First Timothy Lesson 15

So we are in 1 Timothy chapter three, and we're working through qualifications for elders. And we've said before that if there was strict adherence to the qualification, I'm not sure there'd be any elders around. You know, so we're working through verses four through seven.

He must be one who manages his own household well, keeping his children under control with all dignity. But if a man does not know how to manage his own household, how will he take care of the church of God and not a new convert so that he will not become conceited and fall into the condemnation incurred by the devil? And he must be of good reputation from those outside the church so that he will not fall into the reproach and snare of the devil.

So we had just done question one last week, talked about explain what the words manages on household well tell us about an elder's personal responsibility. Well, we said that you didn't have to be married to be an elder, like some churches think that you need to be. Like I think it was a requirement to be a Pharisee, you had to be married. And so that's why people think Paul was married at some point. So it puts The one who seeks to be an elder in a, how do I say this, difficult position, he should know how to do that. We talked earlier that he shouldn't be a brand new convert. Well, no kidding.

So question two was, what does keeping his children under control tell us about his leadership abilities? Under control is the word hupotenze. We've listened to, we know about the word hupomone, and it means under subjection. And notice it says, the verse says that he, keeping his children under control, what do you think he's supposed to do? supposed to have a house run by a gunny sergeant from the Marine Corps?

Sometimes it takes that. It sure does. So it just means obedience. Now, the great thing about this is that if you're law based, your whole viewpoint is going to be this. You know, get in line. But if you're walking with the Lord and you recognize the degree to which He loves and cares for you, then that's what your attitude's going to be. You're submitted to the Lord Jesus because He loves you, not because He orders you around. That's one of the big flaws of Reformed theology is that they bring the law in for performance when and totally forget about what the motivation of doing anything as a believer is. It has nothing to do with God said you better.

Is that where antinomianism comes in? Say that again? Is that where antinomianism... Lawlessness? Yeah. Well, you know, I think if you have a very strict do this or die kind of environment. And you don't go from that to no law at all. I mean, God is very organized. He has everything. There's no chaos. Everything is in order. But the motivation is what's different.

The Jews were given the commandments. Now, really, for God to tell them, if you're my chosen people, here's how you should act, and gave them the sacrificial system. But under grace, if you understand grace, then you're going to be the leader of grace in your house. And I think your children are going to look at you and recognize that you're under the Lord, and that's not a bad place to be. But you also have a responsibility as the head of the household.

And this admonition applies to any Christian family. You agree? Yeah. We have additional instructions, looking it up in Ephesians 6, 4. I think the guidance is, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. That's the guidelines for keeping your house under control. Yeah, that's exactly right. And every parent should, when it says raise them up in the way that they should go, you should know where God has gifted your children and what direction they're going to go in. You know, we live in a society where everybody's got to go to college.

Well, when my son came to me at 18 and said, dad, I don't want to go to college, it kind of blew my balloon. He said, I want to be a mechanic. Okay. And now he's doing great, you know, and I didn't recognize that. And well, I kind of recognize it, but I thought that I told him one day, I said, well, now you have a skill. But now you need an education. He said, I am getting an education myself. I'm doing it. And he does. He does.

So I remember Sharon Echols used to say she knew the direction that her kids were going to go when they were two months old. I don't know how she knew that, but she knew. You know, I told her, I said, well, that's hard for me. I don't know where I'm going. So actually, the basic idea is simple.

The eldest children, if he has any, must be willingly listeners under him as a responsibility as a father. I think it's important that children understand that a dad has responsibility before God. You know, and he recognizes that he can't put 39 rules on the refrigerator and that's how we're going to do it, although he may, but his submission to the leading of the Spirit of God is not based on rules, it's based on intimacy with Christ. The parallel is in Titus 1, where it's, you know, have your children who believe, you know, and it's easy to kind of just get kind of microscopic about these passages and think, oh, well, the father has responsibility for his kids' personalities and their decisions and their sin nature, really. You have to pull it back and say, well, is this the responsibility of the father? Or are we talking about how can he lead a church if he can't do this?

That's exactly right. You got to kind of pull it back and not be so, you know, it speaks to the character of the. Yeah, and it's not something he's striving to do. It's something that he's settled about, comfortable. A leader is comfortable in being a leader. And what I told a guy one time that was told me, he said, you know how you know when you're a leader?

And I said, no. He said, well, first of all, you have to be willing to do it. And then you have to turn around and see if there's anybody following you. And then you have to find out whether they're willingly doing it and that you're willing to let them follow you. Sorry, I didn't mean to speak over you.

It's safe to say that here we're looking at, do your children follow your leadership? And that is a prerequisite to leading in the church. If you do have children, are they following you? And how does that look? It's just like that. You look left, you look right, you see who's around, is there anybody looking to your direction?

And if so, especially your children, that would seem to be a heavy indicator that you would fit into the possibility of being an elder. How your family functions tells others an awful lot about whether you're qualified to be an elder. So, question three, what does the word dignity mean? Because the verse says he manages his household while keeping his children under control with all dignity. What does dignity mean?

I did my normal with Miriam Webster. It didn't help at all. Oh, well, that's the true source of spirituality. Yeah, I mean, the spiritual end of that. It really didn't come up with anything that was even close to what Zodiatis has for dignity here, the word. The closest was the quality or state of being worthy, honored, or esteemed of it. I don't think that's what fits here. Respect is earned. not demanded.

That's good. That's good. I like that. That's really good. Thayer says that it defines the word as the characteristic of a person or a thing which entitles to reverence or respect, dignity, gravity, majesty, sanctity. And then he said, see Ephesians 5 for instructions. I got a couple words. There's decency and seriousness that are related to that. So the way that children behave underneath the leadership of their father is done in a decent and serious way. What would be the extreme? What's the contrast there? Well, the extreme I think would be a household that's run like the military.

Who was that Bible teacher that was the colonel or whatever his name was, Bob Thame. Bob Thame, yeah. If you've ever been in a Bob Thame class, you know what I mean. teach a Bible study in his military uniform. And if you were late, he would call you out.

I mean, I remember Al telling me about that guy. When I was a kid, I had standard attention in the corner. Really? Well, I did too. I went to boarding high school. We had to kneel on the radiators. We were bad. I mean, even as a young believer, if I was in a class that Bob Thame started doing that, I would have jumped him.

Grace is the greatest motivator in the world. There's nothing more motivating than grace. And if you're a gracious person in a position of responsibility, people will willingly want to follow you. And I think that's the point. So Zodiatis had it as, which is kind of, the seminote stands between caring to please nobody and endeavoring at all costs to please everybody. Weird. It is the ability not only to perform well one's duties as a citizen, but also to adhere to the highest principles and ideals of earth and heaven, and thus drawing respect and approval. Sure. Sure.

Kind of just earth and, I mean, and maybe that's why when it says earth and heaven, you know, following verses about you're supposed to be respectful outside the church. So I think this is a dignity of both inside and outside of the church. Your children are supposed to be respectful, decent, both inside the family and inside the family of God, as well as outside. So that brings to me a question.

Let's say that one of you men, as it says here, aspire to be an elder. But before you let anybody know, you start taking a personal inventory of what you're all about personally, and you don't pass muster. What do you do? Do you write down all the rules? Do you write down all the prerequisites and memorize them and try as hard as you can to conform to them? Or is there another path? Because when we're going through these requirements of a person, who are we really talking about?

Aren't we talking about the life of the resurrected Christ? This is Him. This is how He functions. And every believer has that life in him. And the Spirit of God sometimes takes a while to teach somebody, especially one who aspires for leadership, exactly how that life looks and functions and is. So the prep time may be a lot longer than you thought. And that's okay. Because God has to prepare us for the service he wants us to do for him.

And it's really interesting when you look around, even in a small body like ours, you see him working in different souls for the purpose that he has for them. You know? The dignity is really, it's a willingness of respect. It kind of gives the practical application, you know, in the Father's realm. You can park orders and then the kids just kind of roll their eyes at you? Or are you worthy of their respect? So transfer that to the church, right?

Yeah. Or they'll obey as long as you're there. They're afraid not to obey when you're around. Yeah. Getting back to your other statement, I think the Lord draws you into being an elder, and if you seek the office like, I really want that office, it's never going to happen, or it's not the right motivation. Sure. trying to match this list and I got a check off boxes, it's never going to happen. Yeah. Because the wrong motive. I agree. And I think it's, you know, it's your heart's drawn by the by the Lord. to be an elder. And as you do that, you grow in the grace and knowledge. That's right.

And these will manifest itself rather than be a checklist. You're never going to meet all of them. You're going to move towards them or you're not going to be an outlier. You're going to be most of these and then you're going to be a drunk. I don't think that's going to happen.

Pugnacious or things like that. I think it's the Lord's leading, and He's the one who's going to change you. And it's going to be, like I said, out of grace and knowledge of Him that's going to change you to meet these qualifications, not that you strive to meet them.

What's cool about that is that, whether you're in a larger body of believers or a small one like we have, the local church is actually run by the Spirit of God. And he raises up among those he wants to do certain jobs. And the rest of us recognize, well, that guy's been raised up, and that woman's been raised up, and so okay. But to understand that the spirit of God is the one he decides and implements takes the whole thing of One of the visas you can get that Miles and I have been talking about is you get into the country as a religious worker.

Well, there's thousands of people that have gone to seminary to become a religious worker, and they are not qualified for the job they have, even though they have it. Why? Because they went to this seminary. Their involvement in the church is a profession, not a calling. And I think that's where coordination and motivation really comes in. It's like, okay, so I'm not qualified for this, but I want to strive to be. Why? Do you want to be a leader, or do you want to actually grow in Christ? Right.

I think also in that equation is a selflessness that the Lord has developed in someone where, as a father, you care about your family. It comes before you. If you have a desire this way, body becomes more important than what you're doing. You know where the best example of this is that the Lord Jesus demonstrated? Think about it. Huh? No, the Lord Jesus did something with his disciples that he washed their feet. That's the greatest demonstration of what this job is all about. He served. I was thinking about God is spoken. Yeah. And then as the father knows his son, the man speaks. Yeah. Children. Oh, dad's speaking.

Well, what's interesting in church history, especially around the time of Christ with Jews and especially Romans, is that this idea of a man serving was almost sinful. that just doesn't fit the society. So, here's the Son of God and the disciples know that he is, and Peter gives them heat about it.

You're not going to wash my feet. Why not? Because his cultural mindset said, wait a minute, I'm supposed to serve you. And the Lord Jesus put him down. He said, listen, if I don't wash your feet, you don't have any part with me at all. And that, he must have blinked, because he said, well, then give me a, wash me all over. And he said, well, you're already clean. I just need to wash your feet.

Well, that's really, the Lord Jesus, the Son of God, the creator of the universe, is washing those guys' feet. Boy, if that doesn't tell you something about what the job description is, I don't know what does. I've heard of a lot of churches doing... Catholics do it once a year. Use holy water, too. That's an inside joke. Okay, question four.

Is this the only qualification in which Paul attaches a reason to, and that what he's talking about is, in verse five, a man does not a man does not know how to manage his own household, how will he take care of the church? So what Paul does here is he qualifies and puts a reason in, and we've already talked about it, that if you can't, as a man, you can't manage your family, how are you going to manage the church? You know, how are you going to do it? Well, you're not. And so that's why it's one of the critical capacities that someone who aspires to be a leader, if you can't, what does the Lord say, if you can't take care of the vineyard, you can't tear it a little bit, how am I going to give you more?

One other thing that's really cool here is that, I'm just going to make a quick observation. The fact that Paul here is connecting family management to the body of Christ, which is also a family, and those correlate so closely that you can make the connection of how a man manages his family to how he might be able to manage the family of his local body. Sure. That's pretty cool. I mean, that's not something that you're taught in school. That's not something that you learn, you know, going to college. This is a family thing. Yeah. Pretty cool. Yeah.

I kid Roger all the time that our training to be elders was 20 years under Vern Peter. And Vern was learning right along with us as we went. But all kinds of just little tiny things that were issues that you had to take care of, and we got pretty sensitive about how we did it. Because we didn't do it right in the first, at the beginning, you know? And so, probably the best personal example I can tell you about this, I remember one time, I was a young believer, probably four years, three years, and I started teaching my first Bible study, which is the men's study that's on Tuesday, like 1980.

Yeah, a pack of cigarettes hanging out. Yeah, I got the Marlboros here. And I still have somewhat of a Marine Corps mentality. So every once in a while, I would make an emphasis with one of those colorful Marine words. So Miles called me. Miles sent me a pamphlet in the mail that said, others can, but you can't.

And then he called me on the phone, and he very quietly just laid it out and said, you know, and this is what he was talking about, what we're talking about today. And I was being admonished by him, and I knew it. And I wasn't rebellious, I was thankful that he would take the time to do this. So when he was done, it was quiet for a minute, and then he said to me, did I get by with that? In other words, was I effective in the way that I told you? I said, yeah, Miles, I got the message. And he did. Boy, it was. The method that he used, I mean, that was, I mean, what I was doing stopped that day, you know. And he never raised his voice. He was calm. And all he explained to me is, is that if you're going to be a Bible teacher, there are certain requirements you have to have. And one of them is you can't cuss, even if it's guys. So a question, Mike, which I think has come up, and this is from past things, is when you manage your household well, does that mean every one of your children has to be a believer? No. No, it doesn't mean that. Right.

Because salvation is really a personal thing. You can't force your children to. And if you do try to force them, they may say, well, I'm just going to give him lip service just so he'll leave me alone. I think the management is different. It isn't that you make all your kids believers. This is manager, that they're not rowdy. I kind of go back to that word. citizenship earthly and heavenly. It's that your kids aren't going out trashing things or a gang member or whatever.

So it's not that they all have to be believers, and you have to make them believers in order to be. Just that comes up occasionally in this, what that management means. And they all have to believe the same thing. Right. Salvation is up to the individual, so you enforce that. Well, and I think if the, if you're the kind of man that you're talking about here, your kids are going to be pretty open and honest with you about salvation. What do you mean? What is this salvation? Why is it important? You know, kind of thing.

Donna tells a story that as a kid, every morning she got up and went into the kitchen to get something to drink and her dad was in the living room reading his Bible every day. What more did she need to say? He didn't have to say anything. That told her what kind of a man her dad was, you know? And he wasn't, you know, watching the Today Show and, oh, Donna's up. I better shut it off and go get my Bible. No, that's just what he did every day.

So to find the word church, how am I doing? Oh, it's time. We have to quit so the singers can go practice. All right, so we'll pick up at question five next week. Let's pray. Thank you, Father, for... Good discussion today. We thank you for your word and how careful you are to teach us really how the life of the Lord Jesus is to be lived through us with our dependence and our just trusting you. We thank you for that. We pray in your son's name. Amen.