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(Brother Piper is prayerfully intending to use this particular book to promote revival when serving as a church-planter, if the Lord will so allow.)
Below is a pre-publication preview of this work, in the form of excerpts including an abbreviated form of the Table of Contents, and the Introduction.
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[ABBREVIATED] TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Ask for the Old Paths: The Church’s Biblical Order of Authority Revived
- INTRODUCTION
- CHAPTER I: THE HEAD OF THE CHURCH--CHRIST THE CHIEF SHEPHERD
- The Autonomy of the Local Church--Doctrinally and Practically
- The Role of Christ over His Church--“Head over All Things”
- The Extent of Christ’s Authority over His Church--Infinite
- The Modern Hindrances to Christ’s Authority over His Church
- CHAPTER II: THE UNDERSHEPHERD--THE PASTOR
- The Pastor’s Role in the Church
- The Pastor’s Responsibilities in the Church
- The Pastor’s Accountability for the Flock
- The Extent of the Pastor’s Authority over the Flock
- The Modern Hindrances to a Pastor’s Authority over His Flock
- CHAPTER III: THE FLOCK’S SERVANTS--THE DEACONS
- The Need for Deacons in the Church
- The Deacon’s role within the Church
- The Modern Hindrances to the Deacon’s Role within the Church
- CHAPTER IV: THE FLOCK--THE CONGREGATION
- The Role of a Church Congregation
- The Modern Hindrance to a Congregation’s Role within a Church
- CONCLUSION
[EXCERPTED] INTRODUCTION:
INTRODUCTION
The local New Testament church—it is that which Christ loved with His own spilled blood! How far she has wandered from His side over the past century, as she has sought to maintain her
distance from the world, instead of simply maintaining her original position at Christ’s feet. As the world has digressed increasingly over recent decades, the church has always remained a definite
distance from the world’s roaring crowds; however, in tediously maintaining that exact distance, she has herself steadily moved from her Bridegroom’s unmoving side. Instead of the distance growing
greater between the world and the church as the world degenerates further and further, the distance between the two has remained too much the same. It is not enough to keep a distance from the
world, while at the same time following it from that same distance.[i] Of course, the church may
boast that her distance from the world is roughly as great as it used to be. What she fails to perceive is that such a distance should have vastly increased. A wise preacher of the nineteenth
century once stated that, anymore, Christians are too much like the world for the world to hate them. How mournfully true that fact attests itself to be—especially today! O how the local church
needs revival! How very little she fancies she needs revival! As long as she can display a certain number of conversions on her records, and as long as she can maintain an appearance of success,
she screens the true void in her midst—a void of God’s power! From whence comes such a terrible void? It comes primarily from her abandoning the order of authority God has laid down for her.
What is God’s order of authority for the local New Testament church today? Does God
leave such an issue to chance or to human discretion, or does He provide the answers within His Holy Word? Indeed, God does provide every answer for His church—as well as the answers for
every other possible question in life! What a priceless Book have the saints of God, who hold in their own hands heaven’s directives, the declaration of God’s love, and the way of salvation![ii] Let the Christian now begin to open the pages revealing God’s order of authority for His Son’s
“espoused” bride[iii]—the local church.
[EXCERPTED] FOOTNOTES:
[i] II Timothy 3:13-14; Hebrews 13:8; Revelation 18:4; II Corinthians 6:14-18; II Peter 3:10-14.
[ii] Luke 1:1; John 1:18; Acts 16:17.
[iii] II Corinthians 11:2.
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