A Heart-to-Heart with Elim Bible Chapel
I have chosen to take a week off this morning from our 1 Samuel study, as we had a good discussion at our last elders’ meeting. And I asked the men, and they agreed that it would be good to share some of these things we talked about with you. And you know that we recently went to the Basics Conference a few weeks ago in Cleveland at Alistair Begg’s church. And along the way this morning, I want to give you some thoughts that we learned from that time, that tie in with our discussion while they are still fresh in my minds, from such men at the conference as Alistair Begg, Willie Philip, and Richard Pratt. And we thought it would be good to hear from the heart of your elders, as well as some of the things that I will share from the conference, which you will find, as we did, very challenging. Often, before an elders’ meeting, Larry will send out a question to come and be ready to answer when we arrive. And the question that Larry sent out was: What do you believe to be the greatest weakness at Elim? Now my quick response would have been the Bears, Zac’s 2-pitch baseball team. When we first received the list of teams, I sent a note to Zac and said, I don’t want to be rude or anything, but your team doesn’t look very good. They are actually a very women-led team, so we have renamed them the “egalitarian team,” as it will take some true heart change to turn that team around.
Seriously, What do you believe to be the greatest weakness at Elim? Firstly, I wish to say that we as elders spend considerable time praying for and having a concern for the body here. And this brings both a burden and a great joy, as there are times when it is difficult to hear of maybe failures within the body, and it is difficult to hear when people are hurting within the body. But that is also part of the joy of being an elder, that even those difficult things and then of course the times of rejoicing make the closeness we enjoy here such a blessing. I have shared a little on Sunday nights of the church that my son leads in South Cambridge. My son Aaron is pastor of a church called Restoration Church. It is a church plant from Temple Baptist in Cambridge likely around four years ago. In fact, Kelton Christopher, who is Nigel’s and Janelle’s brother is an elder there, and he and his wife Amber, are a great blessing to Aaron and that church. And Aaron and I along with Nikki have some great discussions as they are a very similar size of church to us at Elim, and similar as they too are a very young ministry, in fact, likely younger than us. But we both so much appreciate the closeness that comes with this size of church. Over the course of the four years as Aaron’s church has grown and Aaron has often said to me, Dad when we get too much bigger, we will need to split as he enjoys so much the closeness of that size of ministry.
I have been working towards my doctorate and am in the middle of getting an official approval for my final project, which I will probably share with you at some point soon. And the project must have an integral connection to the ministry here, something that we can work through as a congregation that also works for my doctorate but also is a blessing and a need to this congregation. And in one of our discussion boards the other day I was asked about Elim by a couple of students. And I am pretty quick to brag about Elim, as it is a great church, as I love being here. And I said there are many strengths at Elim. It is true there are many, but there are two that stand out to me, maybe we could say unique.
Fellowship
That our closeness with each other allows us to be quite involved with each other. And that presents for all of us such a great opportunity. To hang around here. To be an integral part of the community here. The stay-for-lunches, the fellowship times, the services, and the studies. And that is both a great privilege but also a great challenge, as this is a wonderful body of people that is great to be part of . At the conference Richard Pratt gave some challenges in this area, he said:
“If you want to be a servant of Jesus Christ, you are going to have to stop maximizing your personal freedom.”
Richard Pratt, Basics Conference ’25
He said that being part of a church fellowship should be done voluntarily, gladly, and willingly. Giving up personal freedoms for the sake of others. For he asked where would one be without the servanthood of Christ? And that the Apostle Paul gave up his whole life for the sake of the church. The second thing that I said to them was the simple …
- Christ-centred Ministry
That the focus is not on a lot of hype and that the church is not quick to embrace a lot of programs. But the focus is more on the essentials and that is Christ and His Word. I also wrote this about Elim:
The church has strong leadership and a great depth among our women. A complementary style ministry is taught, and the women fill that role tremendously well and look to the men for leadership both in the church and in their homes. This has encouraged a great spirit within the church. The closeness of the congregation is also a strength as most within the church are well connected with each other and have a sincere concern for the well-being, both physically and spiritually, of one another. The children have a good relationship with the adults and most of the adults know the children well. Much fellowship goes on both in and outside of the church. There is also great harmony within the ministry, as theologically the church is quite united and generally has the same goals and desires for the ministry, their families, and the community. Finally, the church is very friendly and is extremely gifted at welcoming new people. There are many families who have been at the church only for a few years, yet they have been embraced by the entire congregation and there is no division among them.
I laughed when I received a comment back from my teacher. Just a good reminder to be careful that I am not misunderstood when I write. I had written the blessing of “deep spiritual women” here. And he responded, “Who are these deep spiritual women?” And then said, “Don’t you have any deep spiritual men?” And I am thinking, well, of course we do! He likely thought we had prophetesses running around or something! I should have told him we have Cheryl the greater and Cheryl the lesser here! And then he would have said, oh okay, now I understand. Seriously, it is hard not to be thankful for the elders I work with here at Elim, and the service of the deacons. There is so much harmony among leadership which can never be overstated. And do not overlook the great blessing of knowing each other’s families. Both the deep spiritual things and just the things that we might enjoy in each other.
I found an example of this with my own grandkids. On June 6th we are going to see a piano concert by Aaron and Nikki’s three girls. And I asked Audrey, who is eight, the youngest, “What are you playing Audrey? And she answered some concerto #something. So, we have this deep piano solo. Wow there Miss Padre! And then I asked the oldest Claire, who is elevan, “What are you playing?” Amazing Grace. And I said, good for you Claire. Did you pick that out? And she said, yep. All right Miss Wonderful! And then I asked their middle girl Rose, who is nine, “What are you playing?” Singing in the Rain. And I said, way to go Hotsy-Totsy! It’s all good isn’t it! That fellowship with each other and that simple Christ-centred ministry.
Alistair Begg said that within the church it is possible to catch a glimpse of that future reality of the blessedness of the people of God in heaven, as the authentic local church contains the DNA of a re-made world. Certainly not perfect, as he added that God’s new society may not be in glorious technicolour. Maybe we are still a little fuzzy or in 12” black-and-white, but a blessing and glorious nonetheless. And something that I would always want to be a part. D. A. Carson wrote this:
“The church is not made up of natural friends, but natural enemies. What binds us together is not common education, common race, common income level, common politics, common nationality, common jobs, or anything of the sort. Christians come together not because they are from a natural coalition but because they have been saved by Jesus Christ, in this light they are a band of enemies, who love one another for Jesus’ sake.”
- A. Carson
So, we come together this morning, all different, yet so much to be thankful for the blessing of each other. But the questioned was still asked, What is the greatest weakness at Elim? And I would suggest that as each of us answered this question, we may not have answered the greatest weakness, but a weakness that may be on our radar of each elder individually. There are five of us as elders and we have five weaknesses listed. I thought I could give you a test after to see if you might be able to match the concern given with which elder. Weakness #1
- Prayer
We spoke about the weakness of prayer. This is not a weakness in comparison to maybe other churches, though it could be. But we discussed the need to make prayer a greater focus of the overall ministry. It is important that a vital part of all our ministries include prayer. This is definitely a focus on Sunday evenings, as after our Bible study and some discussion time we spend time in prayer. We hope to be more “prayerful” in the morning service, that prayer might be more specific and particular spiritual needs within the congregation. And of course, this needs to be a focus in our men’s, women’s, and teens and children’s ministries. And of course, this extends into our families, where we pray as families and individually. I am convinced that persistent prayer is vital, that specific needs should be persistently prayed for. And through this, God is always faithful to answer. Not always how we may like, but always clear. I can share that as a personal experience in my own life. Prayer … Weakness #2
- Evangelism
The need to be evangelistic in all our ministries. And we have been discussing of late about a plan starting in the fall with possibly some training in this area. To reach those we work alongside us and who live beside us, anyone that the Lord has placed in our lives that is outside of Christ. Now we did add that within this weakness, there are some challenges, firstly, because of our location. As many of you work a fair distance from the church and some who you might ask someone to come to church or a men’s or ladies’ study, who may live forty-five minutes or more away from the church, and that makes it hard for them to make a commitment here at Elim. And this is not an excuse as we need to share the gospel to people whether they come to Elim or not, but it does create a greater challenge for us.
And secondly, this “spreading out” of us, also, creates the challenge of having a united community spirit. In other words, the thought of reaching out to Arkona is not on everyone’s radar and understandably, as you all have a heart for many of your own neighbourhoods and cities. I remember when we did some evangelistic outreach in Chatham, it was something that united us, as likely ninety percent of us lived in Chatham. That is not the case here. I think back to youth ministry. We had so many high schoolers who became part of our youth group because of the outreach of our teens. But they were all for the most part from Chatham and a vast majority of them went to the same high school. It made it much easier.
I also believe there is a third challenge and that is the changing culture. In the eyes of the culture, churches were generally “friendly” places. But we can actually be viewed as evil today in the eyes of the culture, as we may be looked upon with suspicion anymore. And that is not a fault, it is just the way it is, as society has done a good job in minimalizing and devaluing the church.
The Apostle Paul said in Romans 1 that he was not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes. Paul went on to say that he was “eager” to share the gospel. But Richard Pratt said that because of the climate of our culture we may no longer be “eager” but better word to describe us is “hesitant.” And we understand this, and we know this and will need to think about how we can best reach those where we live and work, whether they are able to come to Elim, or may get involved in a good church somewhere else. A phrase that I learned as a young Dad is one that I often will say to you and was used many times by Pastor Rick Baker in Chatham, and that is the goal of every Christian in all situations is to make our great God look good. So, we need to address this more coming in the fall. Evangelism. Weakness #3
- Faith in Jesus
This weakness hits at the core of our relationship with Christ. And it cuts right to the heart of every part of our lives. That each and every thing that comes into our lives is tempered with a level of trust. And this trust issue ties in with our witness to our families and those we rub shoulders with. Alistair Begg said that we need to cast our lack of trust to the Lord, on other words, our anxieties. He said we need to be humble enough to admit that we are not in control. And especially when the younger culture today is growing up with no Creator God, no absolute reality, and no absolute morality, which makes for a culture that more than any time needs to see believers who have a strong faith in Christ. One of our elders said that our joy must be attached to God, not to our circumstances. And this means the circumstances of our families, workplace, our economic situation, church life, political arena, health and well-being.
We are not overly political here at Elim. True, sometimes I might make a few comments about the government, but that is not that we do not care about or consider the climate of our culture. But essentially, the degree we minister to each other, the degree that we love the Lord, the degree of our ministry effectiveness is not and should not be dependent upon what our government says or who our government is. As I am convinced that the spiritual zeal of this church or our overall spiritual success does not require a change in a particular government. It requires a heart commitment of you and me, God’s people. We see this throughout the Bible. That the people of God made great strides both is times of good government and poor government. Certainly, the early church did not depend upon a change of Roman government before they started doing great things for the Lord.
We have been studying Revelation on Sunday evenings, and if we are understanding correctly there will be a great spread of the gospel at a time when there is massive persecution on the church. And not that we would desire persecution to the degree we see it in the Tribulation, but a change is government policies, which we should care about as they often lead to the goodwill of society or the downfall of society. But changes in government policy or changes in society are not what should motivate you and me in serving Christ. Nor would it necessarily determine our effectiveness, to sense or believe that this is somehow a less effective way for God to revive His church. I said the other week that God does not need our lies to do what He will do, just as He does not need a particular society to do what He will do. As no government, no issue, no policy, no society—can stop you and me from taking great spiritual steps in our lives, nor can stop God from performing His purposes. Trusting in Jesus. Weakness #4
- Our Understanding of God
I guess this could be both a strength and a weakness of Elim, as Elim in its simplistic nature has a great focus on God and His Word. And I would say that generally, there is a great hunger for God’s Word here. I often think that I would not last too long if you were not hungry for the Word, as you would have had me put out a while ago. But what we talked about regarding our understanding of God is a better grasp of what God does and what God has done. And much of this we learn through the study of the whole of God’s Word. In other words, if our focus is only on those attributes of God that are appealing to us, His love, His compassion, His patience and long-suffering, His grace, then we are going to have a one-sided view of God.
As we have been going through our 1 Samuel study, we see some things about God that are part of His overall character. We are seeing similar things in our Revelation study. That though Satan and the Antichrist will have their way, their permission to do what they do, though evil, is all within the parameters of God’s sovereignty. We have seen that in our church read especially as we have been reading through Joshua and Judges. We see where God will command the people of Israel to wipe out nations including men, women, and children. And admittedly, this runs against the grain of the culture we have grown up in. But what does this type of command teach us about God? When God says to Israel, take out all these people. What does this teach us about God? That God has every right to prolong life and take life. We know this about God, but we do not always see this as we read the Bible or look at the world. We know verses like Psalm 139:16:
“Your eyes have seen my unshaped substance;
And in Your book all of them were written
The days that were formed for me,
When as yet there was not one of them.”
Psalm 139:16 (LSB)
It is God who has determined our days. Job 14 says that:
“Since his days are determined,
The number of his months is with You;
And his limits You have set so that he cannot pass.”
Job 14:5 (LSB)
Either these verses are true or they are not. And we see this all the time that the Lord may choose to take from us a grandfather, a Mom, a child, and even the unborn. And that God may commission Israel to be His sword to do this, should not shock us and think that this is some kind of strange behaviour for God. God had every right to life, as He does this every moment of every day. This is God’s right, not ours. This is why abortion is so wrong. This is why euthanasia is so appalling. Because the pride of man is trying to take the place of God by pretending that he has this right that only God has. And God has every right to take a life as He is the only Giver of life.
And another question might come, how does God have the right to eternally condemn someone in the end? Because He does. And as Willie Philip reminded us that God will have ample proof in the end of the evil nature of mankind. Therefore, a deeper understanding of God will help us view the world not only as Ken Hamm says with our biblical glasses on, but it will enable us to view the world with our God-understanding glasses. Not that we will be able to explain everything, but it will enable us to go a long way in seeing the world from a truer perspective only as we are willing to study the whole of Scripture. And as we understand God better it enables us to better trust Him. And trust what God has done in the past and will do today and in the future. As Alistair Begg said that the end point of the world is not in question because the end is the fulfillment of the purposes of God. We have little excuse not to study our Bibles. Not that we would become intellectually smart only, but that our hearts would be more in tune with God’s and our understanding of God. Finally, weakness #5
- Example of Leadership
We asked ourselves as leaders, “Are we a weakness?” At the conference Alistair Begg reminded us that a church will never rise above its leaders. In other words, the church will never advance beyond its leadership. So, this places a great emphasis on leadership, and rightly so. I would pose the same challenge to us as parents. The necessity to be a strong example before our children, as talk is cheap, but strong faith and character are vital. In John MacArthur’s Book on Leadership, he said this:
“A leader is not someone who is consumed with his own success and his own best interests. A true leader is someone who demonstrates to everyone around him that their interests are what occupy his heart. A real leader will work hard to make everyone around him successful. His passion is to help make the people under his leadership flourish. That is why a true leader must have the heart of a servant.”
John MacArthur. The Book on Leadership 12
“Therefore, I exhort the elders among you, as your fellow elder and witness of the sufferings of Christ, and a partaker also of the glory that is to be revealed, shepherd the flock of God among you, overseeing not under compulsion, but willingly, according to God; and not for dishonest gain, but with eagerness; nor yet as lording it over those allotted to you, but being examples to the flock.”
1 Peter 5:1-3 (LSB)
Well, you may have thought of other weaknesses, but these were the ones on the hearts of your elders. After our discussion, one of our elders said that we have a really good thing going here at Elim. And that is a comment, not out of pride, but out of gratefulness for what the Lord has allowed us to be part of. But we also understand that we always need to strive forward and allow us to grow spiritually as the Spirit of God leads us.
Let’s pray. Lord, we come before you as a church family desiring that you might use us for Your glory. Lord, would You instill in us a greater desire for prayer, a greater need for prayer. That coming before You would become urgent and natural and always necessary. Lord, that we might learn well to be evangelists—Christ-proclaimers. That our speech about You might become natural for us before others. Help us as we endeavour to strengthen this within the body here, and as we live our lives to make our great God look good. Lord, give us a deeper faith, that no matter our situation, no matter what government leads us, no matter our culture, we would follow Christ as He is our Lord, always. Lord, give us a greater understanding of You. That as we read the Bible and view our world, we would be quick to say, ah, there is our God! That we would see Your character shining through all things. And Lord, may we as leaders here at Elim be filled with Your Spirit, that we might grow to better lead this people. And that each of us here at Elim would grow to better influence those whom are under our care.
Therefore, may we devote ourselves to teaching and the fellowship of the saints, the breaking of bread and to prayer. Might we as the household of God be a pillar and a buttress of truth, though we do not all have the same function, may we be one body. For we are citizens and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles with Christ as the cornerstone. So, let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works. Not neglecting to meet together and encouraging one another and all the more as we see the final days coming. And all God’s people said, amen.