Eph 901f 9/11/88
A. The Joint Analogy to the Pastor-Teacher.
1. All members and parts of the body are linked by joints or ligaments.
2. Joints are those parts of the body where bones or elements of a skeleton join.
3. Joints permit motion and coordination of the human body.
4. Ligaments are tissue used to connect joint extremities
. 5. Ligaments can also be tough tissue used to support an organ of the body in its proper place.
6. In 1 Cor 12, different parts of the body represent different spiritual gifts in the royal family of God. At the moment of salvation, one of the forty things we receive is a spiritual gift.
7. Different parts of the body represent the variety of differences among believers from the standpoint of spiritual gifts, growth, progress, function, and personality.
8. Joints provide the unity of the body and give it cohesion, because joints are the point of contact and the connection between various parts of the body.
9. Just as there are differences in joints of the body, so there are differences among pastor-teachers. The spiritual gift is given to many different types of personalities.
a. Men with the gift of evangelism have very scintillating, attractive personalities, designed to attract and hold the attention of unbelievers, that they might understand the issue of the Gospel. The word “joint” does not apply to the evangelist, but only to the pastor-teacher.
b. By contrast, the pastor-teacher has to communicate day after day. His responsibility is to inculcate his congregation with Bible doctrine, which is an entirely different type of ministry than evangelism.
c. Therefore, pastors have many different types of personalities. The casting director is God the Holy Spirit. In His marvelous sense of humor, He has given the gift to many different types of personalities.
d. However, every pastor must have preparation and persistence. He must teach line upon line, precept upon precept, advancing a yard or two a day at a time. He must be faithful and consistently study and teach.
e. Pastors who teach doctrine have a variety of personalities, vocations, attitudes, activities, and functions in life.
10. All the members of the royal family of God are analogous to the body of Christ. They are linked together by the doctrinal teaching of the pastor. The emphasis of this doctrinal teaching must focus on the mystery doctrine of the Church Age, found in the New Testament epistles.
a. Therefore, all members of the royal family of God are linked together, not by similarity of personalities, not by conformity to standards of legalism, not by human rapport concepts, and not in conformity to false standards or doctrine, but by the doctrinal teaching from the pastor and resultant advance toward spiritual maturity.
b. Christianity is not changing your personality to a certain mold, but it is growing spiritually through the perception of doctrine. Distinguish between changes that occur through growth and personalities which remain the same.
c. There are all kinds of pastors, just as there are all kinds of joints. The pastor’s function must not be related to his personality, but to the content of his message. The less the message content, the more the emotional preaching and nonsense.
d. You can receive limited blessing from reading the Bible for yourself, but you can never learn how to execute the protocol plan from that method. Only the spiritual gift of pastor-teacher is equipped to dig out the truth of the mystery doctrine and communicate it to you. Without joints, you go nowhere, both physically and spiritually.
11. All coordination in the body of Christ is based upon the function of joints and ligaments, which represent the pastor who teaches the mystery doctrine of the Church Age.
B. Joints are the basis for exercise and building strength in the body.
1. Without joints, the human body would atrophy. Likewise, without the faithful function of pastor-teachers, the body of Christ or royal family of God would lack spiritual growth and retrogress from lack of spiritual food, vitality, and power.
2. Muscle is constructed from consistent exercise, which involves the use of the joints. Repetitious and beneficial exercise involves the consistent and constant function of the joints.
3. The constant use of the joints in exercise is analogous to the faithful and consistent teaching of Bible doctrine by whomever is your right pastor-teacher.
4. In the development of strength, the joints function against pressure which they overcome through the function of their own perception, metabolization, and application of Bible doctrine; i.e., their function of post-salvation epistemological rehabilitation.
a. So there must be both pressure and the use of that which overcomes the pressure, i.e., the ten problem-solving devices. This applies to both the pastor and those in his congregation. You must know the problem-solving devices, because you only grow through pressure.
b. Actually, you need three things to grow: food, sleep, and exercise. The food is analogous to Bible doctrine. The exercise is analogous to overcoming pressure through the utilization of the problem- solving devices.
5. As a result of the congregation’s consistent perception of the mystery doctrine, the believer becomes the muscle of the body, possessing definition, symmetry, strength, endurance, and coordination. This is analogous to the believer’s advance through the three stages of spiritual adulthood by which an invisible hero is manufactured.
C. Joints provide body action.
1. By analogy, every function and action in life must be motivated by thought energy, the divine viewpoint printed on the neurons of the brain in the form of metabolized doctrine.
2. Two categories of doctrine cause you to grow spiritually.
a. Epignosis is the metabolized doctrine that goes into your right lobe.
b. Sophia is the metabolized doctrine on the launching pad of your right lobe being applied to experience in life.
3. You can only receive those two categories of doctrine through the function of operation Z.
a. In stage one, a prepared pastor-teacher communicates Bible doctrine. The believer with positive volition makes the decision to listen to that teaching.
b. In stage two, God the Holy Spirit teaches that doctrine to the human spirit, where it becomes PNEUMATIKOS or spiritual phenomena.
c. In stage three, PNEUMATIKOS automatically goes to the left lobe or NOUS where it is understood academically, called GNOSIS.
d. In stage four, the believer makes a second positive decision to believe what he understands. At that point, the Holy Spirit metabolizes it into the right lobe or KARDIA with its eight compartments. On the launching pad, when it is applied to experience, that doctrine becomes SOPHIA or wisdom.
e. Without the ministry of God the Holy Spirit, there could be no metabolized doctrine in the right lobe or wisdom. The only way to ensure the Holy Spirit’s function in operation Z is to use rebound, i.e., to name your sins before listening to Bible teaching, in order that you might reside in the divine dynasphere where you are filled with the Holy Spirit.
4. Joints provide body action, which refers to the believers who grow spiritually, produce, function, glorify God, and become invisible heroes.
5. Body action can be described in terms of expending tremendous energy. The atom represents energy with its core of protons, neurons, and electrons in the outer ring. The power that holds the atom together, or the energy locked in the atom, equals its mass times the speed of light squared. This energy or power is nothing compared to metabolized doctrine in the right lobe printed on the neurons of the brain.
6. The faithful teaching of the mystery doctrine of the Church Age by pastors provides the dynamic energy for the royal family of God, reflected in the use of problem-solving devices and in the execution of the protocol plan of God.
D. Joints provide body coordination.
1. Without the function of the joints, there would be neither body action nor body coordination.
2. Without the faithful teaching of the pastor, there would be no fulfillment of the protocol plan of God and therefore no invisible heroes. Invisible heroes have maximum invisible impact.
a. Personal impact.
b. Historical impact.
c. International impact.
d. Angelic impact.
e. Heritage impact.
3. Karl von Clausewitz wrote On War. In Book One of Chapter Three, he said, “Every specific calling in life requires special qualities of intellect and temperament. When these are of a high order and manifest themselves by extraordinary achievements, the mind to which they belong is termed genius. Genius is a superior mental capacity for certain activities. The essence of military genius is to bring under consideration all of the tendencies of mind and soul in combination toward the business of war. We say “in combination,” for military genius is not just one single quality bearing on war, as for instance courage, but it is a harmonious combination of powers in which one or the other may predominate, but none must be in opposition.”
a. Our special calling is the fact that we were elected into the royal family of God at the moment of our salvation. Now our life has meaning, purpose, and definition. Therefore, special qualities are required of us.
b. By attaining spiritual maturity, you should become a spiritual genius.
c. “All of the tendencies of mind and soul” refers to our concentration on the message under the filling of the Spirit.
d. When we have different parts of ourself in opposition, we are living the fragmented life in the cosmic system. For none to be in opposition, we must attain spiritual self-esteem, which requires the consistent perception, metabolization, and application of Bible doctrine. You must consistently listen to the teaching of a prepared pastor.
4. Body coordination demands communication of the mystery doctrine of the Church Age by the pastor-teacher, so that winners may be produced in very generation of the Church Age.
5. Just as military genius must have the coordination of all of its faculties, so the body of Christ must have the coordination of all the spiritual gifts, which function to the maximum when the believer involved has attained spiritual maturity.
6. This coordination depends upon the communication of the mystery doctrine of the Church Age by whomever is your right pastor-teacher.
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ible Ministries 5139 West Alabama, Houston, Texas 77056 (713) 621-3740
© 1996, by R. B. Thieme, Jr. All rights reserved.
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