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Hey, everybody. It's Matt. This is the 10-minute Bible Hour podcast, and we're working on the

question of church authority in the New Testament. It's all over the place. Paul, Peter, John,

James, all these different guys who were commissioned by Jesus seemed to acknowledge that throughout the

New Testament. And it seems like people who weren't specifically commissioned by Jesus

acknowledge the authority of those who were. So there's a whole dynamic here that might be a

little bit foreign to a lot of us, but that dynamic pops up in

Philemon 1 when Paul alludes to his authority to tell people what to do, to do the right

thing in the church when he says, therefore, although in Christ, I could be bold and order you to do

what you ought to do, yet I, that's Paul, appeal to you on the basis of love.

That's the verse that has sent us running through the New Testament to try to get a better sense of what that would have meant to the original audience.

So we were working on it a bunch yesterday and I kind of paused us abruptly and told you we'd pick up where we left off.

And now I'm going to do what I promised.

That is pick up where we left off right after Jeff plays some music. Here we go.

It is a supreme empowering of and commissioning of generation one of the disciples and everything

about that language makes it clear that that is going to be carried forward if you weren't clear on

that john 17 makes the reality that j' intent is for that to be carried

forward all the more evident. Here, starting in verse 20, Jesus, he's about to go die, and he's praying

for Christians who aren't Christians yet. In John 17, 20, he's praying for you if you're a Christian.

He's literally picturing you alive today

with an earshot of my voice and me alive today recording this. And he's praying for us. So Jesus is

anticipating that people will become Christians after he's resurrected and ascends to heaven,

...