All right, well I'm gonna ask you to take your Bible out and open it to Acts chapter six. Acts chapter six, and I'll read the first seven verses this morning. 

Now, at this time, while the disciples were increasing in number, a complaint arose on the part of the Hellenistic Jews against the native Hebrews, because their widows were being overlooked in the daily serving of food. So the twelve summoned the congregation of the disciples and said, it is not desirable for us to neglect the word of God in order to serve tables. Therefore, brethren, select from among you seven men of good reputation. full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we may put in charge of this task. But we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word. The statement found approval with the whole congregation, and they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit, and Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicholas, a proselyte from Antioch. And these they brought before the apostles, and after praying, they laid their hands on them. the word of God kept on spreading and the number of the disciples continued to increase greatly in Jerusalem and a great many of the priests were becoming obedient to the faith. 

This morning is a joyful event in the life of our church and a significant event in the life of our church as well. This morning we're installing two men to the office of deacon. So the deacons have asked for two men to help them, and we as a church have selected Joe O'Banion and Kyle Keeswether, and they were willing to serve. They said yes to the request, and we're thankful to them for that and for the willingness to serve. So Joe and Kyle are going to join David Overland, who's the chairman of the deacons, and Brad Ray as the deacons of Trinity Bible Church. And that is gonna allow Ken Perolis to step down from his many years of serving. I asked him how many years it's been, and we were trying to figure it out, but it's, he started when the church got its start, and so that's something like 45 years ago. So Ken's been serving well as a deacon for about 45 years. He's served well, he's finished well, even through a difficult time. towards the end, so we wanna say thank you as a church to Ken, and as you see Ken, you might wanna just tell him thank you for serving us as a church in that way. 

So this morning is a charge to Joe and, where's Joe? Yes, there he is, and to Kyle. To Joe and Kyle from this passage. So we're gonna look at what the task is of being a deacon, and then second, what reward to expect. from serving well. So that's my outline. It's just a two point outline. But both of those are really intended as reasons for Joe and Kyle to pay attention to their own soul. as they serve, to nourish their own soul with the word of God, to live closely to the Lord, to walk by his spirit, to walk in obedience to the Lord, to grow, to remove any hindrance, to give their life fully to the Lord as they serve. So although it's a charge to Joe and to Kyle, I think, I hope there'll be plenty for all of us to take to heart about that as well. 

OK, so first, what the task is, what the task is of serving as a deacon. And here's what I want to say for my first point. The task is leadership. Joe and Kyle, your task of serving as a deacon involves leadership. And this is one bad way to look at deacons. is that deacons serve in the church so that others don't have to. So you look at some task that needs to be done, say, well, I'm not gonna do that, because that's what we have deacons for. The deacons are gonna serve in that way, in that task. Certainly deacons are involved in serving. We're all involved in serving as members of the church. But the deacon's task specifically involves leading others, and probably especially in serving, It involves leading others in serving. 

So not all churches, even in our circles, are deacons considered part of leadership or involved in decision-making for the church, but at Trinity, deacons have always been considered part of the leadership. subordinate to the elders. The elders are overseers of everything that happens at the church. But the deacons are part of the leadership and part of the decision making for the church. 

So I take that from this passage and I think the reason our church is that way is also from this passage that we're gonna look at this morning in Acts chapter six. But these seven men were given, notice, a leadership task. They were given a task that involved leadership here. And there was a problem that arose in the church at this time, quite a difficult problem. 

At this time, the church was only in Jerusalem. So there's only one church in the world at this point, as you open Acts chapter six and it's in Jerusalem. And the members of the church are only Jewish people. If there's any Gentiles at the church at this time, they're like Nicholas, who's mentioned as one of the seven, who's a proselyte from Antioch. So that means before he got saved, before he became a Christian, he had totally converted to becoming Jewish. He was a proselyte in that sense. So it's all Jews. They weren't seeing the gospel spreading to Gentiles at this point. It was Jewish Christians who were in the church. 

And there's a, Difficulty that arose between the Hellenists and the Hebrews, and that might make you think that they're not all Jewish, but they are here, the Hellenistic Jews and the native Hebrews is the way my translation puts it. I think that distinction was not so much a language distinction, you know, when the apostles wrote to any church they wrote in Greek and everybody could understand it. So I think it really has more to do with a cultural difference. The Hellenistic Jews were Jews who had adopted more of the Greek culture and the Greek ways of life. Probably it's something that you'd be able to see at a glance, just in the way that the people dressed, the way that they presented. There were ones that more had adopted Greek ways, and there were ones that had more stayed faithful to Jewish ways. Both of them had gotten saved when the gospel had gone out and spread in Jerusalem. 

So the Hellenistic Jews were looked down on by the Hebrew Jews, as they're called here, for being sort of assimilated Jews, Jews who were kind of on their way out of Judaism and assimilating with the Gentiles. Maybe in a generation, they wouldn't expect it to be remembered that they were Jewish at all. They got saved too, but that same attitude, looking down on them, somehow seeped into the church as well. It's a worldly attitude. It was an attitude from outside the church, but it somehow got inside the church as well, and brought about the attitude in the church, well, these Hellenistic Jews, their widows are probably not worth the time and energy and resources to take care of them. Perhaps they're not quite serious enough anyway. And so that showed up in the neglect of the widows from the daily serving of food. So they all belong to the church. They were all saved. And so the apostles saw this problem and said, we need to solve this. It was a problem that would take time. It was a big job to solve this problem of this oversight of the Hellenistic widows in the church.

The church at this time, the last marker for how many people were in the church was 5,000, and then it was growing since then, so it was larger than 5,000. So it was a job that needed to be done, but it was not to distract the apostles from their main task of leadership, which was prayer and the ministry of the word. So the apostles asked the congregation to appoint seven men from the congregation, and the apostles thought that's what it would take to solve this problem, is seven men working on it.

The congregation wisely chose all seven, probably all seven Hellenistic Jews. And why do I say that? Well, their names are Greek names. Their parents gave them not good Hebrew names, but they gave them Greek names like Stephen and Philip and the other five that are mentioned here. And so you could see why they would be chosen for this task. But more than that, they were spiritually qualified for the task. And so the apostles said to the congregation, therefore, brethren, select from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Spirit and of wisdom that we may put in charge of this task. And so those are the spiritual qualifications, a good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and full of wisdom.

These seven men did a good job. because the church that was divided at the beginning of our passage, and a complaint arising, and perhaps even threatening to tear the church further apart, it's put behind them at the end of the chapter. The Word of God now, it's back on track, and the Word of God is spreading, and the number of disciples continuing to increase greatly in Jerusalem, and even some of the priests of Jerusalem becoming obedient to the faith, and so they were able to put this problem behind them.

Now let me say this about this passage. There are no deacons in this passage, and there are no elders in this passage as well. There's apostles that are leading the church in Jerusalem, 12 of them, and there's seven men appointed to a task. They're not called deacons here, although the word deacon is used. It's used for what they're doing. In verse one, it calls the ministry of people distributing of food, and that's the word for deacons. And then it says, the apostles say, it's not desirable for us to neglect the word of God in order to serve, to minister, and that's the word deacons as well, in order as to serve tables.

So it seems to, although there's no elders and there's no deacons, it seems to fit the pattern. that's later given to the elders and the deacons and fit the rationale for why there's two kinds of leaders in the church. That God has ordained that there be elders and there be deacons. No other rationale is given except for this one, where the apostle says it's not good for us to spend our time serving tables and be distracted from the ministry of the word and prayer is our main responsibility. And so that seems to be the rationale for why there's elders in the church and why there's deacons as well.

So you might say these seven men are just appointed to a task. They're just given a mission here, but you might say they're proto-deacons, and that the apostles here serving in the church in Jerusalem as leaders are proto-elders. I know we've understood this passage this way in the past, because this is why we nominate deacons with a vote from the congregation. That's the way these men were nominated for this task. The apostles asked the congregation to choose the seven men themselves, and so that's why we do it that way.

Elders, we appoint a little differently. Elders appoint elders, and that also goes back to Acts and how Paul appointed elders in each church as well. So the apostles appointed these seven men to this task, not because they looked at the task to be done and said, well, this isn't a leadership role. That's why we're not gonna be involved in it. No, they said it is a leadership role. The church needs leadership for this problem, but it's too heavy of a burden for us, and so we're gonna appoint men to help us in this role of leadership.

For the apostles, the most important part of their leadership, as they say, is prayer and the ministry of the word. And so the apostles were to be occupying themselves, for the most part, with the word of God, and how it applies. They were to be occupying themselves with how to teach the Word of God to the people. First of all, how to teach the Word of God, how to apply it to their own souls. And then how to apply it to others as well. And so they wanted to occupy their time with the ministry of the Word, with meditating on the Word, with studying the Word of God, considering how it applied to their own souls, how it applies to the souls of others, and that involved prayer.

And so it's very similar to what we've been studying in Timothy, what he exhorts. Timothy, until I come, he says to Timothy, this is to be your main task. Give attention to the public reading of scripture, to exhortation and to teaching. And then he says, give your attention also to growth of yourself. of applying the Word of God in your ministry and applying it to yourself as well, being an example of the things that the Word of God requires. He says that, Timothy, take pains with these things. Be absorbed in them so that your progress will be evident to all. Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching. Persevere in these things, for as you do this, you will ensure salvation both for yourselves and for those who hear you.

And so that's what the apostles wanted to be their main task. And so they see a part of the leadership task that's growing too heavy. for them, and they asked for these seven men to come up and relieve part of the leadership burden. But it is a leadership burden that they're asking for help in. They didn't look at this task and say, the problem is we just need more hands to ladle the food to the people in need. Sometimes that's what's needed, and there's nothing wrong with that. That's important to have that, to have sometimes just hands on deck that are willing to serve in that way.

But that's not what this was. This was a thorny problem. This was the thorniest problem that the church had at this time. This was a hard knot to untie for the church. This was a people problem. There were hurt feelings that arose from this problem of a certain kind of Christian's widows being neglected in the church while the other ones were attended to. There were misunderstandings, I'm sure, that made the problem as bad as it was even worse and threatening to become worse and threatening to become a rift to the church. And so this is a problem that required the right amount of delicacy, to solve, and firmness to solve it, say this is the way we're going to go, and love for all. Leadership in the church is to be done in love. And so it required love both for the overlooked and for those that were doing the overlooking as well to solve this. And so it required a certain wisdom for them to say, okay, we're We're not going to unravel this any further. We know what the problem is, and now we're just going to move forward for this.

And so these men were to tackle this problem, and that's why they needed these qualifications. These are qualifications that a leader needs, someone with a good reputation that the people are going to be willing to follow, full of the spirit and of wisdom. for a difficult problem, for being involved in a leadership problem, and the people chose men that had these characteristics. It certainly is what it says about Stephen, he's a man full of faith. trusting the Lord and of the Spirit as well.

And so these men aren't deacons, but in 1 Timothy, when the requirements for deacons are given, they're similar. They're requirements that are appropriate for somebody who's in leadership. And so they are requirements such as, we've had 1 Timothy chapter three, deacons must be men of dignity. not double tongued, or addicted to much wine, or fond of sordid game, but holding to the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. These men must first be tested, and then let them serve as deacons if they are above reproach. Their wives, likewise, must be dignified, not malicious gossips, but temperate, faithful in all things. Deacons must be husbands of one wife, good managers of their children, and of their own households. And so these are qualifications of steadiness, of holiness, of leadership.

And so the deacons are to be involved and conduct themselves in this way while they're in office because they're leaders, because they're sharing in the leadership of the church. So these men were appointed. to be on the same team as the elders, as the apostles, I should say, I'm swishing back and forth, but it's apostles here in the church in Jerusalem, and these seven men were to be on the leader, they were to be involved in leadership. Along with them, they're delegated in order to lighten the load of leadership, and the apostles, when they appointed them, when the men were appointed, they didn't watch over their shoulder. They didn't say, we want you to do this task and here's exactly how we want you to do it. They delegated it. They gave it to these men and they trusted them. The apostles were to oversee the church, and so I'm sure they would have stepped in if these men hadn't solved the problem, but they didn't need to. They could simply trust them to take care of this problem.

So the seven men appointed, were to lighten the task and participate in the task of leadership. That's why they laid their hands on them in front of the congregation as they're to operate as extensions of the leaders. So Joe and Kyle, your task is leadership. Your task involves leadership, and that's why you're to be the kind of man that people at the church can follow. In that way, you're to apply yourself to being that sort of man and then taking responsibilities for others as well as you have opportunity. The Bible shows a great deal of interest in human leadership. The Bible talks a lot about human leadership in a number of different realms, the church, for sure, the family, for sure, and even government, where God has established different realms of human leadership.

Do you remember Moses? was the leader of the children of Israel coming out of Egypt, and the load was too much for him to bear. So he had a reunion with his father-in-law. Remember, we're coming up to this in our Bible reading for the year. Moses judged the people and he heard their cases from dawn till dusk. And his father-in-law looked at him and he said, this isn't good. This isn't good for you and it's not good for the people. You're gonna wear yourself out and you're gonna wear out the people as well. And so he told him, let me read what he told him to do. Exodus 18 and verse 21 and 22.

"'You shall select out of all the people able men "'who fear God, men of truth, "'those who hate dishonest gain, "'and you shall place them as leaders of thousands, "'of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens. "'Let them judge the peoples at all times, "'and let it be that every major dispute "'they will bring to you, but every minor dispute, "'they themselves will judge. "'So it will be easier for you, "'and they will bear the burden with you.'"

So he gave him good advice, and it's interesting, later in Deuteronomy, when Moses is recounting the Lord's faithfulness to the people, he brings this up. This wasn't just a minor thing. He brings this up as part of the Lord's faithfulness to the children of Israel, is that the Lord, through Moses' father-in-law, gave him this good advice about sharing the leadership of the children of Israel.

So why is the Bible so interested in leadership? You've been interested in making sure that the burden of leadership isn't too great, that it doesn't fall on someone that they're not able to keep up with it. Well, in answer to that question, I'm reminded of Del Tackett's ministry with us. I hope you're still pondering a number of the things that he gave us when he was here. I am, and I hope you're putting it into practice as well. But he talked about fruitfulness, fruitfulness, and how fruitfulness God has designed happens in deep relationship with people. And he pointed out, I thought, pretty memorably how even all creation, God has built reminders into this, and the way that plants are fruitful, or animals are fruitful, or people are fruitful as well. None are fruitful alone. or fruitful in relationship with others. It's even how a child is born into the world and how that sort of fruitfulness happens.

So here's my point. The Lord is interested in leadership, how leadership works and telling us how leadership works because he's interested in fruitfulness. He's interested in fruitfulness. He's interested that you and all of his people live a fruitful life. 

And in order to be fruitful, You have to be in relationship with others. In order to be fruitful, you need to be part of a church. You need to be a part of a church that's united, that loves one another, that knows one another. And so in order to accomplish this, any group, in order for any group to pull in the same direction, you need leadership. You need leadership. And the leaders need to have the right measure of authority. The Lord gives the right measure of authority to provide leadership to each of these groups for the sake of unity. 

So in the church in Jerusalem. Here comes a threat to unity with this oversight of some of the widows in the church. It's a threat to the love that the people have for one another. There's some sin involved, at least in attitudes of it. There's confusion involved. And so now everyone maybe has a different idea of how this is to be solved. how a solution is to be put in place. And even in that, there's potential for more trouble. 

And so it needs leaders to step in to say, okay, here's the way we're gonna solve it. Here's the way we're all gonna be on the same page in solving this issue of the widows all being attended to. Even if it's not the best idea that is thought of, it should be a good idea that comes from the leaders. And so now everyone is on board with the program that the leaders are implementing here. And it's adequate to solve the problem.

So leaders are... Involved in this, leaders are provided for the church because fruitfulness is at stake. Fruitfulness is at stake in the church. And what kind of fruitfulness? Well, I mean, the fruitfulness of a life lived as a pleasing sacrifice to the Lord. Or the fruitfulness of the church being a shining light as a witness for Christ to the world. We're able to present our lives as an offering to the Lord that's pleasing in His sight together with others by what we learn from one another. We're able to be a witness to the world around us together with others, and so leadership is needed.

So Joe and Kyle, you might even be asking, well, why did people choose me? Why did people vote for me to be a deacon in the church? But don't underestimate the help you can be as leaders in the church. The Lord has provided you as leaders in the church. As part of the charge to you, let me say this, to remember your task is to protect the ministry of the word. Your task is to protect the ministry of the word in a number of different ways. One is just taking on leadership tasks that free the elders to focus on teaching and to focus on prayer. And in that way, you're serving to protect the ministry of the word in that way. Second, you're serving to protect the ministry of the word, to make sure that the ministry of the word that is the church is accompanied by a powerful testimony of the church itself functioning together well in unity and in love. So when an obstacle comes, like an obstacle came in this church, a thorny issue that's threatening to to become bigger, that you're able to take responsibility, take the authority that you have that's appropriate to the difficulty in order to remove the difficulty. For that, you need wisdom. You need wisdom. You need love for the people.

For the seven that were chosen for this task, it involved them being attentive to the needs of the forgotten. or the overlooked in the congregation. And so you need that as well to be able to see in that way. The Lord Jesus had a way of seeing that kind of person, the person who's forgotten, the person who's overlooked, like some of these widows at the church. The Lord had a way of seeing not just the kind of person that any church would love to have, but seeing the lame and the beggar and the outcast, the widow, he was able to see the two mites that the widow put in and see that she put in actually more than everyone else had because of the attitude of her heart. So there's those who may not have a home anywhere else, but have a home in the church. And for this, the seven men had a task of seeing to their needs as well and providing leadership in that way. And so they were to be full of the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit who's just like the Lord Jesus and who's able to see in that way. 

So you are to serve. the ministry of the word in relieving the burden for the elders so the elders can pay special attention to the teaching of the word. To help make sure that the teaching of the word that the church is involved in is accompanied by a testimony. of a church in unity, a church loving one another, a church attending to the needs of one another as well. 

And so in order to protect the ministry of the Word in that way, you must apply God's Word to your own life. You must be growing in his word. You must give yourself to his word. You must abide in his word. And in that way, follow the same example of the apostles who here were paying special attention in order not to neglect the word of God and even how the word of God applies to their own hearts as well. 

So the apostles were doing that. in order especially to be involved in public teaching. Deacons are not necessarily involved in public teaching, although they can be. Joe gave us a great message from Revelation just this morning. So he's involved in the public teaching. But you certainly should be applying the word to your own self, to your own life, because that's the task of a leader. And it's the task of leadership in part that falls to you. 

So they were serving the word of God in their leadership to the point that in verse seven, when the author of Acts, Luke, he's indicating that the problem has been taken care of and the church is able to move on, he puts it in this way, the word of God kept on spreading. And the number of the disciples continued to increase greatly in Jerusalem. He puts it in an interesting way. The Word of God is back on track because these men are serving. They've removed an obstacle to the free ministry of the Word of God. 

And so your task, Joe, your task, Kyle, is to be involved in protecting and promoting the ministry of the Word of God. So my charge to Joe and Kyle from this paragraph first has to do with what the task is, and I've been emphasizing it's a task. It involves serving, but it involves leadership as well, and that's clear from this passage. 

Secondly, part of my charge to you is what reward to expect from serving well, or what result to expect from serving well. And so there's a reward from serving well. And I'm just gonna emphasize part of the reward, because I think there's an eternal reward that comes from serving well. The Lord is really lavish in the rewards that He bestows on us. He doesn't owe us anything. He's saved us, He's given us everything that we are, but He loves to also reward us as well. And it's sort of grace upon grace. 

So this is part of the reward or the result for serving well. If you serve well as a deacon, Expect to grow. Expect to grow and expect to advance the church in surprising ways. There's a promise about that. We've had it recently, because we've been going through 1 Timothy. 1 Timothy chapter three and verse 13 says, for those who have served well as deacons, okay, so it's those who've not just served as deacons, but have served well as deacons, and here's the promise for them. For those who have served well as deacons, they obtain for themselves a high standing and great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus. The word that's a high standing, we talked about that, a step. you might say a foothold, that's really what the word means, and great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus.

So if you serve well as a deacon, it's gonna boost your faith, it's gonna boost your confidence in Christ Jesus, and it's gonna be an implement of growth for yourself, and that's what's promised to those who serve as deacons. And I think the men that served here, these seven men, in this passage in Acts are a really good illustration and a good proof of this promise that's given to those who serve well as deacons.

They served well in this task. They were just given one task. They served well in this task, and it proved to be sort of a breakthrough for them, at least the ones that we know about. And there's only two that we really know more about, and that's Stephen. and Philip, the first two that are mentioned. And serving well in this task seemed to be kind of a breakthrough for them. It seemed like a light kind of went on for both of them.

And so for the next two and a half chapters of Acts, it talks about two of these seven men and how they're involved in evangelism. Verse eight, Stephen, was full of grace and power. And so he began public ministry. It says in verse 10, they were unable to cope with the wisdom and the spirit with which he was speaking. And that's one of the reasons why he was chosen for this task, because he was full of the spirit and he was full of wisdom.

And so he applied those things to this task. He served well in this task inside the church. And then it's as if these characteristics got turned outward. So now he's spreading the word to unbelievers, and they're not able to cope with his wisdom applied. It's the same thing, but it's applied in a different way, and the spirit with which he is speaking. And so in his outreach in Jerusalem, and Stephen only witnessed in Jerusalem, he started sort of outpacing the apostles based on the confidence he'd gained from serving well in this way.

And then through his martyrdom, the church spread out, and Philip. a second of these seven men was sort of leading the charge in that way as well. And that's in chapter eight. Philip went down to the city of Samaria and began proclaiming Christ to them. Verse eight, and there was much rejoicing in that city. And so he's part of a revival. He leads a revival in Samaria as well.

So if you serve well as a deacon, expect to grow. in surprising ways. I'm not sure Stephen and Philip could have pictured themselves doing this, getting ahead of the apostles in spreading the gospel, but there was a confidence they gained from serving the Lord in this task and from serving well, and it ended up being directed outwards as well. So expect to grow if you serve well as a deacon, and expect it to advance the church, to help the church in surprising ways as well.

The church in the book of Acts was given a mission, and it's given in chapter one in verse eight. You shall be my witnesses. It's a three-part mission in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria. and to the uttermost part of the earth. And at this point, the church was only in Jerusalem. They'd only tackled the first part of that task. They were doing well in it. They were growing in it. They were kind of comfortable. The temple itself in Jerusalem was a good place for them to do evangelism. There doesn't seem to have been a thought of tackling the rest of that mission, of spreading it to Samaria and to Judea as well. There didn't seem to be a plan for that and maybe even not courage among the people to the idea of, okay, this is going to go outside of Jerusalem. It's going to extend beyond this one place.

There was confidence that was brought about from the people from Stephen's confidence and from Stephen dying a martyr's death in Jerusalem. His martyr's death that came about because of the confidence that he, that the Holy Spirit gave him in part through serving well in this way inspired others. And so they were forced to flee Jerusalem and they fled in that same confidence. that Stephen had, and so chapter eight, verse four, after Stephen's martyrdom, therefore those who had been scattered went about preaching the word.

They went about doing the same thing that Stephen did. A martyr's death can open some doors that can't be opened in any other way. So this was an unintended consequence of all this. The apostles, when they saw this problem, all they had in their mind was just solving this one problem. They appointed these seven men, they served well, and it actually advanced the church. to doing something that the church was meant to do, but really hadn't even started yet, which was evangelizing not only in Jerusalem, but Judea and Samaria.

And then Philip was one of those on the cutting edge of doing this, of being spread out. from Jerusalem, forced to flee, and yet preaching with confidence. So he went to Samaria, and there was a revival that took place in Samaria, and then the Lord gave him another special assignment in what is today the Gaza Strip, and he preached to a Gentile, the Ethiopian eunuch, and that was the beginning of something else.

The apostles had to catch up. to what these seven men were doing in the way that the church was being advanced and literally catch up to them. And even that third step of the gospel being preached to the remotest part of the earth in some ways was set in motion by these seven men being faithful in this task because Saul was present at Stephen's martyrdom.

So Stephen gains great confidence from serving well in this one task. and then does things that surprise even himself that no one had planned and that advance the church in surprising ways as well. So all this is a testimony that God was at work in the church with great power in such a way that the church in Jerusalem, even in something that they were acting unchristian, you know, they're overlooking, they're overlooking widows in the serving of food, And that sent the church not into a tailspin, not into a death spiral, not to say, well, they've dropped the ball in this and now the Lord's done with them.

But instead, it became an opportunity. It was dealt with in a godly way. The leadership stepped in. They enlisted the people, the people got behind it, they appointed these seven men to solve this problem, the seven men served well. And it turned out to advance the church in ways that they never imagined after they were appointed for this task. So it's an indication the Lord was working all things together for good in this church. And God is at work in the same way in this church as well. He's at work in your lives, Joe, and Kyle as well, so that even something that looks like a potential for a setback, he uses it for good. He uses it to advance godliness in your own life, and then uses it to advance the church as well.

The seven men didn't plan to advance the church in this way, or even see it. No one could plan to advance the church in this way in advance. But they did plan on being near to the Lord, on walking closely with Him, walking in obedience to His ways, continuing in what qualified them for the task in the first place, being men of good reputation, men who are full of the Holy Spirit and full of faith and full of wisdom.

Ian Bounds, he's written a classic on prayer and he says this, it's quoted off and it's worth quoting. Men are looking for better methods, God is looking for better men. And so this is what you're to focus on. Not methods, not plans, because the Lord's going to use you in unexpected ways, but seeking to draw near to the Lord. That was the qualification for these men in the first place.

The apostles didn't say to the congregation, choose from among yourselves. Seven men who have the most brilliant idea for how to solve this problem that's come to us about the widows. No, he says choose seven men who are walking closely with the Lord. Choose seven men who are full of the Holy Spirit. Choose seven men who have a good reputation for following the Lord. And that's the kind of man that the Lord uses to advance his church even in ways that are not foreseen and unexpected.

So my charge to you, Joe and Kyle, is just simply to remain faithful, to remain faithful to the Lord, and even to remain faithful under pressure. Stephen didn't foresee the way in which he would help the church, neither did Philip. They probably didn't foresee the pressure that was gonna come to them as well, and they were to continue faithful even under pressure.

So expect to advance the church in surprising ways, expect to grow in surprising ways as you serve, as you take pains to give yourself fully in every way to drawing near to the Lord in your heart, to drawing near to his word, to abiding in his word, to abiding in him in prayer. to living a life of obedient devotion to him. That's where the power comes for serving in this task and even beyond as the Lord uses that service.

So Joe and Kyle, may the Lord bless you as you serve the church in this new role as deacons. as leaders and may he make you an instrument of blessing in ways that we can't even foresee. And let me commit you to the Lord just by reading finally this verse, Ephesians chapter three and verse 20 and 21.

Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever, amen.

All right, at this time, I'm gonna ask the elders to come forward. And then I'm gonna ask Joe and Kyle to come forward as well, and we'll pray and lay hands on you as you are appointed to this office.

Kelly. Have you all stand in front here.

Dear Father, we thank you for your presence with us. We thank you that you go with us. We thank you that you've promised to build your church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. We thank you that you provide leaders for the church, and we take that as a sign of your favor towards us. We pray for Joe, pray for Kyle, pray that you would cause them to be adequate for this task, not in themselves, but by the power of your Holy Spirit. We pray that you'd help them to draw near to you as they serve. We pray that you would help them to serve well, that you'd encourage them, that they would serve well, even in adversity, even in difficult times, that they might serve in this way that might honor you and might bring blessing to the church. It's in Jesus' name that we pray these things, amen.