Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Let's pray. Dear Father God, we don't want to be
ordinary Christians. We want to be extraordinary Christians. Really, we're
not here to come to church and whining about what
went wrong in our life, but to rejoice in the
fact that you're the jewel in the journey, the gold
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of the Son of righteousness, the honey of the Word
of God. Jesus, we love you. Thank you for allowing
us to be here. Father, we have seen events yesterday
that have changed the world. We are sleeping adventists. So
many of us know nothing of prophecy, some who have
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been irritated by its preaching and teaching. And yet we
are living at a time where we must engage the world.
And Lord, our radio broadcast goes to places we don't
even know. I've been informed today there was a listener
a radio station picked up our broadcasts without permission. Of course,
that's so with us, and that dear heart reached out.
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May you bless every place like this, Take our little
here and make it much for your cause. Make us
like the magnificent seven in Jesus' name. Amen, What kind
of person does God called elitis Church? We should ask
that question very shortly. The world church will be selecting
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leaders to replace our world leadership, and so we should
ask the question what kind of persons God called elitist church?
We know that Jesus called imperfect people with potential to
become his disciples. Did you hear the word imperfect potential?
We call that God's grace. If you could go back
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and you could know where I came from as a
young person, I don't talk a lot about it because
life before fifteen for me was trauma. I experienced a
kind of life that many of you can never think of.
You would not imagine that your pastor came from where
he came from. But God, in his mercy, took me
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from that put me into a loving Christians association in
Fletch your academy. And I was very imperfect. I'm still
very imperfect, but I began to preach and teach. The
very first year I came to academy was baptized. Because
God works with imperfect people. Did you hear me? So?
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As a disciple of Jesus, a person is mentored under Jesus.
They learned the ways of Jesus from Jesus. Back then,
they learned the ethics of Jesus. From Jesus, they learned
to value God and others as Jesus values every person
with potential. A disciple in time can, in theory, become
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a leader, even though he or she must always remain
a disciple. So just because you become a leader doesn't
mean you stop being disciple. We never stopped following Jesus
just to become a leader. In fact, leaders need to
dig in and follow Jesus all the more because they
are a leader. In fact, leaders will not lead long
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if they don't follow Jesus as a disciple. The early
Church was growing in the Book of Acts. They had
overcome their first hurdle of apostasy in the case of
Antonius and Saphira. They had faced opposition and persecution with
courage and prayer. They were not concerned about numbers. But
God brought providence to grow the church through basics, through fellowship,
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Bible study, friendship, commitment, sharing Christ and so the church
grew in boldness in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Everything looked mighty good until dissension arose in the early Church.
How did rise concerning the widows of the Church. Now
you shouldn't be arguing over widows. So they were complaining
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about widows in the early Church. I've heard all kinds
of complaints at times in the church arise about this,
that and the other thing. But they were concerned about
the widows. And it had a lot to do with
whose widows were being taken care of or weren't in
their eyes and perception. You see, the early Church supported
widows that were deserving of their support. Godly widows who
met a certain criteria were fed and were not allowed
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to starve to death in the early Church. Historians tell
us that by the end of the first century, the
Early Church had created a support structure for the elderly
and the sick that became the envy of the Roman world.
They left no one behind in the Apostolic Church. When
our treasurer Tom Kunju had a stroke. You know, sometimes
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people say, well, how can who so and so serve
in the church with a stroke? Many of you don't know.
But our transition from Alleghany's Conference the Chesapeake Conference was
led by Tom Kunju after he survived with a life stroke.
He guided us with wisdom and the audit to make
it happen. Now we have a new treasure at RhI.
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But Tom is on our finance team and new treasures
Doris Horner. Where's Doris at? Doris? Now, Doris isn't taking
Tom's place. Doris is standing on the shoulders of Tom.
She is humble, committed working with our conference auditor who
is doing our books until certain transitions and fixes occur,
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which is wonderful and God be praised. But you know,
we made a decision we would not leave Tom behind,
and God allowed him to get through that life's threatening
situation to emerge and bless the church in a quiet way.
Everything looked mighty good until dissension arose over the widows history.
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Just like Jesus, the early Church left no one behind.
And that's important to take note of here. Those early
believers did not forget the week and the elderly, and
should we Sometimes good things can be used by the
enemy for bad outcomes if our focus is misdirected on
the good thing. And that's what happened. Look at verse one,
Act six, that's enter our bibles. Last week. You had
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to actually open your bible, open them anyway their slides.
It won't hurt you to turn to Act six. Now,
in those days when the number of the disciples was multiplying.
There arose a complaint against the Hebrews by the Hellenists
Hebrew Christians Greek Christians. Hellenists are Greek Christians because their
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widows were neglected in the daily distribution. Then the twelve
summoned the multitude of the disciples and said, it is
not desirable that we should leave the word of God
and serve tables. Now, the Greek word for desirable is
the Greek word for pleasant or pleasing. Have you ever
seen an unpleasant person going unpleasant I'm happy, and their
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faces down their stern at you, as my wife is
sometimes honey, you know, you gotta watch those eyebrows. Keep
them down, so I don't know they're up. They're up. Okay,
we can look unpleasant when we're trying to be pleasant.
Sometimes now they're saying, here, it's not pleasant that this
is happening in the church. God is not pleased when
ministers of the gospel are distracted and preoccupied doing the
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work of maintaining the church and even caring for its
needs at the expense of not being in the word
and praying. Problem here, it takes time to study the
Word of God. The spiritual leaders of the church to
be foremost in sharing, studying, and praying. It's hard for
a minister. I speak from experience. It's hard for a
minister to minister from the Bible if they are distracted
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from Bibles, study, prayer, and teaching, preaching and visiting people
that the members should be doing. There are roles for
the pastor, but he's not to do everything. Imagine God
frowning on such a thing. Because he does, he's not pleased.
The same challenge was hoisted on Moses and outside. Remember Moses,
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children of Israel, of Sinai, I'm out of Egypt to Sinai,
Jethro as good godly father in laws. As Moses, You're
going to burn out here. You can't handle all the
pressures of the people. You're gonna need to choose spirit
filled men. Let them lead in circles of concern, have
hierarchical levels of leaders, so that the important matters only
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come to you and not everything else on the table.
And when Moses took that council, and Moses lived to
write the Torah, he lived to bring him through the
wilderness for forty years. He lived to see his life
purpose realize we wouldn't have a Bible if he had
not taken that council from Jethro. The same challenge Moses
overcame way back then arose in the early Church among
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the Apostles. God was rebooting Israel through the Apostolic Church,
the Helenus. The Greek widows were Jewish widows who spoke
Greek and who were affected by the Greek culture since
the babylon In captivity. That did dasper was the spreading
of the Jewish people throughout the Greek world, and so
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Jewish were everywhere. They've learned Greek language, Greek culture. The Bible,
the New Testament's not written in Hebrew or Aramic, It's
written in Cooin, a common person Greek. Thus the church
had cultural diversity. Is that a good thing? Let's say, amen,
come on, let's what's the name of our church here?
Going to help me reaching hearts? International? That means multi
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ethnic from every nation, kindred tribe in tongue. We celebrate diversity,
and that means cultural diversity, racial diversity, age diversity. The
Church had cultural diversity back then. That kind of verse,
and the Greek Christians felt that their widows were being
ignored for the sake of the Jewish Christian widows of Jerusalem.
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That's pretty bad. It's apostle that's called we call it racism.
That's what they felt was happening. There probably was a
little bit Peter struggled with racism. God had to straight
out straighten it out with Cornelius. I'm gonna tell you
right now, I love being able in the Lord to
be an old, sixty two year old pastor giving a
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godly affectionate hand thing, you know, and this fist bump,
you know, to the diversity of children in the church.
The apostles said, it's not pleasant for that we should
leave the word of God to serve tables. Are they right?
Are they right? Okay? I would like to affirm the
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same truth here today with you, from the word of God.
It's not pleasant your pastor should leave the word of
God to set tables, to clean the church, to weave
the flower bed, to do a host of things that
would divert his attention from Bible studies, sharing the Word
of God and evangelism. Does that make sense, okay? When
I cannot train and teach because I'm doing everything else
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under the sun. There's a problem we've had COVID. COVID
has really redone the church in any ways. People have
lost the sense that they need to be engaged. People
come to church late because of COVID. Some people choose
to just stay at home and go online rather than
get to church. Well, I got news for you. The
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COVID virus at this present state is not going to
kill you. You need to get to church, and if
it does, you'll die in church serving the Lord, and
then you'll know you'll be in the right resurrection at
the end of the age. Am I right? So get
back to church. So the early Apostolic Church was in
a crisis, racial tensions, rolls were messed up, Satan had
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moved on some to murmur and the complain instead of
rolling up their sleeves to make a difference for the church.
So the word of God gets spread and prosper. So
the Apostolic giftedness could work in behalf of the church
and Act sent six the Apostles called a town hall
meeting where the folk us was placed squarely on sharing
ministry rather than hoarding ministry. I've seen some pastors just
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want they want to do everything. I don't look look
at the manual here leading out Today, God be praised
Samuel's at his older brother. He took the place of
his older brother. Did he do a good job? Amen? Okay, Texas.
They called a multitude of disciples together. We call that
broad consensus. There was a time in reaching Hearts where
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we didn't use board meetings. We had full business meetings
of everybody to make decisions. Now I realized the church
manual structures different, but I liked it better that way
because then we had consensus and buy in. So we've
got to figure out how to work with the structure
to keep the Apostolic way going. Okay. Now they had preached,
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and they administered, and a multitude of new disciples stood
before them to hear. The apostles appealed to the brethren
to empower the apostles so they can teach and preach
the word of God. Look at verse three x six. Therefore,
and what does it say in your Bible the very
next word, Brethren, seek out from among you, don't come
to us. You look inside your own circle, from among
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you seven men of good reputation. The word good is
not in the Greek there of reputation, full of the
Holy Spirit and wisdom whom we may appoint over this business,
but we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to
the ministry of the Word. Were the Apostles right in
standing the ground for those things? Yes? Or no? Okay,
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Now think about these verses a little bit with me here.
First of all, the apostles address the disciples who had
become a multitude as brethren. Are they talking down to
them or are they engaging them as equals in the
family of God? See? So they're not larding over anybody here.
That's the correct leadership style. But are the apostles Do
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they not have apostolic authority? Yes, but they're not using
the authority to hit someone over the head. Secondly, they
collaboratively called the brethren to look within their own ranks
and to consider the lives of their fellow brethren to
see who could make the best leaders among them. Is
that a good thing? Now? Some people just want to
be leaders. I feel that I have been called to
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preach six sermons at Reaching Hearts this week. Some people
say that maybe he has called you to preach a
sermon or two, But it could be he's called you
to preach six sermons at the prison. Brothers Zundel, You
preach how many times a month? How many what? How
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many times a week a month? Do you preach when
you're in the prisons? Every other week? Every other month? Boy,
you're preaching all the time. If I don't get my
voice back, I'll have you come up and finish. Excuse me,
I choked as I was talking to you, all right now.
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The bottom line is that you're preaching and your teaching
and you're not even in the church. Mark you do
the same, don't you. You share the word of God
in prisons, Doris, you do, And so it's good when
you're not. Is it good when they're not in church?
Having church in the prisons for people who need the
word of God? Yeah? Absolutely? Okay. Now, the Apostles gave
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three important criteria for choosing the seven leaders from the
Brethren greatly needed to stabilize the church. Let's look at
those characteristic number one of the Magnificent seven. They were chosen.
They were to choose men of good reputation. You see
that in your Bible. Some translations say it differently. The
Greek is a little more clear than this. It uses
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the verb for martyr, meaning to testify, to bear witness
to something. It's one thing to choose a leader, it's
another thing to be willing to testify that you choose
a good leader whose life bears witness to the consistent
see of their faith and calling. Isn't that right? You
can say, I know that person is a man or
a woman of God. Isn't that someone you want to
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be a leader? Rad I'm not really sure. I have
to really study it. They really don't give much evidence,
but maybe they'll work. That's not the kind of thing here.
It's another thing thing to be willing to testify to
person's credentials. A good person's life bears witness to the
truth they taught that we would testify to. It is
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the duty of the church to choose men and women
to lead the church who are people of integrity. Does
that make sense? Integrity and who will not abuse their
position as leaders? Characteristic number two of the Magnificent Seven.
The Apostles ask the brethren to choose men full of
the Holy Spirit. Who wants to have somebody in leadership
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in the church who's not a Holy spirit filled leader?
Forget it? How can you tell if someone is full
of the Holy Now, this is where I start meddling. Okay,
hold your pulse, hang on here. A holy spirit filled
person has self control in their lives, yes or no? Okay,
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Paul says, a holy spirit filled person doesn't go after spirits.
He says that and that means alcohol that can make
you drunk, and after the Holy Spirit. But after the
Holy Spirit he gives you love, joy and peace. So
is it okay? If for the for the leadership the
church and people who aren't drinkers of alcohol, yes or no. Yeah.
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A person who strives to be a leader in the church,
but who puts alcohol in their house, and who goes
to bars and enjoys worthy pursuits in bars or at
the theater and thinks that that's Christian liberty has no
business being the leader in the church, no matter who
they are. And you know, in Psalm's one, it says
that as people we should not sit in the in
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the seat of scoffers. That when people know the church
and they try to abuse it, and we have fellowship
and association with them as they do this, do you
realize we share in their sins. God has placed us
here to build up the church, to build up the
people of God, to find the weak in the broken
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and to help mend these things. And so these people
that we love dearly, and they're in every church, in
every place in North America I've seen in every church
I've been this has been the case. You see this,
These dear folks need to repent and be baptized or
rebaptized or even disciplined in love as God commands it
for the good of the church in themselves. Holy spirit
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feeled people may feel upset at times. Have you ever
been upset? Do you ever feel upset? Okay? I have
because we're all human? How many of you are human?
Need a DNA check to make sure you're a human? Okay?
But holy spirit people don't blow up in anger and
keep on blowing up up and refuse to calm down
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when God wants peace and calmness in the church. Losing
temper with grudges, trying to exert one's will as if
they're the righteous judge disqualify someone as a spiritual leader
in the church. Holy spirit filled people don't manipulate to
get their way. Now you had many of you've ever
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manipulated to get your way. I'll put my hand up.
It's human nature. Isn't it. Well, I'm gonna get this
because I'm gonna just make it look like this. I'll
triangulate a little bit, I'll get that person talking to
that person. I'll lobby here, and then it'll happen. Hurrah.
I'm a politician. No. Holy Spirit people don't do that.
They're transparent, you know, I say transparent as they can be.
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Sometimes it's not God's will for you to share what
you know, but in that setting, through truth, they try
to move God's work forward. Holy Spirit people are correctable people,
and they're in the wrong. Is that right? Okay? But
they stand their ground when they're in the right. That's
the other side of it. Holy Spirit. Fled people don't
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gossip to hurt others to get ahead. Right, but you're awful,
Calm now, I see. I told you I was getting
into things here. They don't try to get into other
people's heads to become their judges. Right. The sin of
gossip is placed by Paul and Romans one right alongside
the sin of homosexuality, murder, and other awful practices that
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bring the wrath of God. Holy spirit filled people seek
to be in prayer and they're kind people. Have you
ever noticed that when you're praying with someone, you can't
be angry with them. Have you noticed that, Yeah, if
you're praying for someone, it's hard to be angry with them.
They want to live for God, live for others, serve,
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make their lives pouring out for the lives of others.
Holy Spirit people are not rebels, but and peacemakers who
never sacrifice principle to make peace though. Holy Spirit field
people can see I sat down and I was just
writing and what came to my mind from the scriptures,
and I had a laundry list here, isn't it awful?
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Say no, it's okay, right. Holy Spirit people can defer
their own interests and needs for the good of others
in need. In other words, you want to get something
special for yourself, but you see a brother who can't
feed hisself, maybe they're in crises, and you put the
money for the brother rather than your what. I once
knew a pastor who tried to convince me that the
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immoral material of Hollywood put out there with its current
bash of action hero movies and superhero movies, full of
spiritualism and even nudity at times and foul language, is
okay for our young people to watch if we debrief
the meaning of the movie, I'm sorry. And our church manual,
this kind of context not allowed for any Holy spirit
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field leader in the church. The New Testament says the
same thing. You don't need the Church Manual. In fact,
I have a suggestion for the Church Manual that they
put the Ten Commandments and the sermon them mount at
the beginning of the Church Manual, you know, and then
we have everything else that follows. Holy spirit filled leaders
return a faithful tithe, and they are grateful to God
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for the opportunity to quietly give offerings without talking about
how good a giver they are, for as cause as
they are able. Now, this has been a tough one
that I had to learn the hard way when I
was younger, because you always want to make your ends meet.
How many of you want to go broke keep your
hands down, okay, But I have found that this is
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what I do. I'm just going to tell you. I
take the tithe envelope out when I'm doing my bills,
and I don't look at the bills first. I look
at God first, and the tithe is the ten percent
of the increase. Some of you with businesses. It's not
everything that comes through your business. It's the increase that
you have, and that's sometimes thumthing you have to understand
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how to calculate. Some people say, well, what about the
gross and the net on your check? Well, I'm going
to be very frank with you. If the government takes
it from you, it's not your increase. Now. I pay
a tithe on my gross, but I'm not here to
put a burden on somebody beyond what the word of
God teaches, and so I hope the treasure doesn't go
after me. But sorry, you got to go buy the
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Bible here, okay, help our people out. The bottom line
is when you fill out your tithe and you do
it first, God blesses you. That's what I found. I
have a car with two hundred and eighty six thousand
miles on. If you've seen my car, it used to
squeak a lot. I've got some of that fixed. I'm
planning to drive that car for another one hundred and
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fifty thousand miles. Is that okay? I'll call it my
tithe car? All right? God says, you'll pour it out
a blessing on us. Why not get the blessing. I'm
having fun in church today. You got to help me,
Holy Spirit feel people don't insist on controlling finances in
the church when they are not faithful in giving to
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the church. Is that true? I was out of church,
not this one far away where I noticed when I
had the Church of business session, certain individuals always talk
about how we must do the finances this way and
that way. And I later learned you didn't give a
nickel the church. See can't. That's not good? Holy Spirit feelled.
Believers aren't more concerned about their ira as they're about
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the church's financial stability and the church's future. And well,
what happened for the good of mission of the church
in the spring of the Gospel? Is that true? How
many of you want to retire or go to heaven?
You're pausing too much here? Well, you know, I was thinking,
if I don't get sick, even though I get old,
why retire? If God gives me good health, energy, vigor,
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keep at it now. There's nothing wrong with being in retirement,
But you start working for God in retirement. The people
me to Christ had a second wind where they started
a business of soul winning. They lived into their nineties,
they never retired in their minds. Most of all, holy
spirit filled leader will lead by personal example with integrity.
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Is that right? They'll be consistent. That doesn't mean they're perfect.
That means they're trying to order their life right. And
you can see it. As a follower of Jesus Christ,
he or she will strive to live like Christ would
live if Jesus walked in their shoes. So a leader
is still a disciple. Let's face it, there's a high
holy spirit bar for being a leader in the Church
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of Jesus Christ. Am I right? So we don't lower
the bar we pull. We mentor people into leadership. I
recently heard someone tell me, Pastor Mike, it's our turn
to be leaders. I said, well, leaders are mentored. It's
okay to be a leader if God's called you to leadership.
But what if He's called you to service? What if
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he's called you to follow godly leaders? No, I don't
want to do that. I want to be a leader.
Huh huh, I say, the path to being exalted is
being humbled. Just because a person wants to lead does
not mean they need to be a leader. I didn't
ask to be a pastor leader. It came to me
after growth and I need my wife, I need others.
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Many of you know doctor John Butler was mentored me
in leadership after Sligo. I needed his wisdom and counsel.
I need Mervin's wisdom and counsel. At this present time,
I don't have all the answers. Our head elder here,
Elder John is a person of principle. He's a person
who is sacrificially given for this church hours on end
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to make it happen. Never blows his horn, So I'm
gonna blow for the Lord's sake and say God be
praised for our head Elder here. So when people, if
people should hit his size, our head elder, it hurts
me personally, it hurts our church. A holy spirit filled
leader is a faithful leaver, even if he or she
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is a servant in the church. Now, what's wrong with
being a servant who came to serve Jesus did all? Right?
In the early Aventist church, you could not be a
leader in the church. Don't hear this. This may surprise you.
You could not be a leader in the church and
advocate causes that broke the law of God. There was
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a book written called a Solemn Appeal in the Early
Avenist Church e when White wrote a right alongside of it.
In that book, the early Aventist Church took its side
against the practice of abortion. Did you know that? It
was the consistent teaching of this church until and it
still is until some started messing with our hospitals in
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the seventies, and our roots are strongly committed to protecting
life of the ones recently said to me, Mike, what
about the baby that's born, by the way, if any
baby that's born into this church where a mother should
choose to have their baby instead of aborted, can I
ask you by a vote today, would we help that mother?
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Would we help that mother so that she's not abandoned,
she's not discouraged, she doesn't feel like her life's on hold,
but the love of the Church is wrapped around her
and the child. That's what we need to be and
should be as a church. There are many evangelical churches
out there, a number of element evangelical churches who commit
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themselves to not just saving babies, but saving mothers with babies.
It's a godly work. The early Church did the same thing.
The Apostolic church was in the business of saving babies.
Exposed babies throughout the Roman world were gathered and raised
in the church. So the early Aventist church took that position.
That may come as news to some of you. So
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be careful about which causes you advocating holarized political world
we live in. We should not advocate any political cause
right or left in the church that takes our spiritual
eyesight off of our prophetic calling as a prophetic people.
Is that fair enough? So some people come to me
and say, well, I'm a maga Christian. I says well,
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if Jesus Christ is your leader, fine, but don't bring
politics in the church. Others will say well, I'm a
social justice Christian. I says, well, I believe in social justice.
But if you're talking about a political philosophy, don't drag
it into the church. Let's be about saving men and
women for the Gospel, helping people, not virtue signaling on
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the either side of the extremes, and be the people
of the Bible. You see, that's what the early Avidist
church it was like. You might find yourself fighting against
God and your zeal for something that God's working out
bless characteristic Number three of the Magnificent Seven is that
they were wise men. Do we need wise life leader
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in the church? Okay, now the Book of Accadents, God's
chose men of wisdom who were practical people who were
capable of performing good deeds. I got a series of
verses here. Let's quickly move through them. Exus twenty eight three.
So you shall speak to all who are gifted artisans,
whom I have filled with the spirit of wisdom. You
see craft's abilities trades, that they may make errands, garments
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to consecrate him, that he may minister to me as
a priest. So skilled craftsmen helped the church and the
priest Exus thirty one to three. And I have filled
him with the Spirit of God in wisdom and understanding
and knowledge and all manner of workmanship. So it's not
just the Bible, it's the HVAC system. It's how to
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fix things in the church. It's how to have trades
like the garden we see in the back, that holy
spirit filled gifts for the church. God doesn't want sloppy
work in the church, right does he? He wants holy
spirit filled skilled workers in the church. The young people
of the church need to mentor under hard working conscientious
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workers in the church. Now, one thing I appreciate about
Elder Mike Jones here, So Mike Jones mentors young people
with the knowledge of HVAC, of tools of building, of
how to use your hands and develop manhood. I appreciate
that the youth can learn trades in the church by
working in the church with those who are skillful in
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so many areas of life. Proverbs ten twenty three. To
do evils is like a sport to a fool. But
a man of understanding has what what's the word wisdom?
A wise person is a teachable person. Proverbs one seven.
The fear of the Lord, that means to love the Lord.
In Deuteronomy ten twelve, the fear of the Lord is
the beginning of knowledge. So when you start a relationship
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with God, that's when you really start getting smart. But
fools despise wisdom instruction in the context fools despise a
relationship with God. I don't need God. I'm smart. No,
you know, aren't without the Lord? Got anything? With God,
you can be anything he wants you to be. A
wise person makes the relationship with God primarily as the primary.
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It makes the relationship with God's primary as the context
for a life of service. God comes first, and then
I can work for God. Proverbs nine to ten. The
fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and
the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. Now let
me add one more Proverbs twenty verse one, which I wrote,
I had polutionis stick it on the slide. It's not
in my manuscript. And once he gets it up there
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and I can't see it here, so I have to
look there. Wine is a mocker. Strong drink is a brawler,
and whoever's led astray by it is what not wise.
So a Bible definition of a fool was someone who drinks.
We learn of God through God's law, the life of
Jesus Christ, and through the lives of others who model
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Christ correctly. Friend to know God rightly is to have life.
The wise in God's eyes are those who are humble
and not the sinner of the year universe in their
own eyes. In the Church, they're not focused on self.
There are two essential virtues upon which all virtues are based,
and you can write this down is deduced from the
study of the Bible. The first virtue is humility, and
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the second is courage. Now think about the relationship with
those two virtues. Both of these work together. Humility without
courage is not humility. Encourage without humility is unguided zeal
Proverbs fifteen thirty three. The fear of the Lord is
the instruction of wisdom, and before honor is humility. In summary,
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the Apostles sought out these three essential characteristics for leadership
in choosing the magnificent seven. Now I would like to
do here. I need your help. I want to quickly
go through those names and show you the meaning of
every one of those persons names. But before we do it,
let's review in concept the two core roles of the Apostles.
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Number one, they sought men of good reputation. Actually, no,
excuse me, I got my head. Let me back up, okay.
In summary, the Apostles sought out three essential characteristics for
leadership in choosing the magnificent seven. Let's look at the
three characteristics for these magnificent seven men they chose. Number one,
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they sought men of good reputation whose lives were consistent
with their faith and calling. Is that a good thing?
Take a vote here. Number two, they sought holy spirit
filled men characterized by self control and the fruits of
the Holy Spirit in their lives. Is that a good
thing for leadership of the church. Number three? They sought
out men of wisdom who had a relationship of God
and who were humble and courageous men eager to do
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the right thing in life, no matter what the fallout
might be. Is that a good thing? Now? If we're
lacking any of these things? Can God help us? Yeah?
If you say, well, I messed up on number two
or three, God will grow you to be humble and
let the Word work for you. The Magnificent Seven were
men of different temperaments and life experiences, but they had
these three essential qualities in common. Do you want to
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be a leader in the church, then pray for these
three essential qualities in your life. We should take note
of two primary roles of the Apostles. Look at verse four.
The apostles said, but we will give ourselves continually to prayer.
Give means unselfish, give ourselves continued to prayer and to
the ministry of the Word. A pastor is not lazy
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who commits himself to these two primary roles in the church.
Is it a lazy thing for the pastor to study
his Bible two hours a day? Is it? No? How
else can he know his Bible? Well? Is it lazy
for the pastor to be preaching and teaching rather than
doing other things? No? Uh, I can tell you that
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when I preach a sermon, I'm whipped. I go home.
Do you know what Diana does? My wife's an extrovert. Okay,
she says, Mike, let's go pick what were those berries
that she had me picked last week? Come on, honey,
I'm just drawn a blank mulberries and we go. There's
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mulberry bushes near it. She'd always drag me to to
come a park to get the mulberries, but they aren't
as good as the ones next to our house. And
we've just discovered that we have some mulberry trees right
there near our home that are sweet and wonderful. Next year,
I've got a theory on how to pick mulberry's who
it is. Get this big plastic sheet, you put it
all on the ground, You climb up in the tree
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and you shape that baby, and then when they all
fall down, you scoop them up. And she says, I
don't want to do it that way. I want to
get them in my mouth and over my face. So
it's not about the mulberries, it's about the interaction. We
look awful. In fact, we look like vampires walking away
from mulberry bush, you know, look like blood running down
our face. Okay, but I'm tired after I preach and
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she but something about being with Diana gets me going
when I can. You know, I'm sorry. I'm recovering. As
a pastor. God wants me to be known primarily as
a man of prayer and a man committed to the
ministry the word of God. In light of this need,
let's look at the Magnificent Seven chosen by the brethren
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to work in unity with the Apostles, who affirmed them
by the Layan on his hands, Acts six, five and
Six's read their names quickly and the saying please the
whole multitude. They chose Stephen, a man what does it
say full of faith in the Holy Spirit? And Philip
Prachorus Nicanner, Timmin Parmenis and Nicholas at Proselyte from Antioch,
and whom they set before the Apostles when they had prayed,
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they laid hands on them that doesn't mean they beat
them up. It means they consecrated them. Each of these
men have a name that means something very important in
their character. In the Bible, a man's name where a
woman's name is significant. Number one. Stephen was the first
of the Magnificent Seven. Stephen's name means corona in Greek,
and the word for a crown or wreath of victory
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comes from his name. Stephen is the one who endured
under the threat of death. He was stoned, he testified
for God full of faith. He wasn't just a servant
the church. He was a witness, and he could teach
and preach too. And Stephen gave witness that he will
have that wreath, that crown of victory, because he finished
to the end. He is the mightiest of the seven.
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He's at the first. The second is Philip, No doubt
who Philip, the evangelist who had four lovely daughters in
the faith. Philip's name in Hebrew, not in Hebrew and Greek,
means lover of horses. Anybody loved riding horses. Now, don't
be offended by this. This is true. In the Bible.
Horses are a prophetic and linguistic symbol for women. There's
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no amen's there. I won't tell you why. Remember Solomon
said in the Song of Solomon, like a mare of
Pharaoh's court is my bride. Shouldn't we say, oh, it's beautiful? Now?
Why would he say that? Because he was thinking differently
than we do today. Flowing graceful hair, is that a
good thing? I'm on tender ground today. Number two, speedy
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and graceful. Isn't that good? Formally? And a horse makes
those beautiful sounds which can draw you closer. That's why
the symbol is there. In chiastic imagery, it's also there.
I've noticed this. Philip, no doubt. Philip the Evangels, had
four lovely daughters and the faith. He loved his little
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girls as a good Christian father should. He was mighty
indeed to share his faith with others and his girls,
and as a family they were evangelistic. Philip led the
Ethiopian unit to Christ, and he baptized him. To my knowledge,
besides Ezekiel the prophet or maybe even Elijah, who had
has said he at times to be caught up by
the Spirit, he may be the only person to have
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been teleported by the Holy Spirit like star, trek of thing,
beamed here, beamed there, quantum teleportation to the right spot
from Akutas to Ashtodd. If I got that right, God
just transported him. I would love to go to Hawaii
like that. If the Holy Spirit should ever see the need,
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let me go for a weekend. Procreus is the third
of the Magnificent seven. His name only appears here in
the Greek New Testament. His name means choir director, perhaps
first of a happy bunch. Now when we get people
up front and they're leading out, shouldn't they look happy?
Shouldn't there songs be joyful up that we wanted to
sing together. Well, you need a Procreus, You need the
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first of the chorus, the choir director, to lead out.
So he evidently had music in his DNA. Number four
Nicanner is the fourth of the Magnificent seven. His name
means men of victory. As a Christian leaders, we are
not called to be weak in life. We're called to
be what come on, say it with me, strong, victorious,
not pessimistic. Number five Timan is the fifth of the
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Magnificent seven. His name means honor, honor. To lead the church,
you must be a person of honor in the church.
That means you come to church. I mean it's hard
to be honored in the church. You don't even show up.
Living in the slot bucket in your personal life will
not make you a manner a woman of honor in
the church. What you watch, what you do, how you
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spend your free time, friend, it matters to God and
in the church. What you stand for under pressure also
matters to the church. An honorable person will not cave
under pressure. They will endure Proverbs A twelve. Before destruction,
the heart of a man is haughty, and before honor
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is humility Proverbs twenty one to twenty one. He who
follows righteousness and mercy finds life, righteousness, and honor. Number
six Promenius is the sixth of the Magnificent seven. His
name means to stay by one side. Now the holy
spirit's called a peraclate. It means called along the side
of another. He's the counselor the peraclate. So Promenius's name
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means in an essence, loyalty his name. His name means
you don't turn your back on people you are devoted
to in the church. You hang in there, and you minister,
not fleeing the coup when the pressure is on you. Friends,
we need a lot more Parmeniuses in the church who
will hang in there to make a difference with others.
When I come to these children Saba schools, and I
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see our leadership there, and Jeb who came into the
church at the World Bank Bible Study, ministering consistently to
our children week after week, with the other leaders there
in that group. And I see Marcia d and I
see Felicia, and Jim and John and others here hanging
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in there. Whether they have a hundred in their class
or one. They're like Parmenius, the last of the Magnificent Seven,
is not the least important of the seven. He's just
as important as the rest. The seventh man's name is Nicholas,
like Saint Nick. I've been to Saint Nicholas's tomb in Turkey,
the real Santa Claus. The seventh man's name is Nicholas,
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identified in the list as a proselyte from Antioch. Nicholas
name stands apart from the others because he's identified as
a convert to the church. Now think about that, Nicholas
name means victory over the people or victorious people. He
bear his name bears testimony of the fact that he's
not a liability in the church for being a convert
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to the church. You're not a second rate believer because
you weren't born into the church. The Church is renewed
by those who join its ranks by conversion and evangelism.
It inspires others to serve God, to renew their lives
who have grown up in the church. We need more
in the church to revitalize it, to challenge third and
fourth generation believers in our church who have grown up
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with it and don't even know what the faith is anymore.
So what was the practical outcome of the collaborative choosing
of the Magnificent Seven Acts sixty seven? Then the Word
of God spread and the number of disciples multiplied greatly
in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests were
obedient to the faith. As a result of these men
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using their gifts for God, the apostles were more effective
as ministers of the gospel. In fact, the whole church
was more effective. They won new thought leaders to the
church from the priesthood, and these converted priests became abeat
of the faith, and they empowered the church with knowledge
and understanding that they could bring into their conversion experience
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in these seven. If these seven men had not been
obedient to the faith, they would not have made a
difference at all in the winning of others to the faith.
I asked the question, you desire to be someone great
in the church, then take your lessons from the Magnificent Seven.
The Magnificent Seven modeled their lives after the example of Jesus,
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who shared it with his disciples, the true pensive principle
of greatness. And here's where I like the end mark
ten forty two. But Jesus called them to himself and
said to them, you know that those who are considered
rulers over the gentiles lorded over them, and their great
ones exercise authority over them. Yet shall not be so
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among you. But whoever desires to become great among you
shall be your servant, and whoever, if you desires to
be first, shall be slave of all. For even the
Son of Man did not come to be served, but
to serve and to give his life a ransom for
the many. The first of the Magnificent Seven was the
first to die for Jesus Christ as the first martyr
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in the Christian Church, Stephen, the first of the Seven
full of faith in the Holy Spirit. He has proof
that being mighty means being a mighty humble servant for
others and giving your life for the Church. You're a bother.
We'd do it a little longer today. Thank you for
letting us look inside and realize it's not the purpose
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of the Word of God or the Holy Spirit to
put anyone down. Thank you that you love us. Thank
you that you died for us. Thank you that our
sins are covered. Now, Lord, help us to do something
with that. Help us to get up and rise to
our calling as Christians and to find our role in
bringing Christ back to this earth. In Jesus' name, Amen,
Let's pray. Dear Father God, we don't want to be
ordinary Christians. We want to be extraordinary Christians. Really, we're
not here to come to church and whining about what
went wrong in our life, but to rejoice in the
fact that you're the jewel in the journey, the gold
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of the Son of righteousness, the honey of the Word
of God. Jesus, we love you. Thank you for allowing
us to be here. Father, we have seen events yesterday
that have changed the world. We are sleeping adventists. So
many of us know nothing of prophecy, some who have
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been irritated by its preaching and teaching. And yet we
are living at a time where we must engage the world.
And Lord, our radio broadcast goes to places we don't
even know. I've been informed today there was a listener
a radio station picked up our broadcasts without permission. Of course,
that's so with us, and that dear heart reached out.
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May you bless every place like this, Take our little
here and make it much for your cause. Make us
like the magnificent seven in Jesus' name. Amen, What kind
of person does God called elitis Church? We should ask
that question very shortly. The world church will be selecting
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leaders to replace our world leadership, and so we should
ask the question what kind of persons God called elitist church?
We know that Jesus called imperfect people with potential to
become his disciples. Did you hear the word imperfect potential?
We call that God's grace. If you could go back
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and you could know where I came from as a
young person, I don't talk a lot about it because
life before fifteen for me was trauma. I experienced a
kind of life that many of you can never think of.
You would not imagine that your pastor came from where
he came from. But God, in his mercy, took me
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from that put me into a loving Christians association in
Fletch your academy. And I was very imperfect. I'm still
very imperfect, but I began to preach and teach. The
very first year I came to academy was baptized. Because
God works with imperfect people. Did you hear me? So?
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As a disciple of Jesus, a person is mentored under Jesus.
They learned the ways of Jesus from Jesus. Back then,
they learned the ethics of Jesus. From Jesus, they learned
to value God and others as Jesus values every person
with potential. A disciple in time can, in theory, become
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a leader, even though he or she must always remain
a disciple. So just because you become a leader doesn't
mean you stop being disciple. We never stopped following Jesus
just to become a leader. In fact, leaders need to
dig in and follow Jesus all the more because they
are a leader. In fact, leaders will not lead long
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if they don't follow Jesus as a disciple. The early
Church was growing in the Book of Acts. They had
overcome their first hurdle of apostasy in the case of
Antonius and Saphira. They had faced opposition and persecution with
courage and prayer. They were not concerned about numbers. But
God brought providence to grow the church through basics, through fellowship,
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Bible study, friendship, commitment, sharing Christ and so the church
grew in boldness in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Everything looked mighty good until dissension arose in the early Church.
How did rise concerning the widows of the Church. Now
you shouldn't be arguing over widows. So they were complaining
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about widows in the early Church. I've heard all kinds
of complaints at times in the church arise about this,
that and the other thing. But they were concerned about
the widows. And it had a lot to do with
whose widows were being taken care of or weren't in
their eyes and perception. You see, the early Church supported
widows that were deserving of their support. Godly widows who
met a certain criteria were fed and were not allowed
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to starve to death in the early Church. Historians tell
us that by the end of the first century, the
Early Church had created a support structure for the elderly
and the sick that became the envy of the Roman world.
They left no one behind in the Apostolic Church. When
our treasurer Tom Kunju had a stroke. You know, sometimes
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people say, well, how can who so and so serve
in the church with a stroke? Many of you don't know.
But our transition from Alleghany's Conference the Chesapeake Conference was
led by Tom Kunju after he survived with a life stroke.
He guided us with wisdom and the audit to make
it happen. Now we have a new treasure at RhI.
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But Tom is on our finance team and new treasures
Doris Horner. Where's Doris at? Doris? Now, Doris isn't taking
Tom's place. Doris is standing on the shoulders of Tom.
She is humble, committed working with our conference auditor who
is doing our books until certain transitions and fixes occur,
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which is wonderful and God be praised. But you know,
we made a decision we would not leave Tom behind,
and God allowed him to get through that life's threatening
situation to emerge and bless the church in a quiet way.
Everything looked mighty good until dissension arose over the widows history.
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Just like Jesus, the early Church left no one behind.
And that's important to take note of here. Those early
believers did not forget the week and the elderly, and
should we Sometimes good things can be used by the
enemy for bad outcomes if our focus is misdirected on
the good thing. And that's what happened. Look at verse one,
Act six, that's enter our bibles. Last week. You had
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to actually open your bible, open them anyway their slides.
It won't hurt you to turn to Act six. Now,
in those days when the number of the disciples was multiplying.
There arose a complaint against the Hebrews by the Hellenists
Hebrew Christians Greek Christians. Hellenists are Greek Christians because their
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widows were neglected in the daily distribution. Then the twelve
summoned the multitude of the disciples and said, it is
not desirable that we should leave the word of God
and serve tables. Now, the Greek word for desirable is
the Greek word for pleasant or pleasing. Have you ever
seen an unpleasant person going unpleasant I'm happy, and their
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faces down their stern at you, as my wife is
sometimes honey, you know, you gotta watch those eyebrows. Keep
them down, so I don't know they're up. They're up. Okay,
we can look unpleasant when we're trying to be pleasant.
Sometimes now they're saying, here, it's not pleasant that this
is happening in the church. God is not pleased when
ministers of the gospel are distracted and preoccupied doing the
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work of maintaining the church and even caring for its
needs at the expense of not being in the word
and praying. Problem here, it takes time to study the
Word of God. The spiritual leaders of the church to
be foremost in sharing, studying, and praying. It's hard for
a minister. I speak from experience. It's hard for a
minister to minister from the Bible if they are distracted
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from Bibles, study, prayer, and teaching, preaching and visiting people
that the members should be doing. There are roles for
the pastor, but he's not to do everything. Imagine God
frowning on such a thing. Because he does, he's not pleased.
The same challenge was hoisted on Moses and outside. Remember Moses,
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children of Israel, of Sinai, I'm out of Egypt to Sinai,
Jethro as good godly father in laws. As Moses, You're
going to burn out here. You can't handle all the
pressures of the people. You're gonna need to choose spirit
filled men. Let them lead in circles of concern, have
hierarchical levels of leaders, so that the important matters only
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come to you and not everything else on the table.
And when Moses took that council, and Moses lived to
write the Torah, he lived to bring him through the
wilderness for forty years. He lived to see his life
purpose realize we wouldn't have a Bible if he had
not taken that council from Jethro. The same challenge Moses
overcame way back then arose in the early Church among
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the Apostles. God was rebooting Israel through the Apostolic Church,
the Helenus. The Greek widows were Jewish widows who spoke
Greek and who were affected by the Greek culture since
the babylon In captivity. That did dasper was the spreading
of the Jewish people throughout the Greek world, and so
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Jewish were everywhere. They've learned Greek language, Greek culture. The Bible,
the New Testament's not written in Hebrew or Aramic, It's
written in Cooin, a common person Greek. Thus the church
had cultural diversity. Is that a good thing? Let's say, amen,
come on, let's what's the name of our church here?
Going to help me reaching hearts? International? That means multi
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ethnic from every nation, kindred tribe in tongue. We celebrate diversity,
and that means cultural diversity, racial diversity, age diversity. The
Church had cultural diversity back then. That kind of verse,
and the Greek Christians felt that their widows were being
ignored for the sake of the Jewish Christian widows of Jerusalem.
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That's pretty bad. It's apostle that's called we call it racism.
That's what they felt was happening. There probably was a
little bit Peter struggled with racism. God had to straight
out straighten it out with Cornelius. I'm gonna tell you
right now, I love being able in the Lord to
be an old, sixty two year old pastor giving a
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godly affectionate hand thing, you know, and this fist bump,
you know, to the diversity of children in the church.
The apostles said, it's not pleasant for that we should
leave the word of God to serve tables. Are they right?
Are they right? Okay? I would like to affirm the
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same truth here today with you, from the word of God.
It's not pleasant your pastor should leave the word of
God to set tables, to clean the church, to weave
the flower bed, to do a host of things that
would divert his attention from Bible studies, sharing the Word
of God and evangelism. Does that make sense, okay? When
I cannot train and teach because I'm doing everything else
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under the sun. There's a problem we've had COVID. COVID
has really redone the church in any ways. People have
lost the sense that they need to be engaged. People
come to church late because of COVID. Some people choose
to just stay at home and go online rather than
get to church. Well, I got news for you. The
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COVID virus at this present state is not going to
kill you. You need to get to church, and if
it does, you'll die in church serving the Lord, and
then you'll know you'll be in the right resurrection at
the end of the age. Am I right? So get
back to church. So the early Apostolic Church was in
a crisis, racial tensions, rolls were messed up, Satan had
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moved on some to murmur and the complain instead of
rolling up their sleeves to make a difference for the church.
So the word of God gets spread and prosper. So
the Apostolic giftedness could work in behalf of the church
and Act sent six the Apostles called a town hall
meeting where the folk us was placed squarely on sharing
ministry rather than hoarding ministry. I've seen some pastors just
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want they want to do everything. I don't look look
at the manual here leading out Today, God be praised
Samuel's at his older brother. He took the place of
his older brother. Did he do a good job? Amen? Okay, Texas.
They called a multitude of disciples together. We call that
broad consensus. There was a time in reaching Hearts where
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we didn't use board meetings. We had full business meetings
of everybody to make decisions. Now I realized the church
manual structures different, but I liked it better that way
because then we had consensus and buy in. So we've
got to figure out how to work with the structure
to keep the Apostolic way going. Okay. Now they had preached,
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and they administered, and a multitude of new disciples stood
before them to hear. The apostles appealed to the brethren
to empower the apostles so they can teach and preach
the word of God. Look at verse three x six. Therefore,
and what does it say in your Bible the very
next word, Brethren, seek out from among you, don't come
to us. You look inside your own circle, from among
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you seven men of good reputation. The word good is
not in the Greek there of reputation, full of the
Holy Spirit and wisdom whom we may appoint over this business,
but we will give ourselves continually to prayer and to
the ministry of the Word. Were the Apostles right in
standing the ground for those things? Yes? Or no? Okay,
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Now think about these verses a little bit with me here.
First of all, the apostles address the disciples who had
become a multitude as brethren. Are they talking down to
them or are they engaging them as equals in the
family of God? See? So they're not larding over anybody here.
That's the correct leadership style. But are the apostles Do
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they not have apostolic authority? Yes, but they're not using
the authority to hit someone over the head. Secondly, they
collaboratively called the brethren to look within their own ranks
and to consider the lives of their fellow brethren to
see who could make the best leaders among them. Is
that a good thing? Now? Some people just want to
be leaders. I feel that I have been called to
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preach six sermons at Reaching Hearts this week. Some people
say that maybe he has called you to preach a
sermon or two, But it could be he's called you
to preach six sermons at the prison. Brothers Zundel, You
preach how many times a month? How many what? How
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many times a week a month? Do you preach when
you're in the prisons? Every other week? Every other month? Boy,
you're preaching all the time. If I don't get my
voice back, I'll have you come up and finish. Excuse me,
I choked as I was talking to you, all right now.
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The bottom line is that you're preaching and your teaching
and you're not even in the church. Mark you do
the same, don't you. You share the word of God
in prisons, Doris, you do, And so it's good when
you're not. Is it good when they're not in church?
Having church in the prisons for people who need the
word of God? Yeah? Absolutely? Okay. Now, the Apostles gave
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three important criteria for choosing the seven leaders from the
Brethren greatly needed to stabilize the church. Let's look at
those characteristic number one of the Magnificent seven. They were chosen.
They were to choose men of good reputation. You see
that in your Bible. Some translations say it differently. The
Greek is a little more clear than this. It uses
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the verb for martyr, meaning to testify, to bear witness
to something. It's one thing to choose a leader, it's
another thing to be willing to testify that you choose
a good leader whose life bears witness to the consistent
see of their faith and calling. Isn't that right? You
can say, I know that person is a man or
a woman of God. Isn't that someone you want to
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be a leader? Rad I'm not really sure. I have
to really study it. They really don't give much evidence,
but maybe they'll work. That's not the kind of thing here.
It's another thing thing to be willing to testify to
person's credentials. A good person's life bears witness to the
truth they taught that we would testify to. It is
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the duty of the church to choose men and women
to lead the church who are people of integrity. Does
that make sense? Integrity and who will not abuse their
position as leaders? Characteristic number two of the Magnificent Seven.
The Apostles ask the brethren to choose men full of
the Holy Spirit. Who wants to have somebody in leadership
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in the church who's not a Holy spirit filled leader?
Forget it? How can you tell if someone is full
of the Holy Now, this is where I start meddling. Okay,
hold your pulse, hang on here. A holy spirit filled
person has self control in their lives, yes or no? Okay,
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Paul says, a holy spirit filled person doesn't go after spirits.
He says that and that means alcohol that can make
you drunk, and after the Holy Spirit. But after the
Holy Spirit he gives you love, joy and peace. So
is it okay? If for the for the leadership the
church and people who aren't drinkers of alcohol, yes or no. Yeah.
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A person who strives to be a leader in the church,
but who puts alcohol in their house, and who goes
to bars and enjoys worthy pursuits in bars or at
the theater and thinks that that's Christian liberty has no
business being the leader in the church, no matter who
they are. And you know, in Psalm's one, it says
that as people we should not sit in the in
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the seat of scoffers. That when people know the church
and they try to abuse it, and we have fellowship
and association with them as they do this, do you
realize we share in their sins. God has placed us
here to build up the church, to build up the
people of God, to find the weak in the broken
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and to help mend these things. And so these people
that we love dearly, and they're in every church, in
every place in North America I've seen in every church
I've been this has been the case. You see this,
These dear folks need to repent and be baptized or
rebaptized or even disciplined in love as God commands it
for the good of the church in themselves. Holy spirit
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feeled people may feel upset at times. Have you ever
been upset? Do you ever feel upset? Okay? I have
because we're all human? How many of you are human?
Need a DNA check to make sure you're a human? Okay?
But holy spirit people don't blow up in anger and
keep on blowing up up and refuse to calm down
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when God wants peace and calmness in the church. Losing
temper with grudges, trying to exert one's will as if
they're the righteous judge disqualify someone as a spiritual leader
in the church. Holy spirit filled people don't manipulate to
get their way. Now you had many of you've ever
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manipulated to get your way. I'll put my hand up.
It's human nature. Isn't it. Well, I'm gonna get this
because I'm gonna just make it look like this. I'll
triangulate a little bit, I'll get that person talking to
that person. I'll lobby here, and then it'll happen. Hurrah.
I'm a politician. No. Holy Spirit people don't do that.
They're transparent, you know, I say transparent as they can be.
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Sometimes it's not God's will for you to share what
you know, but in that setting, through truth, they try
to move God's work forward. Holy Spirit people are correctable people,
and they're in the wrong. Is that right? Okay? But
they stand their ground when they're in the right. That's
the other side of it. Holy Spirit. Fled people don't
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gossip to hurt others to get ahead. Right, but you're awful,
Calm now, I see. I told you I was getting
into things here. They don't try to get into other
people's heads to become their judges. Right. The sin of
gossip is placed by Paul and Romans one right alongside
the sin of homosexuality, murder, and other awful practices that
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bring the wrath of God. Holy spirit filled people seek
to be in prayer and they're kind people. Have you
ever noticed that when you're praying with someone, you can't
be angry with them. Have you noticed that, Yeah, if
you're praying for someone, it's hard to be angry with them.
They want to live for God, live for others, serve,
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make their lives pouring out for the lives of others.
Holy Spirit people are not rebels, but and peacemakers who
never sacrifice principle to make peace though. Holy Spirit field
people can see I sat down and I was just
writing and what came to my mind from the scriptures,
and I had a laundry list here, isn't it awful?
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Say no, it's okay, right. Holy Spirit people can defer
their own interests and needs for the good of others
in need. In other words, you want to get something
special for yourself, but you see a brother who can't
feed hisself, maybe they're in crises, and you put the
money for the brother rather than your what. I once
knew a pastor who tried to convince me that the
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immoral material of Hollywood put out there with its current
bash of action hero movies and superhero movies, full of
spiritualism and even nudity at times and foul language, is
okay for our young people to watch if we debrief
the meaning of the movie, I'm sorry. And our church manual,
this kind of context not allowed for any Holy spirit
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field leader in the church. The New Testament says the
same thing. You don't need the Church Manual. In fact,
I have a suggestion for the Church Manual that they
put the Ten Commandments and the sermon them mount at
the beginning of the Church Manual, you know, and then
we have everything else that follows. Holy spirit filled leaders
return a faithful tithe, and they are grateful to God
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for the opportunity to quietly give offerings without talking about
how good a giver they are, for as cause as
they are able. Now, this has been a tough one
that I had to learn the hard way when I
was younger, because you always want to make your ends meet.
How many of you want to go broke keep your
hands down, okay, But I have found that this is
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what I do. I'm just going to tell you. I
take the tithe envelope out when I'm doing my bills,
and I don't look at the bills first. I look
at God first, and the tithe is the ten percent
of the increase. Some of you with businesses. It's not
everything that comes through your business. It's the increase that
you have, and that's sometimes thumthing you have to understand
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how to calculate. Some people say, well, what about the
gross and the net on your check? Well, I'm going
to be very frank with you. If the government takes
it from you, it's not your increase. Now. I pay
a tithe on my gross, but I'm not here to
put a burden on somebody beyond what the word of
God teaches, and so I hope the treasure doesn't go
after me. But sorry, you got to go buy the
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Bible here, okay, help our people out. The bottom line
is when you fill out your tithe and you do
it first, God blesses you. That's what I found. I
have a car with two hundred and eighty six thousand
miles on. If you've seen my car, it used to
squeak a lot. I've got some of that fixed. I'm
planning to drive that car for another one hundred and
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fifty thousand miles. Is that okay? I'll call it my
tithe car? All right? God says, you'll pour it out
a blessing on us. Why not get the blessing. I'm
having fun in church today. You got to help me,
Holy Spirit feel people don't insist on controlling finances in
the church when they are not faithful in giving to
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the church. Is that true? I was out of church,
not this one far away where I noticed when I
had the Church of business session, certain individuals always talk
about how we must do the finances this way and
that way. And I later learned you didn't give a
nickel the church. See can't. That's not good? Holy Spirit feelled.
Believers aren't more concerned about their ira as they're about
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the church's financial stability and the church's future. And well,
what happened for the good of mission of the church
in the spring of the Gospel? Is that true? How
many of you want to retire or go to heaven?
You're pausing too much here? Well, you know, I was thinking,
if I don't get sick, even though I get old,
why retire? If God gives me good health, energy, vigor,
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keep at it now. There's nothing wrong with being in retirement,
But you start working for God in retirement. The people
me to Christ had a second wind where they started
a business of soul winning. They lived into their nineties,
they never retired in their minds. Most of all, holy
spirit filled leader will lead by personal example with integrity.
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Is that right? They'll be consistent. That doesn't mean they're perfect.
That means they're trying to order their life right. And
you can see it. As a follower of Jesus Christ,
he or she will strive to live like Christ would
live if Jesus walked in their shoes. So a leader
is still a disciple. Let's face it, there's a high
holy spirit bar for being a leader in the Church
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of Jesus Christ. Am I right? So we don't lower
the bar we pull. We mentor people into leadership. I
recently heard someone tell me, Pastor Mike, it's our turn
to be leaders. I said, well, leaders are mentored. It's
okay to be a leader if God's called you to leadership.
But what if He's called you to service? What if
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he's called you to follow godly leaders? No, I don't
want to do that. I want to be a leader.
Huh huh, I say, the path to being exalted is
being humbled. Just because a person wants to lead does
not mean they need to be a leader. I didn't
ask to be a pastor leader. It came to me
after growth and I need my wife, I need others.
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Many of you know doctor John Butler was mentored me
in leadership after Sligo. I needed his wisdom and counsel.
I need Mervin's wisdom and counsel. At this present time,
I don't have all the answers. Our head elder here,
Elder John is a person of principle. He's a person
who is sacrificially given for this church hours on end
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to make it happen. Never blows his horn, So I'm
gonna blow for the Lord's sake and say God be
praised for our head Elder here. So when people, if
people should hit his size, our head elder, it hurts
me personally, it hurts our church. A holy spirit filled
leader is a faithful leaver, even if he or she
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is a servant in the church. Now, what's wrong with
being a servant who came to serve Jesus did all? Right?
In the early Aventist church, you could not be a
leader in the church. Don't hear this. This may surprise you.
You could not be a leader in the church and
advocate causes that broke the law of God. There was
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a book written called a Solemn Appeal in the Early
Avenist Church e when White wrote a right alongside of it.
In that book, the early Aventist Church took its side
against the practice of abortion. Did you know that? It
was the consistent teaching of this church until and it
still is until some started messing with our hospitals in
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the seventies, and our roots are strongly committed to protecting
life of the ones recently said to me, Mike, what
about the baby that's born, by the way, if any
baby that's born into this church where a mother should
choose to have their baby instead of aborted, can I
ask you by a vote today, would we help that mother?
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Would we help that mother so that she's not abandoned,
she's not discouraged, she doesn't feel like her life's on hold,
but the love of the Church is wrapped around her
and the child. That's what we need to be and
should be as a church. There are many evangelical churches
out there, a number of element evangelical churches who commit
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themselves to not just saving babies, but saving mothers with babies.
It's a godly work. The early Church did the same thing.
The Apostolic church was in the business of saving babies.
Exposed babies throughout the Roman world were gathered and raised
in the church. So the early Aventist church took that position.
That may come as news to some of you. So
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be careful about which causes you advocating holarized political world
we live in. We should not advocate any political cause
right or left in the church that takes our spiritual
eyesight off of our prophetic calling as a prophetic people.
Is that fair enough? So some people come to me
and say, well, I'm a maga Christian. I says well,
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if Jesus Christ is your leader, fine, but don't bring
politics in the church. Others will say well, I'm a
social justice Christian. I says, well, I believe in social justice.
But if you're talking about a political philosophy, don't drag
it into the church. Let's be about saving men and
women for the Gospel, helping people, not virtue signaling on
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the either side of the extremes, and be the people
of the Bible. You see, that's what the early Avidist
church it was like. You might find yourself fighting against
God and your zeal for something that God's working out
bless characteristic Number three of the Magnificent Seven is that
they were wise men. Do we need wise life leader
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in the church? Okay, now the Book of Accadents, God's
chose men of wisdom who were practical people who were
capable of performing good deeds. I got a series of
verses here. Let's quickly move through them. Exus twenty eight three.
So you shall speak to all who are gifted artisans,
whom I have filled with the spirit of wisdom. You
see craft's abilities trades, that they may make errands, garments
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to consecrate him, that he may minister to me as
a priest. So skilled craftsmen helped the church and the
priest Exus thirty one to three. And I have filled
him with the Spirit of God in wisdom and understanding
and knowledge and all manner of workmanship. So it's not
just the Bible, it's the HVAC system. It's how to
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fix things in the church. It's how to have trades
like the garden we see in the back, that holy
spirit filled gifts for the church. God doesn't want sloppy
work in the church, right does he? He wants holy
spirit filled skilled workers in the church. The young people
of the church need to mentor under hard working conscientious
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workers in the church. Now, one thing I appreciate about
Elder Mike Jones here, So Mike Jones mentors young people
with the knowledge of HVAC, of tools of building, of
how to use your hands and develop manhood. I appreciate
that the youth can learn trades in the church by
working in the church with those who are skillful in
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so many areas of life. Proverbs ten twenty three. To
do evils is like a sport to a fool. But
a man of understanding has what what's the word wisdom?
A wise person is a teachable person. Proverbs one seven.
The fear of the Lord, that means to love the Lord.
In Deuteronomy ten twelve, the fear of the Lord is
the beginning of knowledge. So when you start a relationship
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with God, that's when you really start getting smart. But
fools despise wisdom instruction in the context fools despise a
relationship with God. I don't need God. I'm smart. No,
you know, aren't without the Lord? Got anything? With God,
you can be anything he wants you to be. A
wise person makes the relationship with God primarily as the primary.
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It makes the relationship with God's primary as the context
for a life of service. God comes first, and then
I can work for God. Proverbs nine to ten. The
fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and
the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding. Now let
me add one more Proverbs twenty verse one, which I wrote,
I had polutionis stick it on the slide. It's not
in my manuscript. And once he gets it up there
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and I can't see it here, so I have to
look there. Wine is a mocker. Strong drink is a brawler,
and whoever's led astray by it is what not wise.
So a Bible definition of a fool was someone who drinks.
We learn of God through God's law, the life of
Jesus Christ, and through the lives of others who model
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Christ correctly. Friend to know God rightly is to have life.
The wise in God's eyes are those who are humble
and not the sinner of the year universe in their
own eyes. In the Church, they're not focused on self.
There are two essential virtues upon which all virtues are based,
and you can write this down is deduced from the
study of the Bible. The first virtue is humility, and
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the second is courage. Now think about the relationship with
those two virtues. Both of these work together. Humility without
courage is not humility. Encourage without humility is unguided zeal
Proverbs fifteen thirty three. The fear of the Lord is
the instruction of wisdom, and before honor is humility. In summary,
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the Apostles sought out these three essential characteristics for leadership
in choosing the magnificent seven. Now I would like to
do here. I need your help. I want to quickly
go through those names and show you the meaning of
every one of those persons names. But before we do it,
let's review in concept the two core roles of the Apostles.
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Number one, they sought men of good reputation. Actually, no,
excuse me, I got my head. Let me back up, okay.
In summary, the Apostles sought out three essential characteristics for
leadership in choosing the magnificent seven. Let's look at the
three characteristics for these magnificent seven men they chose. Number one,
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they sought men of good reputation whose lives were consistent
with their faith and calling. Is that a good thing?
Take a vote here. Number two, they sought holy spirit
filled men characterized by self control and the fruits of
the Holy Spirit in their lives. Is that a good
thing for leadership of the church. Number three? They sought
out men of wisdom who had a relationship of God
and who were humble and courageous men eager to do
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the right thing in life, no matter what the fallout
might be. Is that a good thing? Now? If we're
lacking any of these things? Can God help us? Yeah?
If you say, well, I messed up on number two
or three, God will grow you to be humble and
let the Word work for you. The Magnificent Seven were
men of different temperaments and life experiences, but they had
these three essential qualities in common. Do you want to
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be a leader in the church, then pray for these
three essential qualities in your life. We should take note
of two primary roles of the Apostles. Look at verse four.
The apostles said, but we will give ourselves continually to prayer.
Give means unselfish, give ourselves continued to prayer and to
the ministry of the Word. A pastor is not lazy
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who commits himself to these two primary roles in the church.
Is it a lazy thing for the pastor to study
his Bible two hours a day? Is it? No? How
else can he know his Bible? Well? Is it lazy
for the pastor to be preaching and teaching rather than
doing other things? No? Uh, I can tell you that
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when I preach a sermon, I'm whipped. I go home.
Do you know what Diana does? My wife's an extrovert. Okay,
she says, Mike, let's go pick what were those berries
that she had me picked last week? Come on, honey,
I'm just drawn a blank mulberries and we go. There's
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mulberry bushes near it. She'd always drag me to to
come a park to get the mulberries, but they aren't
as good as the ones next to our house. And
we've just discovered that we have some mulberry trees right
there near our home that are sweet and wonderful. Next year,
I've got a theory on how to pick mulberry's who
it is. Get this big plastic sheet, you put it
all on the ground, You climb up in the tree
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and you shape that baby, and then when they all
fall down, you scoop them up. And she says, I
don't want to do it that way. I want to
get them in my mouth and over my face. So
it's not about the mulberries, it's about the interaction. We
look awful. In fact, we look like vampires walking away
from mulberry bush, you know, look like blood running down
our face. Okay, but I'm tired after I preach and
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she but something about being with Diana gets me going
when I can. You know, I'm sorry. I'm recovering. As
a pastor. God wants me to be known primarily as
a man of prayer and a man committed to the
ministry the word of God. In light of this need,
let's look at the Magnificent Seven chosen by the brethren
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to work in unity with the Apostles, who affirmed them
by the Layan on his hands, Acts six, five and
Six's read their names quickly and the saying please the
whole multitude. They chose Stephen, a man what does it
say full of faith in the Holy Spirit? And Philip
Prachorus Nicanner, Timmin Parmenis and Nicholas at Proselyte from Antioch,
and whom they set before the Apostles when they had prayed,
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they laid hands on them that doesn't mean they beat
them up. It means they consecrated them. Each of these
men have a name that means something very important in
their character. In the Bible, a man's name where a
woman's name is significant. Number one. Stephen was the first
of the Magnificent Seven. Stephen's name means corona in Greek,
and the word for a crown or wreath of victory
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comes from his name. Stephen is the one who endured
under the threat of death. He was stoned, he testified
for God full of faith. He wasn't just a servant
the church. He was a witness, and he could teach
and preach too. And Stephen gave witness that he will
have that wreath, that crown of victory, because he finished
to the end. He is the mightiest of the seven.
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He's at the first. The second is Philip, No doubt
who Philip, the evangelist who had four lovely daughters in
the faith. Philip's name in Hebrew, not in Hebrew and Greek,
means lover of horses. Anybody loved riding horses. Now, don't
be offended by this. This is true. In the Bible.
Horses are a prophetic and linguistic symbol for women. There's
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no amen's there. I won't tell you why. Remember Solomon
said in the Song of Solomon, like a mare of
Pharaoh's court is my bride. Shouldn't we say, oh, it's beautiful? Now?
Why would he say that? Because he was thinking differently
than we do today. Flowing graceful hair, is that a
good thing? I'm on tender ground today. Number two, speedy
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and graceful. Isn't that good? Formally? And a horse makes
those beautiful sounds which can draw you closer. That's why
the symbol is there. In chiastic imagery, it's also there.
I've noticed this. Philip, no doubt. Philip the Evangels, had
four lovely daughters and the faith. He loved his little
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girls as a good Christian father should. He was mighty
indeed to share his faith with others and his girls,
and as a family they were evangelistic. Philip led the
Ethiopian unit to Christ, and he baptized him. To my knowledge,
besides Ezekiel the prophet or maybe even Elijah, who had
has said he at times to be caught up by
the Spirit, he may be the only person to have
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been teleported by the Holy Spirit like star, trek of thing,
beamed here, beamed there, quantum teleportation to the right spot
from Akutas to Ashtodd. If I got that right, God
just transported him. I would love to go to Hawaii
like that. If the Holy Spirit should ever see the need,
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let me go for a weekend. Procreus is the third
of the Magnificent seven. His name only appears here in
the Greek New Testament. His name means choir director, perhaps
first of a happy bunch. Now when we get people
up front and they're leading out, shouldn't they look happy?
Shouldn't there songs be joyful up that we wanted to
sing together. Well, you need a Procreus, You need the
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first of the chorus, the choir director, to lead out.
So he evidently had music in his DNA. Number four
Nicanner is the fourth of the Magnificent seven. His name
means men of victory. As a Christian leaders, we are
not called to be weak in life. We're called to
be what come on, say it with me, strong, victorious,
not pessimistic. Number five Timan is the fifth of the
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Magnificent seven. His name means honor, honor. To lead the church,
you must be a person of honor in the church.
That means you come to church. I mean it's hard
to be honored in the church. You don't even show up.
Living in the slot bucket in your personal life will
not make you a manner a woman of honor in
the church. What you watch, what you do, how you
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spend your free time, friend, it matters to God and
in the church. What you stand for under pressure also
matters to the church. An honorable person will not cave
under pressure. They will endure Proverbs A twelve. Before destruction,
the heart of a man is haughty, and before honor
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is humility Proverbs twenty one to twenty one. He who
follows righteousness and mercy finds life, righteousness, and honor. Number
six Promenius is the sixth of the Magnificent seven. His
name means to stay by one side. Now the holy
spirit's called a peraclate. It means called along the side
of another. He's the counselor the peraclate. So Promenius's name
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means in an essence, loyalty his name. His name means
you don't turn your back on people you are devoted
to in the church. You hang in there, and you minister,
not fleeing the coup when the pressure is on you. Friends,
we need a lot more Parmeniuses in the church who
will hang in there to make a difference with others.
When I come to these children Saba schools, and I
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see our leadership there, and Jeb who came into the
church at the World Bank Bible Study, ministering consistently to
our children week after week, with the other leaders there
in that group. And I see Marcia d and I
see Felicia, and Jim and John and others here hanging
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in there. Whether they have a hundred in their class
or one. They're like Parmenius, the last of the Magnificent Seven,
is not the least important of the seven. He's just
as important as the rest. The seventh man's name is Nicholas,
like Saint Nick. I've been to Saint Nicholas's tomb in Turkey,
the real Santa Claus. The seventh man's name is Nicholas,
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identified in the list as a proselyte from Antioch. Nicholas
name stands apart from the others because he's identified as
a convert to the church. Now think about that, Nicholas
name means victory over the people or victorious people. He
bear his name bears testimony of the fact that he's
not a liability in the church for being a convert
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to the church. You're not a second rate believer because
you weren't born into the church. The Church is renewed
by those who join its ranks by conversion and evangelism.
It inspires others to serve God, to renew their lives
who have grown up in the church. We need more
in the church to revitalize it, to challenge third and
fourth generation believers in our church who have grown up
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with it and don't even know what the faith is anymore.
So what was the practical outcome of the collaborative choosing
of the Magnificent Seven Acts sixty seven? Then the Word
of God spread and the number of disciples multiplied greatly
in Jerusalem, and a great many of the priests were
obedient to the faith. As a result of these men
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using their gifts for God, the apostles were more effective
as ministers of the gospel. In fact, the whole church
was more effective. They won new thought leaders to the
church from the priesthood, and these converted priests became abeat
of the faith, and they empowered the church with knowledge
and understanding that they could bring into their conversion experience
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in these seven. If these seven men had not been
obedient to the faith, they would not have made a
difference at all in the winning of others to the faith.
I asked the question, you desire to be someone great
in the church, then take your lessons from the Magnificent Seven.
The Magnificent Seven modeled their lives after the example of Jesus,
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who shared it with his disciples, the true pensive principle
of greatness. And here's where I like the end mark
ten forty two. But Jesus called them to himself and
said to them, you know that those who are considered
rulers over the gentiles lorded over them, and their great
ones exercise authority over them. Yet shall not be so
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among you. But whoever desires to become great among you
shall be your servant, and whoever, if you desires to
be first, shall be slave of all. For even the
Son of Man did not come to be served, but
to serve and to give his life a ransom for
the many. The first of the Magnificent Seven was the
first to die for Jesus Christ as the first martyr
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in the Christian Church, Stephen, the first of the Seven
full of faith in the Holy Spirit. He has proof
that being mighty means being a mighty humble servant for
others and giving your life for the Church. You're a bother.
We'd do it a little longer today. Thank you for
letting us look inside and realize it's not the purpose
(46:18):
of the Word of God or the Holy Spirit to
put anyone down. Thank you that you love us. Thank
you that you died for us. Thank you that our
sins are covered. Now, Lord, help us to do something
with that. Help us to get up and rise to
our calling as Christians and to find our role in
bringing Christ back to this earth. In Jesus' name, Amen,
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