Welcome to ECB's Weekly Sermon Podcast. ECB is an international church in Bangkok, Thailand,
with dozens of nationalities worshipping together. We invite you to connect with us from wherever
you are through our website, ecb.asia, or our mobile app. And now we pray that you are blessed
by this week's sermon. Welcome to ECB. Good morning, everybody. So let me pray before we start.
King Jesus, our Lord, our Savior, thank you that we can remember that we are not here for ourselves
on our own. We are following you. And we're asking you as we come together, speak to us through
your word. Help us see. Bring us to a higher level of following you to a deeper level of intimacy.
And use me, Lord, in your power, in your grace, in your love. All these things we pray in the
powerful name of Jesus. Amen. In this series, we learned that when God saved us, it's not that He
just saved us so we'll die and go to heaven when we die. He saved us now from the kingdom of darkness
into the kingdom of light. We belong to His kingdom. We have a new citizenship. We are citizens
of heaven. And as long as we are following Jesus, we are participating with Him in building His
kingdom. We are making Him known among the nations and we are using all the giftedness and resources
He has given us just to serve Him in all the capacities of places that He has placed us. And
we do that with certain things. We learn in the first study that the attitude of this kingdom is
that adaptability is His plans, His guidance. We just follow Him. And we are adaptable like water.
We cannot follow Jesus otherwise. We learned last time that the motive of the kingdom is love for
God. Not fear, not shame, not selfish ambition, but it's our love for God that drives us to pursue
everything that He calls us to do or to be. And today we're going to be studying the pillars of
the kingdom. And we have to understand that as we say we are servants devoted to God, we are people
that love God and serve Him with devotion. That's it. That's what we do. We are His servants. We love
Him. Therefore we serve Him with devotion. And that's the fullness of the equation. If there's
only one thing you will remember from all the studies may be this. This is who we are. That's
what drives us and that's how we serve. We'll discover today that the pillars in this kingdom
are trustworthy leaders, trustworthy servants. And pillars are very important because they are
designed to support and sustain everything that is built on them. And as we are building this
kingdom together and He's working through us to create impact around the world, we need to remember
that we will be either pillars that He can trust and built on, or we will be faulty pillars that
will collapse. One or the other. But pillars that collapse are very catastrophic. 30 years ago in
South Korea in Seoul there was this place that was just known to be like a mall. People would go
there to buy stuff. It was a department store. They spent about three years building this place
and people were going out of their normal business. Except that that fateful day of June 30 years ago,
wow, it collapsed. It became one of the biggest catastrophes in peacetime in the history of
South Korea. About 500 people died, about a thousand people were injured. And as they started
researching and understanding, investigating what caused this catastrophe, they discovered that it
was the faulty pillars. Behind the construction they did things wrong and there was corruption
and money and different things that happened that sacrificed the integrity of the pillars that were
supposed to be built and then they collapsed. Some people had to go to jail because of the lack of
integrity and all the corruption behind it. And some just because of negligence. But you can
understand that when pillars collapse, it's not just the pillars that suffer. People and families
suffer too. And in the kingdom of God, as we are God's people and we are building as God leads us
to build his church, build different initiatives and industries and companies and NGOs, everything
that God has placed for us to build, it has to be built on the right pillars because it will collapse
and if it collapses, the damage for God's kingdom and the reputation of Christ is huge.
Have you ever been hurt by leaders? Have you ever been disappointed, so just disorienting,
that you had to just leave and it took you a while to kind of recover from it. You know,
what it looks like when pillars collapse and it's not pretty. And when it comes to the church
ministry, it's no different. I served in Dallas for 18 years and last year I was reading the New
York Times and I came across this article that caught my attention and just the title of it
meant I had to read it. It said this, around Dallas the church scandal seemed to have no end.
And a pastor with good reputation should not be taken for granted. Now, that's a little bit loud.
There are plenty of amazing pastors and leaders and ministries in Dallas, but it is also true that
there are many that are not. Some have collapsed and become big news. And it is sad. I got to
experience when I was working there a friend of mine that attended a very respectable church with
a very respectable team and famous preachers, radio stars, you know, and people that everybody
respected. And one day they had to let go the worship minister because he had been caught in
adultery. But as my friend had just come out of that weekend where the church had announced it,
I made it public. He was sad and we were having breakfast together and he looks at me and he says,
Pablo, you know, I've been reflecting on this and it's just, I realized that we are all adulterous.
We just haven't done it yet. And what he meant was I realized that anybody has the potential to
collapse. You and I have the potential to collapse. We just haven't collapsed yet. And it was a wake
up call for any of us who are following Jesus to pray that silent prayer that says, Lord, let it
not be me. Let it not be me. That causes people to walk away from you. That puts your name into
disrepute. And it's not just a modern crisis. The apostle Paul and the early Christians faced it
that possible was in prison. For instance, at a time when he writes a letter called Philippians
and as he's writing the letter to the Philippians, he acknowledges something. He says, it is true
that some of these people are preaching Christ out of envy and rivalry. What people preaching Christ
out of envy and rivalry. Yeah. But others out of goodwill, the former preach Christ out of selfish
ambition, not sincerely. What? These people are going and talking about God and Jesus and they are
doing it out of selfish ambition and they are fake? Yeah. And they suppose that they can stir up
trouble for me while I'm in chains. Wow. While you were in prison, there were people in churches
that were actually trying to do that to hurt you? Yes. Faulty pillars. And then Peter warns the
Christian says, yeah, false teachers. There will be plenty of false teachers. Many will follow their
depraved conduct and will bring the way of truth into disrepute. In their greed, these teachers will
exploit you with fabricated stories. What? They will make up stories to get money out of you? Yes.
That brought memories of my college years. I went to a college called Rio Grande Bible College in
South Texas that had a radio ministry. So you could work part time if you wanted in the radio
and different things there. And in that place, in that city, there were lots of plenty of radio
programs from other places. And I remember this radio program where the person would say, okay,
send us the desires of your heart. Write it in a list and put money in it and send the envelope.
And we will pray for the desires of your heart because they call the Bible, delight yourself in
the Lord and God will give you the desires of your heart. So if you want the desires of your heart,
send us your money and we'll pray for you. But here's the trick. If you send it a hundred dollars,
then God will give you 10 times that, you know, a thousand. Well, if you send us a thousand,
God will give you 10,000. So if you are smart, right, or not, send us more and you will get more
back. And that was a prosperity theology in that area that was in the radio all the time. Yes,
faulty pillars. That's why the apostle Paul tells Timothy, Timothy, don't be like that. You be a
solid pillar for the kingdom. You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.
And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses, we need to entrust
these things to whom? Will you read it out loud with me? Entrust to reliable people who will also
be qualified to teach others. Will you read that out again? Entrust to reliable people who will
also be qualified to teach others. Trustworthy, reliable people, trustworthy servants. That is
what we need. And the servant of God is not a person that is driven by selfish ambition and
fake and using people for their own financial benefit. No. Paul tells Timothy the servant of
God is different and the lower servant must not be quarrelsome, must be kind to everyone, able to
teach, not resentful. The inner health of a servant devoted to God matters because it's that inner
health that determines the quality of what kind of pillar you are and whether God can entrust you
with things to build or not. And that goes for all of us. So at the beginning of the church,
you could see that the need for reliable trustworthy pillars was there and it is even today as I speak.
This is how the kingdom is built. But as the first Christians, as God started this movement,
followers of Jesus started spreading and growing, they had to face some challenges and they started
asking three important questions as they started building these pillars. Let me tell you a little
bit of that and also a little bit of background first. You might remember that when Jesus ascended
to heaven, before he ascended to heaven, he met with the apostles and he told them, you know,
wait for the Holy Spirit and then you will be my witnesses in Judea Samaria till the ends of the
earth. So they waited, they were baptized with the Holy Spirit and the apostle Peter preached the
gospel for the first time and there he tells us that on that day, 3,000 people came to know Christ.
Just the day of the opening. How would you like to have a business like that? You have your business
idea, you're in the process of implementing it, you open the business, 3,000 clients right there,
first day, nice, except that you're not prepared for that growth and it creates crisis and how do
we deal with so many people and that created a workload that required pillars, trustworthy
pillars that could support it. And then in the New Testament theology there, therefore, one of the
things that emerged is that there were two kinds of roles within the Christian community that
started taking shape. These were people that God had called to take the load and build and lead in
different ways. One of those pillars had to do with the aspect of governance and the other one had
to do with the aspect of execution. One is direction and where we're going with all of this,
with the church and the other one was how do we keep executing all these needs that need to happen.
And these two different pillars, whether it be governance or execution, became formalized in the
early church and there were very specific words that were used to describe these roles. Right here
in this slide, the Greek word, so actually you can see it, this is the original language in which the
New Testament was written. And in the aspect of the leaders that God was calling for governance,
there were three words that were used to describe the same group. One of the words was poiment.
Poiment was a shepherd, a shepherd that cares for the sheep. And the Greek word for pastor is that,
it's shepherd. In Spanish, pastor in Greek, pastor in Spanish is the same and you're able to
understand, oh a pastor is the person that takes care of the sheep. But in English you don't,
a pastor you don't call a shepherd, a pastor. So sometimes it's lost in translation but that's
the idea. Shepherds, people that would take care of the flock. The other word was episkopos.
Episcopos means overseer. People that could oversee the whole organization and make sure
that it's healthy, organizational health. And then the next word was presbuteros. Presbuteros
mean elders. These were mature, godly men that were seasoned faith servant. In fact,
Jesus is called a diaconos at some point. It's not just a word to describe an office but it's
like someone who serves is a servant, is a diaconos. And here that word became a word to
describe this function of this group of people that were just people that God was calling to
help in the execution of things. And therefore these two pillars developed at the beginning of
the church community. You have the elders that worked in organizational health, doctrinal
integrity and shepherding. And then you had the servants or the diaconos that worked in support,
mobilization, administration of all of these things. And that is what took shape at the
beginning of the ministry of the New Testament. These were the pillars that were established.
Now there's a lot to say about this topic but I cannot address all of it in this study but I can
lead you to some literature about it. If you have questions about this, there's a book that's
actually called 40 Questions about Elders and Deacons. And it's written to help you understand
what is the biblical teaching about it, what are the different views about, can women be
deacons or elders, what about the requirements, what about divorced people, what about this and
that. It's like it answers lots of questions. You may agree or not with it but at least it gives you
an answer. Look at that if you have questions. But go back to the study now. As we go back to the
book of Acts and understand how this emerged and how these pillars took shape and how the church
started building the kingdom, they face these three questions. The first one, do we have the
right structure? Because if they didn't have the right structure it will collapse. And the
beginning of how this worked was right there in Acts chapter 6. It says, in those days, at the
very beginning of the church, when the number of disciples was increasing, no joke, 3,000 people
in one day, the Hellenistic Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because
their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. Oh, it was a problem. As the
first Christians started growing, there were some widows that needed help with food and some other
people that lacked resources that needed help with food. Many of them had come to Jerusalem from
other parts of the empire during that time of Pentecost and the national celebrations. So there
were lots of people in Jerusalem at that time. And now you have all these Christians in this
community and they realize we need to help with food. Okay, let's start helping the people. But
there were two types of Jews in the early community. Jews like the Apostle Paul that says,
I'm a Hebrew of Hebrews. I'm the real pedigree. And then you had the, those were the Hebraic
Jews and then you had the Hellenistic Jews. These were Jews as well, but they were much more
influenced by the Greek culture. Maybe they spoke Hebrew with an accent, you know, their names was
not Ishmael. You know, they had Greek names and among that community, like it happens in many
other countries, sometimes there's like divisions, whether social divisions or ethnic divisions. So
it's like, you're not a real Jew like I am. It's like, yes, I am, you know, and they had all those
tensions. Well, those were coming up at the beginning of the church because the people that
were the Greek Jews, the Hellenistic Jews, said like, how come all those women, all those widows
have food first, but I don't have any yet. Oh, but look, it happens that all of them are Hebraic
Jews. Huh, I feel overlooked here. So they started having all those cultural tensions as well.
And distribution of food for all this large community is not a simple task. So the Apostles
get together, it says the 12 gather all the disciples together and said, guys, it would not
be right for us to neglect the minister of the word of God in order to wait on tables. It's like,
we don't have time to be doing all of that. I have a sermon to preach. And they started
realizing that the needs of the community and building the kingdom were expanding and they
could not do it all alone. They had to bring other people that will be servants devoted to God,
people that were trustworthy, that could join the work. So that's when they realized we don't have
the right structure. We need to do something about it. And they were right. I mean, this whole idea
of waiting on tables for the distribution of food is much more complex than it sounds. They need a
people that could do these things with cultural intelligence to address the cultural tensions
that were happening. Just think about it for a second. You have to find food for all these
people in a time in Jerusalem where everybody has shown up here in Jerusalem. It's like the
highest time of the year. And now you have to start thinking about financial management. How
are we going to afford this? Where will the money come from? Is it going to be donations? Or people
are paying for it? How much do we charge? What is the financial system here? Supply chain. Where
are we going to get the food from? Are we buying ingredients, cooking it ourselves? Is it already
made? Where do we get it from? Facilities. Where are we going to cook this thing? We need to cook
it. Where are we going to serve it? Teams. Who is going to serve it? Who is going to cook? Process.
How are we going to organize all these things, including schedules, to make sure that everybody
gets to eat? We don't have enough tables and chairs for everybody at once. Maybe we need to take
turns. How is this going to be? And then on top of that, do all of that with cultural intelligence.
CI. Oh, complicated, isn't it? And that's why the apostles say when they are assessing all of
this, it's like, we cannot do both. I want to have a heart attack in the middle. And good thing that
they realized that and they had the humility as leaders to say, we cannot do everything
ourselves. We need to trust others. Because not all leaders have that level of humility. They
want to do everything themselves. They want to control. So that's why they realized first, we
don't have the right structure. Let's build the right structure. And this is how the second
pillar of servants or diaconals was established. This was the first case ever. And therefore, the
second question they had to ask is like, do we have the right people? Who can do this? And that
is where they came up with this idea. Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are
known to be full of the spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them and
will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word. If we could find guys that have
intimacy with God, that love the Lord, that that are known to be spiritually mature, then we can
entrust that kind of pillar with this task. Because financial management, working with people,
you know, bad things can happen if you don't put the right people with the right heart. So the
word says that this proposal pleased the whole group and they chose Stephen, who became the
first martyr. This was the guy that was killed a few chapters later when the apostle Paul before
he became a Christian was standing there giving his approval. Stephen, one of the first martyrs,
here is where he was chosen. And it says Stephen was a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit,
a mature, solid pillar. But also they chose Procarus, Nicanor, Tymon, Parmenes, and Nicholas
from Antioch, a convert to Judaism. He was not even a Jew descended of Abraham. He became
converted to Judaism from being a Gentile. So now you have this group of people. And one of the
things that you notice as you are doing the study is their names. All of these names were
Hellenistic names, which means that they chose people that understood the tensions that were
happening. They understood the culture. They understood the nuances of how people perceive
things so they knew we can entrust this to them. It's like imagine for a second that I say, you
know, elders here at ESB, I'm feeling like I'm being misjudged because I come from, you know,
Latin America. I represent the Latin world, South America here in Asia. And you know, I feel like
I'm being overlooked. And the elders say, okay, don't worry, we'll establish a team to work with
you to make sure that you are well taken care of. So then we published the names and it says
Jose, Juan, Jorge, Carlos, Mario, you know. I said all those names are like Spanish names. Yeah,
exactly. That's what's happening here. If you are reading this list, you say, well, Stephen,
Philip, Prokary, you know, they were all Greek, Hellenistic people, Hellenistic Jews. So they
made sure they had the right people with the right experience, the right skills, the right
CI, cultural intelligence. But did you notice that was not the core requirements? The core
requirement was internal. How is your relationship with God? Do you have intimacy with the Holy
Spirit? Why? What's interesting is that this group, therefore, is entrusted with this role,
and they do it well. And the outcome of building the kingdom of the right pillars is that God can
keep building on it. And that's what we are told right here. They presented this man to the
apostles who prayed and laid their hands on them. So the word of God spread. The numbers of
disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to
the faith. Even the hard fish were the ones that were coming to know Christ. That was the
outcome of having the right pillars in place. Why is it so important that the right people are
defined not by just their skills and abilities, but by the inner life of being full of the Holy
Spirit and wisdom? Why? Because pillars that are designed to bear the load have one function.
They have to transfer the load they're supporting into the foundation. That's what a pillar like
that is designed for. It's not that it's just strong. It's that the energy it takes can pass
it down to the foundation. And whether you are leading a team in your company, in an NGO,
whether you're leading your children at home, whether you are leading a church ministry,
whatever role of influence that we have, if you are leading in any capacity, it will make a
complete difference whether your foundation is the Holy Spirit or your foundation is just you, from
a place of self-reliance. I'll tell you why. Because when you are leading in any capacity,
you will always experience circumstances and challenges that go beyond your experience or
your knowledge. You will require wisdom. What do I do in this situation with these things? How
do you connect the dots? You require wisdom. The Holy Spirit gives wisdom. The Bible says,
any one of you needs wisdom, ask God and he will give it to you. But if I'm not relying on the
Holy Spirit as my foundation and I rely on myself, I start freaking out and I just become reactive.
I'll just do this. I'll just do that. I don't pray. Why? I'm the man. I'm going to do it as I think.
But then you start leading from a place of being reactive. There are moments in which you will
need clarity for direction. Where do you take this place for this year, the next year? Do you wait
on some initial plans or you pursue them? Direction. The Holy Spirit will lead you into all truth.
He will direct you. But if the Holy Spirit is not my foundation and I'm my foundation,
then I want to make sure that I'm controlling. Because who ensures that this thing is going to
go the right way? Me. And who else? Me. Therefore, I become controlling. And the type of controlling
leaders that are micromanaging everything is a pain to work for. And then there are moments in
which you are going to face situations in which you require provision. Finding the right person
to join the team. Finding the right resources to be able to address the need that you have.
Well, the Holy Spirit is going to provide what you need. Jesus said, seek my kingdom first and
all these other things will be added unto you. But when I think that I depend on myself and only on
my resources, I start freaking out. And then money really matters. Because without money,
I can do nothing. Forget about in Christ I can do all things. No. Without money,
I can do nothing. So now I become greedy. And then plenty of times it will be mistreated,
misjudged, undervalued, underused, falsely accused. And then people hurt you. And when they hurt you,
you need to forgive because you don't want roots of bitterness in your heart and open yourself to
spiritual oppression. So it's like, where do I find the strength to forgive when I feel so hurt
and disappointed by people? Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the one that gives the fruit of love,
joy, patience, faithfulness, self-control. But if the only thing I have is me, I'll become bitter
and vindictive and manipulative. If my foundation is not intimacy with the Holy Spirit, I cannot
lead from a place that I call a place of flow. I'm just a channel for God to work through me.
Instead, I'm going to be leading from a place of lack of health. And the lack of health,
when I'm that kind of person that is reactive, controlling, greedy, bitter,
that building, no matter what you're building, will collapse. It's just a matter of time.
Because you cannot support the weight. Your marriage will collapse. Your home will collapse.
It's just a matter of time. Now, that's why you see that the priority of looking for people,
not just have the right experience and cultural intelligence, but they had the right foundation
was essential. And that became core in the kingdom of God. If we ever entrusted spiritual
leadership of any form to anybody, we needed to have people that were characterized by intimacy
with God. And it became codified in the New Testament. For these two pillars, in the case of
the elders and the servants, the deacons, this passage in 1 Timothy 3 is the one passage that
lists the requirements for both functions right there. And pay attention to it. I want to read
it to you so that you understand how the Bible emphasizes all of this. Here is a trustworthy
saying, whoever aspires to be an overseer, episkopos, one of these people that are in
the governance side of the church, whoever aspires to be an overseer desires a noble task.
And that's a good thing. But first you have to understand this. The overseer is to be
about reproach, faithful to his wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable,
able to teach, not given to drunkenness, not violent, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not
a lover of money. He must manage his own family well and see that his children obey him and
he must do so in a manner worthy of full respect. Because let's face it, if anyone does not
know how to manage his own family, how can he take care of God's church? He must not
be a recent convert or he may become conceited and fall under the same judgment as the devil.
Pride. He must also have a good reputation with outsiders so that he will not fall into
disgrace and into the devil's trap. In the same way, deacons, servants, diaconals are
to be worthy of respect, sincere, not indulging in much wine and not pursuing dishonest gain.
They must keep hold of the deep truths of the faith with a clear conscience. In the
same way, the women are to be worthy of respect, not malicious stalkers, but temperate and
trustworthy in everything. A deacon must be faithful to his wife and must manage his children
and his household well. Those who have served well gain an excellent standing and great
assurance in the faith in Christ Jesus. That is the list. Did you notice how much emphasis
is placed on the private life of the person, the inner life of the person? Because that
is where you see the person's true colors. So I have to ask you, are you seeking intimacy
with God? Or you have disassociated your role from your foundation? Because it is not uncommon
as we follow God that we say, yeah, I'm doing this for God, I'm serving God this and that.
While at the same time, in the same breath, you say, yeah, but I feel distant from God.
It's like, then why are you doing what you're doing? Your motive is going to be something
else, maybe fear, maybe shame, maybe trying to prove that you are worthy of God's love.
I have no idea. But if you are doing things for God while at the same time you feel distant
from God, then it's a matter of time before things collapse because what you need comes
from Him. And I learned the connection of all these things earlier in my marriage because,
as you know, the first year of marriage is a year of adaptation. For those couples that
are going through their first year of marriage and say, oh, everything is great, it's fun,
it's lovely, they're lying to you. Lots of adaptation on things and personalities and
how you do things and love covers a multitude of faults, right? But I remember that early
in our marriage, as I started pastoring the church, there were some Sunday mornings that
unexpectedly we had one of those interactions that's like, nyan, nyan, nyan, nyan, nyan,
kind of interaction. And it's like, you get to the church and not only you're attending
church, you are the preacher. And in those moments I realized that I felt like the phone
that is like on the red line, you know, the battery is just not full, like the computer
that goes like before the mouse moves, you know. I was just feeling like not fully there.
I was not in the zone. I'm right. Because the Bible says you cannot separate the two.
The health of your marriage has direct impact in the health of your leadership. And that's
not just for pastors. That's leadership, period. The health of your home affects the health
of your leadership. Because if your home, if your marriage is not in a good place, chances
are that you are not in a good place. Therefore when you try to lead outside, you cannot lead
from a place of flow. You have toxicity within you. Therefore it's a matter of time before
toxicity comes out in your leadership. That's why one of the things that we said in Dallas
and we put it in writing was, our first ministry is our family. Do you have intimacy with the
Holy Spirit? Can we see that in your marriage and in your home? If God is calling you to
be a pillar that he can trust, trustworthy servant, start paying attention to how you
are doing, not to what you are doing. And then you will see that if it's in that place, you
find healing and you encounter the Lord and now he starts transforming you from within,
everything that you need will be there, found in him, not in your smarts.
The third thing that they had to discover and ask was do we have the right accountability?
Because you know, the guy looked good on paper and the interview was awesome and the first
week was great. Until then the person was hired and now you cannot fire them so easily.
And now you start realizing that things are not as you thought they were. And what do
you do? Do we have the right accountability? They started wondering about these things
and they put them in place. Also, just like the requirements, they put in place what do
you do once you bring these kind of leaders into the church? How do you keep accountability
going? And this is what they wrote. The elders, the presbuteros now uses that other
word, remember I told you earlier in the study, the elders who direct the affairs of the church
well are worthy of double honor, especially those whose work is preaching and teaching.
If you have leaders that are leading the church well and on top of that they are teaching
the word, they are preaching the word well, then treat them well. Don't take it for granted.
Honor that. But then it says, for scripture says, do not muzzle an ox while it's treading
out the grain. That's a quotation from the law of Moses. And the worker deserves his
wages. And here the point he's making is you need to pay these people well. Because the
confusion at the beginning of the church is like, okay, what do we do? We need these pillars.
We need them to do this job. And they start doing the job. They're doing it well, but
it takes time. It's like, I cannot be working here and doing that at the same time. And
then they start realizing, okay, so what do we do? Do we pay them? Do we pay them a salary?
All that was at the very beginning of the church. They did not know. So as they started
coming up with this philosophy, they realized, yes, if these are people that are trustworthy
pillars, value those trustworthy pillars. But what happens when you see cracks? Ah, do not
entertain an accusation against an elder unless it is brought by two or three witnesses.
Because sometimes cracks will appear. And when you see a crack in the pillar, somebody
has to notice it and notify the authorities. So that can be addressed. Because if it is
not addressed, that pillar will collapse. And then the collateral damage happens. One
of the things that I will remember when I served in Dallas those years that attending
some of these legal conferences with accountants and lawyers to help nonprofit organizations,
that as I discovered through those sessions that one of the reports, the legal reports
that the lawyers will give for all the nonprofit organizations at churches, they will always
say these are the top legal cases that we had last year. And always without a fault,
typically the first top reason why churches will get sued was sexual immorality. And that's
just not there. You could say that could be the whole world. Lack of accountability. But
one of the things they said is like, remember the session where they were telling us, look,
if you're in a church or you have children's ministry, youth ministry, put cameras there.
Make sure we have the technology now. Protect your ministry. Cameras everywhere. Why? Two
reasons they said. First was because you protect your children. In that way something happens
is documented. But also you protect yourselves from false accusations. Like what? Yeah. They
explained to us, you know, some people go to churches and they say, oh, this nice building.
These people have money. And they will present false accusations with the goal of suing the
church and then getting money out of them. You have no camera. You have no proof. It's
your words against their word. And if you read the article from the New York Times last
week, you already believe the person. So there could be false accusations. That's why the
system is to make sure that we're looking at the information and protecting everybody.
Just look at the witnesses. And if it shows to be true, then those elders who are sinning,
you are to reprove before everyone so that the others may take warning. That's how you
do it. In that way, there's clarity. We don't play politics. Everything is transparent.
And that's what my friend experienced that day he went to his church. One day they had
to announce we had to let go of this person because this happened. Why do we do that?
Right here. That's why at the end of this section, the apostle Paul tells Timothy, Timothy,
this is so important. The integrity of the pillars in the kingdom is so important that
I'm going to ask you and I'm going to charge you in the sight of God and Christ Jesus and
the elect angels, keep these instructions without partiality and do nothing out of favoritism.
Don't look the other way. See the crack? Address it. Because accountability in the kingdom
matters. So I have to ask you, are you resisting accountability? There are two ways of resisting
accountability if you realize. The first one is like, I don't want to be accountable. I
don't like you telling me what you think. I don't want to do a 360 evaluation and have
all these people tell me what they think of me. I don't like that. So people resist accountability.
Or when somebody comes and criticizes them about something, it's like, who do you think
you are? They get defensive and attacking. It's like, oh, okay, I'm not going to say
anything then. The other way of resisting accountability is when I see something, it's
like, oh, it's going to be okay. Oh, it's not a big deal. Oh, I think I'm misinterpreting.
And they don't say anything. And then the news appear in the newspaper. And you knew
all along, we are responsible for ensuring the integrity of the pillars. Accountability
matters. So if you are in a place in which you are resisting accountability for yourself,
or you're overlooking things that should be addressed, think again. Because when there's
no accountability, it's a matter of time before collapse happens. And hear me right, it's
not that we do not trust the leaders. The person we don't trust is Satan. And Satan's
like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. So we have to have things in place
for accountability like that in the kingdom. This is what trustworthy servants, the pillars
of the kingdom look like. Are you a trustworthy servant? Can God build on you? Will you be
able to support that because you have the right foundation?
I would like to conclude the study then by telling you these couple of things. First,
these are common symptoms before the collapse. If these are your symptoms, pay attention
to it. The first one is stiffness. The resistance to change, the resistance to do anything differently.
There are times in which things need to change because we don't have the right structure
anymore. Like the kid that no longer has the right pants anymore because it has outgrown
them. So there are moments in which you will have to completely change. And if you are
stiff like this, it's like, no, I'm not moving. I'm doing it my way. Especially if you are
the founder of the organization. So this is my baby. Nobody's going to touch it. It's
just a matter of time and you will see collapse. First, by seeing your best leaders leave,
nobody can work with you anymore. Secondly, superficiality. When I am trying to serve
God, while I'm disconnected from God, you're not going to last. You're going to be burnt
out. You're going to be depressed. You won't be able to last. We cannot serve God as servants
devoted to God without that foundation. So superficiality, pay attention to it. And third,
compromise. If you are ignoring what the Bible says about requirements, if you are hiring
people for roles in your organization, in your church, in your ministries, and you are
not paying attention to this and you say, yeah, but the person has lots of experience.
Yeah, but the person has all these academic degrees. Yeah, but the person, yeah, that's
a matter of interpretation. You know, are you really overlooking this? This is where
the secret of stability is. So don't confuse academic credentials with spiritual power.
They're not the same. So if you see any of these signs where you are, pay attention to
them and make sure that there's no cracks that are appearing in your foundation, in
your pillar. And finally, how do you know if you're a trustworthy pillar? Three simple
things. I know I'm a trustworthy pillar, not because I think I'm trustworthy or not because
people say, hey, I like how you preach. No. The only reason I'm a trustworthy pillar is
because God says, I can trust this guy. That's what makes us trustworthy, right? Right. So
first thing, can God trust your heart? Does God know that you love him? Does God know
that you fear him? That even though you have opportunities to do the wrong thing, the first
thing that comes to mind is how could I do this against God? And what will be the impact
in the kingdom? This will damage the integrity of the kingdom and his reputation. How can
I do this? Are those the thoughts that God sees in your heart? Can God trust your heart?
If God cannot trust your heart, chances are that you're building your kingdom rather than
his. Secondly, can God trust your hands? Will you do what he has entrusted you with diligence?
And you're going to do it no matter what. You're going to do it well because you're
not doing it for people. Even though they disappoint you, even though you may feel misjudged
or not valued, it doesn't matter. God, I'm doing my best for you. Can he trust that?
And thirdly, can he trust your feet? You are following him after all, not the other way
around. So when he says, I need you to step up in this position, new calling, new role,
do this, are you going to go like, no, I'm too comfortable here. I don't really want
to do that. Or me, but who am I? I don't think I have what it takes. Can God trust that you
will step up when he's calling you? But also, can God trust that you will step down when
he's calling you? Even though it was your baby, your organization, your idea, and now
God says, your job is done, but you're not dead yet, but your job is done. You're not
retired yet, but your job is done. What will you do? Can God trust your feet? If God can't
trust your heart, your hands, and your feet, we have become trustworthy servants. And trustworthy
servants from the very beginning until today have never ceased to be the pillars of the
kingdom. If in this study, God reveal any cracks in your pillar, if he revealed to you
that it's time you pay attention to your marriage, to your family, if he reveals to you that
it's time to step down or step up, whatever the Lord is speaking to you, don't hesitate
for a second to follow him. That is always the best place to be. Father, we know that
all of us who are standing here in your presence, we are far from perfect. We don't always get
it right, but you did not call us to be perfect. You called us to be trustworthy. And even
when we fail, acknowledging how we failed, asking for forgiveness, shows trustworthiness.
Lord, even when we do not know what we've done right or not, and we realize it wasn't
the best decision, even acknowledging that we made a mistake shows trustworthiness. Lord,
you are calling us to be trustworthy servants. Build us up, heal the cracks, strengthen the
foundation because we know what it takes. We pray in the powerful name of Jesus. Amen.
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