Language really is a funny thing, because so often how words are used determines what they mean regardless of their actual definition. Or to put it another way, meaning is dictated by connotation more than by actual denotation. This is especially so when it comes to current discussions in the Southern Baptist Convention about who can and cannot serve as pastor. Over the past several decades, the titles and types of pastors on church staffs all across this country have proliferated exponentially. We now have Senior Pastors, Lead Pastors, Teaching Pastors, Executive Pastors, Assistant Pastors, Associate Pastors, Youth Pastors, Children’s Pastors, Worship Pastors, Discipleship Pastors, Missions Pastors, Small Group Pastors, Assimilation Pastors, and on and on the list could go ad infinitum. Just a quick perusal of any ministry job board shows that we have practically become enamored with pastoral titles.
Of course, there is a certain wisdom to this structure. No one pastor is omnicompetent in every area of ministry, and as survey after survey has proven, expecting a single or solo pastor to be such quickly leads to burnout among other things. So, dividing pastoral duties among a group of leaders allows the pastoral staff to share the load of ministry responsibilities. This is in keeping with the vision of the body that is painted in 1 Corinthians 12.12-31. In that passage, we read “For just as the body is one and has many parts, and all the parts of that body, though many, are one body—so also is Christ.” The point is that dividing ministry responsibilities according to age groups (youth, children, seniors) or according to ministry focus (missions, discipleship, pastoral care) is an efficient way for a pastoral staff to share the many and varied tasks of church ministry. This division of labor maximizes the personality strengths, training, and experience of each individual pastor by allowing them to prioritize and focus on the ministry tasks for which they are best equipped.
The difficulty, however, is that the Bible never mentions associate or assistant pastors of any kind. In fact, the word “pastor”, which is the most commonly used title for ministry leaders today, is not even the primary designation used to refer to church leadership roles in the New Testament. In those sacred pages, we read more often of bishops (overseers) and elders, but we must affirm that these three terms, i.e. pastor, bishop, and elder, are meant to be viewed as synonymous terms, all of which refer to the ministerial leaders of the local church. Of course, this claim is not without its critics. Those who claim that women can serve as pastors are quick to claim that the role and function of pastor/teacher is separate and distinct from the role of bishop/elder. And so, the logic goes, women can serve in the role of pastor/teacher (e.g. as children’s pastor, women’s pastor, missions pastor, etc.) under the supervisory authority of the senior or lead pastor and/or elders.
Unfortunately, a thorough examination of the scriptural evidence would go beyond the limits of this space, but a quick examination of one particular passage will serve to demonstrate the thesis that the role of pastor, bishop (overseer), and elder are in fact the same role. In 1 Peter, chapter 5, verses 2, the Apostle Peter gives the following exhortation to the elders (c.f. 5.1) of the churches that he is writing to, “shepherd(or pastor, same word) the flock of God among you, exercising oversight, not under compulsion but voluntarily, according to the will of God”. Peter goes on to show that elders exercise these responsibilities under the authority of Jesus Christ, the Chief Shepherd (or “Senior Pastor”, c.f. 5.4), who is the “shepherd (or pastor) and guardian (or bishop) of your souls” (2.25). This is not the only text that relates these ideas, but it is reasonably clear from this text that the responsibility for oversight and pastoring belongs primarily to those who serve as elders. If this analysis is sound, then the qualifications and restrictions that pertain to one must equally pertain to the others.
This is why we must reevaluate our use of pastor as a title for ministry leadership, particularly as it relates to the role of women leaders in the church. The application of the title “pastor” to women leaders who serve, for example, in the area of children or missions is careless at best and a complete disregard of the prescriptions of Scripture at worst. Further, we must affirm that changing the title from “pastor” to “director” while leaving the ministry responsibilities the same is merely wordplay. The New Testament is never interested in titles solely for the sake of titles; the biblical titles for leadership always refer first and foremost to the functions of leadership. And it is the function of bishop, elder, and pastor that is restricted to qualified men according to the Scriptures. Here again, this does not mean that women cannot participate in the ministry of the church, but it does mean that women should not serve in the role or function of pastor.
At the very least, this means that we desperately need to reevaluate our (over)usage of the title pastor. As the 2000 Baptist Faith & Message states, “[The church’s] scriptural officers are pastors and deacons. While both men and women are gifted for service in the church, the office of pastor is limited to men as qualified by Scripture.” There are two and only two offices of leadership in the church, i.e. pastors and deacons, and the office and function of pastors is limited to qualified men. This is the design of God given in His inspired, authoritative, and sufficient Word, and it cannot be dismissed simply because we find it to be distasteful or out of step with modern cultural concerns. We must obey the Scriptures; we cannot play fast and loose with words, change their meanings, or fit them to our own preferred usage. Words have power and meaning, and we must use them in ways that are scripturally faithful.
This article is also published at SBCvoices, here.
1 I have taken refuge in the Lord. How can you say to me, “Escape to the mountains like a bird! 2 For look, the wicked string bows; they put their arrows on bowstrings to shoot from the shadows at the upright in heart. 3 When the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?”
4 The Lord is in his holy temple; the Lord—his throne is in heaven. His eyes watch; his gaze examines everyone. 5 The Lord examines the righteous, but he hates the wicked and those who love violence. 6 Let him rain burning coals and sulfur on the wicked; let a scorching wind be the portion in their cup. 7 For the Lord is righteous; he loves righteous deeds. The upright will see his face.
~Psalm 11
Series: Praying through the Psalms Text: Psalm 11.1-7 Church: South Caraway Baptist Church, Jonesboro, AR Date: June 7, 2023
15 This is why, since I heard about your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, 16 I never stop giving thanks for you as I remember you in my prayers. 17 I pray that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father, would give you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of him. 18 I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so that you may know what is the hope of his calling, what is the wealth of his glorious inheritance in the saints, 19 and what is the immeasurable greatness of his power toward us who believe, according to the mighty working of his strength.
20 He exercised this power in Christ by raising him from the dead and seating him at his right hand in the heavens— 21 far above every ruler and authority, power and dominion, and every title given, not only in this age but also in the one to come. 22 And he subjected everything under his feet and appointed him as head over everything for the church, 23 which is his body, the fullness of the one who fills all things in every way.
~Ephesians 1.15-23
Title: On the Ground of Christian Hope Text: Ephesians 1.15-23 Series: The Letter to the Ephesians Church: South Caraway Baptist Church, Jonesboro, AR Date: May 28, 2023
It seems like there has been a lot of discussion recently, especially within the Southern Baptist community, regarding pastoral ministry and the role of women. This is largely due to the actions taken by Rick Warren and Saddleback Church. In May 2021, the southern California megachurch made denominational headlines when it ordained three women as pastors. Since then, it has also recognized Stacie Wood, wife of current pastor Andy Wood who succeeded Warren in 2022, as a Teaching Pastor. Because of these actions, the Credentials Committee of the Southern Baptist Convention determined that Saddleback Church is no longer “in friendly cooperation” with and therefore is no longer a part of the SBC. Saddleback intends to appeal this decision at this year’s national convention.
In this post, I am not concerned with the question of Saddleback or its future relationship with the SBC. Rather, I am interested in some of the biblical arguments that have been proffered throughout this discussion in the attempt to justify the pastoral service of women in the church. One pastor in particular, Dwight McKissic of Cornerstone Baptist Church in Arlington, TX, regularly advances the argument that pastoral ministry is a spiritual gift that can be exercised apart from the function and office of pastor. In his defense, he affirms that the role of lead or senior pastor is reserved for men according to the Scriptures, but he suggests that, under the pastor’s authority, the gift of pastor may be exercised by anyone so gifted regardless of gender.
This argument is primarily based on Ephesians 4.11, which says, “And he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers.” The verb “gave” points back to verse 8 (quoting Psalm 68.18), which reads, “When he ascended on high, he took the captives captive; he gave gifts to people.” The language of “gifts” and “giving” suggests to some that this passage should be read alongside the paradigmatic “spiritual gift” passages, e.g. 1 Corinthians 12, Romans 12, and it is this coalescence of passages that leads to the conclusion that pastoral ministry is a spiritual gift that can be exercised apart from the office and function of pastor. I believe there are several problems with this interpretation, and in the space that follows, I would like to highlight three of them.
First, this view rests on a grave misunderstanding of “spiritual gifts”. In English, the word “gift” can be used to refer to an ability or a talent; it is customary to speak of someone who is extremely skilled in a particular ability as someone who is “gifted.” This is the fundamental assumption of so-called “spiritual-gift inventories”, namely that a person’s “spiritual gifts” are in keeping with or even identical to their natural abilities and personality strengths. If this is the case, then anyone who has a strong personal charisma or is particularly skilled in public speaking could be viewed as having the “spiritual gift” of pastor/teacher. The problem is that none of the qualifications for pastoral ministry in the NT are based on a person’s ability or skill; almost all of them are grounded in the qualities of a person’s character. In his book What are the Spiritual Gifts?: Rethinking the Conventional View, Ken Berding suggests that this connotation of gifts as abilities has significantly skewed our understanding of what Paul actually means by “spiritual gifts”. Rather, he argues that spiritual gifts should be understood as ministry roles or areas of service. In this sense, pastors are a gift to the church; they are called by God to serve a particular role or function in the life of the body.
This brings me to the second concern I have with this view, namely that it misunderstands the role and function of pastors in the life of the body. In Ephesians 4.12, we read that these gifts, i.e. apostles, prophets, evangelists, and pastor/teachers, are given “to equip the saints for the work of ministry, to build up the body of Christ.” In other words, the roles that are given in verse 11 are given for the edification of the body in verse 12, meaning that they are not exercised among the body at large. They are leadership roles given by Christ to care for and serve His body, “until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of God’s Son, growing into maturity with a stature measured by Christ’s fullness” (4.13). This understanding would seem to be confirmed by Ephesians 2.20, which says that the church is “built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone.” This would mean that pastoral ministry is a leadership role in the church, and therefore it is not a gift to be exercised among the various members of the body regardless of gender.
A final concern that I would like to highlight in this regard has to do with the misunderstanding of the phrase “some pastors and teachers”. Is this phrase referring to one group, i.e. pastor/teachers, or is it actually two groups that are in view, i.e. some pastors and some teachers? Exegetically speaking, the two nouns are governed by one article, and this is the same article that identifies the other three groups. So, literally translated, the verse in question reads, “And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers” (Eph 4.11 ESV). The most natural reading would indicate that there are four groups of leaders in view here, and that the last group, i.e. “pastors and teachers,” should be understood as one group with a compound role of shepherding and teaching. Of course, this is not the only way to understand this line (e.g. see the footnote in the NET Bible for an alternative view), but the fact remains that all pastors are teachers, even if not all teachers are pastors. The close proximity of the terms here along with the use of the article would seem to imply that it is pastor/teachers who have been gifted by Christ to His church, and therefore, pastoring cannot be viewed as a gift that is exercised apart from the role and function of pastor.
If this is the case, then the question of who may fill such a function in the church must be answered in light of the qualifications that are given for pastoral service. In particular, this would mean that the famous (or perhaps infamous) prohibition found in 1 Timothy, chapter 2, verse 12 must be taken into consideration; in that verse, we read, “I do not allow a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; instead, she is to remain quiet.” This is not to say that women cannot teach in the church, but it is to say that Ephesians 4.11 cannot be used to define such a role. Pastoral ministry is a leadership role in the church that is limited to qualified men per the Scriptures, and we simply cannot set those limitations aside based on our modern understanding of giftedness or ability. Certainly, the service of women in the church is vital and necessary for the health and growth of the church (c.f. Titus 2), but we must submit ourselves to the prescriptions of Holy Scripture, which limit the role and function of pastor to qualified men.
For the choir director: on the Gittith. A psalm of David.
1 Lord, our Lord, how magnificent is your name throughout the earth! You have covered the heavens with your majesty. 2 From the mouths of infants and nursing babies, you have established a stronghold on account of your adversaries in order to silence the enemy and the avenger.
3 When I observe your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you set in place, 4 what is a human being that you remember him, a son of man that you look after him? 5 You made him little less than God and crowned him with glory and honor. 6 You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet: 7 all the sheep and oxen, as well as the animals in the wild, 8 the birds of the sky, and the fish of the sea that pass through the currents of the seas.
9 Lord, our Lord, how magnificent is your name throughout the earth!
~Psalm 8
Series: Praying through the Psalms Text: Psalm 8.1-9 Church: South Caraway Baptist Church, Jonesboro, AR Date: May 17, 2023
In my previous post, I argued that our hermeneutic for interpreting the Bible must be grounded in the conviction that what God intended to say in the Scriptures is accurately and faithfully conveyed in what the human authors actually wrote, and for most of the Bible, this seems to be rather clear. The question, however, arises when we come to texts in the New Testament that seem to interpret the Old Testament against the grain of the author’s intent. If we believe that “scripture interprets scripture” (see my post, here), then it would makes sense to suggest that we should follow the interpretive principles of the Apostles, and if they were not bound by a strict conception of authorial intent, then perhaps we should jettison this hermeneutical ground in our interpretive efforts as well. This then is the point that must be proven, namely that the New Testament authors did in fact disregard the human author’s intent when they interpreted the Old Testament. Of course, to examine every place where the New Testament author’s quote from or allude to the Old Testament would require far more space than is available here, and this work has already been done by many fine scholars in the field. I recommend Commentary on the New Testament use of the Old Testament, edited by G.K. Beale and D.A. Carson. But in lieu of that, I would like to explore one text as a test case for the thesis that the New Testament authors ignored the principle of authorial intent in their use of the Old Testament, that being Matthew’s use of Hosea 11.1 in chapter 2, verse 15 of his Gospel.
After they were gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream, saying, “Get up! Take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell you. For Herod is about to search for the child to kill him.” So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night, and escaped to Egypt. He stayed there until Herod’s death, so that what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet might be fulfilled: Out of Egypt I called my Son.
~Matthew 2.13-15
The book of the prophet Hosea is a story of love and betrayal; set against the backdrop of Hosea’s own marriage to the adulteress Gomer, throughout the book, God repeatedly rebukes the northern Kingdom of Israel for scorning His grace, rejecting His love, forgetting His covenant, and playing the whore with the false gods of Baal. And so, in chapter 11, and verse 1, we read, “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son.” In these verses, God is looking back on the Exodus experience of His people as the initial overture of His love for Israel; as He goes on to say in verse 4 of that chapter, “I led them with human cords, with ropes of love. To them I was like one who eases the yoke from their jaws; I bent down to give them food.” It is clear that these verses are operating on the paternal imagery of parenthood. In the same way that parents nurture their newborn children, so also God nurtured His “son” Israel by bringing them out of Egyptian slavery, providing for them in the wilderness, and leading them into a land flowing with milk and honey. Even in spite of their repeated betrayal, God goes on to say in verse 8, “How can I give you up, Ephraim? How can I surrender you, Israel? How can I make you like Admah? How can I treat you like Zeboiim? I have had a change of heart; my compassion is stirred!” This chapter is a beautiful picture of the tenderness and mercy of God toward His rebellious son, and even though, the people of Israel will suffer His discipline, it holds out the hope that God has not ceased loving His people.
Now, in chapter 2 of the first canonical Gospel, Matthew connects the flight of the Holy family to Egypt to the words of Hosea 11.1, “so that what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet might be fulfilled: Out of Egypt I have called my Son“ (quoting Hosea 11.1b). But if the prophet Hosea wasn’t making a direct messianic prediction in the text in question, as we saw above, then how can the Egyptian flight of Mary, Joseph, and Jesus properly be considered a fulfillment? The answer is that this is a fulfillment by way of typology not prediction. Part of Matthew’s portrayal of Jesus is to show that He is the long awaited “prophet like Moses” (c.f. Deut 18.15-19), and he demonstrates this by highlighting the ways that Jesus recapitulates the story of Moses. A few examples should suffice. When Moses was born, Pharaoh killed all the Hebrew boys; when Jesus was born, Herod killed all the Jewish boys. According to 1 Corinthians 10.1-2, Moses had a baptism experience in the Red Sea, and Jesus was baptized in the Jordan River. Moses and the Israelites spent forty years in the wilderness; Jesus spent forty days in the wilderness. Moses went up on Mount Sinai to receive the Law; Jesus went up on a mountain to give the law (Sermon on the Mount). There are five books of Moses (Pentateuch); there are five discourses of Jesus’ sermons in the Gospel of Matthew. And “out of Egypt, I called my Son.” Based on this evidence, it is reasonably clear that the fulfillment that Matthew sees in the text of Hosea 11.1 is typological. Even as Israel was God’s typological “son”, Jesus is the true and better messianic Son of God.
In the final analysis, rather than violating the principle of authorial intent in his use of Hosea 11.1, the typological connection drawn by Matthew actually affirms the authorial intent of Hosea. And still, the question remains, “what of God’s intent in Hosea 11.1? When He inspired Hosea to write “out of Egypt, I called my son,” did he know that Matthew would take it in a different direction?” Of course, it is a theological truism to say that God knew the theological connections that Matthew would draw when He inspired Hosea to write, and so it is not wrong to say God “intended” more than Hosea understood at the time. However, this doesn’t mean that His intent stands in contradiction to or competition with the intent of Hosea. We must assume that God’s intent in Hosea 11 was to spark His people to repentance by reminding them of the great depths of His love that was demonstrated in the events of the Exodus, especially because the words of Hosea 11 are reported by the prophet as the very words spoken by God. (This is the Lord’s declaration, Hosea 11.11) Whatever “fuller sense” that we may understand from Hosea’s words, it must be grounded in the inspired intent of the human author, and this is exemplified in Matthew’s use of the text to explain the flight to Egypt.
But there is something that Matthew’s use of the Old Testament can teach us about our own interpretive efforts, namely that our hermeneutic for understanding of the Old Testament must reckon with the person and work of Christ. As Jesus himself affirms, “everything written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets, and the Psalms must be fulfilled.” (Luke 24.44) In other words, we have not done our full interpretive work in the Old Testament if we fail to consider how the text points to or is fulfilled in Jesus. If our understanding of the Old Testament would be accepted in a Jewish synagogue, then we haven’t understood the text Christianly. However, this does not mean that we can disregard the principle of authorial intent; we must still labor within the boundaries of literary and historical context before we can consider the broader canonical and theological implications. At the very least, our understanding of the human author’s intent must function as the true and necessary foundation upon which we stand as we seek the illumination of the Spirit in understanding the theological and applicational implications of the text for our lives in Christ. This is a thoroughly Christian understanding of how to interpret the Bible.
Despite the claims of postmodern literary critics, it is reasonably certain that the meaning of any given document or literary work is grounded in and governed by its author. To put it another way, the meaning of the text is limited by the message that the writer of that text intended to communicate. This principle has been the foundation of biblical interpretation for most of the modern period, and rightly so. The Word of God comes to us through human authors who were writing to historical audiences, so we must work within the boundaries of literary and historical context in order to understand it. The problem, however, is that an overemphasis on authorial intent could relegate our interpretive efforts to nothing more than an exercise in historical investigation. But, the Word of God is more than a historical artifact; it is living and active, and its truths are just as relevant today as they were when they were first written. Over the last twenty years or so, more and more emphasis has been given to the intent of the divine author in an attempt to arrive at a more robustly theological interpretation.
However, this too has led to certain hermeneutical problems, particularly when the supposed divine intent in a given text is set in competition with or in contradiction to the human intent. This appears to be the underlying assumption of a question that was posed on Twitter a few days ago (pictured above). A pastor on Twitter recently asked, “Did the human authors have perfect/sinless intentions while writing Scripture?” Of course, Twitter polls are probably not the best resource for scholarly research, but the results are nevertheless concerning. Some 73% of respondents answered the question in the negative, meaning that almost three quarters of those who answered the poll believe that the human authors of the Bible had sinful intentions when they wrote the words of Holy Scripture. While the relationship between the human and the divine in the writing of Holy Scripture may be complex, we must conclude that this answer is out of bounds for those who believe that the Bible is the Word of God. How can sinful words be received as the Word of a sinless and righteous God? This is a contradiction in terms. As we read in Second Peter, chapter 1, verse 21, “instead men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”
Based on this text, we must affirm that there is no divine intent apart from the words of the human author. In other words, our interpretive efforts must deal directly with the words of Holy Scripture; we must labor to understand the genre, the syntax, the vocabulary, the grammatical relationships, and the literary flow of thought of the documents themselves. This is the fundamental work of biblical interpretation. There is no such thing as meaning that is separate from the text; there is no mystical or hidden Word that may be sought apart from the words on the page. Whatever the timeless supernatural theological implications of the text may be, these truths must be grounded in and derived from the actual words of Holy Scripture. In theology, this doctrine is known as verbal plenary inspiration, meaning that the quality of inspiration extends to very words that comprise the text and not just the ideas that stand behind those words. In the act of inspiration, God so worked in through and with the human authors of Holy Scripture, such that their words are His very words, thus they are without error in every way.
If their words are His words, then we may conclude that their intent is His intent as well. The difficulty, however, lies in the reality that the God of the Bible is infinite in His understanding, that He sees more and knows more than the human authors could possibly comprehend when they were writing. So, there is a sense in which the divine intent is so much more than what the human authors could understand; some have referred to this as the sensus plenior, or the fuller sense of the text. In their book Introduction to Biblical Interpretation, Klein, Blomberg, and Hubbard identify the problem with this idea, namely that “we have no objective criteria to posit the existence of a sensus, or to determine where it might exist, or how one might proceed to unravel its significance. In other words, if the human author of a text did not intend and was unaware of a deeper level of meaning, how can we be confident today that we can detect it?” To put it another way, if we understand textual meaning as something that is grounded in authorial intent, then we must assume a certain amount of similitude, if not even near identity, between the intent of both the Divine and the human author. Otherwise, we would never be able to understand what God is saying to us in any real or meaningful way.
In the final analysis, we must conclude that there is no competition or contradiction between the intent of the human the divine authors of Holy Scripture. While it is possible that the Spirit intended more than human authors, He certainly did not intend less than what they intended to communicate to their audiences through the words that they wrote. In other words, authorial intent in the Bible must be viewed as finely woven tapestry in which the human and divine is so interlaced and knitted together, such that any attempts to divide or separate them would in effect destroy its beauty and grandeur. As interpreters, we must hold these facets of the text in harmony and proceed with conviction the Bible is the very Word of God. B.B. Warfield puts it this way in his book The Inspiration and Authority of the Bible, “The Scriptures, in other words, are conceived by the writers of the New Testament as through and through God’s book, in every part expressive of His mind, given through men after a fashion which does no violence to their nature as men, and constitutes the book also men’s book as well as God’s, in every part expressive of the mind of its human authors.”
For further study, see: Warfield, B.B. “The Divine and the Human in the Bible.” Pages 542-548in Selected Shorter Writings, 2 Vols.
3 Blessed is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavens in Christ. 4 For he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless in love before him. 5 He predestined us to be adopted as sons through Jesus Christ for himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, 6 to the praise of his glorious grace that he lavished on us in the Beloved One.
~Ephesians 1.3-6
Title: On the Blessings of Election and Predestination in Christ Text: Ephesians 1.3-6 Series: The Letter to the Ephesians Church: South Caraway Baptist Church, Jonesboro, AR Date: May 8, 2023
1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by God’s will: To the faithful saints in Christ Jesus at Ephesus. 2 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
~Ephesians 1.1-2
Title: On a Historical, Literary, and Theological Overview of Ephesians Text: Ephesians 1.1-2 Series: The Letter to the Ephesians Church: South Caraway Baptist Church, Jonesboro, AR Date: April 30, 2023
A psalm of David when he fled from his son Absalom.
1 Lord, how my foes increase! There are many who attack me. 2 Many say about me, “There is no help for him in God.” Selah
3 But you, Lord, are a shield around me, my glory, and the one who lifts up my head. 4 I cry aloud to the Lord, and he answers me from his holy mountain. Selah
5 I lie down and sleep; I wake again because the Lord sustains me. 6 I will not be afraid of thousands of people who have taken their stand against me on every side.
7 Rise up, Lord! Save me, my God! You strike all my enemies on the cheek; you break the teeth of the wicked. 8 Salvation belongs to the Lord; may your blessing be on your people. Selah
~Psalm 3
Series: Praying through the Psalms Text: Psalm 3.1-8 Church: South Caraway Baptist Church, Jonesboro, AR Date: April 12, 2023
Faith seeking Understanding 