 I don't think it's a small thing for you to entrust yourself because that's what you do, you entrust yourself to a pastor, to, for you to entrust yourself to follow behind someone who is leading. Paul makes a statement he says to imitate me or follow me as I follow Christ. And so there's got to be something or someone that you're looking at to kind of emulate Christ, try to emulate who you're following after. And the problem is today, we look around and we see pastors today who just don't seem to be following after Christ. They seem to be following after themselves. And so sometimes you all have seen, you've noticed some questions where people ask, maybe in Q and A or just any other time about how do you know if it's the right time to leave? How do you know if I should leave my church? My pastor said this, things like that. And so the question is, well, how do I know if I should leave my pastor? If I should find another church? Well, someone says, do we need a pastor? Well, yeah, you do, you do. That is now what he's supposed to do and what they are or are not doing might be the issue. Scripturally speaking, he gives us, the Lord gives us, pastors gives us leaders to do a couple of things. And we wanna look at what one, what the role is, the qualifications and so forth and what they just should not be doing. And some of you all are gonna wonder, well, is it time for me to move my membership? Well, Corey, is church membership required? No, that is obviously that's a new thing. But by that we mean by people that know that you are part of the family. And by knowing you're part of the family, we know that you're gonna be part of what we're doing. We can count on each other. We are a fellowship. That means that you are tied into staying. But I just said that, hey, we are together and we can know you. I need to know what's going on with you. You need to know what's going on with me. You can pray with me, I can pray with you. So we can get to do things in a corporate fashion. Amen. And so sometimes though, we might actually end up skewing a good pastor from a perfect pastor. Meaning you're not gonna have that perfect pastor. You're not gonna have the pastor who's not gonna make a mistake and not gonna do some things wrong. And so let's just, I wanna be clear about that. There are some things though that you need to look out for. As a matter of fact, if these things are happening, at least five things, at least five things, maybe more, that you should look out for. And if these things are present, you need to leave. There are some other things that you also might wanna just kind of take note and just use that as a sign to be cautious about because there are some things that could be happening. Yeah, let me just watch that a little bit further. I wanna pull up a passage. I wanna pull up a passage. And this is Matthew chapter 20. You remember, you recall guys when Jesus is making a statement. He's telling them that the Son of Man is about to be delivered to the chief priests and scribes and he is going to be killed. Well, these wonderful apostles that we have, what do we see? They decide, you know what? Here is a wonderful opportunity. Here's my shot. Here's my chance. Here's my goal. I mean, here's where I can reach my goals. What do they start doing? Prompted by the mother, but still it's in their heart as well. The mother of the sons of Zebedee came with Jesus and said, can you just give my kids a spot? Can you look out after my boys? One on the right and one on the left. And he says, you don't know what you're asking for. The problem is though the others get this, they get wind of this and they get upset. The Bible says they became indignant with the two brothers, but Jesus called them and said, and here it is, you know that the rulers of the Gentiles lorded over them and their great men exercised authority over them. So he's saying, I don't want you to be like that. That's not for you. He says, it is not this way among you, but whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant. Whoever wishes to be first among you shall be your slave. Just as a son of man did not come to be served but came to give his life as a ransom for many. And Holy's whole point is your lives are no longer yours. The pastor's life is no longer his. No, obviously his first alleges is to the Lord himself. And then after that his family and then to the body. And so he cannot be about himself. Unfortunately, don't we see that though? We see pastors today who are just more about themselves. They are more about their brand. If you have, if you have a pastor, yeah, I can't, I'm not your pastor. If you have a pastor that is more focused on themselves, more focused on promoting themselves, more focused on their brand, more focused on how they look, more focused on going to this conference, that conference. The pastor's always out of town or going, remember he's a shepherd. Where we get this term is for pastor is from the word shepherd which is point point may now, which is to shepherd. And what does the Bible say? The Bible says that you ought to guard the flock that was entrusted to you that he's made you overseer of to shepherd the church of God which he purchased with his own blood. And you treated like it was your blood as well. You treated, you treated just that, just that carefully. But you've got a pastor out there who want to promote themselves. And it is Bob, Bob Smith. Sorry if your name is Bob Smith. I'm just thinking of a basic name, not that Bob or Smith is basic, not saying that. But Bob Smith is a pastor. You go into the church and Bob Smith's face is everywhere. You can't get a program, Bob Smith's face on the program, Bob Smith's face is on the walls. Bob, if you're old fashioned church, you got the old fashioned fans, dog on it, Bob Smith's face is on the fan, making yourself cooler. Bob Smith is everywhere. He's got Bob Smith ministries. Not something that does anything wrong with having your name in ministries, but everything is Bob Smith. Well, wow, amazing. We don't see that as a pattern in scripture. I don't have a problem with you having Bob Smith ministries, but make sure you are clear that Bob Smith is serving. I think we've turned minister into a way up, a come up, rather than being what it really is, a servant. That's what the word means to serve. And so every time you turn around, it's about Bob. It's about Bob this, Bob that. And I don't have a problem with there being even a church anniversary the pastor's anniversary, the pastor's and wife's wedding anniversary and a pastor's four month anniversary and all get all these different anniversaries. Well, okay. I don't have a problem with you honoring him. I don't have something wrong with that. But sometimes we go overboard and I can promise you this, the more you pat a pastor on the back, the more he wants to be patted on the back. I'm telling you what I know, the more you give somebody accolades, it becomes harder for him to resist that. That means that you shouldn't. I'm not saying you should, but you want to find out that your pastor, you want to know that your pastor is humble, that he's not looking to have his own, to start his own. And you even know so when you start seeing him lining up junior and his kids and his grandkids, everyone to, these are the guys that are next in line. That's a telltale sign. And so if your pastor is someone that is promoting his brand, it's time to leave. If your pastor is out, I don't have a problem with your pastor writing you a book, nothing wrong with that at all. But he wants to go on a book tour. If your pastor is, you know what he wants to be in the record studio. He's out there trying to cut a demo. He's trying, it might be time to get another pastor. If your pastor wants to go on the preaching Chitlin circuits, which is he wants to go over here, here, here, here, here and here to preach everywhere. It might be time to get, I don't have a problem with your pastor going somewhere else. But if that's all he's doing, we got a problem. We have a huge problem. Why? Because what is a pastor supposed to do? The pastor is supposed to, he's not supposed to be great. That's not his job. He's supposed to be a shepherd. I didn't make sure I am. What about the meeting Greek? Nothing wrong with pastor doing that. As a matter of fact, a pastor, what a pastor should do after service or anytime he can go out and meet the people. There's nothing wrong with the pastor having a large flock as well because again, we see that in the Bible, but he needs to be able to have something set up to where he can take care of the flock. We'll get to that in just a second, but he cannot be out after his own. Notice what Jesus says. He says, it is not this way among you, but whomever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant. You want someone that wants to be, that want to be great. You want someone who, if they're great, they're great because they got there not seeking it, but it just came to be. And so you just don't want that. You don't want the one that's self seeking. Why Paul says so that we should not be out seeking our own. As a matter of fact, as a matter of fact, one of my favorite passages, 1 Corinthians 10 31, whether you eat or drink, whatever you do, do it all to the glory of God. Look what he says, not giving offense either to the Jews or to the Greeks or to the church of God, just as I also please all men and all things, not compromise, that's what he's talking about, but not seeking my own prophet, but the prophet of the many so that many will be saved. That's the goal. Now someone brought up an interesting point. He says, that's why there needs to be a plurality of elders if at all possible. Sometimes it's not always possible. The Bible doesn't say that you have to have a plurality of elders or you should have a senior pastor. Sometimes certain situations dictate that. Why, how do I say that? Because in some places, let's say if you're in a small community, you usually don't have enough people to have a plurality of elders. And what ends up happening, this is another thing you ought to do. This isn't one of the lists, but sometimes churches, pastors are guilty of looking for other people to bring on in positions and just throwing any and everybody in that position. If you're a man and you've got good church attendance, well, I think you ought to be in ministry. No, he's just doing his job just because he's doing what he's supposed to do, which is showing up. Doesn't mean that he's qualified. There should be some qualifications. Huh, isn't that something? There should actually be some qualifications. And what if we actually determine that the pastor, now you can't always determine but you can determine who you'll sit up under that the pastor should be someone who qualifies, who meets the qualifications. Well, what are the qualifications? That is a good question. Ladge asks, the Bible tells us in 1 Timothy 3. Let's go to 1 Timothy 3 and we can see what the qualifications are. The qualifications are. Now, by the way, it's you desiring to do so. No one is coming knocking on your door. Hey, I need you to put your hands up and come over here and start preaching. No, no one's forcing you to become a pastor. He says, if you desire to do that work, you desire a great job. It's a noble task. And overseer must then be above reproach. Okay, stop. Now, by the way, these are all non-negotiable. These are all non-negotiable. It doesn't mean that you have to have been this way all your life. Doesn't mean that the pastor could not have had a past because that means we couldn't have a pastor. It means this is the right now. Right now, this is how you ought to be. This is the life that you ought to be living. And he starts off by saying he then must be above reproach. Oh, what does that mean? That means that he is not blamed or blame worthy of certain things. You're this, you're this, you're this, you're this, you're this, well, again, he must be above reproach. Now, does that mean that he can't have anyone that will say anything negative about him? No, because again, who are you gonna find? There's always gonna be something that somebody can say, but in this regard, how are you viewed by the people? Now, notice how he's gonna kind of blanket this or kind of sandwich this between a good reproach. This is amongst the brethren, amongst the churchgoers. But then also he must have a good reputation outside the church. In other words, he's gotta be well thought of or thought of well by the folks inside the church and the people outside the church. Otherwise, how do you follow a person that you think is just a crummy person? You can't, I'll cover that. By the way, I will take questions from you guys as we go. So I'll cover that, he's explaining about a pastor who got divorced while pastoring. Okay, I'll pull that up, I'll cover that as well. Then he must be the husband of one wife. Good timing, the husband of one wife. Now, what this doesn't say, matter of fact, let me address Scorched Earth 824 right now. Explain a pastor who got divorced while pastoring. Now, here is the rule, here's how this pastor's taken. And some churches may see it differently. The husband of one wife, this refers to not necessarily the person that's been divorced. This refers to someone that has one wife at the moment. Because at that time, that's what you had. You had people that had multiple wives or wives and concubines. And so you couldn't be that because what was initially the goal, the standard from God? That for this cause, a man shall leave his mother and father and the two shall be joined and become one. Man and woman now, man and woman, I know we're getting, we have men marrying men and we've got some pastors, sad to say, we've got some pastors who are men who are married to other men. And I know in the eyes of us and God, that's not a legitimate marriage, but Lord help us. But does he have to be married? That is a good question. Does he have to be married? No, he didn't have to be married. If that were the case, then you would see other elders in the Bible who are not married, not being elders. We don't know that Timothy has a wife. The Bible didn't say. We know Paul is an elder and Paul does not have a wife. Peter does have a wife. We know that because she was sick. Well, she wasn't sick, I'm sorry. His wife's mother was sick. And so the Bible doesn't say he has to have a wife. But if he does have a wife, he can only have one. Now, what if he was divorced during being a pastor? Well, that person needs to sit down and it might disqualify that person forever. It might not. The things that disqualify you for the moment might not disqualify you forever. There's no such thing as once disqualify for always disqualify, but the issue is though, if you are, well, no, hold on a minute, since Paul was not a pastor, Paul wasn't overseer. Paul was an elder without question, just like Peter was. Peter himself says that he was an elder. So yeah, the point of an elder or a presbyterian shepherd is what Paul and what Peter and the rest of them think. Now, and they follow the same rules. They follow the same guidance. The issue about someone back to this issue of divorce, if he gets divorced, he's got to sit down. He's got to step aside. He has got to deal with the issues that cause why. Well, first of all, as we see it, and we'll go to real, we'll just jump ahead real quick and move down. He says in verse five, but if a man does not know how to manage his own household, how will he take care of that church of God? Well, getting divorced means you're not managing your household. Does that mean he can't have a fight or an argument? Sure he can have it. Listen, he can have a fight or he is going to have a fight and an argument with his wife. I don't mean a fist fight. No, no, no. If he's hitting her, he's got to go. If he's hitting her, he has got to go. Now me, I tried that little deal with my wife this morning, I was messing with her. You know the thing I played about, Jamal Bryant, I'm still the man. Yeah, she got a kick out of it for a little bit, just for a little bit. After a while, she said you could turn it off. So you're going to have times where you're going to go back and forth with the wife. That is going to happen. There are times where you upset and bother with yourself. So naturally you're going to be upset and bothered with her and vice versa. But it's how you manage that and how you show love for that. And when you mess up, how does he go back and fix that and so forth? Or how does he give her space to fix her mess ups? So there are going to be those issues, but they have to be walking together as one, as the whole notion starts off, the two becomes one. So therefore, he and his wife have to be on the same court and there cannot be confusion in that household. Now when kids leave, that's different. Because someone's going to ask, well, what about if the pastor has a child who is outside the house on their own and they're doing certain things? Well, that's different. The Bible is speaking about just managing the household. So it's not as clear about everything that we would like it to be, but continuing, let's go back to what these qualifications are. The husband of one wife, temperate. Someone that's just lashing out at people in prone to anger and outbursts and so forth, where it goes to also pugnaceous and so forth. If you can't be even killed and temperate, no. Why? Because you're going to come into contact with members who might kind of get you off your game. And so you need to be that way. You're not guaranteed to get only good sheep if you're the shepherd. No, some, guess what sheep tend to be? Sheep tend to be a little bit wayward. There's a natural tendency for them to kind of go over here, go over there. And so therefore, that pastor's got to be able to handle that. He must be prudent. He must be, again, respectable, not that he is perfect, the words is not used there, hospitable, inviting. You call up the pastor, what do you want? I ain't got time for you. Think about Jesus, how when Jesus, he's constantly being approached, constantly being, and how did he handle it? If Jesus was not the definition of hospitable, I don't know what the definition of it is. And he would deal with that to the point to where he would have to sometimes just kind of get away off by himself and just pray and relax. Jesus is in the boat sleeping. Oh, he's a man at this point in time. He gets tired. Jesus was allowed to get tired and to sleep in his incarnate state. And so, but the reason why he's tired, the reason why he's getting away, because he's putting time and effort into the lives of these people, he's being an example. And we're gonna come into that in just a second. But here's the one, able to teach. Ladies and gentlemen, let me move to the next part. I said, number one, if he cannot, if your pastor is about his brand, about seeking himself and so forth, and is about saying the next time that he's gonna be over here preaching and the next, it's always about him and always about, hey, can I get more money and so forth? Those are red flags, big red flags. But secondly, after promoting himself, the next one is, can't teach. You mean tell me, you can't teach. When you see preachers, and we've seen it over and over and over and over again where someone comes out and says something, that 85% of Jesus's life was out of order, or when God was speaking to Adam, Adam didn't have a body, or the one pastor says that Jesus was after his resurrection, he was never called the only begotten of God, but you and I are the only, are also begotten of God, begotten sons. We're only begotten sons. They say things like that, if your pastor is constantly saying things that are not scriptural, leave. You need to leave. There is no, there should be no tolerance of a pastor who cannot teach. Again, it's a qualification. The problem is we see men, and now women, and we'll do with that in a second as well, but we see men who get up and they rely on a gimmick, either stage props or they wanna preach a certain way. If you're, let me just say this also, if your pastor wants to preach a way that he doesn't talk, you might wanna consider that. You might wanna consider that. He talks like this normally, but then when he gets behind the mic, he wants to put on airs. That's a little, the guys has been hypocritical. That's the word hypocrite or hypocrite, it's an actor. You don't want your pastor on stage acting. You want your pastor to be able to disseminate the word as clearly and concisely as possible. He didn't have to do backflips and cartwheels and be catapulted in from the back of the pew and back of the sanctuary to the front. He didn't need all that. If he cannot give you the word of God and cause you to want the word of God, Houston, we got a problem. He says, like newborn babes, long for the pure milk of the word so that by it you may grow in respect of salvation. Boy, his job is to want you to desire it more and more. His job is to want you to, I want more of this. I like what you said. I appreciate that. That was awesome. Now, he's not trying to be profound enough with the preachers who only want to be profound. They want to say something deep. No, if your pastor's trying to be deep, get rid of them. Well, I'm sorry, you can't, you get lost. You move, you kick rocks. Hey guys, love you, but this ain't working. It's not you, it's me. I just need more. I don't want to go and sit in a classroom full of teenagers. After a while, all right, you know it's time to go. Have you done that lately? Have you just been around a bunch of teenagers? Love teenagers, I got one down the hall. Love teenagers to death. But to sit around them and listen to them, after a while, no, I need something a little bit more. And if you're, you should not like just infantile stuff. You should not like things that, you know what, I'm past this, I'm past this. He's got to be able to teach. And if he can, if he's got to go and make up things, if he's got to stretch the bounds of reality to get you to see the scriptures, we got a problem. I don't have a problem with him using analogies. Nothing wrong with that at all. That nothing wrong with them using stories. But if he can't teach, if he can't break down the word, if he can't go into what this word is, what it means. If you're a pastor, I'm not saying this as an example. I mean, if he does this, then leave. But I'm saying as an example, as an example. Let's, have you ever heard someone say, and you all have, I'm pretty sure, where they'll say there's a difference between the Ramah word and the Lagos? I mean, let me put it on, let me, uh-oh. Doggone it, let me, I gotta fix my buttons over here. But have you ever seen a pastor do that where they'll say there's a difference between the Ramah word and the Lagos? Where's this thing at? Where is this? I'm looking for this deal, guys. You don't know what I'm looking for, but I'm trying to fix something on my own computer. But have you all seen that before? There's the Lagos word, and then you need a Ramah word, right? Have you all, have you all seen that? Well, ladies and gentlemen, that's not biblical. I'm pretty sure you all seen that though, where someone says that there's that, no. And you know why they say that? Because they don't know the word. They've heard someone else say it, and so, but the Ramah word is no different, as far as the Greek is concerned, no different between the Lagos. And we say it as far as the Greek is concerned, because guess what? It's a Greek word. Ramah is a Greek word. Ramah says someone speaking, the person that's speaking, or Lagos is just a word. Now, they can be used to mean something, but the words and everything so aren't all that different. Then also, how about if a person wants to say, there's a big difference between Agape love and Filet-O-Love? No, it's not. Now, Agape is used most oftenly speaking about Godly love, but the Bible talks about the Lord loving the Son, God loving the Son, the Son loving God, and the word that's used there is Filet-O. Are we saying it's not a Godly love? Well, sure it is. And so my point is, you see people trying to make something out of something, why? Because they don't know anything. I'm not saying I shouldn't say that, but they don't know enough. And so you shouldn't be on stage, your pastor should not be on stage trying to fake it until he makes it. No, you shouldn't do that. He needs to be able to go through the word. Even listen to this, ladies and gentlemen, even if he's wrong, he can at least show you where he got that from. So no, no, someone says they're different types of love. No, they're not different types of love. They're not. As far as the Greek concern, they mean love. They literally mean love. And I'm not gonna do it for time's sake, but I can pull out passages. Now, Eros, that's different. That kind of love is different. Yeah, that's different. But in these cases, no. And so your pastor needs to be able to just walk through this and to show you this. Again, he must be able to teach. Going back to it, not addicted to wine. You don't want a pastor that's on the sauce. You don't want a pastor that's addicted to other substances as well. I don't mean like addicted to sugar or addicted to caffeine or addicted to chocolate. I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about something that will wreck his life, alcohol or drugs or things like that. No, that's, you can't have that unique. Why? Because he needs to be sober minded, not addicted to wine or pugnacious, but gentle. You want a, if your pastor is not gentle, we got a problem, peaceable. Here's a big one, free from the love of money. If his goal is, I need more money. I need this. Well, wait a second pastor, let's say we got, you've got your salary. You got your housing allowance. Plus we pay for your house. You got your living allowance. We got all these different things. And I don't have a problem with the pastor having these things, but we got to take care of some folks in the church. We got to do this, we got to do that. And so therefore pastor, if he's, well, fine, fine, fine. If you guys can't pay me, then I need to go out on a preaching circuit and make some money on my own or this and that. Well, okay, wait a second. You signed up for this. You signed up for this, not, not, no one made you sign up for it. Amen. No, no one caused you to go and sign up for this at all. Let me do this real quick. All right, let's do that. Here we go. No one caused you to come be a pastor. And so if you're not making enough money, well then be a bi-vocational pastor. But even still, I'd rather you would not. Just sometimes you're gonna have to trust God. Now there's a way if the pastor wants more money, there's a way for him to get paid more. Oh, there is a, there is a way to get paid more. Yeah, pastors get a, not all, not all Shining Rivers, not all pastors get that. Some pastors do get a living allowance in the house. It depends on the church. And also, let's be honest, some cases it does, they might need more money. Now I'm not saying like you said Creflo Dollar, not to go out and get a jet, no. But let's say you have a pastor and the pastor's in, I don't know, California, where loaf of bread costs $12, $17 a gallon for gas, I'm making it up. But again, you know, in my point is, it's costing more and more. It's hard. The cost of living has gone up all across the country. And so you can understand that a pastor is, it may be squeezed sometimes. And you don't wanna put him in a position where he's got to, even the thought will show, take care of the pastor, but you don't have to make him a billionaire. You don't have to make him a billionaire. So he must be not, I mean, free from the love of money. He must be one who manages his own household, keeping his children under control with all dignity. We already covered verse five, knows how to manage his own household. Six, he cannot be a newcomer. Now, let me throw this out here. This is not a where you have to, this is this, I'm not saying if he's this, leave. I'm saying if he's this, be cautious. If you have a young pastor, I would never, I don't think a 20-something year old should be a pastor personally. I couldn't sit up under a 20-something because there's just too much he doesn't know. I don't care how great of a speaker he is. I don't, yeah, there's a level of maturity that he just doesn't have. You can say he's mature for his age, and I've seen some people that were pretty mature for 20-year-olds, 25-year-olds. But guess what, nope, now that's just me. But it becomes a red flag. Why? Well, for a couple of reasons. When you go and just survey the landscape and look at the pastors that we have problems with today, you can just run through the list of the folks that are saying things that are just out of pocket. They either are young or started off as young pastors and have just stayed in that same frame of mind. Someone like a, I'm just using the name, I'm not calling him out, but someone who, well, I won't say his name, but someone who is known for his smile and his quaff hair down in Houston, large church, one of the largest churches in America, he's not young, but he started off young. The guy that's over in North Carolina, who talks about lifting his church up, kind of elevating it, he's not young anymore, but he started off young. Then we go to the guy in Tulsa, who wants to transform things, he is young. You see some of these other people, these are young people, or they started off young and they've been that way and they had no guidance. So for that reason, it's just a caution, just proceed. Now, my particular pastor, he's younger, he is in his mid-30s, and there are things that he'll say something like, okay, all right. Now, I'm tone-ass, well, are you always trying to correct him? I really don't, I don't correct him, hey, this was wrong, that was wrong. If he said something that was just heretical or just wrong, hey, I have said once before, he made a statement, I think. How did he, he did it kind of, what's the word? Innocently, that the Lord said, or not the Lord said, but I feel the Lord, you gotta be careful about that. You gotta be, you feel a certain way and you say it's the Lord, okay, be careful. Because now you're getting to that territory where you are speaking for the Lord. Here is something that the Bible says. This is in Psalm 78, 72. So he shepherded them according to the integrity of his heart and guided them with his skillful hands. A pastor needs to be, obviously have some integrity. A shepherd must have some integrity and he has to have some skillfulness to it, how he does things, how he moves. In other words, wisdom. There's gotta be some skill that comes about from wisdom how you deal with, how you treat someone. You've got a hard and fast rule, but sometimes situations don't fit in your hard and fast rules so you gotta be able to just use wisdom. How I deal with this person might not be the same way as I deal with that person. My thoughts on Shoreline Church in Dallas. I don't know about Shoreline Church in Dallas. I didn't know we had a Shoreline Church in Dallas. I'll have to check it out. What do you know about Shoreline Church in Dallas, Kenneth? I have no idea who that is. I don't know where they are. There's a billion churches in Dallas. There's a billion churches in Dallas and it's though everyone wants to kind of get a leg up, everyone wants to be the cool church, the new church, the hip church. We got the best choir. We got the best this. We got the best that. Gotta have, and the preacher's gotta be the best preaching. I'm not the best at preaching so I'm gonna have some gimmicks. I'm gonna say some things that I shouldn't say, but I'm gonna push the line a little bit. That's a problem. That's a problem. Pastor Trey is 36. Yeah. Yeah, I'd have to watch you, young fella. I'd have to put my glasses down to tip my nose and look down at you and do one of these things to you. And so yeah, you're not too young. You're not too young, but being young, you have to be cautious because there's an expectation and when you don't meet that expectation, in many cases, they're gonna look at you because of your age, but in many cases, because of your age. I can promise you, and it's not about pastorings, it's just about life. Ask the person who is 40, ask them what they thought about when they were 30. Ask the person who's 30, what they thought about themselves when they were 20. Hopefully you believe you're gonna get smarter and wiser and when you look back, yeah, I wasn't as smart as wise as I thought. That's just one of those things. So he's gotta have some skill and obviously some integrity or else we got a problem. A pastor with no integrity is just a wolf in the pulpit. So if you can't, you don't want a pastor who promotes himself. You don't want a pastor, number two, who cannot teach. And then three, you don't want a pastor who violates scriptures. You cannot have a pastor who violates scripture. He's got to be, obviously he's gotta be an example. Matter of fact, let's read this. Hebrews 13, 7 says, "'Remember those who led you, who spoke the word of God to you and considering the results of their conduct, imitate their faith." Well, I wanna have a pastor that I can imitate and I can't imitate this pastor because one, he's in sin. And two, he just makes up stuff as he goes as far as the scripture. He says things, like for example, if your pastor is Mrs. So-and-so or Mrs. So-and-so, if your pastor's pronouns are, her pronouns are she and her, you need to leave. If your pastor's pronouns is she or her or she and her, you need to leave. No if, ands, what's about it? Why? Because you're already violating scriptures. Well, that's not fair. She can teach, okay, that's not, it didn't matter. It violates one of the other qualifications. It's okay, but she's wise, fine. She can't fulfill that office. It's not my rule, it is God's rule. I'm sorry, and people can get upset. And by the way, when a person okays this, what they're saying is it's okay to violate scriptures or I just simply don't know the scriptures. The Bible is clear. He says, I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man but to remain silent for it is Adam. And he gives a qualification why? Looking back to Adam, it was Adam who was first created and then Eve. And it was not Adam who was the seed, but woman being the seed. So he's making this that, well, Corey, but that was just for that time in that locale, really? So he's writing this to Timothy. Why didn't he write to any other women? Why doesn't Paul himself have female pastors or elders? There are none and do it. Don't, please don't come back with Phoebe. She was a servant. Please don't come back with Priscilla. Please don't, don't do that, ladies and gentlemen. We don't have one. We don't have one. And so Paul is, well, but what was happening in Ephesians, I mean, in Ephesus, well, we have a letter to Ephesus, to the church in Ephesus and Paul never addresses that. Was there some things happening in Ephesians? I mean, in Ephesus, sure. But he said the same thing about the church in Corinth. This is happening everywhere. We've got women that are out of control then, just like we got women that are out of control now. But again, the majority of people that were out of control that Paul was rebuking or correcting were men. So it was because of bad behavior. Why didn't Paul say to the men the same thing? Why would he just single out the women? Because this is what God has given us, what God has ordained. And you could be bothered with that all you want. That's fine, but take it up with the person that made the rules, that is God. Who is the head? It's the same folks that quietly is kept would also have a problem with the order of the household. It is what it is. She can't be at home running this particular man. She may not like it, well, then fine, be single. But you cannot get married and use of authority just like, because again, the running the house is in the same vein as, what does he say? If you cannot manage your house, you can't manage the church. How does she manage the house? She cannot. So if you have that present, leave. Also, if the pastor, the head pastor is not, I mean, it's not a woman, but let's say you've got four or five assistant pastors who are women. It's time to go. Because it ain't a hop, skipping a jump for her to become, hey, her daddy was a senior pastor. So now he's dead. Now she's dead. Or the wife. And by the way, you might want to be careful about the first ladies, the first lady syndrome. Well, something happens now. She's second in charge. No, that's not how this works. So be careful on those fronts. Now someone's gonna say, well, what about it? Can a woman be, let's say, the pastor over the women's group? Don't have a problem with that. But I would say that's, you gotta be cautious because now she's got the title. Well, if she can be the pastor over this, then why can't she just step over here and be, there's a problem that you have. And so to usurp or to have authority over a man, the Bible is clear on that. Amen. So these are some things. So you cannot violate scriptures. That is violating scriptures. If you're making up things, if you're saying things that aren't in the scripture, if you're a pastor has a problem constantly doing that. Now you'll know he, now by the way, the only way that you can know he's violating scriptures is if you're studying yourself. And if you're not studying yourself and you don't care, and so it doesn't matter anyway, then doesn't. But if you're concerned about the word of God and he's not, it should never be that the people in the pulpit are more concerned about the word of God than the person that's leading them. This is, let me move this junk out the way. This is what he's, this is his whole focus right here. This is it. By the way, I wanna, my goal, I don't use this Bible as much. This is my favorite Bible, but I don't use it as much. The reason why I don't use it as much is because it's Hebrew and Greek. It's all Hebrew and Greek. And I don't know, let me put it in front of you, you all can't see this. And it starts, it starts off backwards. You gotta, well, here's Genesis. Here's the Hebrew part right here. So it's the opposite way. So when you open this book up, you've got the Greek that starts off first. The reason why the Hebrew is right here is because Hebrew start reads from, not like ours read from left to right, Hebrew reads from right to left. So they put it in the back of the book first. And so my goal is to read this thing like that and just a, and I'm, you know, like I'm reading English. And then go to the Greek and just move to the Greek. And okay, okay, okay, okay, and then ban. So that's my goal. But a pastor should want a pastor's goal is to be able to understand the word as clearly as he can. The better you understand it, the better you can explain it. The less you understand it, the less you can explain it. That, that makes sense. If you're asking me about something that the young folks are involved then I can't, I don't know. I don't know. My kid, especially my youngest, she'll say something and I have no idea what she's talking about. I try to nod my head and be cool about it like I know, but after, let me go, let me Google what she just said. Let me, let me, let me figure this out. So, and I'm not trying to be hip. I'm not trying to be cool. That goes back to number one, if he's trying to promote himself. In other words, if your pastor is 50 or 60 and he wants to be 30, leave. Cause he's violating so much. He's violating so much. He's trying to be something other than what he is and he's gonna wreck somebody. He's gonna do, yeah, that's a, that's an unwise, immature person. You are 50, 60 years old and all of a sudden you wanna dress like you're a teenager. Now I'm not saying it's a deal breaker, but boy, if the pastor starts, if the pastor starts wearing skinny jeans and those, you know, and cultural tight pants, we're gone. I think we have more problems now. So I'm gone. I am gone. I actually would prefer that all pastors would have no hair. I think a wise pastor, the wisest of all pastors would be bald. But that's just, that's just my preference that of me have to have no hair. That's just, that's just me. That's just me. But he must not violate scripture. And the only way for you to know he's not violating scriptures is you know scriptures. And here's what you can do. If you have to keep asking your pastor questions, one, if he's not available or ready or willing to answer the questions, especially if a smaller church, there's a red flag. It's a big, big bright red flag. But if he's constantly saying things that just don't align with scriptures, we have a huge problem. We have a huge problem because what does a pastor must be able to be diligent to study, I mean, to present yourself approved to God, a workman who need not be ashamed accurately handling the word of truth. If he can't accurately handle it, as a matter of fact, confidently and accurately handle it, we have a problem. What says something else? Someone says you're off on tongues. You couldn't, let me just say this, let me just say this, young fella. You couldn't come here and prove them off on tongues. You know why? Because you don't have anybody in the hemisphere. You know why? Because you're gonna make it up. Now, I tell you what you can do, send me an email and we can discuss it. We can discuss it. And what we're gonna do is we're gonna go through, we're gonna go through the tongues in the Bible. We're gonna come to the tongues in the Bible. You know, the Greek. That's what we're gonna do. And I'm gonna ask you, especially through the power of the Holy Spirit since he's moving in you to interpret these passages. By the way, I had an occasion where a person says, well, you don't need the Greek all you need or you don't need the Hebrew either. All you need is the Holy Spirit. I believe you. I told him, I said, I believe you. No problem. I think you're right. I think you're right. Assuming you have a close relationship with the Holy Spirit. Do you? I sure do. I sure do. I'm so in tune to the Spirit. Well, amen. Amen. So what did I do? I just gave. I said, can you read this for me? I just picked a Greek passage out. Matter of fact, it wasn't even a difficult Greek passage. It wasn't even a difficult, it was John 1.1. John 1. I'm sorry. Not 1.1, but all of John 1. Just read it. Just read John 1. Have the Holy Spirit speak to you. Matter of fact, I'll give you a day. You can come back tomorrow and tell me what the Holy Spirit is. You can go and pray about it. You can anoint the paper with oil and all that stuff. And you can come back and have the Lord tell me what that said. Oh, you're just playing with God. No, you're playing with God. You want me to take your word for it. And so when someone says that I'm wrong on tongue, well, first of all, if I am wrong on tongue, as I said before, earlier, young fellow, that it's okay to be wrong, but you need to be able to show your work. At least if I'm wrong, I'm teaching you and showing you why I am. You can see where I'm going off of. And so you can't just disagree. You've got to say, okay, Corey, I see why you're wrong. I see what you said and here's why you're wrong. Can you do that? There in lies the issue that we have because most people want a pastor that agrees with them. Most people want a pastor to tell them what they want. Most people want a pastor to make them feel good. Most people want a pastor that is not interested in giving the word. Most people want a pastor who doesn't care what the word says. They have these tickled ears. Matter of fact, where am I coming from? Well, the Bible says, the Bible says, Noah says, you are wrong on tongue. That's fine. You are more than welcome to come tell me where and how. But the Bible says, I solemnly charge you, present before God, of God and of Christ Jesus, who is a judge. He says, what did he say? Preach the word. Preach the word. Be ready in season and out of season. Why? Now he says, for the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine. But notice what he says. Notice what he says. He says, reprove, rebuke, exhort with great patience. Keep doing it. But he says with patience and instruction. These folks want to hear what they want to hear. And I don't care that you want to hear. If you're a good pastor, I don't care that you want to hear what you want to hear. I'm going to give you the word. If you disagree, fine. Sit down like a man or a woman and show me in the scriptures why I'm wrong. That's all. Simply show me why I'm wrong and why it's right. If your pastor cannot run through the scriptures, he could be wrong. He's going to be wrong on something. But if you can't see why he came to his point and why he came, believe it or not, my mentor, how he came to be my pastor is when we moved here to Dallas, he was my wife's professor. And he did not believe in tongues. I did. He did not believe, I mean, he believed in internal security. I did not believe you can lose your salvation. And I'm thinking this man is wrong. So what did he do? He's running through the scriptures. Show me where I'm wrong. Show me, and okay, well, here's why you're wrong. Well, wait a second, Corey, let's back up. Back up, let's see. And I just kept fumbling over and fumbling over and he calls me to go back and look at the scriptures. He calls me to go back and look at the scriptures. Well, wait a second, if this means that, Corey, what about this? And you know what I want to do? I want to keep going over to another passage and to another passage. He said, well, no, hold on, stay right there. What does this say, though? Well, we'll get to those other passages. We've got time. We will get to those other passages. What does this mean? And we would write down what I think it means. And if that writing down caused us to go look at another passage, then fine. And so we got to the point where I said, you know what, I can't keep arguing my point just because I want to be right. And so he did what a pastor should do. He walked me through the scriptures. He was one able to teach, two had enough concern and love for the word and for me, that he labored with me with great expectation and teaching. Like I said, I'm sorry, with great patience and teaching, like he says, for the time will come when people will not endure sound doctrine. They want to hear, because again, oh, you folks that think I'm wrong on tongues, you would not have thought that I was wrong on tongues 120 years ago. None of you would have thought that I was wrong about tongues 120 years ago. Why? Because no one else did. So if we were having this conversation and I don't know, 1840, 1760, you wouldn't have had that conversation. But it's fine. I could be wrong, they could be wrong then. Let's just go to the scriptures. You would have thought, you would have agreed with me on a lot of these things and we would have went to the scriptures. There was no razzle dows on the pulpit. It was just the word. And so he says, the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will find for themselves people that want to teach what they want to hear. Here is the problem. Here's the problem. I say, you look good for being over 120 years old. I do. For 120-year-old, I look awesome. For 120-year-old. Here's the point that I'm making with this. Number four, first one, if he promotes his brand, gotta leave. If that's all, if he's so interested, too interested in promoting himself and his brand, you need to leave. Leave that pastor. If he cannot teach the Bible, matter of fact, you should be impressed if he's wrong about how he taught it. He should be able to go through it. I see your point. Man, that was good. You made me work for it. Can I tell you something? Y'all might not, you may not believe this, but this is a fact. I'm not gonna say the people's names but I see Brother Alton in the chat. Brother Alton, you won't believe this. Matter of fact, Alton, if you called me, I would tell you exactly who these people are, but I would have to swear you the secrecy. Of the people that said, I'm not gonna talk to you, Corey, because they heard what I said, went back and searched it and could not disprove it. And rather than accepting it, let's just move on. The folks like, you know what? I see your point. Doggone is hard for me to, they didn't say doggone, but it's hard for me to argue this point. Let's move on. You would be, why? If a person, as I'm calling you tonight, if a person can teach, even if you disagree, you should still be, you should still have some sort of feeling about the way, about the way, I got you Diana, about the way they teach. You know what? He's wrong. I appreciate the way he approached that, but I disagree. Now I gotta figure out biblically why I disagree. That's fine. That's fine. Now, so number three, number two, can't teach three. Cannot, if he violates scriptures over and over again, got to go. I don't mean once, you know, I don't mean he's wrong, but he's constantly violating scriptures. We're little gods. Nope, got to go. Sorry. You got to do this in order to be safe. Meaning you got to be baptized and come up out of the water in Jesus' name, speaking with tongue. That's the evidence. Nope, got to go. Got to go. Here's number four. And this might surprise you, but if your pastor is too topical, you got to go. If your pastor is too topical, you have to go. What do you mean, Corey? Is there something wrong with the preacher that gives topical sermons? Nope, not at all. But if that's all he gives, he's got to, again, having someone that gives you what you want to hear is along those lines. Talk about current events, make you feel good about this, you need someone that can open, wait a minute, why can't we open Obadiah, bring out what Obadiah is saying and show the relevance? Do you think Obadiah is there just cause? What about Nahum? When was the last time you had a sermon from Nahum? Or Hosea, very rich, or Zachariah? What's wrong with that? Don't bring up Philharmon only because, only because it's Black History Month and we got to talk about slavery. No, no, no. If he can't give certain distinctives that are mentioned, that are shown out in the Gospels, you got to be able to do that. That goes back to being able to teach, but he can't, so it's all about a topic. And then what the topic and the topical preaching ends up becoming is his opinion, how he feels. Now we got a problem. That's why it's a red flag. Again, topical sermons aren't wrong. They are not wrong. As a matter of fact, a lot of topics fleshed out in the Bible brought up doctrinal issues, scriptural teaching. So Jesus would do that. Paul would do it. Peter would do it. Something happens. Well, what do we do with this? And so there's nothing wrong with that. Topical sermons are fine. Nothing wrong with topical sermons. But the pastor needs to be able to expound on the scriptures. And unfortunately, too many pastors can't. Fifth, I kind of jumped the gun on this one, but fifth, if he is a she, if he is a she, you got to go. There's just, there is no if, ands, buts, about it. You can stay there if you want to. You can stay there if you want to. But if he's a she, you gotta go now. Again, I said another thing. Age is a concern. It's not to be, there can be some 30-something-year-olds. Pastor Trey is just, by the way, I think his heart sank a little bit when I said about the young pastors. You can have a pastor in their 30s, but listen, he better, he better be about his father's business. He better be serious. He better be willing, he better be studying, which leads to something else. Just cautionary, it's not out, it's not, you have to leave, but is he educated? Not that he has gone to seminary, but just he understands the scriptures. He's focused himself on learning the scriptures. If he didn't, listen, if your pastor doesn't put his time in the scriptures, he's got to go. I'm sorry, no, you've got to go. I showed a clip before where the young lady brought up, you know, I'm sorry, it was on the other channel, the small channel, where this young lady brought up a cup of hot something, whatever, brought to the pastor and asked him to preach on it. And then I showed a picture, I mean a video of the guy in North Carolina who his wife played a song and he had to preach about it. Now, both of them are wrong, especially the one in North Carolina, but that's what we're having nowadays. They're not studied enough. If you, it should be that if you ask them on a question they should have at least some knowledge of something, not everything, there should be times where you know what, I don't know, let's look at it right now. But if you study this enough, there should be if someone asks you about marriage or about children or about whatever, or about this particular doctrine, about the Holy Spirit, about the Trinity, is it real or is it not? About Sabbath, whatever, there should be some familiarity with the Bible, with the text, know where to go to, that you can figure this out, that you can understand what it's saying. Why? Because as I said before, we're not trying to memorize scripture, we're trying to memorize a story to see where it's going and that will also help you know where certain scriptures are, what these books are about, why is he writing, what's the point, what's the goal. So therefore he needs to have some sort of education. I'm not saying he has to go to seminary. I'm not saying he has to go to seminary or Bible college, I'm saying, but he has to educate himself. He has to educate himself. Again, he needs to be able to teach. That goes with education, having to rightly handle the word of God. But here's something else. This might be something along, it might be your own determination of this, but don't mess this up. This is a you issue, not a him issue. It's a him issue, but also a you issue. He's gotta be loving. He's gotta be loving. Shepherd the flock of God among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion, but voluntarily according to the will of God and not for sort of gain, but with eagerness, nor yet as lording it over those, allotted to your charge, but proving to be an example to the flock. He's got to care for the sheep. You need to know he cares. He's got to be loving. He's got to have a heart for you. That's just it. First of all, they're actually not his sheep anyway, but he should treat them like they're his sheep. Sometimes pastors act like, yeah, you know what they're not my sheep anyway. You know, the pastor should treat them like they are his sheep, like they belong to him. And he cares, not possessive. He says, you're gonna do what I tell you to do because he says, not compulsion, but voluntarily, you should encourage them to do the right thing. They should have enough respect for you as a pastor to where you say something, you know what? I think you're right. I think you're right. You should be an example. Like Paul said, follow me or imitate me as I imitate Christ. And they should see that. Amen. Amen. All right, now I'm gonna go ahead and answer some of these questions. Make sure the questions are along the lines of what we're talking about. Not other stuff. We'll have Q and A on tomorrow. Kelly, what'd you ask that for? You said, why do they do that about money? What about money? You mean as far as the anniversaries and the, I'm not sure, is that what you're asking about? Let me know again. I'll look for your question again. Is a pastor qualified to lead a flock after adultery? Could be. Let me go back to something. Maybe, maybe not. A pastor can be reinstated. He can be restored or he can be permanent disqualified. And there is no hard and fast answer on it or a pastor to go to except for this. When we go back to the qualifications of a pastor, notice what he says. He says, verse seven. And he must have a good reputation with those outside the church so that he will not fall into reproach and ascended to the devil. But it started off with, and it started off about him being respectable and having really a good name amongst the believers as well. Well, if the pastor doesn't have a good name, if the pastor doesn't have a good name, how does he get up and preach? And so if he goes back before the people and all they can remember is what, in matter of fact, it's not just even adultery, it's any passing. If all they can remember or think about is his sin, he can't be that person's pastor for sure. And I use an outrageous example, but it's the best example I can think of. And that is if Jeffrey Dahmer decided to become, if he were alive, he got out and he decided to become a pastor, or he goes to your church and his cousin's the pastor and he passes on to Jeffrey Dahmer. No, no, no, no, no, because all you can think about is that you can't get past what his past was. And that might not be your fault. That might be because it was so egregious, so outlandish that, yeah. And so in that regard, that's one of the consequences of your sin. So, let's see. Oh, you have one of those pastors where he's the main guy, but I'm afraid of he fails, the whole church goes with, yeah, you need to have a pastor, there needs to be a strong support system around him and also qualified men. The whole goal of a pastor is to be trading not just the people there, but also other men that come alongside him and also take over either to plan another church. By the way, your pastor should be evangelistic, meaning we want to bring more people in and we wanna encourage the church to grow and so you should be training men to either take over or to lead in this local body or to go and plan a church elsewhere. I think we have too many pastors who want to, you know what, we need people, and let's say I'm in this part of Dallas, we need people over here in Fort Worth, people over there or over there. So let's have a second campus, third campus, a fourth or fifth campus. Why not just train men and have them go plan a church over there? I'm not saying there's anything wrong with the extra campuses or multi-campuses, but sometimes it's just about being greedy. It's just about you being the man everywhere. Someone asked, what about accountability? You need to have other men, other pastors and even sometimes non-passers who can just, you know, hey, listen, let's talk and pray for you. Someone that you can even open up to and say, hey, listen, yeah, I got that wrong and so forth. Is Bishop the same as pastor or are they two different offices in the church? They are the same. They all end up being the same because the words that we see, we see presbytuer, we see overseer, we see the word pastor, we see shepherd, we see elder. And I gotta find out where that scripture, I'm not scripting about that video where I covered all of that. Matter of fact, Steve, do me a question. Ask that same question in the comment section and I'll send you the video for that where I go through all of that stuff about what a pastor is and which one of these verses pertain to someone being a pastor if you can. Why do you use a Southern slang term to blast? What Southern, I don't, I have no idea what you're talking about. What's, type it in again, Mr. Rangel. Tell me which Southern slang that I use to blaspheme somebody or as blaspheme. I wonder, are you talking about dog on it? That's not blasphemy. I don't know if that's what you're talking about though. Oh, you mean as far as pastors going, I see what you're saying about pastors going to other churches and preaching. There is this racket, I shouldn't say a racket, but there are these where, hey, listen, we got a special service, you wanna come over and preach? I'll go to your service and preach and this and that or whatever. Well, what ends up happening is they pay him an honorarium for going and doing so. And it's fine, but if that's also part of your gig, it shouldn't be a side hustle for the pastor. That can be a big problem. What are your thoughts about a pastor who preaches and believes in preaching ties? I had this conversation before that, for me, it's not a deal breaker. If the pastor, oh, he's resting right now. Okay, I like that term, he's resting right now. If a pastor, if a pastor, if the church believes in ties, does that mean I need to leave? That's not a deal breaker because they're gonna be, what you don't wanna do is get in the habit of looking for everything that you can possibly look at. Cause if you look forward, you'll find it. If you look forward, you'll find it, okay? So be careful, ties, I've been in a church that they asked for ties and I didn't flip out. I didn't go too crazy, okay, fine, fine. I'm not paying, I'll give, I'll give my offering, but I'm not paying a tie, I'm not obligating myself, but I'm probably giving more than 10% anyway or somewhere they're about, so therefore, and that was the time that we had a pastor can't bring that up. I don't see the, what if my pastor cries a lot? What if your pastor's a sissy? No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. What if your pastor cries a lot? Is there anything wrong with your pastor crying? I'm joking, ladies and gentlemen, I was just joking. Don't, Cory, call it, there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with that if your pastor cries a lot. Now, if he's crying for a reason, if he's crying for a reason, I cry. I cry every time, every, I have two kind of cries that I have, two cries. Every time that the cowboys win, I cry. I cry, every time the cowboys lose, I cry. I mean, I shared a tear of joy, so yeah. I cry, no, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. If he cries, there's nothing wrong with the tear. Jesus wept, the shortest verse in the Bible. So there's nothing wrong with crying. Now, if he's crying all the time at the drop of a dime, it's like, by the way, I had a buddy, one of my main, one of my best buddies, and I would pick on him in church. I'm up preaching, I would pick on him and I would just say something because it's gonna make him cry. And that bottom lip gets a quivering and next, you know, he just, it's okay to cry. It's okay to cry. Let's just leave it at that, real men, real men cry. Especially guys with hair, bald men don't cry as much as we're tougher. What about pastors that support women to preach? Leave, because if he's supporting someone else, some other woman, I can promise you, it's coming to a church near you, to your church. So yeah, yeah, it's got to get going. It's got to get going. Was Deborah a leader of Israel because the men of Israel fell short and God doesn't know? God used Deborah because men were horrible. All of Israel was rotten. What the judge was to do was to deal, when you bring problems to the judge, the judge was to sell it, but they weren't even doing that. They weren't even doing that. Now notice the leader or the commander, unlike other judges, the leader of the commander, as far as Deborah's concerned, was not Deborah. It was Barak. God is telling her to tell Barak to go do this and Barak like, no, only if you come because Barak is a sissy also. Now notice though, now she says that Cicera is gonna be delivering to a woman's hand, but not her hand. The hand that she was speaking of was this other woman, the one that nailed the tent peg into his head. But notice in Hebrews 11, that when the Bible speaks about faith, the Bible doesn't speak about Deborah. Not that she didn't have faith. I'm not saying that, but he speaks about Barak's faith because I guess it took some time, but she says Israel being, I mean, since we're being delivered to the hand of a man, is gonna be to your shame. And so that was, it was a shameful thing. And that was just really kind of just to really rebuke or put a thumb in the eye of Israel. So how many assistant, co-pastors or assistant pastors should there be? And if a pastor dies and there is no other to take over, what should happen? My cousin took over as pastor when her husband died. Okay, that can't happen. She can't take over as pastor. Now we don't have a church, not a biblical church, but how many co-pastors and assistant pastors? This is what someone talked about, about a plurality of elders. It's good to have other men there. Again, you wanna be careful because you wanna make sure that they are qualified men, not just having men there just for the sake of having extra men there. You want to make sure that the men are qualified that they've been trained. Because I believe, and this is kinda how it was with us, that the elders, the associate pastors that sit underneath them are a reflection of the one that's actually more entrusted. There are some churches that have it to where there is no elder that is above the other elder. That can get to be a problem because during that I've seen it where it has been a problem where there's jockeying for position, but then there's also jockeying for position even when you do have a leader like with the apostles or the disciples did. So, it would depend on that local church. It's neither good nor bad to have extra pastors and so forth. How many there is no certain number? If you got an extra one, you got one elder with you, or two or three, the Bible doesn't say. But that's where wisdom has to come in. Amen. What do you think about churches that institute the title minister and they may not have a female pastor but they have female ministers? Same thing. Because when you start giving them a title, let's be honest, let's be honest, male or female, I don't care who you are in America or in Western society, a title goes to your head. You put a hat on a guy, he all of a sudden, especially down here in Texas, you put a hat on that guy or he's a cowboy. He is without question a cowboy. He ain't got no horse. He ain't never seen a lasso but he's a cowboy, go buy him some boots. He thinks he is Southern as they can get. Listen, he even starts, he starts adding more to his little Southern draw. So the same thing, you put a title on a person, it can oftentimes go to their head. Are you with me? Thank you, camera. So yeah, it's the same thing. It's the same thing. Because even if you don't put the title on, but you're giving her authority over men or women, that's still violating the tentative, isn't it? Do you think pastors should take a leave when dealing with death like a family member or something? They don't have to. It depends on how they operate. It depends on if it interferes with them conducting their duties, then yeah, he's allowed to. He's allowed to grieve, but maybe he grieves and continues going. Maybe he understands is what I gotta do. And so some folks might not take off or a long time when a person dies in their family. But if you're grieving, if the grieving interferes with what you're doing, then you ought to. Whoa, what happened? Okay, something's happening, ladies and gentlemen. What is going on? All right, ladies and gentlemen, I'm not sure if everything is still moving. Guys, let me know, is everything moving out there? Right here, everything is just frozen up here. You see me? Okay, let me just, hold on. Do you, I don't know if you all can see me or not. Do you all see me? You're all, okay. Something happened over here where everything except for the main screens are working but my backups aren't. That's weird, that is weird. Let, you know what I know what it is. Well, I don't know what it is. I don't know what it is. Maybe one of the, because these are on a backup service. Okay, fine. I'll assume you guys can see me. Let me change something over here. What is this connected to? Oh, I see what it is. Okay, okay. This is moving over here. I guess something happened with the cable. We've got two internet systems. And so I think the one, okay, let me see something was happening. Yep, that's what that one is on. Let's see, give me a second, guys. Something is working with you guys but what's working, something's not working right here. And it's telling me I do have, I don't know. I don't know, let's push this button and see what happens. Bam, did it pop back up? So let's go back over here and see. And yep, okay, all right, cool. All right, it's everything else that's not working but the main stuff is working. So this is Benny Hinn did it. So I'm sorry guys, the main, these systems right here are on a different system than what you guys are watching, the hard wire connection. Okay, cool. I just had to make sure. I didn't know what I was talking about. I have no idea what we were just talking about. I blame you guys with hair. I blame you guys with hair. But to answer your question, Dutch, yeah, if it's interfering with his duties then he should leave. He just takes some time off. What if he outwardly confesses to love whiskey? What if the pastor drinks? Well, what does that love mean? That it means that he can't take a step without whiskey. I don't know why that Chris Stapleton song popped in my head, Tennessee whiskey but if he can't move without it, if he's addicted, that's a problem. Listen, I love coffee but I can do without it. I'm fine. I love ice cream but drinking it is not a sin but again, he can't be addicted to it. So that's what the Bible is telling us. He cannot be addicted to it. What are your thoughts about the passing of Jerry Seville? Jerry Seville introduced a lot of bad teaching to the church, the whole word of faith stuff. And so I don't wish anything bad to him. I pray that he knew the Lord. I have no way of knowing if he did or didn't. I've never actually even covered him before. So I don't know. I pray that he knows the Lord, knew the Lord. But that said, I haven't really given too much of a thought about it. I hadn't even thought about even covering him even since then. By the way, I made a statement about what's the guy's name? Bishop Murray and folks, it's too soon. It's too soon. He just got stabbed. He's out of hospital. It's too soon. How long do I have to wait? The man is telling us that we need to pray to Mary. Or as the other guy said, we need to talk to Mary and ask her to intercede on our behalf to Jesus. Really? Or I bow before Mary. Well, no, I don't, okay, fine. Anyway. Here is a problem that we do have in churches though. Pastors who get a divorce. Is that pastor forever prevented? We talked about this earlier. Ever prevented from coming back? He's not prevented from coming back because the pastor in 1 Timothy isn't specifically covering that. But what's happening is that because we have a forgiving God that people not just want to divorce either but on other things, they use that as a get out of jail car because God has forgiven. Let's just live how we wanna live and let's move on. There was one guy who I told you who said that his, the Lord told him that the wife that he was with wasn't the one that he told him to marry in the first place. And so he was in sin because he was still married to her and he need to go marry the woman that God wanted him to. Well, wait a second, wait a second, wait a second. No, no, no. And even we've got people that have gotten a divorce. Well, the Lord forgives me and so on. But you don't just go and just run to something just because you know the Lord forgives you. Now that tells us about your heart and you really don't care like you say you do. You care more about you. Sunshine's question. Okay, let's type in sunshine. I'm on the wrong keyboard. Oops. And I spelled sunshine wrong. Idiot. Where's your question? Okay. My pastor's son committed a very public offense and his father senior pastor stated that that the son would step down because I'm sorry, hold on. Let me read this again. Pastor's son in HTX, Houston, Texas, committed a very public offense and his father, the senior pastor stated that the son would step down because it was his church. Oh, is it, you said would not, are you saying would not step down? Okay, she says wouldn't step down. Yeah. If that's what it is, if he wouldn't step down because of, yeah. Leave. Leave because the church is about him. Leave. You don't discipline him because, because he's your boy. Yeah. I'm not going down with that ship. That's a ship that's going down without me on it. No, no, no, no. Hey, here's my brother from Radio Apologetics. How you doing my friend? So, got to go. You've got to go. You've got to go. Again, this is serious. I said it before, I believe, I believe that I could start off right now and go say, hey guys, we're going to start having a Bible study here in Dallas somewhere, it's a large enough community. I can get folks to show up with the intent of planning a church and I think you would do well, but that's not the goal. The goal is to be as prepared as I possibly can to, I think I'm knowledgeable of the word. Maybe not, maybe, maybe not. Who knows? But I want to go through school. Not that I have to. Not that I have to or not, but I want to be as thoroughly prepared as possible. Get my family prepared and I might come back so you know what, not going to do it. Not going to do it. But I might say, yeah, here it is. Or I may move to a different city and do it. But the point is, I take that responsibility seriously. That's an awesome responsibility and so you shouldn't enter into it lightly. It's like, yeah, you know what? I got some time on weekends. Let me go ahead and plan a church. Is it ever, oh, here's a good one. Is it ever okay to stand up and interrupt service when something blasphemous or just super dissu... There can be times. There can be, now it depends. Now, let's see, let me, I'll tell you what, give me some examples guys of what you might want to stand up in the middle of service for. Give me some examples of what you might think it might be okay to stand up in the middle. I'm gonna come back to you again being saved. But give me some examples. You don't, do I agree with Kenneth Hagan's teaching? No, I don't know. No, I don't agree with Kenneth Hagan's teachings. No, absolutely not. A stripper on a pole. Get up and stand up for that. But here's the thing about what Mark Driscoll did and I brought this plan and folks got upset with me and then come to find out, yeah. So one, you knew this was gonna happen and he knew this was gonna happen and you had time to bring us up. First of all, before that happened, you see other things happening. But what kind of men's service is this? I don't have a problem with them standing up and saying, hey, this was wrong guys. But like the other guy who's also wrong, why don't you say anything to me? You could have talked me off of this. You didn't even try. So this is your, you'd be indignant but you weren't so indignant before and then even afterwards, if this was supposed to be, as he said, a spirit of Jezebel, which is what I'm saying, but if this what you think it is, you come back and cuddle and hop-knop, wait a second, wait a second, wait a second, wait a second, where's the outrage at? But that's my friend. So yeah, that's a reason but everybody should have got up. Everybody should have. 85% of Jesus' life was out of order. That's the reason they get up. Hey, wait a second, hold up, wait a second. Now, but when you saw that, what happened? As he said that, as he said that, people like, wait a minute. Oh, amen, amen. They're looking for something, something like just bit me. But as he said that, people are cheering, people clapping. Wow, that's deep. That's not deep as dumb. That's dumb. And so even if now, listen, if you have to think about it, because sometimes it might hit you like, okay, well, let me think about this. I want to be. And so if you, I think I should, but I want to make sure you want to show some caution just to make sure you might be wrong and you approach them after service or you just leave, that's fine. You want to be respectful because you might be the one that's wrong. So you don't want to just naturally, you know, let me just bust up in here and say what I think, what I feel. Now we got a problem. If you see some things, if your pastor, your preacher's up there and he's pouring syrup over the, you know what? Rather than getting up and making a scene because they want, just leave yourself. So yeah. Yeah, I think that there are times where you might need to. If the pastor is saying something that's so overtly erratical and things like that, well, then we, yeah, we got a problem using. Annette, thank you for the super chat. Okay, I'm sorry. I thought I saw something else soon. A woman high school pastor, if, if, that's what I said earlier about, let's say she's a youth pastor over the, over the children and it's the girls. You got to be careful because again, that title, titles breed titles don't they? This title can bring another title and it certainly breeds you thinking that I'm the man or I'm the woman. We got to be careful. It's us thinking that we know better than what God has stated to do. Should a pastor who was against women being ministers preach at a church of a pastor who believes it's okay for women to be a pastor? That dog, that's a good question. That is a good question. So I go to this church and we go preach at a church where there's me personally, excuse me, me personally, I wouldn't do it. I would say you can't do it. Matter of fact, I would have already told the person if I know, can't do it, you shouldn't do it. And then let's go over to the scriptures or do we not think that the scriptures matter? If the scriptures don't matter, well then fine. Have all the women that you want to their preaching. Matter of fact, get some kids that are teaching. Do all of that. So yeah, me personally, I would not go. I would not go. I'm not sure what someone's talking about. I see someone just out of the corner. I said, so sad to see many deceived. Let me say this also as well as I read this as well. People, one of the things that I learned and this is, I think this is just wise. And this isn't a pastor thing. This is a person, people thing. Everybody, everybody is not going to accept what you think or what you believe in. And by the way, you can't change everybody. So wisdom is going to kick in sometimes. So you know what? Some battle I can't fight. If a person is just bent on, what did I just do? If a person is just bent on, I just moved. No, go on, what did I do? If a person is just bent on doing something or believing something wrong, all right. And all you can do is all you can do. How about Jesus is not the only begotten Son of God? How about, do y'all know what Brian is speaking of? I'm sorry, I didn't play this clip. Let me play this clip. Where is it at? Where is it at? I know I have it here somewhere. I know I have this thing here somewhere. Oh, here it is. After the resurrection, none of your neighbors say pay attention, pay attention. That's why after the resurrection, Jesus is no longer called the only begotten Son of God because after the resurrection, he is no longer the only begotten Son of God. I'm a begotten Son, you're a begotten Son, you're a begotten. Yeah, that's just, that's bad. And what are the folks that are just cheering and yucking it up and that's awesome. That's wonderful. If that whole church went to hell, you wouldn't be surprised, right? I don't think so, because again, again, the reason why we wouldn't wanna say that, why? You can be saved and stupid. Treat that, you can be saved and stupid. And oh, by the way, he was the one, Brian said, who is that? That is Clarence MacLennan. He is the one that I was telling you earlier, who said the Lord told him that he was married to the wrong woman, divorced this woman and married the woman that he wanted to, that God wanted him to. And folks still stayed around. Folks still stayed around. So, yeah, anyway. Let's see, should preaching be psychological, philosophical? You could, if you want to, bring in elements of that. There's nothing wrong with that. Understanding how the mind works or how psyche works and things like that. But your focus should be the word. Your focus needs to be the word. Now, as you're explaining it and you wanna bring in certain elements, that's fine. But it can't cause you to depart from the word. If what you're saying, if your thoughts, your philosophy and so forth moves you away from the word, we got a problem. But I'll never forget this. I was, I was witnessing, I was not witty, but I was actually trying to speak to, and then this was almost an everyday thing, speak to this transgender young fellow. He wanted to be a girl so bad. He was going to therapy and counseling. And I was saying things and he said, he said, Corey, how come? You know, a lot of, he said, you ought to be a counselor. A lot of things that you say, my therapist is saying also. I said, well, it's not that I'm saying something that, you know, that I'm a psychologist or a psychiatrist. What I'm saying, what I'm giving you is the Bible. Now I'm also adding some things, just, you know, some anecdotal things as well and some analogies, but it's just the Bible. It's just what we used to call wisdom. It's what we used to call just, I wouldn't say common sense, but we used to call it wisdom. That's where we got it from. And so if your therapist or psychiatrist or psychologist, what have you, a philosopher, whatever, if they're saying things that are true, then amen. If what they're saying is true, then amen. I'm saying what's true. And so that's why it resonates with you. And if what I'm saying is true, then maybe you ought to come and lean further over on more truth. All truth is there. So, but so it's okay to have that, but you just don't want to be tidy. That shouldn't be your focus to be. And there are some that want to get to be philosophical and be profound and deep, be deep into the word. That's what you can be deep into that. I'm taking a few more questions and we got to go ahead and move. I have to, I made a mistake and I have to redo a paper that I messed up on because I uploaded the wrong paper because I'm a moron. So I've got to redo this paper. I uploaded a rough draft and then deleted the where I was typing it and deleted the final copy, but kept the rough draft. And so I've got to finish this paper. What software, what's my go-to Bible software? It depends if I'm online, if it's this right here, it's accordance because it just looks better. I can move about cleanly. But if it is to study, I use accordance and I use Lagos. Or where you had Katrina, she says. Doesn't the husband of one man mean a one woman man? What then restores him? It's only Mia's Ganaikas Andra, which is a one woman man. So he can only have one at the time. It's not referring to divorce. Now some churches might interpret that, some folks might interpret that to be divorce. And so if he gets no one, well, now you got two. Well, the understanding and even when we see if we just go back and just look at how the church also interpreted that at that time, not those that were trying to find a loophole. That's always been the case because we saw leaders in the past who had multiple wives. Think about Solomon. Solomon, you ruined some things with that one, didn't you? So even David, even David, all of these different, too many cooks in the kitchen. So that's literally what it means. Should you stay at a church that don't have church meetings about finance? A church, the church doesn't necessarily have to have church financial meetings about the church. It didn't have to, but the church should be open about the finances. Let's have a meeting guys. Today we're having a meeting about the finances and so that's not the, but they need to be open about the money because it's your money, it's all of our money. And so the church should be above board and so forth as it relates to finances. There should not be a hint of any sort of discrepancy there. Be above board, you don't have to apologize for it. You don't have to apologize for letting folks know everything. Oh, you use, okay, you use accordance also. Yeah, when I pull up, when I put up, what's the other one, when I put up Logos, it just doesn't, when I move about it, on this, when my curse moves about it, it makes a thing jump. I don't know why that is, if that's a Logos issue or if it's just not compatible with this, with this streaming software, I don't, I have no idea. I have no, by the way, thank you for the, for the super chat. I have no idea why it does that. Plus I can put up multiple passages on here a lot easier. And I think it just shows up better. It just shows up better. Now I think you can do a lot more. I think you can do more on, on Logos, though I don't use all of Logos. If I'm looking for passage, I am, I'll do some research with it, but not as much as I should. And I take the long way around with, with Logos. I really do. It's like dog on it. I got these tools and I'm not using these tools. Somebody says interpret dog on it. That's just dog on it. Dog on it. Someone said, well, that's a bad word. It's not a bad word. Dog, gone, it. That's all. So anyway, let's see. By the way, Cameron, how have you been, Cameron? How have you been? Okay, let me ask her one. Is that Greek? No, that dog on it is not Greek. Let me ask one last question. Debunk 241 asked for my test money. Let me give that to you. If you ask it tomorrow during Q and A, I'll give it to you. Right now, we don't have an hour. We don't have an hour, so I can't get it. Now I do have several videos where I cover it, but I don't want to do it right now. Because if I do it right now, it'll be forever. Wait a second. I thought I saw another question. I thought I saw another question that I was looking at. I have no idea what the, okay, I can, I don't know what that question's asking. I just, what camera brand am I using? This is a Sony, something. I'm gonna have to, I'm probably going to upgrade this particular camera as well. I'm actually supposed to be, believe it or not guys, I'm actually supposed to be, prodigal daughter, you sure can't ask. Matter of fact, we'll let you ask a Bible question, prodigal daughter. But I'm supposed to actually also shoot, do make videos over there on my comfy couch. I've only done, I've done one video on that couch. And so eventually I will, eventually I'll turn the camera that way and just you'll see me sitting down with my nice, hot, warm beverage, like a grandfather with my glasses down here, looking down on people like Dutch and Pascha Trey. Because that's what you do when you get older. You put your glasses right here and you look down on them to make them think, make it feel like that you're older and that you need to listen to me young fellow, kid, this is a good question. This is a good question we can end on. Why does God harden Pharaoh's heart throughout the plagues in Exodus? Doug, act as a good question. It's so good of a question. Now you're gonna, I don't know if y'all recall me going over this and ended up preaching this thing. I don't know if y'all remember, let me see if I can do this without actually going through the scriptures, okay? And I will put this on the side to see if you guys, so you and the guys can see this. I preached this one time before. Matter of fact, let me take it off the screen. I want a full screen. Why does God harden Pharaoh's heart? It's by the way, do any of you guys know why God harden Pharaoh's heart? And your pastor, your pastor should be able, if your pastor can't do it like this, no, I'm just kidding, I'm just kidding. But your pastor should have an answer to this. But the reason why God harden Pharaoh's heart? Well, let's back up. Let me see if someone, someone said to prove a point to demonstrate God's glory. The reason why God harden Pharaoh's heart. See if you can figure out where I'm going. Cause somebody asked a question. Yeah, God answered Pharaoh's heart. I mean, harden Pharaoh's heart because somebody asked a question. Well, who asked a question? Well, let's back up for a second. The reason why Pharaoh's heart is hardened is because he doesn't want to let the Jews go. Well, why are the Jews there? Well, the Jews are there because there was a famine in the land. And then Joseph goes and he becomes the number two man and why? Because somebody had a dream. Not Martin Luther King, Jr., but somebody had a dream that required him to interpret. While he was in the lowest place of his life, while he was locked up, somebody had a dream. Matter of fact, two, somebody's had a dream and Pharaoh, not Pharaoh, I'm sorry, Joseph interpreted. One of them had a good outcome. The other one had a bad outcome. And Joseph said, when you get restored, can you please remember me? Have you been somewhere where he just wanted somebody just to remember you? And so he says, remember me and the man did. He promised to, but he didn't. Meanwhile, somebody else had a dream. Somebody had a dream and nobody can figure out or interpret what this dream was. But the man that was restored, I know a man who can interpret your dream or tell you what your dream is. His name is Joseph. Well, where is he? He's in the dungeon. He's in the jail cell. Go get him. And he interpret the dream and so he gets placed in a prominent position. Why is he in a prominent position? Well, the reason why he's in a prominent position, not so much because he interpreted that dream because that king or Pharaoh had a dream, not even because the two guys prior in the prison had a dream. It's because Joseph himself had a dream. Yeah, Joseph had a dream about himself being lifted up, not necessarily in an egotistical way, not about promoting him, but Joseph had a dream and his brothers did not like that dream. Well, in the meantime, while Joseph is in jail and then he gets promoted, a famine comes because he's interpreting that person's dream, the Pharaoh's dream. He interprets that dream. Now, why is he interpreting that dream? Well, because God gave him that dream and gave him the ability to interpret it. What's happening? Well, also there's a famine going on and the famine is hurting not just Egypt, but it's also affecting those in Israel. Well, who's in Israel? Joseph's family. Joseph's family, that is Jacob and his brothers, are there also and they're growing, they're getting promised, they've got a little bit of money and so forth, but it's a famine. And folks, I don't care how much money you got, your money can't make it rain. Not like how some folks think about it, but it can't make it rain. And so they need to get somewhere. So what happens? Well, they end up coming to Egypt. Well, why are they there in the first place? What goes back again to Joseph having a dream? Why is Joseph having a dream? Well, the reason why he's having a dream is so that they can eventually make their way to Egypt. Remember, after all is said and done, Joseph is confronted with his brothers. His brothers are saying, please forgive us, don't mistreat us, daddy's dead. And what was Joseph's response? I'm paraphrasing, but Joseph says, did you not know, don't you know that even though you meant it for good, God, I mean for evil, God meant it for good to bring you here and that I can preserve, or you can be preserved. Well, why would we have to be in the first place? Well, the reason why they're all there needed to be saved, why they have to be in Egypt to be saved, I said before, because somebody asked a question. Well, who asked a question? A guy named Abraham. Abraham asked a question. Remember, God tells him in Genesis 12 that he is going to make him a great nation. Bless those that bless you and curse those that curse you and even through you, because of you, all of the families of the earth shall be blessed. But the Bible tells us something kind of odd. He didn't really fully believe then, at least not to the point to where he would be credited with righteousness. It is in Genesis 15 that God tells him again, and he says after he shows him this, he is, wow, now I believe. The problem though, that he asked a question. The question was, how will I know that these things are gonna be so? And because he asked those questions, the guy said, I'll tell you what I'm gonna do. Tell you what I'm gonna do, Abraham. Matter of fact, on that very same day, I'm gonna cut this covenant with you. But on that very same day, he tells them, shows them all the land and so forth, that he's gonna occupy his family. He said, but know this, since you wanna ask a question, mister, since you don't believe in God, maybe I threw that point at me. But since you wanna ask a question, mister, know for sure that you'll die at a good old age and be buried with your people, but your people will be enslaved. They're gonna be soldiers in the foreign land for how long? 400 years. And when they come out, they're gonna come out with great wealth. So why are they, but Corey, that didn't fully explain we know why they're there. Remember, he says I'm gonna bring them out with great wealth. How's that gonna happen? Well, I need Pharaoh not to just take my word for it in the beginning, I am as sent you, but I need you to see that I am, is as sent me. But also more to the point, I need you not to know that I am, and I am, I am, but I also need you to know that I can do what I wanna do to you. I will need to harden your heart to the point that you are going to give me what they need. In other words, I could, I could, I could make it so that Pharaoh would let them go on at the first attempt. No, I wanna punish Pharaoh because what does he also say? When he tells Abraham about his question being answered, he says I'm also gonna punish them and you're gonna come out with, with great wealth. And so after hardening his heart and after hardening his heart and then show him this miracle and harden his heart again and show him this sign and harden his heart again. What happens? You know what? I am sick of these Jews. Get rid of them and give them what they want. So Pharaoh's heart is hardened for a couple of reasons. One, to eventually let them go with wealth, but also hardened again, because he got hardens their heart one, his heart one last time, one last time. Cause Pharaoh said, you know what? Wait a second, I got to go back and get them. I can't let them go. So he pursues them again and he destroys their army. So bottom line, he hardens his heart one to bring Israel out. Remember, even when Israel is disobedient, Israel keeps getting blessed even in spite of their disobedience, which tells you if God is for you, okay, nobody be against you, but Israel is blessed. Even in spite of this, they come out with great wealth of million, at least a million people come with him, not just the Jews, but they also have soldiers coming with them. People who aren't even Jewish are coming with them and they have this wealth and then he's gonna destroy this army. Why does he harden Pharaoh's heart? To show everybody that I'm God. I can harden hearts. I can soften hearts. I can close wounds. I can open rooms. I can set you free and I can kill you. But above all else, I need you to know one thing. The reason why Pharaoh's heart is hardened so that I can get glory, why so that you can know for a fact that I am God. Amen.