingdom and for the name. Evil does stuff for self.

If something is good, we're going to support, we're going to be fellow workers. Now the question is how, right? But if something is evil, we're going to call that stuff out. How? Because it's tricky. Because diatrephas is spreading lies. And when you've got two stories being told, a lot of times it's confusing to know which to discern.

And if there's good, you imitate it. If there's evil, you don't imitate it. Good is of God. The evil fruit cannot and has not seen God. So I make this little chart so my mind can track the logic and the flow of the arguments that are here. So I'm calling him bad boy diatrephas.

This is a bad dude. So what's happening? So first, John actually straight up judges this man's motivations. This man wants preeminence. He's all in it for his glory. And in return, he doesn't accept what we say. How dare he? But diatrephas is saying, who are you, John? How dare you?

And that's how church divisions start, right? So he's going to come and call attention to diatrephas' deeds. And what are the things that diatrephas has done? And there are four. One, oops, he unjustly accuses. He doesn't receive. He forbids and then puts them out of the church. Have you guys already kind of processed this in your own discussion?

Yeah, okay. Now, diatrephas, he rejects authoritative truth. He rejects instruction. And what does that result in? He rejects this apostle of God. Okay? And the fruit of this rejection of the apostle's authority is slander, failure to be hospitable, hindrance of expressions of love, and then it seems like this man's unilaterally just excommunicating people.

Are you guys tracking? My question is, how in the world does this man ever become a church leader if he's a church leader? If he's not a church leader, he's pretty bold. He's like, "I don't have any authority in the church, but get out." Right? That's a pretty bold man.

So I'm assuming he's a church leader. How in the world did this guy get in there? Okay? So church leadership, here's an exhortation to church leaders. Paul's exhortation to Timothy reads, "Pay close attention to yourself." So your character, your life. "And to your teaching, your doctrine." So those two things, life and doctrine, life and doctrine.

"Persevere in these things, for as you do this, you will ensure salvation both for yourself and for those who hear you." So the exhortation that Paul gives to his protege Timothy is, "Pay very careful attention, scrutinize your life, scrutinize your teaching." Titus, he says something similar, but he's describing an elder and an overseer.

He says, "The elder, the overseer, he's one who holds fast the faithful word, which is in accordance with the teaching, so that he can do two things, exhort in sound doctrine and to refute those who contradict." So this is kind of across the board. All church leaders should be able to be beyond reproach in character and teach the truth.

Teach sound truth. Sometimes with sound truth, you have to exhort. Sometimes in sound truth, you've got to bash the incorrect. So then here's Dietrichus. Was his problem more doctrinal or more behavioral? Who says doctrinal? Okay. One person. Who says behavioral? One person. Some of you guys are like, "This is a trick.

It's not a trick question. His behavior sucks." His problem, first and foremost, is a moral character one. It's an arrogance one. It's a prideful one. We don't know what he's teaching. So it's a behavioral one. But then the question is, how in the world did this man become a leader and a prominent figure in the church?

And this is what church leadership really ought to look like in terms of character. Titus 1, 7 to 8. For the overseer must be above reproach as God's steward, not self-willed, not quick-tempered, not addicted to wine, not pugnacious, not fond of sordid gain, but hospitable, loving what is good, sensible, just, devout, self-controlled.

What's the first quality of God's steward? Not what? Not self-willed. Diatrephes, the first quality that's mentioned about him is what? He's all about himself. He's all about his own glory. If his pride is hurt, oh, he's going to unleash war. If his ego is brushed against, he's going to start kicking people out of the church.

How dare you oppose me? Do you know who I am? I am Diatrephes. I'm going to kick you out of the church. And I guarantee you he's going to do everything he can to protect his ego. And this is one of the first qualities there is for a church leader not to be self-willed.

First Peter 5, 2-3, Peter's exhorting the pastors and the elders, and he says, "Shepherd the flock of God among you, exercising oversight." So, there is some degree of responsibility and authority, right? But not because you're forced to, not under compulsion, but voluntarily, according to the will of God. Not self-willed, but according to the will of God.

Not for assorted gain, but with eagerness. Nor yet as lording it over those allotted to your charge, but proving to be examples to the flock. So, Diatrephes is not this kind of man. Are there Diatrepheses, do you think, in churches around us? Oh, for sure. How do they get there?

Because people in church leadership are often put there because they're gifted, not because they're godly men. When someone is very good organizationally, when someone is very good at spinning a tale, when someone is very good at teaching, when someone has exceptional leadership qualities, before you test their character, you're tempted to just elevate them.

But you know what Paul says in terms of even the leaders in the church? Don't put a new convert in there, because what happens to the new convert? They fall into the same temptation as the devil. They get poofy in the head, they think they're God's gift to Christendom, and next thing you know, they're a Diatrephes.

So is it easy or is it difficult to test whether someone is self-willed or not? It's very hard, because you're going to give everybody a benefit of the doubt. But it's very difficult really to catch someone who has a desire to exalt himself. It's very hard to grab that and expose that.

But you know what exposes this? Conflict. That's why another one of the qualifications of church leadership is temperance. You don't need temperance when people love you. When do you need temperance? When there's opposition. And a lot of times, true colors get exposed when there's opposition. True or false? False.

So one of the things that we're looking at here in 3 John is you have a guy that was put in place too quickly, is my guess, who is now in it for his glory, his own namesake, his own ego, and not the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And he wields that abusively. But you know what's interesting? You know what Diotrephes' people are going to probably say? The Apostle John is abusive. The Apostle John is overstepping his bounds. How dare Apostle John come at us and our leader and say all of this stuff? Because Diotrephes, what is he doing?

He's spreading. If you guys notice, all five translations, the wording is all different. Disparaging, spreading wicked lies. Do you guys notice that? Just look at it and you'll be like, "Oh, all the words are very different." There is an evil, sinister deception going on in the things that are coming out of Diotrephes' mouth.

And he has to discredit John. So all this to say is if you ever desire to become an elder and overseer, you desire a lofty noble thing. And it has to be your character, and it has to be your soundness of doctrine, your teaching, and your consistency in your life.

Now that's a scary task for those who are already in church leadership. And that, for you guys, for church leaders, you do need to lift the leaders up in prayer so that we don't fall into the same temptations as Diotrephes. Amen? Because that's not something that we... Nobody plans to be accused of exalting self.

That happens when we're not scrutinizing our own lives and our teaching carefully. So this is actually a very sobering passage. The rest of it, I'm just gonna do a little rehash, review. Second and third John end almost exactly the same. I noticed that I made an error. In third John, it's actually paper and ink.

In second John, it's actually with a pen. But... Okay. So it's not that different. There's a "see you later" in both. In third John, at the end, there is an imperative, another command, but that's not as significant as the imitate one, so I didn't put that in there. Before I give you the discussion questions, here are some announcements.

Over there in the corner, there are gonna be... There's a lot of lost and found items. So go look through it if you've lost a sweater or a water bottle or sunglasses or something. See if it's yours, go pick that up. And if you guys are in the old cafe, you guys are all on the other side, every week the chairs are put that funky.

And so there's been a request for you to look at the diagram that's on the wall and to put the room back together according to the diagram. For logistics of the Bible study next week, we're actually starting Philemon. It's gonna be seven verses. If you have a calendar on you, it actually says just verses one and two.

The pastor, Mark, has called an audible and he says, "I wanna actually do verses one and one... Up to verse three." But verse three, it just says, "Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ." So you're not gonna get too much inductive out of that 'cause it's in like five of the epistles, right?

So verses one through three, what you wanna do is look for the main points of emphasis as you look through all 25 verses, come up with a general summary, and then try to outline the letter. These questions, I'm gonna copy and paste and put on the Facebook along with a template of all of Philemon and then the three verses.

So all that will be provided for you. So here are some group discussions that... And I'm gonna explain a little bit why these are the questions that I would like you guys to try and discuss. If you are a Christian, how are you doing objectively in being a fellow worker of the truth?

First of all, what is that? What does that mean for you? And are you faithful to it or are you saying later, not now? Right now, I can totally ignore this. No, but there's almost a strong exhortation, how are you gonna be a fellow worker of the truth and what keeps you from doing better?

What are you waiting for? Those are the questions that I want you to ask for that. Number two, if a diatrophase was in our context and was being called out in a similar fashion, what are things you would need to be sober about? What are things that you ought to pray for?

What are things to avoid so that you actually don't obstruct the work that's happening or the ministry that's happening? So my guess is in that church, there was some drama, right? This apostle of love, but previously he used to be called the son of thunder, came in and he called out diatrophases, my guess.

But that probably had some messiness involved. So what would that look like for you if you were a bystander? The third one is reflecting on the study of the twin epistles, the second and third John, what are some truths you feel the need to apply to your life? And as way of review, just remember second John is, don't show hospitality.

Third John was, do show hospitality and don't be a diatrophase. But then that's tricky, 'cause you have to discern in what context do I support, in what context do I call out an abstain? And so as you reflect through the last five weeks or so of our Bible study, hopefully number three is a very beneficial exercise as you answer that question.

Okay, let me wrap us up in prayer and then we'll go back to our discussion groups. Father, second and third John have been just fruitful studies for us. And on the surface, it almost seems to have a contradictory thrust. The Lord, I pray that you would give us wisdom to discern the proper contexts in which to be hospitable and in which context to be an abstainer from evil.

Lord, we need your wisdom, not just for these chapters of Scripture, but we need your wisdom also to know how to live day to day in obedience to the Word of God, obedience to the Spirit of God. So give us insight. Lord, your Word has said that solid food is for the mature who because of practice and training have learned to develop a skill of discernment.

We pray that our church people will grow to be a discerning people because we fed hungrily off your Word. So would your Word bear fruit in each of our individual lives and in our church as a whole for your glory and for our fruitfulness. We love you, Lord, and we thank you for our time together and pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen. So go back to your discussion and please do share about these things. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

Bible Study 4/12/23

Transcript