This Sunday we will conclude our series on the 9 Marks of a Healthy Church.  I sincerely hope this series has helped remind you of some of our core values.  The ninth and final mark of a healthy, biblical church is an understanding of Biblical Church Leadership.  Of all of the marks that we have surveyed so far, this is one area that we have most recently attempted to become more biblical.  For most of the 31 year history of Oak Crest, the church was a Single-Elder led Congregational Church.  In 2013, we transitioned to a Plural-Elder led Congregationalism.  It is our biblical conviction that the healthiest church is one that is Christ-Ruled, Elder-Led, Deacon-Served, Committee-Operated, and Congregationally-Affirmed.
          This is a good opportunity to remind ourselves of the role and purpose of the elder.  An elder is a pastor or an overseer.  The Bible uses these terms interchangeably.  He is one who teaches and preaches the Word of God.  He is a doctrinal gatekeeper for the church.  He equips the saints for the work of ministry.  He is not a dictator.  He is a servant-leader that instills a love for the Word of God in the hearts of the people he has been entrusted to serve.  As I have stated on several occasions, the elder does not have an inherent authority, rather he has a derived authority on the basis of his faithfulness to teach the Scripture.  What this means is that his leadership is in the teaching of the truths of Scripture, not in the administrative minutia of the church.  That responsibility lies, to some extent because of his administrative responsibilities, with the senior pastor as a first among equals among the elders, but to a greater degree with the committees of lay people who exercise their giftedness to operate the church.
          The other New Testament office is that of the deacon.  Deacons are vitally important to the function of the church.  They are an extension of the pastoral ministry of the church.  They serve the needs of the people in the congregation.  I am so thankful for the faithfulness of the deacon body at Oak Crest.  They are here to help each of us and to encourage each of us.  If you don’t know who your Sunday School class deacon is, I would strongly encourage you to ask.
          According to Scripture, the final authority lies with the congregation itself.  We are Congregationalists.  This is a different model than we see in Presbyterianism.  I am convinced that the biblical role of the congregation is extremely important.  The congregation affirms elders and deacons.  The congregation affirms direction and budget.  The congregation is the final point of church discipline.  All of this is the case because we are all, each and every believer, indwelt by the Holy Spirit.  Therefore we strive for unity in the Spirit, in the bond of peace.
 
In Christ,
Blain Craig

          The eighth mark of a healthy, biblical church is a concern for promoting Christian discipleship and growth.  Church growth is a major concern in American churches.  Sadly, in many cases genuine, biblical growth is misunderstood.  There are two key things to remember when we talk about growth in the local church.  The first and most important truth about growth is that God accomplishes the growth.  Jesus said, “I will build my church.”  Paul said to the Corinthians, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the growth.  So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth.  He who plants and he who waters are one, and each will receive his wages according to his labor.  For we are God's fellow workers. You are God's field, God's building,” (1 Corinthians 3: 6-9).
          This concept of Christ building his church should be remembered today.  Many churches have wrongly thought that they are responsible for growing the church much like a company would market its product to cause the company to grow.  The end result of such thinking is that creative marketing and programs that are appealing to people, especially the lost, are the key to growing a church.  This is simply not true.  I have often said that if this time next year many hundreds of people more are part of Oak Crest, yet we can point to some “creative” thing we did for those people to be at Oak Crest, rather than the simple preaching of the gospel, we have not built a church but merely a crowd. The way a church grows to the glory of God is by doing those things God has called us to do namely, worshiping God, preaching the word, praying and covenanting together in obedience to God.
          This brings us to the second crucial key of church growth.  Growth in the church is not limited to larger numbers.  Certainly we pray to see people saved and added to the number of Christ’s church, but that is only the tip of the iceberg in relation to growth.  In fact, as we read the New Testament the kind of growth that the disciples consistently speak of is growth in holiness and growth in covenant unity.  Mark Dever describes biblical growth, “growth can appear in many different ways: through growing numbers being called to missions; by older members beginning to get a fresh sense of their responsibility in evangelism; by funerals many of the younger members of the congregation attend simply out of their love for the older; by increased praying, and desire for increased preaching; by church meetings  characterized by genuinely spiritual conversation; by increased giving, and by givers giving more sacrificially; by more members sharing the gospel with others; by parents rediscovering their responsibility to educate their children in the faith. These are just a few examples of the kind of church growth Christians pray and work for.”
          So how does this kind of Godly growth occur?  It happens through discipleship.  Discipleship is not merely taking in more information about God, but allowing the Holy Spirit to apply the truth of his word to our hearts resulting in obedience and holiness.  That is biblical growth.  At Oak Crest, everything we do should be to the goal of growing the church through the growth of individual believers in the faith.  As we do this, not only do we grow, but God gloriously receives all the credit for our growth.
 
In Christ,
Blain Craig

          I have mentioned on several occasions the importance of the Cooperative Program.  This is the giving program of the Southern Baptist Convention that was established for mission funding in 1925.  I know I am biased, but I can honestly say there is no other giving mechanism I know of that so brilliantly allows individual Christians to be so involved in so many different aspects of ministry in so many different parts of the world.  Through our church’s participation in the Cooperative Program, Oak Crest Baptist Church is actively sharing the gospel with thousands of people around the world.  We are actively training thousands of future pastors, youth ministers, and music ministers through our six seminaries.  We could never dream of doing so much by ourselves, but through the Cooperative Program we can and we are.
          Resurrection Day is still two weeks away, but I did want to remind you that we have a unique opportunity to supplement the Cooperative Program in North America through the Annie Armstrong Easter Offering.  I can’t remember an Easter without Annie.  The Annie Armstrong Easter Offering is much more than a Southern Baptist tradition.  Just as the Lottie Moon offering in December supports International Missions, so too the Annie Armstrong offering at Easter supports North American Missions.  It is a means of supporting the work of thousands of missionaries all throughout the United States and Canada.  Seventy-Five percent of the offering monies go directly to pay missionary salaries.  Fifteen percent of the collected monies go to church starts.  Southern Baptists endeavor by God’s grace to begin hundreds of new churches each year.  There is significant cost attached to a church start.  Your Annie Armstrong gift goes to defer some of that cost.  Ten percent of the Annie Armstrong budget goes to evangelism.  Evangelistic efforts supported by the Annie Armstrong Offering include, church and community ministries, resort ministries, literacy missions, sports evangelism, and internet evangelism.  Once again, we are able to do so much more together than we can individually.  Would you begin to pray about how God might lead you to give to this significant offering?  This year the goal convention-wide is $70 Million.   At Oak Crest, our goal is $3500.  Of course every dollar counts, but more important is your conviction and motivation to see the gospel spread that counts most.  I believe God would rather someone give a nickel with an earnest desire to see God glorified in the gospel, than someone to give a million without a passion for the good news of Jesus.  May God bless you as you seek His will, and may we do this only to the glory of God.
 
In Christ,
Blain Craig

​The seventh mark of a healthy, biblical church is a biblical practice of church discipline.  For centuries membership in the church of Jesus Christ has had meaning because churches willingly and obediently practiced church discipline.  This biblical idea has not only faded from church practice, but is all but non-existent in modern evangelicalism.  The vague practice of church discipline among churches does not reflect the importance the Bible places on it.
          Today, many are afraid of talking about church discipline, much less practicing it, but it should not be as frightening as we make it.  Our picture of church discipline should not be one of radical, legalistic, rampant excommunications of members – not at all.  It is a mark that flows from the sixth mark of meaningful church membership.  It means something to be a part of the bride of Christ.  How can we rightly share how the Bible says we are to live in Christ, if we are not equally willing to say how we should not live?  The church is a family.  Families are healthiest when discipline is acted out.  Consider Hebrews 12: 3-11, there the writer reminds us that discipline from the Lord is never fun, but it is always beneficial.
          Most churches avoid talking about church discipline because of modern misconceptions about what the Bible says about judging.  Judging has a wide range of meanings in the English language.  Within the church encouragement to righteous and holy living is a kind of judgment, but it is not the kind of self-righteous judgment Jesus himself condemned.  We do not hold others to any standard we are not willing to be held to ourselves.
          In terms of church discipline itself, there are many misconceptions.  Certainly there is the extreme discipline that is sometimes necessary, that is removing someone from fellowship due to unrepentant sin.  But those cases are not the norm.  In fact, there are two kinds of discipline: formative, that is edifying and growing each other up into Christ, and corrective, that is confronting unrepentant church members for the purpose of restoration.  To this point, think of all the steps that discipline takes before that final outcome.  Matthew 18: 15-20 is our guide.  So according to Matthew 18, even having a conversation about what God is doing in our lives and times we have been offended is a kind of church discipline.  When we lovingly and gently confront a brother or sister about open, blatant, unrepentant sin, the Holy Spirit may very well bring repentance in that encounter, thus avoiding any of the other steps.
          Here is the real point of all this.  The Bible would not have us investigating one another and performing “witch hunts.”  We are talking about open, blatant, unrepentant sins.  The larger point is that church discipline has a positive side too.  First it is restorative.  Reconciliation is always our goal.  Second, the reason most churches don’t practice any form of discipline is because membership is meaningless.  Imagine a drug intervention on a family member that hates his family.  The intervention would not go well because there is no desire on the part of the addict to please his family.  Unlike the analogy of a family intervention, in the case of discipline in the church our goal is not merely to please others, but to glorify God.  In church discipline our goal is not to start calling out people on their sin.  No, it is to create an atmosphere of love and covenant where if there ever does arrive a point of discipline it would mean something.  When we are a healthy church, proper discipline will follow.      
 
In Christ,
Blain Craig