Take your Bibles and turn with me to 1 Timothy chapter 5. 1 Timothy chapter 5. We're going to continue in verse 17 to 25. We'll finish up this chapter today and then next week we'll move into the next chapter, the last chapter in the book of 1 Timothy. 1 Timothy chapter 5. Let's just read the text and then we'll look to the Lord in a word of prayer and pick up where we left off last week. He says, let the elders who rule well be counted worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in the word and doctrine. For the scripture says, you shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out the grain, and the laborer is worthy of his wages. Do not receive an accusation against an elder except from two or three witnesses. Those who are sinning or persist in sin rebuke in the presence of all that all the rest may fear. I charge you before God and the Lord Jesus Christ and the elect angels that you observe these things without prejudice, doing nothing with partiality. Do not lay hands on anyone hastily, nor share in other people's sins. Keep yourself pure. No longer drink only water, but use a little wine for your stomach's sake and your frequent infirmities. Some men's sins are clearly evident. preceding them to judgment, but those of some follow later. Likewise, the good works of some are clearly evident, and those that are otherwise cannot be hidden. Let's look to the Lord in a word of prayer. Father, as we come before these verses today, I pray that you would take them by your spirit and you would take truths that are in these verses and that you would apply them to our lives. And that Father, as we look at ourselves and we look at our lives in light of your word, you would help us to conform our practice and our character to what you require. Lord, as we think again of these really important issues when it relates to how a church governs itself and what a church does, I pray that you would give us insight as a congregation. that Lord you would just build this and continue to build this ministry on a sure foundation and that these things would form the bedrock of our thinking and Lord just be a part of how we practice as a congregation. So I pray in Jesus name. Amen. So we've been going through this section. We've been talking about the double honor that accrues to an elder and don't want to build on all this again. But really, as we read through this, there are two areas that Paul is addressing. One has to do with reimbursement and the other had to do with rebuke and how that is to be handled. And then from that, he builds on other kind of parallel and parenthetic thoughts. And so what we've been doing is we've been looking at six truths after we looked at those two issues, six truths that are related to effective ministry. And we've covered most of these today. We're going to look at the last three. I say most of them. We looked at a half of them today. We're going to look at the last half that effective ministry and ministers are to be discerning. So he says in verse 22, Don't lay hands suddenly on any man. You don't want to partake in other men's sin. Keep yourself pure. And then he also goes on and he talks about the sins of some men are really not clearly evident. And same with the good works of some. And so it takes time and it takes discernment to know character. So he says be discerning. He also says here that ministry and ministers do not neglect the body. There's a parenthetic thought here that we'll look at related to Timothy's health. And then we'll just close by talking about the solemn responsibility that we have. So as we look at these things, again, this is kind of a teaching, much more teaching than it is kind of preaching. And we're just trying to lay a sure foundation for us as a congregation that we think about these things and we think about how we practice and what we do. And here related to eldership and here related to pastors, we think about some of the ways that the church installs its spiritual leaders. And he's talking about the importance of that, that you don't do it willy-nilly. You know, many times, especially in smaller churches, rural churches, you know, somebody comes into a congregation that has a magnetic personality and they just kind of, on the surface, are just the cat's meow. But it's kind of like flies to milk, and as time goes on, you find out, oh, we shouldn't have put that individual in that place of leadership because it's created carnage. And so, Paul is giving Timothy some guidelines. It is a call to discernment in how the church installs its spiritual leaders. Now, there's no 100% safeguard. Even Jesus had his Judas in the will of God, didn't he? Jesus chose 12, he said. I chose 12 and yet one of you is a demon. One of you is a devil. Now that was within the will of God. And so there's no 100% safeguard that the church isn't going to get into a wreck when it comes to the spiritual leaders that it has installed. But nevertheless, Paul is giving Timothy wisdom. And he's saying to Timothy, let time and relationship reveal character. Isn't that what he's saying? Don't lay hands suddenly on anyone. Keep yourself pure. Let time and relationship reveal character. This is important. Now, there are some things to note here. Let's think about, I think this is linked to the verse preceding when he talked about partiality. Do nothing from partiality. And one of the ways that sometimes we are not impartial, is when it comes to people who seem to have it all together. And so we initially just gravitate to them and we grab them up. So it's linked to partiality. It's also, notice this, he says, keep yourself pure. And when we get down into chapter six and we get to verse three, he's gonna build on this same thought. He says, if anyone teaches otherwise and does not consent to wholesome words, even the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, to the doctrine which accords with godliness, he is proud, he knows nothing, he is obsessed with disputes and arguments over words. from which comes envy, strife, reveling, evil, suspicious, useless wranglings of men of corrupt minds and destitute of the truth, who suppose that godliness is a means of gain, and then what does he tell Timothy? From those types, make a strategic withdrawal. From them, withdraw yourself. Keep yourself pure. And so there's a link and we'll study that more in depth when we get to those verses. There are some things to note. Let's think about some things here. First of all, when we talk about laying on of hands, and we've talked about this earlier in chapter four, when he talked about the laying on of hands of the eldership, we are talking about a formal recognition related to office. The laying on of hands. the actual formal recognition of installing someone into a position of spiritual leadership. And he says, don't do that hastily. Don't do it quickly. Don't do it suddenly. Don't do it on a whim. Now you just look at your life for a minute, even not in this immediate context. Think about how many times in your life you made a spur of the moment decision only to regret it. Have you ever been there, done that? Maybe you're at the mall and you're a teenager and you had $40 burning in your pocket and you saw this thing that you just had to have and you bought it and you got home and the next day you had buyer's remorse, didn't you? Why did I waste my money on that stupid trinket? So we always say in almost any decision that we make, give it time, sleep on it. Don't do things quickly. Don't be hasty. Don't do things suddenly. The most boneheaded decisions I've made in life, and especially in the ministry, were decisions I made on the spur of the moment. When I didn't say, you know, so I'm confronted with something, and rather than saying, oh, let me think about that, I'll get back to you tomorrow, I just kind of shoot off the cuff and I deal with it, and then boom. And so Paul tells Timothy, don't lay hands suddenly on anyone. Now, I also think that this then comes back to those qualifications that we studied in chapter 3, the qualifications of an elder. And in those qualifications, one of them was, let him first be tested. Let him first be tested. The second one is don't install a novice. A novice. Now what's a novice? Remember the Greek word was neophyte, someone who is newly planted. And I think we could kind of almost apply that in two ways. Someone who is newly planted in the faith, someone who is a new Christian, but we could also say someone who is newly planted in the congregation. Give it time. Let them function in the congregation. Let them serve faithfully. And then install them when they prove themselves faithful. Notice this as well. No man or no one. In other words, don't make exceptions to this rule. Don't make exceptions. So he says, lay hands suddenly on no one. Now this relates to issues that come up in the church. One would be how the church installs its elders from within the congregation. The second thing would be how the church calls pastors, vocational pastors. Most of you came here from some other place in the United States of America. Most of you have been in different churches at different times. Probably a lot of you have been in churches where a pastor stepped down and the church replaced him. And then the church did not take sufficient time to really determine whether this guy was suited to this congregation. And then all of a sudden, the church has a blow up. And so he says, lay hands suddenly, unknowing. Another thing that I think this relates to is the issue of itinerant ministries. People who call you on the phone and say, I'm an evangelist. I'd like to come to your church and preach for five days. Or I'm going to be in town. Can I preach? And you don't know them from Adam and you need to check them out. Don't you? I remember one time. It was very early in my ministry. I think Jan Moore might remember this. I don't know if you will. Not many of you here were at the time, but we had had this family come that did some music ministry and they were very gifted, tremendous. Well, I knew the guy had pastored and I knew the guy had preached. I said, oh, why don't you come back through sometime and instead of just doing music ministry, why don't you preach? Boy, did I live to regret that. I did not sufficiently check him out. And when he got up in the pulpit and let loose, I had to apologize to the congregation the next Sunday. Because it was a total train wreck what the guy did. I didn't check him out. And so, it is so important, and this is one of the things that we have to think through as leaders in the church and as a congregation, that Paul tells Timothy, check things out. Now, why? Why does he say this? He says, because you don't want to fellowship in other men's sins. Now, that word is the Greek word koinonia. I mean, it's not that, it's a form of that word. That's the root word. You've all heard of the word koinonia. What does it mean? Fellowship. So we talk, you know, some churches are even called koinonia house. And we're talking about church fellowship all the time and how important fellowship is, that we grow in the word, we grow in worship, but we also have to fellowship with one another. Fellowship is very important, but it's much more than just going into the multipurpose and sitting down with a cup of coffee and having a pie or something. Fellowship, that word, speaks of a partnership. a partaking. It is a vitally important word in the New Testament. And what he's saying here is, don't become a fellowshipper with other men's sins. And I think you can lump into that from the context, they're bad theology. They're false teaching. You don't want to fellowship with that. He says, keep yourself pure. I want to draw your attention to two related passages. I don't know if you can read that, so if you can't, take your Bible and go to 2 John and 3 John. And I want to just draw your attention in these two passages to what John the Apostle tells the churches that really relates to this. And it shows both sides of this coin when it comes to fellowshipping and sharing. In 2 John, in verse 8, He says, watch yourselves so you do not lose what we have worked for, but that you may receive a full reward. Think about that. We want to receive from the Lord a full reward, a blessing from the Lord in a fullness for the way that we serve him. And he says, watch yourself so you don't lose that. And then he goes on and says, anyone who does not remain in what Christ taught, but goes beyond it, does not have God. The one who remains in that teaching, this one has both the Father and the Son. And then notice what he says in verse 10. If anyone comes to you and they do not bring this teaching, don't receive him into your home, don't greet him, For the one who greets him, what? What is that word? Quelonia, fellowships in his evil works. Think about what he's saying. When you partner alongside somebody who abandons the core doctrines of the faith, and you stand alongside them, what happens? God tells us there, we then fellowship in their evil works. Now, when you go to third John, we see the flip side of the coin. He says there, dear friend, you are showing faithfulness by whatever you do for the brothers, especially when they are strangers. So here we're talking about strangers who are coming to the church. They have testified to your love in front of the church. You will do well to send them on their journey in a manner that is worthy of God, because they set out for the sake of the name." There again you see this Christological test, accepting nothing from the pagans. Notice verse 8. Therefore, we have an obligation to support such men so that we can share or fellowship, be a co-worker with the truth. So what he says is this, we have an obligation as Christians to participate and support those that are from outside of us who nevertheless stand with us in Christ. We have an obligation to them. But when somebody does not pass that test, We cannot join with them because if we do, if we fellowship with that, we then share in their evil works. That is why he goes back here and he says, be discerning. Be discerning. Not everything is as it appears to be. You know, there is a great faultiness in our human judgment. 1 Samuel chapter 16. It is so easy for us as human beings to just judge things on superficial levels. And what Samuel learned in this text, when he is to anoint the next king of Israel, He learns from the Lord that he is not to choose the one that he thinks is best. He is to choose the one that the Lord knows is best. And that doesn't just come from a superficial observance. It goes to the heart. So when Samuel sees Eliab, he says, certainly the Lord's anointed is here before him. The Lord said to Samuel, don't look at his appearance, don't look at his stature. I've rejected him. Man does not see what the Lord sees, for man sees what is visible, but the Lord sees the heart. Now, so what is the criteria? By what criteria should we choose? Number one, biblical qualifications proven by time. Lay hands suddenly on no man? So what is the criteria? The biblical qualifications, 1 Timothy chapter 3, that are proven by time. That is the one that you identify and then install in spiritual leadership. Secondly, I'd say a part of that, because, you know, he says, don't do so hastily. So how much time's got to go by? Well, I think it just builds on a foundation. Faithful prior ministry in the congregation. You know, somebody comes into the congregation, if they're just faithful to serve in the little things, they're going to be faithful in what's bigger. And so as people serve, as people minister among us and we get to know them, the more safety we find in putting them into spiritual leadership. So faithful in little, faithful in much. There's a tightrope we've got to walk here. We've got to be willing to be a risk taker too. And Paul writes this, but think about Paul's own experience. When Paul first became a Christian, was everybody in Jerusalem jumping up and down for joy, saying, Paul is a Christian, let's bring him in, he's going to be a leader of the church. Were they doing that? No, most of the people were doing what? They were very skeptical. They looked at Paul and thought of him, this guy's just trying to trip us up. He's tricking us so he can get in amongst us and then we're going to go to prison and we're going to be beheaded. We're going to lose our lives because Paul is deceiving us. That's what most people thought. It was Barnabas who took a risk on him and brought him to the other leaders. It was Barnabas. So there's a tightrope to walk here, right? We can't just play it so safe in life that we're not willing to walk by faith and take risks as God brings them to us. But on the other hand, we shouldn't be foolish, OK? So we've got to balance that out. Let's move on and talk about the second thing, which is keep yourself pure. I think it's interesting. Paul says, keep yourself pure, and then he starts talking about water. It's almost like The thought of purity here led Paul to address something in Timothy's life in a parenthetic way, an issue of impurity in the water. Some of the translations of the Bible actually have this next verse in parentheses. It's just like, you know, when you're reading through this, just all of a sudden, out of the blue, This is one of the ways, too, by the way, this is a tremendous proof to those who believe in higher criticism that Paul didn't really write this. If somebody was faking this and had written it 200 years after the fact, like some higher critics like to assert, why in the world would Paul have thrown something like this in, in a parenthetic fatherly counsel to his young son in the faith, Timothy? This is so much the way we as people work. It's just like Paul is writing, he's giving Timothy advice for the church, and then all of a sudden, oh, would you just quit just drinking water? Mix some wine with it because you keep getting sick and your stomach is going to pot. And you can see that fatherly concern that Paul has for Timothy, and it just comes out in this text. So let's think about this for a minute. What is he saying here? Drink no longer just water, take a little wine. There's a positive and a negative command. The negative command is stop just drinking water. The positive command is mix a little wine with it. The reason for it is your stomach's sake because you are often getting ill. Water is life. You gotta drink water. You need to be hydrated, right? We all learn that. You're going to go on a hike. You're going to climb the mountains. Take your water bottle with you. Take your camel back. You need to drink. We need water. What's the percentage? I forget this all the time. They say our body's like 80% water or something. I don't know how they figure that up. But you can go a long time without food. You can't go very long without water. I didn't say soda pop. Water. Water is life. But water is also death. You can look at water that to you looks pure, clean, beautiful, and lurking in that water can be disease that you could never see. This is doubly so in the ancient world. In the ancient world, before they dug deep wells, before they had enclosed well casings with pumps, with, you know, pipes that piped it right into your house so it never saw the light of day. It came out of the ground, it came right into your house, and you turn it on. Before there were septic systems, most water in the ancient world had become heavily contaminated. And just drinking the water was a good way to get sick. Now, you go to most countries of the world today. Let's say you go on a mission trip. You go on a vacation. What do they always tell you? Don't drink the water. Don't drink the water. Take bottled water. Why? Because your stomach isn't used to what their stomachs are used to. You're not going to have a very nice vacation sitting on the pot. It's going to make you sick. Don't drink the water. So we understand this. Even think of contaminations. We don't deal with this much in our country or in the world today. It's cholera. Think about cholera and how devastating that was. And until they figured out what caused it, They kept thinking it was an airborne disease, and it was related to, they called it miasma. And it was just these bacteria that floated around in inner cities, and you could get it. And then finally, through a process of elimination, they found out, no, it came from the water. And so he says, don't just drink the water. Put a little wine in it for your stomach. What are some things we can take away from this? How do we relate this to us today? Now, I'm not going to go into the minutiae of how in the ancient world the Jews or Christians even would mix water and wine and what they did it for and what the different ratios were. You can read about that in your study Bible or somewhere else. I want to take this and apply it to some principles that I think are important for us, though. And let's think about some of the ways that this is important. I guess before we do that, why was Timothy not adding wine to the water? We'd have to say right away, it doesn't tell us, does it? It does not say why Timothy had stopped doing this. There's some reasons perhaps. Maybe Timothy was prone to ascetic practice, and so because of that he didn't want to have any alcohol, he didn't want to have any wine. Perhaps Timothy had taken a Nazirite vow. You know, when we think about Nazirite vows, we erroneously think of Samson all the time, and Samson was a Nazirite. But he had a lifelong Nazirite vow. Most people who took the vow of a Nazirite did so for very short periods of time. And so maybe they're going to say, because of some issue, it's almost like a fast. I'm going to do away with this in my life. And so maybe that's why Timothy had stopped doing this. And now Paul's saying, OK, you took this Nazirite vow. The vow is done. You need to quit just doing this. You keep getting sick. Perhaps Timothy felt it undermined his testimony. Maybe he was concerned that there were Christians who would see him drinking the wine with alcohol, even though it was mixed with water, and they would think he was drinking too much. And he didn't want anybody to think, because you could even think, in the qualifications of an elder, he said he is not given to wine. So maybe that's the issue. We don't know exactly, but for whatever reason, Timothy was doing this. What did we learn from the command? First thing we could just say is, God desires us to guard our physical health. Now look, we're all going to get sick. We're all going to die. Barring the Lord's return, something's going to get us sometime. But God does expect us as people, as Christians, to guard our physical body. and to take care of it. In fact, think with me of Romans chapter 12 and verse 1. When he is there talking about giving yourself to God, he doesn't say, give your heart to God. He says, present what to God? A living sacrifice. Your body. Your body. We tend to have this Gnostic tendency that separates the physical and the spiritual. and we make just the spiritual dimensions kind of worthy of our attention and we disregard the physical. No, God gave us a body and God expects us to guard our physical health. Like I said, something's going to get us in the end. We're all going to get sick. We're all going to have struggles. But we shouldn't also just live in complete disregard for our physical health. Secondly, I would say here, when God makes a means available for our use, we should avail ourselves of it. So God gave Timothy wine to disinfect the water. And Paul says, God gave you a brain, use what God has given us. You know, use the wine so you quit getting sick all the time. So when God makes a means available, we should use what he has given us. I don't think it honors God when Christians, and this really is related to the next one, don't tempt God. Don't tempt God. Don't say, you know, I'm not going to take care of my physical body, or I'm not going to use a means that is available to me to preserve my health, and then just expect God to bail you out. You know what? God will probably let you get sick. God will probably let your health deteriorate. So, it's not right to tempt God in this regard. It's not right for us just to say, I'm going to trust Jesus. He's going to keep me healthy. And then just live any old way we please. And disregard our body. So I think we learned that from this command. Another thing that I think we learned here is this. We know that God can be glorified through our illnesses. When you're sick and you're on a bed of affliction and you are trusting in the Lord and you are showing that to others as you suffer, that is a testimony for the Lord's glory. But in this case, Paul is recognizing that Timothy's frequent illnesses had become a hindrance to his ability to do what he needed to do. And so, Paul says, put a little wine in the water. So those are things that I think we can learn here, that we should make use of those things that God gives us. Now we know, in 2 Corinthians chapter 4, Paul has told us, our outward man is perishing. It's growing old, it's wearing away. But the inward man is being renewed day by day. And all that is true. Nevertheless, we should use a little wine. Okay? We should use a little wine. We should use those means that are available to us. I read the story of a guy, his name was Robert Murray McChane. Robert Murray McChane was a godly man. He was a Scottish minister. I have a book of his letters that he wrote to his congregation when he was convalescing for his health. They had sent him from Scotland to Palestine. This is before there was a Jewish homeland. It's Palestine, but it's a dry climate. Scotland is not. So they sent him from Scotland to Palestine to try to convalesce his health. Robert Murray McChain, like I said, was a Scottish minister who God used to bring great revival to the Scottish churches. He gets ill. He goes and tries to convalesce. He comes back at the age of 29. the age of 29, his body was worn out and he died. 29 years old. On his deathbed, one of his good friends in ministry, a guy named Andrew Bonar. We sing hymns by Andrew Bonar. Andrew Bonar comes to visit Robert Murray McChain. And Robert Murray McChain, laying on his deathbed, looks at Andrew and he says this, God gave me a horse to ride, and a message to deliver. Alas, I have killed the horse, and now I cannot deliver the message." There's a lesson in that for us. Last thing that I want to note, and then we'll close, is Paul urges Timothy by reminding him that what he has been entrusted is a solemn responsibility. And I want to just draw our attention to this verse. When he is talking to him in the midst of this section, he says, I charge you. Think of that word, I charge you. I charge you in the presence of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the elect angels. that you observe these things without prejudice, doing nothing with partiality. Clearly, Paul is stressing to Timothy that this is a solemn responsibility. He's going to come back to this in chapter 6. Notice with me in chapter 6, in verse 12, he says, I urge you in the sight of God, who gives life to all things, before Christ Jesus, who witnessed the good confession before Pontius Pilate, that you keep this commandment without spot, blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ appearing, which he will manifest in his own time, he who is the blessed and only potentate, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone is immortality, dwelling in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see, to whom be the honor and everlasting power. Amen. I urge you in the sight of God. This is so close to what Paul says to Timothy at the end of his life, when in 2 Timothy chapter 4, he says, I charge you before God. Preach the word. He is stressing to Timothy that Timothy has a solemn responsibility. I would take that bigger than just Timothy. Paul is saying that to the church. Through Timothy, you have a solemn responsibility, we have a solemn responsibility, and someday we will give an account to God for how we have discharged it. As I was thinking about this, I was thinking of the book of Ezekiel in chapter 33. Not to go there, but in Ezekiel chapter 33, God says to Ezekiel, I have made you a watchman on the wall. He's talking about like an early warning system in Israel. That if someone was coming against the land, that watchman on the wall was to cry out, was to blow the trumpet, to warn everybody so that they could be prepared. And he says, if you're a watchman and you blow the trumpet and everybody's in their house and they give no heed to it, they're going to perish, but their blood is on their own head. You did what you had to do. You were a watchman who blew the trumpet. He said, if you fall asleep on your post of duty and you don't blow the trumpet, you don't warn people, they will perish. But their blood I will require at your hand. That is a sobering passage. That is sobering. In Hebrews 13 verse 17, the writer of Hebrews, probably Paul, says, obey your leaders, submit to them. But notice why. Notice what he says here. For they keep watch over your souls as those who will give account. Fathers, mothers, someday you'll stand before the judgment bar of God and give account. pastors, leaders, we're going to give an account before a holy God for how well we did in fulfilling the responsibilities that are entrusted to us. Now, I don't want any of you to rise up at that last day and point your finger at me and say, you never told me. I needed to trust in Jesus and Him alone to be saved. I don't want that. You come in and out of this place, I want you to know that your only means of salvation is Jesus Christ. Any other way? Now, you choose to spurn that. I'm sad for you. I am sad for you. I grieve for you. But I want you to know, I was thinking this week, I was talking to Sue Miller, and I'll close with this. Sue's husband passed away this week, Martin. And we were talking on the phone, and she was talking with me about various things in the past. And she reminded me, and I was talking with her, and she reminded me, I remember it clearly, they had come to church, Martin and Sue, for the very first time. I don't even remember who it was in the congregation had known them and introduced me to them and said, you really need to go talk to them. And so they had a business on Main Street and in Thane. And that week I went into their business and we sat down together and started opening the Bible. And I could immediately tell that Sue knew the Lord. I went through the plan of salvation and I could tell Martin didn't have a clue. He did not have a clue. I got to the end of it, after going through the plan of salvation, and I said, you know, would you like to accept Christ? And he said, yes, I would. And I about fell out of the chair. Right? Have you ever done that? Where you share the gospel with somebody, and they're like, yeah, I'm ready for this. I mean, he was like, what do I need to do? How do I do that? You know, when I look back on that, you know, something, I don't want to say trivial, a trivial meeting, But if I hadn't took the opportunity as the Lord led, and they'd never come back to church and gone a different direction, where would Martin be today? We have responsibilities. And the Lord brings people across our path, and he desires that as we walk in the spirit, we take those opportunities to point them to Jesus Christ. Let's close in order. Lord, we thank you for your word. We thank you for this chapter that we've studied. Lord, a lot of it is just truth that we need to understand and we need to know. We need to practice. Help us, Lord, to do so. Lord, help us also to be reminded often that the stakes are eternal. It's not about whether somebody comes back to our church or whether they like us. It's about heaven and hell. May we remember that, Lord, help us not to take more upon ourselves than we should, recognizing and realizing that you're a sovereign God and results are yours, but Lord, help us also to be faithful, to share Christ when we have that chance, to live a life in accordance with your will. And so we pray, in Jesus' name, amen.