Hartley, Mark: Overview Of Hebrews-11 ~ Heb

Thank you, Johnny, for that. Um, open with me, please, in your Bibles to Hebrews chapter thirteen. Hebrews chapter thirteen. I, I think of all the books of the New Testament, this is my favorite. You know, I don't know if you have a favorite book in the Bible, but in the New Testament, this is my favorite. A- and Leviticus is one of my favorites in the old. No, th- those are a little strange. Uh, but I, I think this book of Hebrews has had a greater impact on my life than any other book in the New Testament. And again, maybe because of my background in Roman Catholicism or whatever, but it's just been a precious book to me, and, and I think one of the reasons, another one of the reasons is, although all the scriptures exalt and speak of the Lord Jesus Christ, I think this book in particular is so focused on the person of the Lord Jesus and the superiority of who he is and what he's done for us. It's just amazing. It's just a thrill to our hearts. And when you think of the Lord Jesus Christ and, and those of us that lived a wicked life for many years, and the Lord saved us, i- i- I'm, I'm still amazed every time I think about the fact that one as wonderful and lovely as the Lord Jesus would give his life for me, and even as we were talking about the other day, for the joy that was set before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For the joy that was set before him, it's an amazing thing that the Lord Jesus Christ would receive joy just by having you and me forever with him in heaven. And, uh, every Christian ought to wake up every day just excited about that and just thrilled with the fact that today could be the last day that we have to suffer through the things of this life, and, and not, and not all of it's suffering. There's some good things that happen in this life. I mean, there's, there's times of joy, and there's times of happiness, and times of, of good times with family and friends. I'm not saying it's all suffering, but it's always mingled with suffering. And yet the time in heaven, brethren, when we get there, uh, it's just going to be such a thrilling thing to us, we're going to wonder why we ever wanted to stay down here for the time that we did. So this book of Hebrews is so precious. And, and, and again, the, the main theme is the superiority of the Lord Jesus Christ, but mingled in that, in that general theme, there are so many great and wonderful truths found in this book of Hebrews. And one of them we're going to look at. We're going to be going reading in chapter thirteen, and we're going to start at verse seven. Hebrews chapter thirteen and verse seven, Remember them which have the rule over you, and who has spoken unto you the word of God, whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation. Jesus Christ, the same yesterday and today and forever. And then drop down to verse fifteen. By him, the Lord Jesus, therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to his name. But to do good and to communicate, communicate, forget not, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased. Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves, for they watch for your souls. It is they that must give an account that they may do it with joy and not with grief, for that is unprofitable for you. Pray for us, for we trust we have a good conscience in all things, willing to live honestly. But I beseech you the rather to do this, that I may be restored to you the sooner. Now the God of peace that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant, make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is well pleasing in his sight through Jesus Christ, to him whom be glory forever and ever. Amen. And I beseech you, brethren, suffer the word of exhortation, for I have written a letter unto you in few words. Know ye that our brother Timothy is set at liberty, with whom, if he comes shortly, I will s- I will see you. Salute all them that have the rule over you, and all the saints. They of Italy salute you. Grace be with you all. Amen. Now, what I want to look at this evening are three verses, really, in this portion, verse three seven, verse seventeen, and verse twenty four. Uh, those three verses deal with the saints' responsibility to the oversight in the local assembly. You know, the, the oversight has a responsibility to us as believers, to every one of the saints, and they're raised up by God, given by God to the local assembly as under-shepherds of the Lord Jesus Christ, and they have a responsibility, and we'll look at some of those things tonight as well, but they have a responsibility to us, but we have a responsibility back to them. Um, about a year and a half ago, um, or a little bit longer, the, the elders in the assembly where I am in at Northgate Chapel in Durham came to me and asked me if I would join them on the oversight. I'd, I'd been meeting with them for some time, and, and I really, it wasn't something that I wanted to do, not that I didn't desire the work because I'd been doing the work, but I just, because I'm gone so much, uh, and just some in- some feelings, some mixed feelings about being a committed worker and and being on the oversight as well, I wasn't thrilled about taking on that responsibility, or at least that title, uh, and that responsibility. But I did so just simply because at that point there wasn't anyone else. There wasn't any other brother that either met the qualifications or had the desire. And I'm hoping and praying that working with some of the other men in the assembly, that there'll come a point when there'll be others that have that desire. And it's something that really all the men in the assembly should desire, to take that role of ministering to the saints, of shepherding the flock, of meeting their needs, of serving them, because that's really what the oversight is for. Not to be the head of the assembly, because Jesus Christ is the head of the assembly. He's the shepherd. The, the oversight are the servants in the local assembly, those that minister to the needs, those that give of themselves. It's a work, and it's work to be an elder. It's not simply just ruling over and making decisions and, and being the, the ones who have responsibility to decide who's going to speak and what's going to be done with the finances and how the building's going to be taken care of and all those things. Those are minor aspects, and even some of those things aren't really the work of the elders. The work of the elders is to minister to the flock, to be those under-shepherds of the Lord Jesus, to be the ones that make sure the flock, flock are fed and are protected, that their needs are met, that they're encouraged, that when there's correction, there's correction given. When there's encouragement, that there's encouragement given. When there's instruction needed, that there's instruction given. That's the work of the elders in the local assembly. But we as saints have a responsibility to them, and in these three verses, there are five things that we see that the apostle, the writer to the Hebrews, exhorts us to do. They're found, first of all, in verse seven. It says, remember them which have the rule over you, who has spoken unto you the word of God, whose faith follow, considering their conversion. First of all, we are to remember those that are in the oversight. Now, that doesn't mean because we forget, because you have to think, now let me see, uh, let me see if I can remember who's the oversight in the local assembly. I mean, all of us should know in every local assembly, we should all should know if someone comes up and says, who are the elders in the local assembly, we should know who they are, right? We should be able to name them, this brother and that brother and that brother and that brother. They're the recognized oversight in our assembly. It's sad. I've gone to assemblies before and said, who are the elders? And people say to me, uh, I'm, I'm not real sure. That happens. That's sad. But here it's not talking about remember in the sense of we, because we've forgotten. It's like when the Lord Jesus Christ says, do this in remembrance of me, he doesn't say do this to be reminded of me. He doesn't say do this because you've forgotten who I am or forgotten what I've done. What it really means is to call to mind, to bring to the forefront of our thoughts, to keep in mind, uh, to, to focus our attention on. It, it has the connotation of making mention of, to pray for the oversight. Brethren, every saint in the local assembly ought to make it a habit every day to pray for the elders in that local assembly. And what do we pray for? We need to pray for their protection. Satan knows that if he can bring ba- down the leadership in the local assembly through some kind of temptation or through some kind of heresy or error, if he can bring down the leadership, he'll bring down the assembly. And he's done it. And men that take that role of leadership in the local assembly are under greater attack from Satan than the rest. And we need to pray that God would put a hedge of protection around them, that God would strengthen them, that God would give them the grace that they need to overcome temptation in their lives, that Satan might not cause them to fall. Because, brethren, there have been great men of God, greatly used of God, that have fallen into all kinds of error and all kinds of immorality. We need to pray. We need to bring to the forefront of our minds the elders in the local assembly and lift them up. We need to pray that God would give them wisdom. You know, I was in an assembly one time, uh, in fellowship in an assembly one time, and we were gathered together, and I prayed for wisdom for the elders. And you know, the elders, one of the elders came to me and told me I had no business praying for him for wisdom. That it was a sign of disrespect. Brethren, we need to pray for wisdom for those men. We need to pray that God would give them great insight and understanding in the things of God and in the things that are happening around us, that they might know what's going on around and be able to protect the flock from even minor, minor deviations from God's word. Because you know what? A big deviation is just a bunch of little minor deviations added onto them, one to the other. And Satan is astute enough, he is subtle enough, he is intelligent enough to know that you don't attack something head on. He does it little by little by little. And the oversight needs to be careful as they make decisions that they realize that what a little bit, what a little change might do, what a little bit of compromise might do to the local assembly. We need to pray for wisdom for those men. We need to pray for their families. I know many elders that have had to step down from the oversight because their wife or their children fell into some kind of immorality, some kind of sin. And those men, because of the testimony, the losing of that testimony before the local assembly, felt it was improper for them to stay in that place of leadership. We need to pray for their wives and for their children, that the Lord would protect them, that the Lord would give them help. We need to pray for the elders. We need to pray that the Lord would, would provide specifically for them so that they would have freedom to go and do the work of the elders. Let me tell you, the work of the elders doesn't happen at the elders meeting once a month. I mean, that's the most insignificant part of all the work of the elder. The work of the elder is done every day, praying for the saints, caring for the saints, visiting the saints, ministering to the saints, living a life before the saints, and we'll see that more in just a moment, that the saints can follow. It's a daily, constant work, and we need to pray for them. I think also there's this concept too that we need to realize, brethren, that we need to do things for the elders, so that they have freedom to go out and do other things, spiritual things. You remember when the early church, the, the apostles there who were before the elders were, were established in local assembly, they were the leadership there. And they said to the, the saints that it wasn't good for them to wait on tables, that they could give themselves over to the, to the study of God's word and the presentation of God's word and the spiritual needs of the saints. We need to do things for the elders, help them in, in, in some of the, the mundane things around their home, around their houses, so that they have more freedom and more liberty and more time to go out and minister to the needs of the saints. We need to remember the elders. We need to consider them. We need to think about them. We need to try to find ways that we can minister to them so that they might minister to the flock. Remember those. And brother, I want to say one other thing here, and we're going to talk a little bit more about this on Thursday night. Th- th- these things that we're reading tonight, they- they're in the form, they're in the verb form that they're not a suggestion, they're a command. They're a command. He doesn't say, now if you feel like it, or if you feel good, or if everything's fine and you don't have anything else to do, remember the elders. No, it's a command. Remember those that have the rule over you, that have leadership in your life in the local assembly. Remember them. The second thing in this verse that we see, it says that we are to follow them whose faith follow considering the end of their conversation, the end of their lifestyle, the end of their, of their, uh, daily walk with the Lord. The, the word, the word follow there is the same word, Greek word, that we get the word mimic or to imitate them. That we should imitate their lives, that we should imitate the way they live. And remember what we talked about back in Hebrews chapter ten and verse thirty eight, the just shall live by faith. Now this puts a, a great burden on the elders in the local assembly, because the burden that it places on them, they've got to be men of faith. They've got to be men that exhibit the person of the Lord Jesus Christ to the local assembly, that exhibit a mature believer, a dedicated believer, one who lives his life not by sight, not by his own devices, but by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The elders need to be able to say in the local assembly what Paul said in First Corinthians chapter eleven and verse one, be ye imitators of me, even as I am of Christ. The elders need to be able to say to local assembly, what I do is what you should do. What I talk, the way I talk is the way that you should talk. The way I live my life is the way that you should live your life. Everything that I do, if you do, you will be pleasing to the Lord. Now that's a burden. That's a heavy burden. But we should be able to look up to the elders. We should be able to look up those in oversight and live our lives like they live their lives. Look what it says in First Peter chapter five. First Peter chapter five and verse one. Peter says, the elders which are among you I exhort, who also am an elder and a witness of the sufferings of Christ and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed. Feed the flock which is among you, taking the oversight thereof not by constraint, not because someone forced you to, but willingly, not for filthy lucre, not for selfish gain, not bec- not for the your own good, your own benefit, but of a ready mind, of a mind that, that a desire to serve others. Verse three, neither as being lords over the flock, not as being some supreme authority over the Lord's, over, or excuse me, over God's heritage, but being examples to the flock. And when the chief shepherd shall appear, you shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away. Likewise, ye younger, submit yourselves unto the elder. Yea, all of you submit, be subject one to another, and be clothed with humility, for God resisteth the proud and giveth grace to the humble. Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time, casting all your cares upon him, for he careth for you. The elders are to live lives that are examples to the flock. How does an elder spend his free time? I want to know, so that I can do the same thing. What kind of books does the el- an elder read? I want to know because those are the books that I want to read. How does an elder treat his wife and his children? How does he lead his family? I want to know because that's what I want to do. What is an elder's, um, view of the local assembly? In other words, are the meetings of the local assembly important to him? Is he there? Is he there on time? Is he participating? That's what I want to do. Now, that's a burden on the oversight. It's a burden. Because he knows that he's being held up as an example before the saints. And the word of God says, imitate his life, imitate the way he behaves, imitate the way he talks, imitate the way he spends his time, the way he spends his money, the way he spends his life. Oh, brethren, it's, it's, it's a, a very weighty matter to be an elder in the local assembly. And I think, sad to say, that in modern times, in many assemblies that I, I know of, and, and you could talk to other men that go from place to place, and they have the same experience. Many times, many times, the oversight in the local assembly are simply those men that have been most successful in business, most successful in the things of the world, and they run the local assembly like a business. And they see themselves as the CEOs and the presidents and the leaders there, and they make decisions in the local assembly based upon expediency and not on the word of God. The elders in the local assembly ought to be the most humble, broken, Christ-like men among all the saints. And every saint in the assembly ought to aspire to be like those men in the local assembly. You see where the burden is both ways, where the, where the burden falls on the elders to live their lives like that, but as us as saints, it falls on us to imitate their lifestyles, to imitate the things they do. Again, an elder ought to be able to say the things that I do, the things that I am, the things that I believe, the things that I hold to, you hold to. Be ye followers of me, even as I am of Christ. And how can a man, how can a man live a life that is contrary to the teachings of God's word and still be held in respect in the local assembly. And it's sad to say, that's part of the reason why there's a lack of respect for the oversight in many assemblies. Because I've, I've had young people come to me and say, I understand the word of God. I spend more time in God's word than the elders in our local assembly. I know some men in the local assembly that go out and visit the saints more than the elders do. And that's a sad commentary on us, brethren. The elders are to be those godly men. And let me tell you what, I, I here, this is another struggle I had with being recognized in the oversight. I- I'm only forty seven years old. I- I'm convinced, we can talk about this later if you want, I'm convinced that the elders are to be elder, elders. They're to be older men, men that have lived lives, men that have raised families, that they can show forth the, the example to the, to the flock of, I've raised my children, I've raised them up in the fear and admonition of the Lord, I've been tested in that home, and I've proven myself faithful in that, in those little things, and the Lord gives me greater things to do. Now that's what I'm convinced of. That I can look at their lives, I can look up to the men, and let me tell you, the the elders in my assembly, I'm the youngest one, and those other men that are old enough to be my father, I'll tell you what, I don't always agree with them on everything, but I love them and I respect those men. And I look up to those men, and I think if when I'm eighty years old, I can live a life like that man does, God bless me for it. I hope I can say that about the leaders in the local assembly. Remember them, lift them up, keep them in the forefront of your mind, pray for them, minister to them that they might minister to the flocks, and some, or excuse me, imitate them, follow their examples, respect them, and hold them in esteem. The next, the the third command that we have concerning the oversight is found in verse seventeen. It says, obey them that have the rule over you. I, I want to read this, uh, there's a brother by name of Kenneth Weiss who has commentaries on the New Testament, and he also has, um, a, a little more little translation of some of these things. And here's how he translates verse seventeen. He says, keep constantly obeying your rulers and constantly be submitting to them, for they are constantly watching for your souls, knowing that they are to live, or excuse me, give an account that they may do this with joy, not with lamentation, for this would be profitless for you. Every one of us are going to stand before the Lord Jesus Christ at the judgment seat of Christ and give an account for the way we live our lives, for what we've done with the gifts and the talents the Lord has given to us. Have we used them for his glory, or have we wasted them away, buried them in a hole somewhere, and they have done absolutely nothing for the glory of Christ? We're giving an account. There's scripture that says that as a father and a husband, I will give an account for how I ruled in my house, how I led my family, how I treated my wife, how I was a- an example to her, how I ministered to her, how I was a leader in the family. I'm going to give an account for that, my wife and for my children. Now, they will give an account as well, but I'm going to give an account. But also the elders in the local assembly are going to give a- an account for all that happened in the local assembly. I'll tell you what, as an elder, that scares me to death. And I tell the other elders in our assembly, when we gather together and make decisions, I said, brethren, it's with fear and trembling. I'm afraid that I might make a decision, that I might do something in this local assembly that would bring dishonor to the name of Jesus Christ or would cause a young or weak Christian to stumble or be discouraged. And I'm scared. They've got to give an account. We've g- we in the oversight have to give an account someday. But here's the other side of it. As a member of the local assembly, as one in fellowship there and under, because even though I am an elder, I'm also under the elders. I'm under their authority, and I submit myself to them. And at the same time as they're going to give an account for how they led, or I'm going to give an account as an elder for how I led in the local assembly, all the saints are also going to give an account for how they respected and submitted to the oversight. And I say this when I, when I teach something in, in our local assembly, I say, listen, I'm teaching this, there's no way I can force anyone to accept and obey what I've shared, but someday you're going to stand before the Lord Jesus Christ, and he's going to hold you accountable for what you heard. And there's no excuse. You can't say you didn't know. You can't say you've never been taught because the word of God has been opened. Now, here's the, here's the, the, the balance of all that. We're to be like the Berean Christians, and back in Acts chapter uh seventeen, it talked about the Berean Christians, that they were more noble than those in Thessalonica because they searched the scriptures daily to see whether the things Paul said were true or not. And we've got to be like that. It doesn't matter if it's Mark Hartley, or if it's one of the elders here in the local assembly, or Steve or Bruce Holshiser that were they just here, or Larry Price who was just here, or Randy Amos who's been here, or some other godly man that comes here and speaks from the platform. Every Christian ought to go and study out the word of God and say, is it in line with God's word, what this brother has said? And if it's in line with God's word, then we need to hold on to it with everything we have. And if it's not in lines with God's word, because any of us can be in error, any of us can make a mistake. We're human, we're fallible. I can be wrong. That's an, I know that's a revelation to you all, but I can be wrong even. And, and we need to be discerning in the Word of God, and we need to be studying the Word of God, and we need to do it not because Mark Hartley or because one of these other men has said it, we need to do it because thus saith the Lord. And we need to be discerning in God's Word. And an elder, a leader in a local assembly, when he makes a decision, it ought to be based on God's word, and he ought to be able to say to any of the saints that come up in question, because we all have a right to go to the elders and say, why did you make this decision? Why are we doing this particular thing? That's right to do, and there's never an, an elder should never be offended when a saint honestly and sincerely comes up and says, why are we doing this particular thing? And the response from that elder should be, or from the oversight should be, here's what the word of God says, and this is why we're doing it based on this particular scripture. Here's our handbook. The local assembly does not belong to one man or group of men. The local assembly belongs to the Lord Jesus. He is the head, we're the body. He is the one that gave his life. It is his bride, and that bride has simply been entrusted to the care of the oversight to take that local assembly to the place of maturity and a place of unity in the scriptures to have the mind of Christ, that they might all together serve him and glorify him as one body, an expression of the body universal. That's what the elders are to do. And we as saints are to obey them. What it really means here, allow yourselves to be persuaded. That's the literal translation of the word obey. Allow yourselves to be trans- or, or excuse me, to be persuaded by those who have the leadership over you. In other words, if these men truly are godly men, if these men are truly are men of the book, if these men truly love the Lord Jesus Christ and see the local assembly as his body and as as being entrusted to them, and with care and with fear and trembling are ministering and leading and guiding the saints, then I need to give them the benefit of the doubt. If I really believe that they know more of the scriptures than I do, then I need to respect them. And even at times when I might not agree with their interpretation of a particular passage, I need to give them the benefit of the doubt. There's a plurality of elders, and I don't know what takes place here. It doesn't matter to me what takes in this sense, but in our local assembly, the elders will never make a decision, we will never come to the saints with a particular decision that we're not all in agreement about. We come to the saints as a body in the oversight, and we will work on that thing for months, weeks, however long it takes, so we can come to a decision, an agreement among us, that this is what we believe the Lord wants us to do. Now, if you've got five or six men that love the Lord Jesus and know his word and understand his word, we sh- we can show them respect, and we can allow ourselves to be persuaded by them. Obey them that have the rule over you. Realizing, this is what Paul said in Acts chapter twenty and verse twenty eight. This is what he said to the Ephesian elders. He said, take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers, to feed the church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood. It's not men that raise up elders. Now, I- I- I'll say again, I believe, and I'm not talking about this local assembly, I'm talking about in general today, and it's sad, the- the- the spiritual condition of the assembly today, of the assemblies of God's people, is that there are men in that position that are elders only by title. They don't do the work. They don't, they don't love the flock. They don't give themselves to the flock. They don't serve the flock. They simply lord over it. And they're sad to say that in many local assemblies today, that's what there is. But if there are men in the local assembly, and I'm, I'm gonna tell you, this is my opinion about the elders here. I mean, I, I, I respect these men, and I'm not saying that just because I'm here or just because they're, I wouldn't say anything if I didn't really believe it. But I respect these men, and I think they're godly men. I think they love the Lord. And we need to show them respect. And we need to esteem them. We need to hold them up before the Lord. The, the Spirit of God is the one that raises up elders. You know what? When I was a young man, I went to a, uh, one of the, a man I respect greatly. He's with the Lord now, and I said, but brother, what if there's an elder in the local assembly and you don't believe he's really an elder? He said, Mark, who does the assembly belong to? And I said, well, the Lord. And he said, who's more powerful, you or the Lord Jesus? And I said, well, uh, the Lord, you know. And he said, you know what you need to do? If there's not, if you, there's a man in the assembly that you don't believe should be an oversight, you need to pray that one of two things would happen. Either that the Lord would open your eyes and would remove any kind of prejudice or any kind of bitterness or any kind of hard feelings against that man from you, and you would see him as one raised up by the Spirit of God to be in that position of oversight, or you pray that the Spirit of God would remove him out of the oversight. You know what? I prayed about this brother I thought shouldn't have been in the oversight, and you know what the Lord did? He didn't take him out, he, he changed my heart. Because it wasn't him that had the problem, it was me that had the problem. The assembly belongs to the Lord Jesus, and we need to pray, God, if it is your will, in your timing, take this man out of oversight, or if he's to be there, change my heart. I'm gonna give you the example, and this is a lovely example. David knew that he had been anointed by the Lord to be king of Israel, and yet Saul was the anointed one. And David had, at least on two occasions, opportunity to destroy Saul and make himself king. He could have done it. And who would have s- what man would have said anything about it? All of them knew, all of them understood. Saul himself understood that David was anointed to be king, and yet David would not raise up his hand against the Lord's anointed. And even when that Amalekite came to David, the Amalekite that really wouldn't have even been alive if Saul had done his job that God had given him to do, when that Amalekite came to David and told David that he was the one that had killed Saul, what did David do to that man? Did he reward him? No. No. I think it was Abishai who he had to, not Abishai, it was one of, uh, it was Joab's brother. Um, he had take him and kill him. What right do I have to put down or to, uh, disregard or to disrespect or to speak badly about a man who's in oversight in the local assembly. I better be careful about touching the Lord's anointed. If he's not to be there, then let the Lord in his timing and pray that the Lord in his timing would remove that one or to change my heart concerning that one. Allow yourself to be persuaded. Obey those that have the rule over you. And then in the last, the sec- the fourth thing in that particular verse, in verse seventeen, submit yourselves. Literally, uh, to retire or to withdraw yourself, um, to surrender yourself to those in authority over you. Uh, most of you here have flown in an airplane, and when a- when you're in the airplane, the only thing you can do as a passenger is sit back and let the pilot fly the plane. Uh, it would be ridiculous for me to go up into the po- cockpit and say, now listen, I, I'm gonna, you know, I don't really trust you. I'm gonna help you fly this plane. Well, first of all, I don't know what I'm doing to begin with, but, but second of all, wouldn't it be a disaster for two of us trying to find the plane? He'd go left and I go right, he'd go up, I go down, whatever. It'd be nothing but a disaster, it'd cause a wreck. When I get on that airplane, I sit in my seat, and I put my hands, my fate, my life into the hands of that pilot, and I retire, and I relax, and I surrender myself to him. And if he gets me from here to there, praise the Lord, and if he doesn't, I have no control over it. The elders in the local assembly, we're to have such respect and such, uh, high regard for that we allow them to do the work that they're ne- that the Lord has called them to do. We surrender to that. We retire from that. We don't try to get in the way. We don't try to push them aside. Another thing I've seen in local assemblies is older godly men have been pushed aside by the younger men who say, y'all are of no use anymore. You don't know what you're doing, you're old fashioned, you're not modern, you don't want to change, you don't want to go with the times, and we're going to push you out of the way. And the younger men have pushed them out, and I've seen it happen in assembly after assembly. And you know what's happened in some of those assemblies that hap- that that has taken place? They have fallen apart, and some of them don't even exist anymore. I'll just give you one quick example. A good friend of mine, fellow that was inspiration or was was an inspiration for me coming to the Lord Jesus, was in a local assembly with godly men, godly oversight. He had great respect for those men up to a point, and they made one decision that he disagreed with. And he and a several other young men started to backbite, started to speak ill of those elders, started to disrespect them publicly and privately. And they broke off from that local assembly, they started their own assembly, and those same young men who had, who had spoken evil against those o- elders started their own assembly and became elders in that assembly. That was about ten or twelve years ago. You know that not one of those men that are elders that broke away from that assembly, those young men, are in fellowship in a local assembly today. Some of them, the majority of them, fell into gross immorality. You see, the problem wasn't with those older men that were in the oversight, the problem was with the heart of those younger men. And they thought that they knew more, and they thought that they could do better. We need to respect those, obey those, remember those, and submit to those that are in authority over us. Now, a couple of things, and we're just gonna, we're gonna go through this quickly because time is almost over. Submission never, never, never is linked with inferiority. Just because I submit to someone doesn't mean that I'm inferior to them. The Lord Jesus, First Corinthians chapter eleven and verse three, it says the Lord Jesus submits to God the Father. Is he inferior to God the Father in any way? Absolutely not. And it's not because the elders are a, are a class apart. It's not because this whole clergy laity system that has been perverted by man, and they're in a different class than us. They're set apart from us. They're higher than us. That's not what it's about. They're leaders among equals. And they're believers just like I'm a believer, and they go through the same struggles that I go through. And they have some of the same difficulties that I have in my life, and some of the same temptations that I have in my life, they go through. And it's not because they're superior to us. It's not because they're more intelligent than us or because they're more godly than us. Well, they can be, but that doesn't necessarily mean that they are. It doesn't mean that they're superior. It means that God has placed them in a role of leadership. I'm not any more spiritual or godly than my wife, but I'm the leader in my family. I'm the, I'm the head in that family. And in some ways, she's better than I am. She's better looking than I am, that's obvious. But she's also, she there's, she's more tender-hearted than I am. Well, you can believe that too, can't you? She's more gentle than I am. She's sweeter than I am. But also she's, she's shyer than I am, and she told me one time, Mark, if it hadn't have been for you, I never would have gone to the foreign field. But thank God that she did, because she followed my leadership. So it's not a sign of inferiority. Also, um, everyone that is in authority is also under authority. You remember when the Lord Jesus, when the, when the, um, the centurion came and asked him to heal his servant, and the Lord was on his way there, and the centurion sent a servant and said, there's no need for you to come into my house because I'm a man under authority. Now, this was a, a man who had a hundred soldiers under his command, but he didn't say I'm a man of authority, he said I'm a man under authority. And if I say to this one, do it, do this, he does it. And if I say another one, come here, he comes because I'm a man under authority. And it wasn't because of that centurion that the, the, the those under his authority obeyed him. It was because he had the power and the authority of Rome behind him. The same thing's true in the local assembly. It's not because those men that are in, that in the oversight have authority in and of themselves. It's because the authority of the Lord Jesus Christ, the head of the church, is behind them. And I've got to be careful. If I don't submit to them, I've got to realize that it's the Lord that has given them an authority. All authority has been given to him, and he entrusts that authority to certain ones. Uh, just another quick example. When I was in Spain, there was a young couple that came to me, and they were trying to make a decision. The elders had told them to do one thing, they thought about doing the other thing, and they came to me and asked my advice. He said, what should we do? And I said, well, in the end result, you've fallen, you'll stand and fall before the Lord. You've got to answer to him for the decision that you make, but you be careful. Disregarding the counsel of the oversight in your life. You be careful about going against what the elders have told you to. You better be absolutely sure that the word of God tells you to do something contrary to their counsel, their advice. Because God has set them up as guides, as leaders in your life. And that's why I tell young people, you want to know, you want to make a decision, you don't know what to do, you go not only to your father, to your the your parents, but go to the oversight in the assembly and say, brethren, here's a decision I need to make. Give me your advice. Pray about this with me, brethren. Tell me what I should do. Tell me, uh, what what the path of the Lord for me is. And the elders ought to be able to give that advice, ought to be able to give godly counsel based upon God's word. So submit to them. And finally, the last one is found in verse twenty four. Salute all of them that have the role, uh, the, the, the rule over you. That word simply means to embrace or to enfold in one's arms. What it really means is love them, cherish them, because those men are going to be gone someday. I've been on this island for three weeks now, and I don't know how many times I've heard of some of the men that were elders in this assembly in years past, and the fond memory that the saints here have of those men, those godly men that went before, and the examples in their lives and their standards and the, the understanding of God's word, and they hold those men up and they admire them, and they, they say, boy, we sure wish that, that, or sure miss one brother or the other brother. Well, you know what? These men that are in oversight right now aren't going to be here forever either. And we should cherish them and love them and admire them. And you know what it'd be nice from time to time to do? To go up to them and say, brother, I love you. Thank you so much for all the work that you do in the local assembly. Show some appreciation. Embrace them, enfold them in your arms. Go up to them and sometimes and just show them a little bit of kindness and affection for all the work that they do for us in the local assembly. Five things. Remember them, imitate them, obey them, submit to them, salute them. That's the responsibility of the saints to the elders, to the leadership in the local assembly. And God's going to hold us accountable for those five things, brethren, and he's going to ask us how we did in those five areas concerning the leadership in the local assembly. I can't answer for anybody, but I hope it helps you examine your heart tonight and say, how do I treat the elders in the local assembly? Do I backbite and talk bad about them behind their back? Do I speak evil of them? Do I disrespect them? Or do I really look up and admire them and appreciate them and seek to follow their, their guidance and seek out their wisdom and seek to follow the example of their lives and pattern my life after theirs? God will hold us accountable for it someday.