Presiding Over Conflict: The Case of Diotrephes – 3 John 1:10-14

SPEAKER 02 : 0:00

How firm a foundation ye saints of the Lord is laid for your faith in his excellent word.

SPEAKER 01 : 0:17

The gospel walked in shoelace in the first century in the Roman Empire. And today it needs to get down where the rubber meets the road in our day. In spite of any energy shortage, we need to get it out on the highways and byways of life.

SPEAKER 03 : 0:37

Welcome to Through the Bible. That’s Dr. J. Vernon McGee’s challenge as we end our study in the New Testament book of 3 John. I’m Steve Schwetz, and before we get to our message, we got a word from Dr. McGee himself on Through the Bible’s communication policy and what you can expect when you partner with us in ministry.

SPEAKER 01 : 0:56

It has never been our plan of purpose from the very beginning to use high-pressure methods. We do not send out junk mail. Everyone that’s on our mailing list got there because they asked to be put there or else someone asked for them. We today believe that if You are not able to support the program and you want our notes and outlines that God will raise up somebody down the street or over in the next town to send in enough for you and for them also. We believe that the real test is the support that comes from any area and we will not continue on a program if we do not get a reasonable amount of support. And we always give every station a fair opportunity to see if it’s going to pay for itself. And that by the way is all that we ask. We do from time to time appeal to you to support our foreign broadcasts. After all, we cannot ask them, that is, the Chinese or the people of India or the people of South America or the people in Russia, to support our program. We believe that there are enough folk in this country that are interested in getting out the word over iron curtains, under bamboo curtains, and through the curtains of indifference and sin today to get the Word of God out to the world. So we just let you know this and trust you’ll understand that we do need your support, though we will not violate our rule by using high-pressure methods.

SPEAKER 03 : 3:02

Well, that’s through the Bible’s communication and financial policy right there in a nutshell.

SPEAKER 04 : 3:07

It is, Steve. And we still live by exactly what Dr. McGee told us to do and what not to do. And so we just want to confirm you’re the chairman of the board. I’m the president. I think we can speak with a degree of authority here that we not only abide by it, Steve, but we believe in it. Yeah. I have been a front row witness to this for the last almost decade and a half. And God always provides. And you know what I love about this is that those of us that get into vocational ministry, we didn’t get into it to ask people for money and raise funds. And I feel bad that that’s part of what often has to happen. But for us, we spend 100 percent of our time thinking about how to advance the ministry. And we’re grateful for that.

SPEAKER 03 : 3:52

Yeah, and God has been so faithful in providing for us through you as listeners, and we do appreciate that. And just so you know, we won’t subscribe you to anything unsolicited, so if you sign up for the World Prayer Team, you’re not going to suddenly, oh, look, I’m now receiving the monthly newsletter. No, you’ve got to sign up for the newsletter specifically as well. And we do request that… Here’s a nuance. Radio stations need to be self-supporting. So if you’re listening through the Bible on a radio station, that you would let us know that you typically listen on a particular station. That’s very helpful. But also, you know, the same is true. We’re spending a lot of money developing apps and the digital side. And there’s a sense that, oh, you can download it and do it anytime and it’s all for free. That does come at a heavy cost to the ministry. So if you do engage with Through the Bible in that way, we would certainly appreciate you supporting us financially so that we can continue to do that.

SPEAKER 04 : 4:44

Yeah, and we love that you communicate to us even about the way you give and your thoughts on giving. Now, we have time to hear from Kathy in Washington who says, I heard that there are about 17,000 people praying on the World Prayer Team. Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. And you know what I like about that is she’s pointing out, yes, we do need money to run the ministry, and people understand that. But we also, what we really need is prayer. And you and I have seen the results of that prayer just faithfully month after month for decades.

SPEAKER 03 : 5:39

Yeah, God has been so good to this ministry in providing for it. In such a unique way, this really is a, and we’re not touting, blowing our own horn here, but God has just been so faithful. And there’s a bunch of smart people in the room. Nobody’s building through the Bible. And that’s the way the Lord wants it. And it continues to prosper. Greg, go ahead and pray for us as we begin.

SPEAKER 04 : 6:01

Father, we acknowledge you are the provider of everything, our life, our breath. Everything we have has come from you, and we thank you for it. Thank you for the way that your people support this ministry, and we pray it honors you and pleases you. In Jesus’ name, amen.

SPEAKER 03 : 6:20

Now open to 3 John as we go through the Bible with Dr. J. Vernon McGee.

SPEAKER 01 : 6:25

Now, friends, last time we were looking at the second of the three men that are mentioned in 3 John. John mentions Gaius at first. He was a beloved brother, the one to whom the letter was addressed. But in the church that Gaius attended, there was another man, and I am not prepared to say whether Diotrephes was a believer or not. I do not know. But the thing that is said about him, he loved to have the preeminence. And it caused him to turn down all of these traveling evangelists, and he would put out of the church anyone else who would entertain them or offer them hospitality. And this was a very, of course, tragic thing, as there was going through the country in that day many very wonderful Bible teachers. Now, John says, this man who loved to have the preeminence among you, one of the things that he would do, he’d engage in vicious gossip against John and the other apostles and others because he wanted to be number one. He was a self-seeking, self-important, and a self-elected official of the church. And he was one that woe unto you if you attempted to oppose him. And I don’t know whether he was the pastor or not. I think he’s a layman. I sure feel sorry for his pastor because I’m of the opinion he tried to keep him under his thumb because he wanted to preside. He wanted to be the one to be heard. There are a great many folk like that today. And my whole point is this. Certainly, we need somebody to preside. We need somebody to sing a solo. We need somebody to teach the Word. We need many. But search your heart before you do that, because you can wreck a church if you are one that is like Diotrephes, who loves to have the preeminent. You love to be in that position. Mrs. McGee and I were ministering in a certain church, and I won’t tell you where, but when we left, she said, concerning the man who presided, and they did not have a pastor in the church at the time, she said, you know, he certainly did enjoy presiding, didn’t he? And I said, yes, he loved it. And I’m just wondering whether they really are seeking for a pastor with that man presiding, because he’s not only presiding, he was killing the church. The attendance was way down, and I feel sorry for any man that comes there as pastor, because he’ll certainly have trouble with that individual. Now, John says he’s going to deal with that. In verse 10 now of 3 John, he writes this, “…wherefore, if I come,” and I don’t think it’s the if of doubt, as we shall see at the end of the epistle, John intended to come. And he was coming, but we never know what a day he’ll bring forth. And John says, if I come in the sense that something should come up, something should happen, I’m unable to make the trip. But his intentions were to come. There’s no doubt in his mind about that, as we shall see at the end. Wherefore, if I come, I will remember his deeds, that is, diatrophies. I will remember his deeds, which he doeth. Now, what are some of the deeds that he’s doing? You see, Christianity, the important word is truth. And truth manifests itself in love. And it’s just as simple as that and as important as that. Now, Diotrephes, who loved to have the preeminence, and that, by the way, is a characteristic of the flesh. The fruit of the spirit is meekness. And Diotrephes was a dictator. And by the way, I was looking last time for a name for Gaius. He’s the delightful brother, the delightful brother. Here’s a dictator. And the next man is going to be dependable. But this is the dictator. Now, meekness does not necessarily mean weakness. In fact, it does not. It could be cowardice. Someone has said silence is golden, but sometimes it’s yellow. And it’s too bad there weren’t those in the church to speak out against this. Now, Moses was considered a meek man. But you remember when he got up and talked to the children of Israel, he didn’t sound like a meek man according to our notion of meekness. He spoke right out. And you remember the Lord Jesus was meek and lowly, but he went in and cleansed the temple. And that’s the reason I feel like that I should speak out on this because nobody else speaks along these lines today as far as I know. And the thing that’s hurting our churches, somebody should speak out today and say, look, brother, sit down. You’re spoiling things. You ought not to be trying to love the preeminence all the time. You should learn to be meek and let others speak out. Well, John says, if I come, I’ll remember his deeds which he doeth. He exhibits that which is not the mark of a believer by any means. And he exhibits that which reveals that he apparently didn’t have the truth. And notice what he does, prating against us with malicious words. Now, he was attempting to absolutely destroy the effectiveness of the apostles and especially of John. And John says, when I get there, I’m going to deal with him. I’m going to speak out against him. I’m going to let it be known that this man is actually using malicious words. Now, I had a man that called me some time ago. He actually was a man who was a member of my former church. And he called me and he says, I want you to forgive me. The man was weeping. He said, I said a lot of things about you. In fact, he went so far as to say that I left the church in debt. And I never have served the church yet that I ever left it in debt. Fact of the matter is, I left a tremendous reserve fund. But he, along with a few others, just didn’t mention that. And as a result, the false report went out. And he called me weeping. He says, I ask your forgiveness. I said, you don’t have to ask me to forgive you. Ask the Lord. He says, well, I’ve already repented and talked to him. Well, I said, it’d be nice now if you would tell these people that you gave the wrong report to, you’d give them the true report. Now, I said, you don’t need to call me about it at all. Now, he was a diatrophy. He enjoyed presiding. He enjoyed having his way. And the day has come. Apparently, change has come over him. He’s in another church today. And I understand doing a good job. And I rejoice in that. But he was a Diotrephes. And I have always felt that I should have dealt with him more severely than I did when I was there. Because John says, I intend to deal with this, prating against us with malicious words. And not content with that, neither doth he himself receive the brethren, and he forbiddeth them that would, and casteth them out of the church. Imagine this fellow. He is excommunicating anybody that would entertain one of these men. What a horrible picture this is. And if you want to wreck a church, you just have a man like this or a little group like this, and friends, you will wreck the church. That is the sad situation today. There are too many diatrophies that are in existence. And John says, I’m going to deal with that when I get there. John, remember, you can call him apostle of love if you want to, but the Lord Jesus called him a son of thunder. And I think they had a regular thunderstorm when John arrived at this church because he’s going to deal with diatrophies. And it’s too bad that other churches don’t deal with diatrophies because of the fact they’ll wreck a church if they’re permitted to go on, permitted to continue. Now, will you notice we have come now to the third brother. He’s a lovely fellow. And he is the man that you just can’t help but rejoice in him. He’s the dependable brother. One of those unknown saints. Listen to this. Verse 12. Demetrius hath good report of all men and of the truth itself. Here’s a man sound in the faith. Yea, and we also bear witness. And in the mouth now of two witnesses, the thing is established. But Demetrius, he has a good report of all man. And the truth bears witness to him. He’s sound in the faith. And John says, I bear witness. And ye know that our witness is true. This church knew that John bore a true witness. Now, may I say, Demetrius is obviously one of these wonderful saints of God that this man, Diotrephes, had actually shut out of the church. May I say to you, this man, Demetrius, we have only one verse about him here. That’s all we know. He’s never mentioned again in scripture. Let me just give this. While there’s only one verse about Demetrius, it gives us an insight into the Christian character of this noble saint of God. We cannot identify him with any other of the same name. His name means belonging to Demeter. Ceres, that is. We get our word cereal from that, the god of agriculture. And that identifies him as a convert from paganism. He evidently was brought up in a pagan home, worshipped the gods of the Greeks and Romans. And this man, converted, now goes around teaching, and he adorned the doctrine of Christ. Others testified to his character, and he was true to the doctrine of Scripture. Now, here are the three men. They pass before us in this little epistle. Christianity was on trial in the first century. Two of these men that are mentioned in this epistle, they are genuine. They’re real. They’re wonderful children of God. One delightful brother. Another dependable brother. But one of them, dictator, he was a phony. May I say to you, the gospel walked in shoe leather. In the first century in the Roman Empire. Now, come back to verse 12 again. It’s all we have about Demetrius, and we want to see something about this man. Now, will you notice? Demetrius, I’m reading, hath good report of all men, and of the truth itself. Yea, and we also bear witness, and ye know that our witness is true. Now, this is evidently the man that John mentions, and at least he’s among the group of men that John mentions that Diotrephes would not receive. He was one of the many itinerant preachers who went about In that first century, humble, unknown, and unsung, he was a member of that great army that carried the gospel throughout the Roman Empire so that it could be said that the whole world had heard the gospel. And that actually was true, and it means the whole Roman world of that day. They were the civilized world. It was entirely evangelized. And they were pushing out beyond its borders when the apostasy began to set in. When there came in men like Diotrephes. Now, will you notice about this man? He’s one of these shining lights then of the New Testament. And again, may I say, this is the only reference to him. One of these humble saints. And around us today… There are multitudes of people like that. They’re not a Diotrephes, and they’re not even a Gaius, an outstanding Christian. They’re just an humble saint of God. But they’re doing their thing. a thing God’s called them to do. And in an humble way, maybe this woman I heard about teaching a little Sunday school class. She teaches the handicapped. How wonderful. Nobody knows about her. Nobody’s ever given her a loving cup. Ought to, but they never have. She doesn’t want it. She’d be embarrassed if you gave her one. How many saints of God there are like that today, that God is using in a small way? They’re not trying to be the chief soloist. They’re just singing the choir. They don’t try to be the main speaker. They don’t want to preside. They don’t want to be chairman of every board. They’re just willing to fade into the woodwork of the church. But they are one of the pillars of the church. They are supporting the work. They’re encouraging the preacher. I think one of the most wonderful members I ever had was a dear little lady came in every Sunday morning on a cane. She never missed a Sunday morning. There’s always something nice that she had to say. Always encouraging the preacher. She told me one time, she says, I think that’s my job to do that. Says that’s all I can do. Well, she did other things too. I’d have you know, but the church is filled with wonderful saints of God today. And when I mentioned last time about these diatrophies around, don’t get the impression that everybody’s a diatrophies in the church. Thank God they’re very few. And it’s a good thing they’re very few. Here it’s two to one. I think it’s more than that. A hundred to one today. Generally, they are around, but thank God for these folks. Now, the tense that John used here indicates that Demetrius had a good reputation in the past. He still had a good reputation, and this was over a long period of time. Time-tested faith, Demetrius the dependable. The church knew him as a man of God. You might deceive the church, but he was tested by the truth. He measured up to the definition of a believer. And John knew him and agreed. Three witnesses. He adorned the doctrines. Now, the real test of the Christian life, you see, it’s not on the arena backed by applause. It’s not before the crowd in the Colosseum. There were five million martyrs who bear testimony to the truth of the gospel in the first three centuries. They lay down their life for Christ. But did you know that there were many more millions? than that who bear witness by the faithful lives they live each day. Nothing spectacular, nothing sensational, nothing outstanding. They’re just living for God. They have a purpose, they have a direction, and they have a thrilling experience. After World War II, there were the English boys who wrote the book, Look Back in Anger, and it revealed a bottomless pessimism. No hope for the future. And this has produced the beetle brain mob of youth today with no direction. A group told me in Athens, I say a group, three of them, they wanted to drop out of society. Into the decadent first century with its low morals and the erosion of character, there came the message from God that he gave his son to And there were multitudes who came in contact with him, and they got involved. And may I say to you, you may not find their names in the Yellow Pages, but you’ll find them in the Lamb’s Book of Life. They live for God, unknown to the world. And they died unknown to the world, but they are known to God and their names are inscribed on high. Now, will you notice verse 13? I had many things to write, but I will not with ink and pen write unto thee. John, frankly, though he wrote the gospel to John in the book of Revelation, two of the longest books in the New Testament, yet John very frankly said that he’d much rather tell it to you than write it to you. And he says here, verse 14, now the last verse, but I trust I shall shortly see thee and we shall speak face to face. And someday that’ll be true for you and me. we’ll be able to speak face to face with John. I want to talk to him about these little books that he wrote. And there are a lot of questions I want to ask him. We shall speak face to face. But of course, he’s referring to the fact that he’s going to come and he’ll speak face to face to diatrophies. I feel sorry for old Diotrephes. I’m sure he got it in that day. And Demetrius and Gaius, those wonderful men of God in that day. He says, but I trust I shall shortly see thee and we shall speak face to face. Peace be to thee. Our friends greet thee. Greet the friends by name. Isn’t that a lovely way to end it? He says, I want you to know that our friends that are here with me, they greet you. And will you greet the friends by name? Go and say to Demetrius, say, Demetrius, I have a message from John. He wanted to greet you. He’d be coming our way before long. You see, the gospel walked in shoe leather. in the first century in the Roman Empire. And today, it needs to get down where the rubber meets the road in our day. In spite of any energy shortage, we need to get it out on the highways and byways of life. Until next time, may God richly bless you, my beloved.

SPEAKER 03 : 25:13

Next time, the Bible Bus moves on to the book of Nahum. Until then, to be in touch, visit ttb.org or call 1-865-BIBLE or find our app in your app store. I’m Steve Schwartz, and as always, I’ll save you a seat right here on the Bible Bus.

SPEAKER 02 : 25:34

All to him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow.

SPEAKER 03 : 25:53

Our journey on the Bible bus today is supported by the prayers and gifts of fellow passengers as we travel through the Bible.