Giving Careful Instruction

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“The Lord’s servant must not quarrel, instead he must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful.” 2 Tim. 2:24

“You must teach what’s in accordance with sound teaching. Teach the older men to be temperate, worthy of respect, self-controlled, sound in faith, in love and in endurance. Likewise, teach the older women to be reverent in the way they live, not to be slanderers, addicted to much wine, but to teach what is good.” Titus 2:1-3

“Teach the slaves to be subject to their masters in everything, to try to please them, not to talk back to them.” Titus 2:9

“These, then, are the things you should teach. Encourage and rebuke with all authority. Do not let anyone despise you.” Titus 2:15

“In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again.” Hebrews 5:12

Paul referred to himself in 1 Timothy 2 and also in 2 Timothy 1 as being an apostle and a herald and a teacher. He looked at himself as being a teacher, and you can see clearly in the book of Romans how he patiently laid out issues. At great painstaking effort he went into teaching. Not just exhorting, not just admonishing, not just rebuking, but painstaking efforts in the process of teaching and laying the groundwork in people’s lives.

Man does not live by bread alone. There has to be a process and a commitment in our hearts, just as there would be for our children, to teach God’s lambs and to not let them starve out of negligence or out of some spiritual way of looking at things that just would wait until something happens and then just spring out with a couple of sentences and then drop it at that point.

Now, having said that, let me say something that I’m not trying to accomplish by getting together like this. Something sterile, something plastic, something academic, is obviously not the goal. We’ve come too far to go back and turn God’s House and God’s Family into some sort of sterile classroom environment where people are elevating themselves to some position of academia --professor or whatever, to become “the teacher.” Jesus said clearly to call no man teacher. You’re all brothers.

In that sense what I want to stimulate us towards is a commitment to love people, and a commitment to the patience of understanding God’s counsel, and then being able to patiently lead people through God’s counsel on a day-to-day basis, whether corporately or individually. What I’m not inspiring or stimulating you or me to do is to somehow substitute for life a process of some sterile academic pursuit of flipcharts, slideshows, or overhead projector sort of gimmicks. I’m saying to be aware that God’s people need “careful instruction.” Careful instruction was what Paul told Timothy that God’s people needed. Careful instruction. Patient, thorough instruction.

I can think of people that are a part of the assembly of believers here that need some careful instruction. They’re a little careless, a little bit slipshod. There is maybe not a lot of depth there yet as there could be if there was a commitment to say, “Hey, let’s sit down. Let’s walk through this teaching of God, this concept that God has in terms of character or understanding of His ways or His will.” But to have careful instruction, patient endurance in the process of instructing God’s people. Making sure that all of God’s people have a steady diet of the word of God in a reasonable way. Not just exhortation, not just admonishment, not just a prophetic blast, but reasonable, thorough instruction in God’s ways and God’s mind and heart. There is a responsibility that we have.

Now, as this might demonstrate itself in a gathering at some point in time, I think having been stimulated to this and called to move forward in all of these things, I would think that there would be more people, yourselves or others, putting more effort into -- out of the discipline of heart and mind and a love for others -- more effort into bringing forth the word of God in a way that is thorough and comprehensive and not just a blast, or a shot, or word of exhortation.

In a corporate setting, I would like to think that this will result, if you all are taking this seriously, in far more frequency of you all handling correctly the word of God as workmen. As those that desire to be approved by God and desire to thoroughly equip God’s people for every good work, that you will be workmen correctly handling God’s word and approving yourself as a good, wholesome workman of faith.

Again, some sort of sterile environment of just blasting out with, “Okay, boys and girls, sit at my feet while I teach you.” I’m not really talking about that at all. But if I can paint a picture for you, maybe you can understand better how this could express itself in a corporate gathering. If you all are thinking of yourselves as workmen that desire to feed God’s flock as well as feed yourselves...if you are thinking of yourselves as responsible for making sure that, since man doesn’t live by bread alone, that as those that have some measure of responsibility in God’s house -- you will help God’s lambs find green pastures.

You’re going to take that responsibility yourself to help God’s people find green pastures rather than just view yourself as one blip in the middle of a mob. You’re going to take responsibility to help in that matter. Remember we read if your gift is service, serve. If your gift is teaching, teach. There’s an encouragement from both Paul and Peter to make sure that we’re pressing forward in those things that God has entrusted to us. We all ought to be teachers by now.

In a corporate gathering, if someone brings up some particular issue of life, something they’re struggling with or dealing with or whatever, some particular song that we sing sparked something and your life has been such, as you view yourself as one that needs to correctly handle the word of God, and needs to invest in others and absorb into your own bones that commission to go and to teach and to prepare God’s people for works of service.

In Acts 6 it says that we must devote ourselves to prayer and service with the Word. Do you view yourself as one needing to devote yourself to prayer and to devote yourself to serving with the Word? That’s a very practical thing. If you view yourself as one that’s called by God, and one dedicated to God and to His people to help God’s people not suffer from malnutrition...if you view yourself that way, and as you spend time with God and are devoted to prayer and to service with the word, you’re going to find yourself in those corporate gatherings where there will be a passage of scripture that you have been mining for the truths of God with a view not only to yourself, but also with a view towards helping God’s people. You’ll find yourself much more equipped, much more ready, instant in season and out of season to proclaim and help God’s people.

In the past, instead of “this song reminds me of this song,” or “this song reminds me of something that happened to me today,” it’ll be, “this song reminds me of this passage in 1 Timothy 3. Let’s go through it, line by line. Let’s talk about it.” That’s been lacking. We’ve been motivated, we’ve been stirred to bring an exhortation. “This is working inside of me, and I exhort you to follow the ways of God in this area.” Exhortation. These things in corporate gatherings have stirred us to bring a song or a poem that we’ve written or a song that we’ve been singing today - these things have stirred us and there’s been a dynamic and a chain of events that have happened in corporate gatherings of things that have been stirred within us. That’s the flow of a corporate gathering is a stirring, stirring, stirring.