Doctrine
Tom Shrader opens a Christianity 101 series by addressing the crucial importance of sound doctrine in the Christian life. Drawing from 1 Timothy, he demonstrates that Christianity is fundamentally a belief system, not merely an ethical framework, and that theological knowledge is essential for spiritual growth, leadership, and handling Scripture accurately. He challenges both those who think doctrine is beneath them and those intimidated by it, showing how proper understanding of God's truth provides stability during trials and equips believers for ministry.
“Christianity, at its core, is not an ethic. It's a belief system.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: Christianity 101 (2004)
Recorded: 2004
Duration: 46 min
Themes: doctrine, fundamentals, knowledge, truth, basics, foundation, understanding, growth, new believer, intimidated by theology, thinking doctrine is beneath them, struggling with spiritual growth, seeking biblical foundation, beginning Bible study, wanting theological grounding, needing doctrinal stability
Scripture: 1 Timothy 4:11-16, 1 Timothy 3, 1 Timothy 5:17, 1 Timothy 6:2-4, 1 Peter 3:15, Philippians 4:13, Revelation 3:20, Colossians 4:5, Hebrews 5:11-14
Theological Themes: sound doctrine, biblical knowledge, theological understanding, scriptural truth, doctrinal foundation, systematic theology, biblical literacy, orthodox teaching
Full Transcript
Today we begin a brand new series. Eight weeks, I think it'll be. The title pretty much says it all: Christianity 101. We're talking about the very basics.
Almost every lesson that we do, every study that we're involved in, inevitably I'll get one of two reactions. One will be, "I'm way beyond this." Or the other will be, "This is way beyond me." You'll get a group of people that say, "This is so elementary, so fundamental. I need the deeper things in life." Then you get the other group that says, "I'm not sure I can get this."
For Those Who Think They're Beyond the Basics
If you're one of those that looks at the topic and says Christianity 101 and thinks you're way beyond this, let me plead with you to understand you really aren't. I'm not saying you don't already know this stuff, and I'm not saying you aren't familiar with it. I'm just saying you can never overlook these. These are the fundamentals. These really are the basics of understanding our faith in just broad, general terms. It's going back to your very roots.
I've got a couple of friends that when I play golf with them, they're good golfers. When we're in the driving range, I'll say to them, "Look at my swing. Take a look at my swing, will you?" When they do, it's interesting, they never even get to the swing. When I'm standing there and sitting up, they're looking at the grip. What we've observed over time is our grips will tend to change, weaken or strengthen. They're looking at the setup. They're looking at the fundamentals, the basics.
We were on vacation this summer. I was not hitting it well. I discovered on the last day that was there that I was so worried about hitting it right, I kept closing up. The more I closed, the more I couldn't get the club through the ball. The minute I squared up, bam! That is so basic.
This is the old Vince Lombardi: "Gentlemen, this is a football." I'm saying to you, ladies and gentlemen, this is Christianity 101.
For Those Who Think It's Too Advanced
There's another group of you that say, "This is beyond me." Well, it isn't beyond you. You've got a little bit of a low evaluation of maybe where you are. But if it is beyond you, what that means is it's time for you to get into gear and let's get going. This is the way to go. This is the way to get started.
Paul writes in 1 Peter 3, "Be ready to make a defense of the hope that lies within you." You and I need to be able - we don't need to be the answer man or the biblical answer man. You don't need to be Hank Hanegraaff that can answer every question that's ever come up or ever been posed. But what you need to be able to do is have a basic, ever-growing, fundamental understanding of the faith.
Christianity Is a Belief System, Not Just an Ethic
Let me say a couple of things. I have to come back to this again and again. It really fits, especially in today's topic. Christianity, at its core, is not an ethic. It's a belief system. Will you grab that with me? Most of the people that you encounter are going to want to define Christianity in terms of, "I do this, I do this, I do this, I do this." No.
I have conversations regularly with people and they'll say, "Do you know Bob?" And I'll say, "I know Bob." And they'll say, "Bob's a good Christian guy." And I'll say, "Tell me about that." And they'll say something like, "Well, he's just an extraordinary dad. He's incredible with his kids. He's a really good provider. He works really hard. This time of year, he gets together and Thanksgiving is a big time. He'll take the whole family down to the rescue center and he'll feed people. Christmas, he gets toys. He takes the money that they'd use for their family, cuts it in half, the other half goes to buy toys for needy kids. He does a lot of good things. He's a great Christian guy."
Okay, stop right there. There's a lot of pagans that do that. There's a lot of Buddhists and Hindus and Muslims. There's a lot of non-Christians that do those things we just described. That is not what makes you a Christian.
What makes you a Christian is what you believe. That's what makes you a Christian. Now, what you believe must affect how you behave. Those things that we outlined, those and things like them should be present in the life of a Christian. But that's not what makes me a Christian. What makes me a Christian is my belief system. What do I believe? Those core fundamental beliefs that I have. Those non-negotiables. Those essentials. Those are the things we're talking about when we talk about Christianity.
The Importance of Doctrine
What we're going to talk about today - and if we would have announced this ahead of time, my suspicion is we could have held this in a phone booth - is doctrine. We're going to talk about doctrine. When I say doctrine, you go, "Boring, dull." We're going to hopefully change your entire perspective on that this morning. Better stated, God's going to change your perspective on that this morning.
Let me make just a pitch. I'm going to give you six things here, and they're not on your outline. Six things that are important about knowledge, and they may even run together, overlap just a bit.
Knowledge Gives Substance to Our Faith
Here's the first one: Knowledge gives substance to our faith. Knowledge gives substance to our faith.
I will periodically be teaching, and somebody will come up afterwards and they'll say, "I disagree with what you said. I don't buy that. I don't buy that at all." Which is absolutely fine. There's no problem with that. Lots of people don't. I'll say, "Well, why don't you buy that?" And they'll say, "Well, I think that, or I feel that, or I believe that." Now I've got a problem.
The Problem with Subjective Theology
I don't have a problem when somebody disagrees with me. They just brought me my mail, and I've got a four-page letter in here from a guy who disagrees or would like to expand my view on a specific issue. He'll go to Scripture and say, "Here's what I see," and I think I know the arguments pretty well. I'm not sure that I agree with that, but I understand it, and I certainly love and respect that view. At least we can talk.
When somebody says, "Here's what I think" or "Here's what I feel," there's no substance there. It's totally subjective. What happens when your thinking changes? What happens when your feelings change? What happens when your experience changes?
I know this because I'm the king of this. I'm the guy that sat down and was talking to a guy one day years ago. I was not a Christian, and I said, "That Bible's full of hooey. I don't buy that Bible at all. That Bible's filled with mistakes and errors." He said to me, "Listen, why don't you go home, get your Bible, find ten errors, we'll meet tomorrow and go through them." I had to admit, number one, I don't have a Bible. Number two, I've never read it. I just heard somebody say it had a bunch of errors in it, and that worked well for me.
If you have eyes that are open here and you really get into it, what you'll find when you start talking and speaking with people about this stuff is that they have a theology, but it's almost based on just subjective impulse. We'll talk about it more in a moment.
Knowledge Stabilizes During Testing
Here's the second thing: knowledge stabilizes you during tough times or times of testing. I have kind of a problem in the sense that I don't use one single Bible. I've got probably four or five Bibles that I use, and that's probably not wise because I have markings in some places and not in others. My memory is not as sharp as I'd like it to be. Literally, once I'm done with a lesson, I can't recall much of it at all. I'll know in that one Bible it's on the right-hand column about three-quarters of the way up, somewhere toward the back of Matthew's Gospel. But now I don't have that Bible, and I'm lost because it's on the left column in the bottom, and it's all messed up.
In this Bible that I use at different times, mostly in teaching settings, I have a card. You can kind of get the sense of it. It's probably about three by five that's folded in half. If you could see the front, you'd see a little cutout section with about an inch and a quarter high two footprints and then a little hand. When you open this up, it says, "In celebration and memory of our daughter, Elizabeth Grace, born July 9, 2003 at 9:45. She was born one pound, eleven and a half inches," and then she died that day.
That's tough stuff. These are people that have spent eight years trying to have a baby. This is the dad who went into the nursery and said, "I'm convinced we're going to have a little girl," and painted everything pink. This is really hard. It does not get much more difficult than this.
To this day—it's July, so we're August, September, October, three months later—the other day at women's ministries, Stacy was working at the door, and I walked in, and there was a lady with a baby. I stopped and did my thing with the baby and how cute it is and all that stuff. When I turned back, there was Stacy there with a little tear in her eye, and I know what she was thinking, and you know what she was thinking. It's tough stuff.
When I met with them, and this is the thing about the Christian faith, your emotions don't necessarily go away. It's not that you become a robot. It's not that all of a sudden there's no sentiment. It's that all of a sudden there's a place to take your grief. When I met with them to talk about the memorial service and what we wanted to do and how we wanted to honor, how we wanted to celebrate, how we wanted to support, all those different things, what they kept coming back to is the character of God, the righteousness of God, the holiness of God, the love of God, the mercy of God, the omniscience of God and who He is.
See, knowledge in times of testing gives you stability.
Knowledge Enables Accurate Bible Handling
Here's the third thing: knowledge enables you to handle the Bible accurately. It's important for you to understand, while I believe you and I as kind of average Joes can pick this Bible up and understand it and read it, it does take some work. It does take some labor. It's pretty easy, and let me tell you as somebody who's in the front, it's pretty tempting to take passages, pull them out of context, have them say exactly what I'd love them to say, but not really what they intend to say. That happens all around you.
Revelation 3, verse 20. You've heard that verse a thousand times: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock." You've heard it in this context—somebody at the front sharing their faith, they're advising you to come, or maybe in a crusade setting, with heads bowed, buses await, you come forward. "Jesus said, 'Behold, I stand at the door and knock.' That's this moment. Don't let it pass." That has absolutely nothing to do with that topic. But boy, does it preach well.
There was a guy on TV the other night saying, "You know, Paul writes in Philippians 4, verse 13, 'I can do all things with Him who strengthens me.' Now, I don't know what you face tomorrow, but I know this: You have the strength to handle all these things. If you just need to get that deal done, you just believe to get that deal done." That's not what it says.
So I need to handle this Word of God accurately. And knowledge teaches me that.
Here's the fourth thing: knowledge equips me
Knowledge As a Tool to Detect Error
Knowledge equips me to detect error. One of Larry's favorite stories, and my assumption is that it's fictitious, but we like to tell it as fact, is the story of the bank teller that was completing training. It was the very last day, and there was an article in the newspaper that there were a whole bunch of counterfeit $20 bills that were being introduced to the marketplace. Secret Service had uncovered this plot, and there were counterfeit $20 bills, and it would be reasonable to think a teller would be encountering them.
The guy says to the teacher, "When are you going to show us the counterfeit $20 bill?" And the teacher said, "We aren't. We're going to have you so familiar with the real thing that when the counterfeit comes along, you'll spot it right away." Whether that story is true or not, I'll tell you the principle is good. The principle is true.
When people come to me with questions, my most frequent answer is, "I don't know." But I will tell you this: I have a really good, basic, fundamental understanding of the Scripture. When somebody comes with something that doesn't sound right, I may not be able to go to chapter and verse, but if you give me a little bit of time, I can go to that Scripture. The reason is, you know the real thing.
I have people all the time that say, "Will you study this religion? Will you read this? Here's a book about such and such a faith. It's 500 pages. Will you read it?" My answer is no. I'm not going to waste my time on that. I want to know the real thing. I can tell you some of the errors that are in there and we approach it that way.
Knowledge Gives Confidence and Filters Fear
Here's the fourth thing that knowledge does. It gives you confidence. Again, this is godly confidence, not self-confidence. In a sense, confidence is kind of the Siamese twin of knowledge. Not arrogance. Not taking this Bible and beating people to death with it. But opening it up in gentleness and love.
Here's the last thing. Knowledge gives me really a good filter to understand fears and superstitions. Knowledge just helps me, because I understand the truth, be able to deal with fear or superstition.
Defining Doctrine
So I said at the beginning, here's what we're talking about. We're talking about doctrine. You've got Webster's definition there before you. It's a good one. It works for us. Something taught as a principle of a creed or religion, a tenet, belief, dogma, handed down by authority is true and indisputable.
I want to deal with two myths. This is really important for you to understand. You may say you're not a theologian. If by the technical term you don't measure up with that, I'm fine with that. I'm not a theologian. I've got that figured out. But you have a theology. That's what I want you to see.
Everyone Is a Theologian
There's a sense in which everyone is a theologian. Every person. I can go down there. I don't care. We can go over to Fashion Square today. We'll sit down there. Get a Coke at Johnny Rockets. We'll sit there. Let people walk by. I'll let you pick the person. Pick whoever you want. You pick them. We'll bring them over. Don't care who it is.
When we start to talk, you will discover that they have a theology. When they start to talk about God and how God works or how God doesn't exist or whatever, they've got a theology. So you need to understand that. You have a theology.
Doctrine Is Practical
The second thing that is a myth that needs to be destroyed, and I think we can begin to do that, and I think we do that almost every week here, is that theology is not practical or doctrine is not practical. In the Scripture, we will see, aside from the word doctrine, we'll see the word teaching or instruction used. It's the verb form of this idea of doctrine. The Scripture tells us how to live.
It's important for you and I to understand that when you hear doctrine, you think dull, dreary, and I'm saying to you, no. It's essential for how to live. I mentioned last week, and somebody asked me this morning about the book, we mentioned last week, Bondage of the Will. Bondage of the Will, Martin Luther. That book is 400 years old and it sounds dull and dreary.
Right after somebody asked me about the book, another guy came in and said, "I'm reading Bondage of the Will." He said, "It's extraordinary. Number one, it's encouraging to know that 400 years ago, people used sarcasm the way we do today." Luther absolutely just sticks it right in your face.
The Historical Relevance of Sound Doctrine
What this guy made as an observation is so extraordinary. What Luther was fighting against, and what the church was fighting against 400 years ago, is what exactly has become mainstream today. If you drop Martin Luther in most of these churches today, he would go nuts. These are those Protestant churches that are out there protesting something. If you drop Luther in the Lutheran church, he wouldn't recognize it.
But if you drop Luther here today, and this guy is prone, I think, to a little bit of depression anyway, he would be very discouraged. Because he would look around and say, "Obviously, we missed the vote." See, this has huge practical ramifications. How it manifests itself in theology, in church, how it operates, how you run your family, how you run your business, how you deal with one another. So it's really practical.
Turning to 1 Timothy
All those things being said, on your outline, seven points here. If you've got Bibles with you, just go ahead and open them to 1 Timothy. We're going to just kind of do a flyover of just a few of these verses and make a few of these points from 1 Timothy.
Let me remind you about 1 and 2 Timothy. Because we'll be on those two books these next two weeks. Paul is the author of these books. He's writing to his young protégé, Timothy. I believe, at least I think biblically, you could build a case that Timothy is Paul's favorite person on the planet.
There's a very special relationship here. Timothy is a young man. We'll see some of that today. And that is a bit of a stumbling block in a society that puts such an extraordinary value on age and wisdom.
Timothy is left to pastor Paul's very favorite church, the church at Ephesus, the church that Paul spent three years there with these people. Tradition, and it always gets scary in tradition, so we're not going to drive a stake in the ground here, but tradition says that John, the writer of the Gospel, John 1, 2, 3 John, book of Revelation, worshipped in the church at Ephesus, as did Mary, the mother of Jesus. Do we know that for a fact? No, but tradition seems to indicate that. Ephesus, a very important place, a very important church.
Paul leaves Timothy. Timothy and Paul very tight. There's one point where a church says, "Listen, we need some help," and Paul says, "I'm sending a guy to you, and his name is Timothy. I have nobody like Timothy. He and I are of one mind. I have no one like Timothy." So Timothy is this very extraordinary young man. 1 and 2 Timothy are two letters that Paul writes to this young man instructing him in the basics and the fundamentals of ministry, and giving him a structure—a very loose one—a structure for the church and how the church should operate. So that's what you have in front of you.
Doctrine is Complementary to the Gospel
Seven points. Number one, doctrine is complementary to redemptive teaching or to the gospel. Paul writes this to Timothy in 1 Timothy 10 and 11. Whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine—that word "sound" in the Greek means healthy, productive. Whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine, that conforms to the glorious gospel. That word "glorious" is this idea of revealing, revealing who Jesus really is. Sound doctrine helps us understand and reveal who Jesus really is.
Doctrine is not something that is optional. It's not something that's unimportant. It's not something that's secondary. It's absolutely first and foremost, and sound doctrine has as part of that the understanding of the gospel, who Jesus is.
We're getting ready. We're gearing up. I was in way early today because I had to get some copies made, and I came over to Thomas, and I never go over to Thomas, and I went by, I think it's Paddock Pools, and they've got the whole thing decorated, and I assume they sell Christmas decorations. So they've got all the things, the lights, thousands of lights. I don't know if you know this, but Christmas is 55 days from today. It's not far away. It's time to get going on this thing.
Isn't that interesting? And that's that time when we stop and we celebrate Jesus' birth, and we get all swept away: little baby Jesus, meek and mild, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Do we understand that at Christmas what we're really celebrating is God coming in the flesh so that He can live a perfect life and die to save His people from their sin? That's what Christmas is all about. Christmas is about giving. No, it isn't. Christmas is about you and I receiving the gift of eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. That's the gospel. He came, He lived, He died, He rose again so that we would have life. Sound doctrine and the gospel go hand in glove.
Sound Doctrine is Essential for Leadership
Here's the second thing. Sound doctrine is an essential quality for leadership. And that may sound like a strange thing to emphasize in this study, but it isn't. At our church, our desire is that every adult there would be elder qualified. Now, there's all sorts of issues there, and we're not suggesting in any way, shape, or form that every person there is going to be an elder. What we're saying is there are characteristics here. And certainly every man in the church should strive to be elder qualified.
As you look through those characteristics, let me just read them. They're in 1 Timothy 3. "Here's a trustworthy statement. If anyone sets his heart on being an overseer, he does a noble task. Now, the overseer, the elder, the pastor, must be above reproach, husband of one wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach." I want to stop right there.
You should be striving to be a leader. Now, that leadership may just be of a three-year-old in the house. It may be just over a small group of two or three rag-tag sort of guys that you put together. It may be just a group of gals that get together once a week and have some coffee and study the Bible. I don't care. In this process of leadership, what Paul is saying to you is you need to be able to teach. That does not mean that you can take a hundred people and keep them on the edge of their seat. It means that you can take the Bible and you can deal with life situations, life truth, theological truth, from this biblical perspective.
You Can't Teach What You Don't Know
I want to make this point. This is a life principle. It's absolutely true. It is self-evident, and yet it could be easily misunderstood. Don't miss this. You're supposed to be able to teach. You can't teach what you don't know. Now, I know that isn't profound, but we seem to overlook that.
Paul's saying if you want to be a leader here, there is an important thing in this whole package. And then he lists all these things. He doesn't talk about tall, dark, and handsome. He doesn't talk about being a leader in the community, a good businessman, an entrepreneur. He doesn't talk about being rich in material things. He begins with the area of character. He says you must be above reproach. And then he lists all these things. And you must be able to teach.
I wrote this sentence. See if this sounds right to you. No way you can lead without knowing doctrine. I wrote that and then I crossed out and said no, that's not true. No way you should lead. You can lead. In some places you can buy yourself a deaconship or an eldership. Or if you're a cheerleader for the pastor and yes or yes are three bags full, he may fast track you to a position of leadership. But there's no way you should be in a position of leadership without
The Foundation for Spiritual Growth
This doctrine is essential for spiritual growth. If you point out these things to brothers, you'll be a good minister of Jesus Christ brought up in the truths of the faith and of the good teaching, the good doctrine. He's talking about all these things that we're dealing with in life. All these different truths. If you want to grow spiritually, you need to have a working knowledge of doctrine.
I'm walking through the neighborhood one day and I see this guy in his garage doing something. And it just blows me away. I walk a little further and I see this thing again. I walk a little further through the neighborhood and I see it again. And I come home and I said to Susan, "You're not going to believe what I saw today." She said, "What did you see?" I said, "Three times I saw something." She said, "Well, what was it?" I said, "Three different times as I'm walking through the neighborhood, I saw guys out working on their car." And she said, "You really don't understand people very well, do you? People like this. People do this. They don't just come in and sit and read. They do things. They do yard work. They like to get out and they like that." And I said, "Don't they understand Jiffy Lube and Minute Lube and all?"
Learning Through Hands-On Experience
Now here's what's interesting. I'll go up and talk to a guy and I'll say, "What are you doing?" He'll say, "I'm just working with a carburetor." And I'll say, "Well, what is that?" "Well, I'm taking these out and then I've got rings..." and they'll start all this. And I'll say, "How did you ever get to do this? How did you ever learn this?" "Oh, it's not hard. I've been doing this since I was a little kid. You just get in and you start working in it and turn it apart. In fact, my dad and I, when I was just a young boy, my dad and I bought a jalopy. We tore it apart. We put it back together again. That was the first car I ever had."
You'll talk to people about this Scripture and they'll say, "I could never do that." In fact, here's what they'll say to me: "Where did you go to seminary?" And I'll say, "Well, I didn't go to seminary." "Where did you go to Bible school?" "Well, I didn't go to Bible school." "Well, where did you get your training?" Here's what I did. My dad and I, when I was a kid, we bought a Bible. And we just tore it apart. And we put it back together again.
A Simple Approach to Biblical Knowledge
Here's how you get it. Here's how you get knowledge. You do things like this. You hear about bondage of the will. You buy the book. You read it. A novel approach, I understand.
I'm going to make a statement now and I think I can support it. I think it's absolutely true. If you will give to the study of God's Word 30 minutes a day for the next year, 30 minutes a day for the next year, I guarantee you'll be in the top 10% in the world in terms of theological knowledge. I'm talking 30 minutes a day. That needs to be targeted. What do you read? Where do you go with that? I understand that. But if you will just give it 30 minutes a day, I'll give you a couple of places to go.
There's a book by James Boice. B-O-I-C-E. James Boice. And I believe the book is called Foundations of the Faith. It was out of print. It's back in print. It's about 700 pages, I would guess. If you read seven pages a day, you'll read the book in 100 days. And this is not a page turner. You're not reading Grisham here. This is going to take some work and it's going to talk to you about God and who He is, and the Bible and what it is, and man and how we got here, and how we deal with a holy God, and how God redeems His people, and how the body should interact.
Overcoming Intimidation
I'm telling you, if you'll take that book and master that book, which you can do in 30 minutes a day for a year, and really get a working knowledge of that book, at the end of that year, you're in the top 10% of knowledge in the entire world in terms of understanding Christian faith. I will meet people who have Master's degrees and PhDs and they will tell me—they won't say it out loud, but they will say this—"I'm intimidated by this book."
The Creator God of the universe did not write this book and then allow it to be distributed to you and me so that we would not understand it. Are there some tough things in here? Sure there are. Are there some things that take some work? Absolutely. Are there things you're never going to understand? Obviously. But the Gospel, the core things, the truth, the basic sound doctrine, you're going to be able to get your arms around.
Knowledge Doesn't Guarantee Growth
Now, I want you to understand it. The sound doctrine is necessary, I think, for spiritual growth. But here's the other side of it. It doesn't guarantee spiritual growth. I know all sorts of people who have a lot of knowledge who haven't grown spiritually. It's just the same thing. It's the same issue. We're just pounding the same nails over and over again.
I know people who would know the things in that Boice book inside out and I don't even think they're Christians. And they would in the quiet of their heart periodically say, "Yeah, I don't even know if I'm a Christian because I don't exhibit the fruit of it." It's so interesting to me that the churches that tend to be the most sound doctrinally tend to be the driest, dreariest, dullest places and people. And what he's saying is that this sound doctrine plays an important role in your life and my life.
How Sound Doctrine Is Cultivated
Here's the fourth thing. Sound doctrine is cultivated through biblical literacy. It's maybe self-evident. Command these things. Teach these things. Don't let anybody look down on you. Until I come, devote yourself to the Scripture, to the preaching, to the teaching. This sound doctrine is cultivated as I understand this spiritual teaching and preaching and the Word and I spend time in it. It's a simple truth.
Here's the fifth thing. Sound
Doctrine is modeled by personal example. Sound doctrine is modeled by personal example.
I'm getting ready in a couple of weeks to deal with the end of the year Major League Baseball Conference, PAO. I go to PAO and I'm working on my talks now. My first talk, this should be a good one, is "God Hates Free Agency." That's my first talk so that should get their attention. Then the second one will probably be something along the lines that Charles is wrong—you are a role model.
Living Out Your Faith Visibly
So are you and me. If you're in here, I'm going to give you a tip. If you're in here now, you're a Sunday school teacher or you're looking for something to study, but you're looking for something to do a lesson, I got a passage for you right here: 1 Timothy 4:15-16. Begin to look at this: "Be diligent in these matters. Give yourself wholeheartedly to them so everyone may see your progress. Watch your life and doctrine closely."
Apparently, I'm supposed to be able to see the way you live. I'm supposed to be able to look at it, see it, understand it, perceive it. It's supposed to be evident all around you. I'm supposed to be able to see this doctrine.
Now, a little bit in this process, He tells us what I should see. I should see the love. I should see the faith. I should see the purity. I should see the speech. Back in verse 12, I should see these things in your life. You should be living in such a way that the people around you have concrete physical evidence that there's something different about you.
In Colossians 4 or 5, somewhere in there, Paul writes and he says, "Conduct yourself in a way that you're above reproach. Conduct yourself wisely with those outside." What he's saying is with non-believers. It's not just that we love one another, but our love is evidence to those outside the church. Our faith is evidence to those outside the church.
The Office Test
I mean, this is really a great example and a time for you to at least point this out. If I went with you to the office today, and I sat down with two or three people that work very closely with you, and I said, "Did you know that Barbara here is a Christian?" What would their response be? Would they just laugh? "Wait a minute. How many Barbaras are there here in the office? This Barbara? That one? There's no way." Or would they say, "You know what? She really never said anything about her faith, but I knew there was something different about her."
Let me make the point here. That's why it's not enough just to live this and let people see it. There has to be a point where you speak into their life and into that truth. People in this day and age are very open, I think, to having you speak into their life. You may not even realize it, but when they say to you, "How come your life just seems to be going along? How come you can handle this? How come? How come? How come?" That's them saying to you, "Who's Jesus and how can I know Him?" Because there's your answer. This sound doctrine should be modeled in the way you live.
Paying Those Who Teach
Here you go. Two more points. We've got six minutes. Sound doctrine, and I make this point—it's number six—sound doctrine is worth remuneration. In other words, the guy preaching and teaching is worth getting paid.
I say this to those of you who are in positions of leadership, and there's many of you here, and the people here, the tapes, and the people this afternoon, who are on elder boards, who are in positions of leadership in a church. The guy at the front did not take a vow of poverty. I am convinced that many elder meetings begin with the chairman praying this way: "Father, I want to pray tonight for our senior pastor. We love him, we care for him. Father, we'd like to make a deal with him. You keep him humble, we'll keep him poor. You keep him humble, we'll keep him living on the edge."
Here's what Paul's saying. Paul's saying in 1 Timothy 5:17: "The elders who direct the affairs of the church are well worthy of double honor, especially those who work in preaching and teaching." Especially, let me talk to those of you who are involved in small churches. You tend to be the most abusive of the staff guys. You've got this guy working 60, 70 hours a week, and you're paying him next to nothing. That is not biblical. It may fit into what you think church should be, and it may fit into what you perceive he should be.
Every year, my board here will say, "We'd like to give you a raise. Do you need more money?" Every year. This is what, 12th or 13th year. Every year they've asked that, and I've said, "No, I don't need it." Except six or seven years ago. It was right when the girls were both going to high school, and we were a little tight. So we were having our meeting, and I thought, "Okay, they're going to ask this year, and I'm going to take it." We got through the whole meeting, and no one ever said, "Do you want a raise?" They've said this every year, except this one. We're at the end, and they said, "Anything else?" And I said, "You know, this is embarrassing. But I just need..." And I said, "Oh, gosh, yeah, sure, boom. Yeah, let's help."
You need to understand that. Again, I say this not in a self-serving way. I say this to challenge you in your thinking as you're dealing in your individual churches.
Scriptural Validation
And here's the last thing. Sound doctrine is confirmed by scriptural validation. These things that you are able to teach and urge. "If anyone teaches false doctrine and does not agree with the sound instruction of our Lord Jesus Christ to His godly teaching, he's conceited and understands nothing. He has an unhealthy interest in controversies, quarrels, etc."
Larry Wright. You all know how I feel about Larry Wright. Outside of my family, there's no person on this planet that I have had a deeper relationship, love, care with. You take outside of my family, my mom, my dad, my immediate family, my brothers—
There's no one that I care more for, love more than Larry Wright. I absolutely love Larry Wright. He is my hero. I mean, he and I, I was thinking the other day driving in, God, this is perverse because I should want to die to see you, Jesus, but I do want to die and see Larry. I want to be with Larry. I want to see Larry.
Having said all that, Larry used to say this: "I know this Bible is true because I put it in the test tube of my life and it works." And I would say to Larry, that's not right. That's not correct. I know this Bible is true because it's true. When you say you've put it in the test tube of your life and it works and therefore it's correct, what you're doing is opening up the validation of this to experience. Because I can bring somebody in who said, "I put it in the test tube of my life and it didn't work, therefore it's not true." Do you see that?
The Danger of Experience-Based Faith
This is very important because you and I live in a world, even in a Christian community, that says experience, experience, experience. Watch a little of the Christian TV. Just a little sport watching. Not enough to get any of this doctrine on you. Just to watch. And watch them. Watch the experience. Watch them talk.
It doesn't matter. Anytime, night or day, what are they going to talk about? Healing, prosperity, this, I was swept away, this happened. It's all experience. They'll grab some verse, usually out of the Old Testament, usually out of context, and then they'll try to apply it to today and then they'll validate it. Do you see this? With experience, experience, experience, experience.
I don't care. I don't care about your experience. Your experience doesn't make this true. Do you see this? So somebody will come in to me and they'll say, "Well, this is what happened to me. You can't argue with my experience." I don't want to argue with your experience. But your experience is contrary to what this says here. So your argument is with Him, not with me. Do you see that?
Faith Versus Sight
This is really important. I think this is me saying it's tangential and it's not exactly what we're talking about here. But what you see in this whole faith thing, all these people on TV saying it's faith, it's faith, it's faith. We have to have faith. We have faith. I think it's exactly the opposite. They're not living by faith. They're living by sight. They see this, they see this, they see this, they see this. And that validates what they believe. It's absolutely backwards. And it's absolutely wrong.
People are going to come to you with all sorts of things that they say are true because it was their experience. You see that? This is really huge. So somebody will come in today. Periodically people come to church and they say, "Oh, the Spirit of God is here." And I'll say, "How do you know that?" "I can really feel it here." I feel it on the 14th tee at Paradise Valley Country Club. I mean, what is the point here?
I don't buy this. You feel it. What you feel can be very dangerous if your feeling isn't flowing from your knowledge. See that? I'm not asking you to buy it. I'm just making sure you see that. And you will as you begin.
Recognizing the Pattern
It's like, we're going to San Antonio in a couple of weeks. So we'll get a rental car. We'll get a white Taurus. Once we get a white Taurus, I'm driving down the road and we will go about five miles and I'll say, "Look at all these white Tauri." There will be Tauruses everywhere. Taurus, Taurus, Taurus. White ones. I drive for months and never notice one. But the minute I have a white Taurus, I see a white Taurus.
Once you understand there's a couple of things like this. Once you understand that God chose you for salvation, all of a sudden, haven't you in the last two or three weeks seen it everywhere when you're reading? Sure you have. I've had people say that to me. Once you understand that experience isn't the final barometer and it doesn't matter what you think or how you feel, but what the Bible says, once you get that in your mind, over the next two or three weeks as you're talking to people, notice how often they try to validate what they're saying by experience or feeling rather than the scripture.
And you'll hear it in a conversation. You'll hear it in places you've never even thought or heard it before. That you had that experience is nice and sweet, but that doesn't necessarily mean that that experience is valid.
The Case for Sound Doctrine
Here's our pitch. Our pitch is for sound doctrine. The author of Hebrews writes this. We'll let you go. "We have much more to say about this, but it's hard to explain because you're slow to learn. In fact, though by this time you ought to be a teacher, you need someone to teach you in the elementary truths of God's word over and over again. You need milk, not solid food. Anyone who lives on milk, being an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about the righteousness, but solid food is for the mature."
I'm talking to a guy. We're walking out and he said, "I'm a brand new Christian." I said, "That's cool." He said, "Tell me about it." And he starts to tell me about it. And I said, "Well, when did this happen?" Here's what he said: "Ten years ago." I said, "Ten years ago? You're a brand new Christian ten years ago?"
Can you imagine today if you're at your desk, you're at your office, and the guy comes in and he says, "Listen, we've got to get some production out of you. We've got to get some going." You go, "Wait a minute. I'm brand new here. I've only been at this job a decade. I've only been here ten years and you've got these demands on me? How unreasonable."
Taking Responsibility for Growth
If you've been a Christian for ten years and you still are acknowledging that you don't know anything, I want you to understand that's your fault, no one else's. And you can fix this thing and you can fix it fast. How do you do that? You get into this Word. You get into a systematic study of the Word. You get a hold of that Boyce book. Or here you go, Dr. Grudem. Many of you are at Scottsdale—
Bible Church. Dr. Grudem goes to Scottsdale Bible Church. Dr. Grudem has written a systematic theology. But they've taken that systematic theology and they've placed it into a book called Bible Doctrine. It's a magnificent book.
To get that book and work your way through it four or five pages a day in a systematic way. And all of a sudden, you're going to start to understand that your theology is going to line up and you're going to grow. You're going to explode. Your evangelism is going to be stronger. Your life is going to be stronger. Your prayer life is going to be stronger. Everything is going to be stronger. Because you're falling in love and knowledge of the Creator God of the universe.
And the more you know Him, the more you're going to want to love Him. And the more you love Him, the more you want to know Him.
Looking Ahead
Next week, here's what we're going to look at. The Bible. What is the Bible? We've got this Bible. We live by it. This Bible. What does the Bible say about itself? We'll take a look at that next week.
Father, help us take these truths, apply them to our word, to our life. Help us understand that doctrine is essential. Sound truth. God, let us be men and women of the Word. We pray that to You in Jesus' name, Amen.
Have a great week. We'll see you next week.