Basics Panel Q&A with Alistair Begg, Sinclair Ferguson, and Rico Tice

e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e she put the man up this this right all right well good morning good morning uh welcome back to this uh third and final day of Basics uh it's been a good few days hasn't it yeah um well this morning uh we're excited to be able to hear from our speakers through a question and answer time um I do want to thank those of you who submitted questions uh there were so many helpful things written in uh I I doubt we'll have time to cover everything but we'll try to get through as many as possible um the way the Q&A is going to work is I'll address certain questions to specific ones of you uh but any of you can chime in as you feel led uh other questions will be for all three of you so uh before we start I thought we'd just pause and pray so we pray um our Father in heaven we thank you uh that your mercies are new to us each and every morning H we thank you for your kindness and allowing us to gather like this today and to be sharpened in how we think about the Christian Life and in how we think about pastoral Ministry uh Lord we commit this time to you and we ask that you would guide each one of us here on this panel by your Holy Spirit and uh Lord we ask that the the words of our mouths and the meditations of our hearts uh would be pleasing in your sight and helpful to our brothers here and we pray these things in Jesus name amen amen well this first question is for all three of you um this comes from a younger man and he writes that that Alistair made mention of his own flight of fancy with the parchments from 2 Timothy 4 what exactly would you say were those parchments is this on well I actually do know the answer I figur I figured that you would yeah yeah you probably better all write this down they were parchments [Laughter] it's good it's good but that said that said um and adding to what Alistar said without contradicting of course um a it it it is it just struck me recently that when Paul wrote I happened to be working on one of his letters and it struck me when he wrote it it a copy would have been kept of it um a because that's what people did um and B I suspect that some of that material was also copies perhaps not only of his letters but since Peter clearly had access to copies of Paul's letters um they there may have been copies of other things as well in addition to all that that Alistair said so so you know many of us at s we were brought up on the question of the gospels and Q so we need to reintroduce the the begag theory of the gospels and P not jde e and P yeah but say M M L J and P insightful yeah helpful I would just I would just add to that I would add to that do you have my microphone on here and okay sorry I beg your pardon um I just want to add that I agree with him well on a more uh serious note Rico this question is for you should I just throw one thing on there oh please I just think what is interesting when you're um trying to help people come to Faith the two areas of keeping on saying this is inspired by God but written by men and and just as they come to Faith getting clear the Dual authorship of scripture God has breathed it out but here are real men writing this material and what they went through but the Lord's hand was behind it I think that's that's very important to introduce them to the doctrine of scripture early on you know as as as they're coming to Faith and I thought it was a fascinating uh in insight into that is he he wants them to come and how are they being mentored and their writing as men of their time but the Lord's behind it and and let's let's be teaching that to people as they come to Faith that's good well Ric this is a question for you um this question reads it seems that most churches have a proclivity either toward evangelism or discipleship but seldom both how can a church balance its breadth in evangelism and its depth in discipleship brother well if I talk about the UK um I think we're at a once in 500y year moment so the early church the big issue is who is Jesus is he fully man and fully God obviously the Reformation is why did Jesus die we're now at the point what does it mean to follow Jesus and therefore the key word is repentance that is the key word and I think both in our discipleship and and in our evangelism we've we've got to hold our nerve and keep teaching repentance knowing that as we call people to repent God regenerates their hearts so 2 Timothy 2:4 acts 11:18 the Lord granted them repentance so as I say stop it brother well M no that's not right I trust the Holy Spirit to be convicting them and and calling them to repent so I so I what I'd say is I I think that the Battle Is Over repentance the Church of England my home church is breaking up over repentance um at the moment at um Canterbury Cathedral so that is the that is the lead um uh building in the whole denomination for S 70 million anglicans uh David is married to David who is Arch Deacon of the cathedral so that's no repentance so I would say um as you're balancing the two and as we see what the cultural battle is that is the word we're fighting for the second word is wroth that actually it's God's settled control personal hostility to evil so I think the two things that define both discipleship and evangelism is our faithfulness to wroth and repentance to ours to ours everyone wroth and repentance uh Alistair and Sinclair this pastor writes in your opening messages you spoke on the solemn and holy call to pastoral Ministry can you describe your initial call into the ministry and provide any helpful word to those exploring such a call yeah I I I can't date this but it did happened at one totally specific moment I think when I was 16 I can so not date it I can't even remember whether I was 16 or 17 but I would have been a Christian for a couple of years and I have no memory of ever thinking what I would do despite all those people when we were growing up we would say what are you going to do son when you grow up um and I even even when I was examined for the ministry I was actually asked the question what will you do if we turn you down and I'm sure I sounded very arrogant to a couple of men who got really angry with me when I said that the thought has never crossed my mind I don't know what I would do and I I invented a couple of things I said well maybe I'd be a journalist or a detective and that's more or less the same thing as being a pastor um but I was I was just standing somewhere in the church I attended which was at the end of the street and a lady in the congregation asked a boy I knew uh who was who was more or less contemporary what he was going to do and he said I'm going to be a minister and I I didn't know this about this boy but it was as though a light had been turned on in my life or someone had put the last piece of a jigsaw puzzle into place and I I thought oh that's it um it it was really as simple as as that and you know I I still had to learn then as I think I said in on Monday night that there are there's at least a triple D dim menion in a call to the ministry so you know somebody asked me the other day you know were there were there any regrets or anything and I think I would say no it was it was pretty straightforward from then although when I when I began to sit under Mr st's Ministry it was very obvious to me from his ministry that it could be a desperately costly thing um and so there were challenges on the way uh what don't know is could I have survived the answer is no could I have survived without the encouragement of God's people because I wasn't naturally disposed to a public life you know down in here I'm I'm a very shy um I my father was almost paralytically shy um and I you know I still see that coming out um and America has been good for me because Americans don't allow you the same private space as other people do um but the encouragement of the people of God has really been a tremendous thing to me it was really helpful to me early on that people confirmed that I you know I hadn't lost my head um and that has been true all the way through so um you know there a couple in a couple in the tron alist and I know very the church that alist and I know well where Terry McCutchen is um were in the building the night I was converted and he went to be with the Lord just a few years ago and I think about people like that who must have heard me in my earlier days and wondered what planet I'd come from um who who loved me and stayed with with me and encouraged me and so that aspect of the encouragement of the people of God has meant just worlds to me and I'm pretty sure that though I've tried I've never been able to express to people how much they have meant to me in the course of my Ministry because they they they seem I guess because they look at me while I'm looking at them and they don't think I'm looking at them congregations don't see to understand that if they can see us we can see them and are looking at them and and we take in I think we can take in a tremendous amount about our congregation just by keeping our eyes open and our ears open and so the people of God have just been such a help and encouragement to me in that respect aliser similar what was the question um just describing your own call into the ministry and how younger men Maybe can think through uh that sense of calling yeah the youngest fellow I've met here uh is 16 and the youngest Pastor I've met has just begun in January he's 24 and um so there are there are a number of young young men here which is wonderfully exciting um I was sitting at lunch at uh LBC you you could sit up at the The Faculty table if you were brave enough or foolish enough and uh on a particular uh Monday I was sitting up there I had I was my third year into our studies so it was going to come to an end um and I had deviated from course and gone there out of a deep sense that I had my life completely organized for myself the way I wanted it that I I knew I knew the girl that I wanted to marry I knew the car I wanted to drive and I knew what I wanted to do and I had faxed that to God in the old days you could fax asking for his signature he sent back a blank sheet and said if you sign your name at the bottom I will fill in the top part for you that's the metaphor so now I was very amable to the idea of serving God in whatever capacity but definitely not in pastoral Ministry I had had um as siner alludes to it a lot of ministers in our home because my parents um Hospitality to them I was often left uh Sunday was the lunch was being prepared and some little Minister was sitting next to me and he would do that you know what are you going to be sunny you know maybe you'll be a minister too you know it's like no no no that's that's scary that is so scary now I should say it's not because I didn't love these guys I I I loved them if I went to church I always want to to shake hands for a minister I I it wasn't that at all but I just seemed like way out there it's lunchtime we're having a conversation talking about the weekend I volunteered to the group that I don't like doing these youth weekends anymore they said well why not I said 'w you go there we had just come back from Bournemouth on the south coast myself and a guy who was an evangelist with MW and uh we come back and and I said because you go on Friday you meet a group of people that you've never met before you are engaged with them over a period of about 48 hours or whatever else it is you say goodbye you get in your car and you drive away somewhere and John bolon um one of the guyss had really Coca-Cola glasses he always squinted when he looked at you because you know he was looking at me but I was also looking at him and and uh amazing that isn't it um no wonder they asked what planet are you from sorry sorry I was never very good at physics no and and so he says he says to me and I can tell you why that is just like that and I said why is that he said because I believe that God has given you a pastor's heart the heart to invest somewhere and stay I got up from the table I went back to my room and I wept because it was like a sword on the back of my neck and a huge door opening in front of me I was 23 years old there's no place to go unless you're an Anglican or a presbyterian in the Free Church there were two churches I knew of Steve Brady went to the one in Leicester leester evangelical church and then there was a guy called Derek Prime in a church in edenburgh I won't go into all the details of that but I Against The Run of play I was invited to go up to be with Derek and the understanding was that if in the course of time the eldership and the congregation felt able to confirm uh that sense of call in the context of that in congregation then we would proceed to do that and in terms of the the pieces in that puzzle that have gone on I I concur with that I'm not sure what the three-fold dimension is but there are multiple dimensions of that but on the day that I was ordained was the Second Sunday of October in 76 Derek said to me if cuz we still wore clerical collars and Derek said to me if you are ever going to wear a clerical collar you should wear it on the on the day of your ordination because that will mark it and you can go on from there I thought no so anyway I went to George Street and I went in and I got one and I got the stock and I took it home to the flat where we lived and I was in there by myself and I was trying it on and I had it on and in the door com Sue and one of my sisters and I turn around and all they do is just fall around the floor laughing they thought they thought it's the funniest thing they ever saw in their life which was a great encouragement to me and and I don't mean this in any stupid way but when I stood up there in that act of ordination in the lake h on of hands if i' had been start naked it wouldn't have been any more devastating to me than it was to stand up there in that thing because it was for me it it was it was uh there was no going back from this one there was no going back from wherever I was going I don't know where I was going but I wasn't going back and so that sense of call was it continues in way you remember how difficult these things were to put on the back the buttton thing yeah the button things so I was a moment of comic relief here I was I had put my car in the shop to get a service and I was going some was coming back on the top of a corporation bus in Glasgow I was reading my book and I had my hand out like this with the money for my fair in it and I heard I felt my hand being pushed back and this little Irish voice saying just put it away father so I I've never confess this in public but I I I think I cheated Glasgow Corporation under masquerading as a Roman Catholic [Applause] priest that's good I I think it's interesting on motivation to get ordained Uncle John John St used to say there are three motivations love for people love for truth but the interesting was the third Ang anger anger that the truth is not being taught anger that in a community um the Bible is not being expounded there isn't an unders sheeper there and I I think I think that so I you know I got converted at this boarding school I found that the School Chaplain really was not a Believer there was another another gospel being preached and very quickly I just thought this is outrageous I had contemporaries who all think they're going to heaven and they're not but they were told at confirmation you given a ticket you're going to go to heaven so I do think you know part of the the for me the driver of of of ordination was the anger of the the defilement of of of the truth and I think that's a motivation too if you feel that anger then then I mean obviously we've got to love the church family we've got to love our enemies but but there is that sense of the truth has got to be taught it's good you all three seem to mention the significance of the church the people of God in in that call yeah it's helpful um this next question reads uh that the three of you have served in different denominational settings what are the benefits and potential detriments of serving within a denomination or non-denominational contexts well Lloyd Jones was right so 1967 there was Uncle John and Lloyd Jones and he called he called the anglicans out and at that stage they didn't come out because there was a real sense of we could win the Church of England but I think when I look at the church of England leadership now and the apostasy of of of the the senior Bishops with glorious AC exceptions um I I I can't see how people can can remain in so I I think that um I just look at the the Church of England and the incredible you know the 39 articles the incredible Legacy the doctrines the liturgies just what we have there but but we we have this is the key Brothers we have ordained people who should never have been ordained there should have been there's got to be church discipline and I just say this with grief I just look at my denomination we just haven't exercised church discipline in who we ordain and when you do that you end up institutionalizing sin so repentance isn't being taught properly so I I just please learn the warning of the the Church of England I'm sure the Church of Scotland would Echo that but um I think that's what I've seen very brutally as I've moved to the Presbyterian Church there's a much much stronger um sense of church discipline in who who is allowed to be an elder and indeed um be the pastor as as someone who doesn't fit either of these categories as an observer I would say there's tremendous advantages in being uh for example within historic presbyterianism in so far as the Westminster conf confession of faith and the structures and framework of things are are when when believed and applied provide framework provide stability provide the wider dimensions of pastoral care that go beyond even the um the the local congregation in the Anglican Church um as Rico knows I mean if the church was committed to the 39 articles if they actually beli the things that were foundational documents uh then things would be marketly different in our situation um or in a situation that may be akin to some others um there's there are peculiar dangers that attach to being uh disengaged in a formalized way from from other people the key is I think if you're in a context like this that you are not constitutionally disengaged from these people that you are not you're not quotes independent in your mentality um when I read dore's second volume on uh on Whitfield and Whitfield found himself you know roaming around on his horse and preaching in different places and then they were getting in touch with him from England and saying you know you shouldn't be in that place is that's not a place for you to be and damore rightly or wrongly says that Whitfield was actually operating on the basis of Evangelical Unity a Unity that was grounded in his convictions about irrespective of the sort of larger denominational structure and I think one of the benefits of what is what is Illustrated right here is that here three of us said and perhaps the classic of of all of our Basics was when it was Derek Prime dick Lucas and Eric Alexander and they sat up here each of them from very different by grounds and yet the three of them had never ever done anything together in their entire lives and each of them actually had more in common with each other than they had out of the context from which they had emerged so there's pluses and minuses I I think yeah yeah I I am uh my ordination is in the ARP denomination which most of you haven't heard of it's the ancient right Presbyterian church and it's the group that nicked Whitfield and said You Preach with us in Scotland and nobody else and that was when in Scotland Whitfield took the line I'm not prepared for that kind of exclusivity um personally I think I'm probably uh a kind of con congregational type Presbyterian in the sense that I I think every True Church of Jesus Christ has in essence all that it needs to be the church in that place or by God's grace we'll grow into it and sometimes that depends on for example John ow thought the the perfect size for a church was maybe about 300 and something if you had a lot less than that you might lack gifts if you had a lot more than that there were other kinds of challenges and I mean it does seem to me that the the New Testament teaches us that local churches should be Presbyterian in the sense that they should be governed by elders and we know at least of one congregation in the New Testament that actually had deacons and another congregation that at least was going to appoint deacons um and at that level I think I mean even among the three of us even when Rico was was in an Anglican Church there would a pretty high level of commonality in the sense that our local churches were governed that way the strength of preser is that there are structures in place that open the local congregation to other congregations the weakness of preser is that there are structures in place and my sense of Church life in general throughout church history is that from very early on uh ecclesiology has always tended towards hierarchy and in episcopacy that hierarchy has been formalized but in every other connectional ISM it eventually becomes formalized and sometimes structured in people and boards and I um I think I by God's grace managed to mortify my dislike of session meetings in the Presbyterian church but I never managed to mortify my dislike of presbyter meetings and even less in at meetings so I would be happy with the general assembly of the Saints in glory meeting once in eternity and not annually on Earth that's good that's good um well this is a a preaching question um this question reads where is the line in preaching between being influenced by a commentary and plagiarizing a commentary well brother wouldn't you just say I found this to be a great help you know you just you just say um I've nicked a lot of these men's sermons I say well I've Sinclair was a help on this is that right maybe I'm I'm wrong don't you acknowledge I mean I I've got dyslexia I got a third at University I'm not great at getting structure um and I just need my brothers to really help with it's not I don't work at it I just find there's an amazing Clarity that they can give me but I just need to acknowledge that is that right I don't know tell me if I've got that wrong yeah what do they say that if you put footnotes as research and if you don't it's plagiarism I mean um I it can be it's I launched into doing first Samuel which was like jumping off the end of a diving board into something not knowing how deep the water was and pretty quickly I realized I need help in this stuff just the structure of it the way it unfolded and Christopher Ash was on the phone and he and he said uh do you have uh do you have woodh house and I say yeah I just found that he said he's your man and so so Woodhouse basically taught first and second Samuel to Parkside Church and and he actually he he actually it's there's no plaguers yeah that's right when when I had him here at Basics I said I said to our congregation do come we had him preach on Sunday I said CU here's the here's the voice behind the voice but what I what I didn't know was that he had already for some other reason begun to listen to Parkside online and he got on touch with me to say that he was thoroughly enjoying my stuff and and I wrote him and said well of course you were enjoying it it's your stuff you know um no I mean you you we can't do we I mean we have yeah we got we've got to we've got to watch that I mean I don't I I my my most memorable recollection of this and I've told this before but I I decided I want to try and explain the the human uh responsibility and you know Divine for ordination and I was going to do that on a Sunday evening and I got to I got I don't know whether it was Saturday afternoon or whatever it was and I looked at what I'd written down and I said this is this is evangelism in the sovereignty of God by ji Packer I mean this is so ji Packer that there's no way to disguise this I should just read the book and then and then I thought I'm going to phone that man up so I phone him up I said Dr Packer you don't know me but I heard you at the Tron when you did keeping step with the spirit he saids go go ahead go ahead and uh and I said and I said I've got all my notes in front of me Sunday tomorrow I got to do this thing it's all your stuff he says dear brother we cast our bread upon the Water I have cast The Bread upon the Water if you can feed on it and pass it on do it with uh without any fearfulness at all and so I stood up and I told the congregation uh here's my best work at preing jip Packer if you want the full notes you'll find them in his book um but uh yeah I think I I think it's good for us all to acknowledge how dependent we are on different people at different times I mean um and it sometimes it's just little things that but we you never we never I don't want to I can't preach like Sinkler but when I have something really good you know I look at the congregation go that was really good and they go yeah it was probably Sinkler so I mean they they know they know I said there's a good there's a good bit coming you know but when I stopped I'm actually reading there probably that I've been benefited from you know I can only bear so much responsibility for the chaos you [Music] created yeah I I think I would say three things or two things in a poem um maybe the first is this that it I I do think our congregations discover over a period of time that we didn't make all this up ourselves but it would be it would become an irritant to them if we kept saying to them as Alistair beg says as Rico T Ty says um and in general terms I would say there may be times it's appropriate to acknowledge something that is uniquely the Insight of an individual and not pretend it was your Insight but what is Catholic truth is is shared by us all so you know I think that's the the first thing I would say um I think that I think maybe the second thing I would say is um that in recent years and maybe maybe it's just like where I hang around I have been struck by the sense that younger ministers are using commentaries less and listening to other people's sermons more and that actually alarms me because they are more likely to be plagiarizing the best the juicy points in aliser sermons whereas if they're if they're working with commentaries they are left with at least the challenge of transposing the world of the architect's office in into the world of the hard heart which is the life of the church and probably a better drop the poem since it wasn't by Simon and Garfunkle nobody in this crowd will recognize it oh are you going to do the spury poem no no what it's a great wow that's you is that what you thought I was going to do Cas in that case at the special request of Alister there was a young preacher called spury who hated the church's lurgy but his sermons are fine and I use them as mine as do most of the Anglican [Laughter] cleric there you [Applause] go that's good well that last part kind of ties in um to this next question in some ways um this question reads as you look to the Future and a younger generation of pastors coming behind you what are things that encourage you and things that concern you with younger men in Ministry what encourages me is that they're there and and that they take the task seriously um I think to be honest what discourages me is two things um one is well three things really one is the amount of social media to which they tend to expose themselves the second is the amount of time they spend on social media so I've kind of I've got a kind of Mantra every every posting every video whatever you do that you not been asked to do by your elders in some fashion or another is one less Widow in the congregation who has been visited and you're paid to visit her you're not paid to establish your own reputation and by and large the world is not waiting for your perspective so that that has really become a concern to me um and but it really involves self-discipline um and the other thing I think that is really important to understand is that the the people to whom you look like like Rico or Alis or whoever it is to whom you look did not arrive there by what they are doing now so what you need to learn from them if you can is not how can I how can I get where he is by imitating what he is doing now but what happened in his life that led him there and I um I am actually not a good reader I'm I'm a very bad reader Alistair is a hundred times better a reader than I am but I think one of the things I've noticed is the extent to which with some people in particular uh younger men read the books that they refer to without asking the question what were the books they read that made them what they are now um and I think that's a matter of of not thinking that you you you become what older men have become without the long and arduous and hardworking task of the process of becoming it's good anything you would offer I think that's a good answer yeah yeah I I think 1 Corinthians 9 is very interesting just echoing Sinclair's point about the widows being visited or the Ono ones that Richard was I think so helpfully highlighting I think 1 Corinthians 9 says all things to all men to win as many as possible and that's a real energy statement and the next passage is I beat my body and make it my slave so if you're not self-disciplined in your personal life you don't have time to go out and reach for others and um I I so much of of ministry is that personal relationship and then it's the tiny gestures that hold Church life together the text the just the remembered birthday or or I know it was three years ago that you lost your husband Margaret or you know just the remembered things but that takes a self forgetfulness you've got to be organized on the backstage so that you've got time to reach out and I totally Echo the social media point I I I I we we've got to be visiting people and getting the Bible open because that's where the power is and with the Widow and and with the younger man and you know I I I do worry that social media just consumes us because it's designed to do that it actually releases stuff in our brains that that will will hold us in so um uh yeah let's let's keep one Corinthians 9 and that those two passages going together all things to all men to win as many as possible next passage have the discipline of the athlete of the boxer it's good um this next question reads during this conference we've mentioned Derek Prime's name on multiple occasions uh he along with Alistair writes in the book on being a pastor that pastors should never forget that no matter how much we might wish it otherwise we are the natural focus of people's visual attention we should set a good example of entering wholeheartedly into whatever is sung um any word you'd offer on how a pastor thinks through and participates in corporate worship well I alluded to it just in passing uh last evening or whenever it was um I think it is vitally important that that the person who has the prance of the opening up of scripture is um organically involved in the framework of those church services whatever um place they may have in the the public dimension of it or not um as a church sings so it really goes I mean the things that if you go into a congregation where it starts with uh you know uh man and his need rather than God and His glory I mean from the very opening um of the of the thing the orientation has been has been skewed in a direction and I'm not sure that the uh congregation is able to navigate is able even to distinguish that um necessarily and therefore those who are responsible for entrusted with the privilege of leading the praise that for me I have a very close relationship with that all the time um partly out of a sense of self-preservation I mean I when I when I came to America this is a completely different world for me I never I mean for six years was I spoke to the organist and we chose I told him what my hymns were he came in 20 minutes early put them up on a board on the side him 3:22 and so on but those those was my my approach to the text of scripture and it's true to this day that I'm just scribbling all the time in the margins of what I'm doing with with hymns and songs that come to mind and I don't uh uh demand that those things are are then used but between myself and and those who lead it I'm I'm involved in that I you know Spurgeon Spurgeon said you can let somebody else preach for you but don't let him do your pastoral prayer that's a very interesting insight and it's a kin to what Rico is referencing here and it's actually is one of the ways in which the notion of affection is actually conveyed not simply in the in the opening up of scripture but the fact that there is that engagement I mean to the to our credit but not so that we would blow our horn but one of the things that comes back to us from the people who are online watching our services in various parts of the country whatever else is they say it's quite remarkable you actually mention people's names before you pray for them well of course we do I mean there are people um but there's so it's it the place of scripture the reading of the Bible the choosing of the hymns everything I I'm I would be regarded as a bit of a Neanderthal I think when it comes to this in this context the worst of it is and I remember in the early days I went to a place and one the the guy that led the praise also played like a saxophone or something and he had it around his neck and every so often he would burst into playing this thing and uh I almost you know I didn't know what to do except grab the saxop phone and throw it somewhere but and and it was all heavily programmed and he said you know and you have uh 27 minutes I said how much time you got for your saxophone by the way you know so it's it's it's it it's Deuteronomy 4 let us assemble the people that we might hear the word of God everything else is contrapuntal motion in relationship to that all of the other stuff is related to the the was that Glen bag the that big drum yeah I don't know if that's a good answer but I just took a stab at it s yeah we I said to dthy once we were somewhere in this country in a state that wouldn't be mentioned and I said we can I was doing something I was teaching I said we could go to this church that that will be good and I was I was sitting quietly with her in the in the seat when this green blonde goddess appeared you know dressed in this green robe and encouraging us all to lift our hearts to the Lord and almost brought an end to my marriage bond I kind of felt that my wife had turned into the ice Maiden uh what was you know what has happened to my husband that he's bringing me to this I think several things one is I I I've kind of developed the view that that the building you have may constrain certain elements in what you do and that you you probably do have to take that into account so that this room very different from like our room in in Colombia the second thing is that I think there is both a theological and a psychological order to worship so whether we speak in terms of liturgy and to what extent that is documented or not or or or projected or not um that we that we recognize there is an appro that we are Sinners approaching a holy God um and that there is built into the way in which we worship God an order that also corresponds to our own psyche um so for example uh when when we were in Glasgow one of the one of the things I eventually felt I had the courage to say to uh the the elders who were responsible for is you know confession of sin in our service us is a hdden miss a total hdden Miss if whoever is praying decides that we need to confess our sin we confess it otherwise we don't and that seemed to me to be deficient theologically and it was also deficient psychologically and so when we when we Del deliberately introduced a confession of sin into the congregation um it canol immediately transformed something and and was really helpful to them so I think these you know whatever whatever variance there may be these are really important things and you know to be honest it and I think this is what aliser is saying um our worship Services therefore need to be approached from a theological point of view as well as from a psychological point of view you um because we are communicating with him and he is drawing near to us and and we've got to learn to do that appropriately and so you know watch word for me in many ways has been what again back to First Corinthians what Paul says you know if you're all speaking in tongues they'll think you're off your head but if there is prophecy and without going into one's idiosyncratic views of what prophecy may be at the end of the day that is where we want to be we want to be down in our faces before God in the joy of recognizing him and worshiping him and to to be honest sometimes I I think probably in Scotland there was the kind of lingering old style um whether it was just superficial or not uh but I sometimes at the end of services I wanted to scream will you L not just sit down and be quiet for a minute or two you don't come into the presence of God you know here I am and you shouldn't just pick up your handbag and walk out of this place as though you know well let's get on to the next thing so we were both probably reared and Rico too um in a context where the the worship would end in at its best being bowed lost in Wonder Love and praise um and I you know if you take the parable of the sore I sometimes thought you know the the birds of the air are actually flying in the front door at the moment and they're picking up the seed that's been sewn and and it's not even being time to bed itself in so I think we do need to give a a lot of careful thought to what we're doing yeah that's excellent um this is my last question um this question reads we've all seen men in Ministry uh particularly in recent years disqualify themselves through moral failures is there any word of encouragement or warning that you'd give that can help us to live Faithfully while serving in Ministry well um you know TI heed less than thinking that you stand you do actually fall I I think I I really have valued enormously the friendships that God has given me and the models that he set before me and those have been very helpful but the you know at the end of the day the chief thing is that we need to guard our hearts because that's it's out of them that the issues of Life come and we need to encourage one another I don't personally think that always means that we're kind of eyeballing one another and asking the 10 questions you know are you doing this are you doing that because I've I've come to the the the sense that I think I've known people who have done that and still fall but this the sense of of the real friendship that we have in Christ that makes ease of mutual confession to one another and the recognition of one another's weaknesses just been a great help to me yeah anything you d i I think Cobra in the UK um there's been a a right emphasis in the last 10 years on blind spots what are my blind spots and I think we were asking that question we look back so for example I can think of people who've fallen and people would just say oh well you know Jonathan's like that well that's not good you know he was um very effective in Ministry it seemed but but had a a a really brutal tongue on him sometimes and people said oh that's just Jonathan well no that's not permissible and you can't have a blind spot in a congregation where because of someone's gifting we all know this you know it doesn't mean that character isn't important I do think with Uncle John what always struck me was that John stopped there was a huge emphasis in the morning on his own sin so he'd learned that from Simeon and that that um Golden Chain of Christian discipleship which is that you get up in the morning you open your Bible it is a mirror it shows you your sin the Holy Spirit Will convict it's not he doesn't the Holy Spirit doesn't bring God's punch but he does bring uh God's kiss it is a conviction of it Rico it was here and and the Bible is the mirror so sin Grace you know I I live not by my performance but Christ how does God feel about me amazingly he's delighted with me because he's delighted with Jesus I cannot believe it Joy you know gosh out we go what a great day I'm forgiven I mean they with Simeon they couldn't believe he would he would come come out and just be thrilled in Cambridge having been brutally treated because he couldn't believe that he was a forgiven Sinner and that was his you know the only way up is down he went down into his sin said those people who live with him each morning and then you go discipleship evangelism training but I think that sin Grace joy and Uncle John certainly had a you know he would weep about his sin sometimes if you prayed with him and um there was just such a sense of his own personal depravity one man said to him um uncle Uncle John um your commentaries are amazing I I I I'm just so thankful for the way that God has used the work of a righteous man in my life to which Uncle John replied if you could see my my heart as God does you'd spit in my face before you said that you know so just I think it is also just treading very very carefully on our own sin and seeing that and I think if as with our Bibles open if we keep doing that then that that's a great way of watching ourselves oh well both those things are profoundly helpful um I I think what Sinkler is saying is the fact that I exist and he knows me and he knows that I'm watching him the fact that we're separated by an oce is really not that significant that the photographs that surround me in my study uh bear the faces of people some dead to whom I feel a strong sense of accountability and when tempted to delve into the blind spot or to go in that direction um the fear of God is conveyed in part to me by a genuine sense of fear lest I would ever uh bmer the relationship that has been established over all these years no matter how desirable um the Temptation might be and that may be just very simple but you know I and and going at it in another way um you going to you're going to sit down and tell your grandchildren and your children that that you decided not to take seriously uh Proverbs to delight yourself in the wife of your Youth and let her breast satisfy you always are you you decided that you just would violate that that that I that's that that helps me and also to your point I mean the accountability thing if guys were in accountability groups with John St there are nowhere in the gospel right now you know that and and so the the fight of the matter is if I lie to God I'll lie to anybody so what I am on my own is the key one final quote is from Bridges I was looking for I wasn't I wasn't going online um but uh to the highest B yeah okay guys um I I was with Christopher Ash we were in Brisbane we're in we're in Brisbane we're in a mall and uh we'd been there for about a week and we're going up an escalator in the mall and it so happens that we're in like the women's um um you know bathing suit department or whatever it was what were you doing there what were you he said he wanted to buy a pair of shoes so we were going we were we were got really small feet yeah I'm just trying to read a quote from my book okay so so we're go we're going up we're going up the stairs and and all the mannequins are are on either side and so I'm thinking to myself I'm thinking what I'm thinking and I'm thinking oh oh Christoper such a such a godly man he won't be thinking any of this and we get to the top and he pauses and he goes I do think it's about time for us to go home brother and so hence the quote Charles Bridges make of this what you wish tender well-regulated domestic affection is the best defense against the vagrant desires of unlawful passions take care of the Home Fires it's good uh well with that I do want to bring our time to a close and so if we could just thank these gentlemen for their Ministry among us thank you thank you thank you we can just walk off I think aliser would you would you pray and then we'll sing uh you guys can just step down and we'll we'll move from there Our God and our father um God and Father we acknowledge that uh we are all Learners uh from the one who knows the answers and we thank you that your word is a lamp to our feet and a guide to our path grant that anything that has been said that helps to reinforce the truth of your word may find a resting place in our hearts and minds and anything that would be an unhelpful distraction or a deviation from course we pray that it might be banished from our recollection thank you for Sinkler and for Rico and for Matt and for the privilege of these moments and we commend uh this interim period now into your care in Jesus name amen well let's stand and we'll sing [Music] together what a friend we have in Jes Jesus all our sins and griefs to [Music] Bear what a privileg to car everything to got in pray oh what peace we often for f oh what needless baby bear oh because we do not car everything to God in [Music] [Music] pray how we trials and temptation is that trouble [Music] anywhere we should never be disc take it to the Lord can we find a friend of all Jesus knows our every we you the Lord PR [Music] all we weak [Music] heav with the Lord ofe savior still oure take it to the Lord in pray to th friends desp forsake me take it to the Lord in bre in his arm take Shield the th will find us all [Music] we are going to take just a 15minute break uh for coffee to use the restroom and then we'll be back for our final session see you then I

Channel: Parkside Church

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Id: JaXfDdl2wOY

Length: 71min 45sec (4305 seconds)

Published: Wed May 08 2024