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And the rest of us, please, back
in our Bibles to 1 Timothy chapter 3, continuing on. in our study
of 1 Timothy. All right, 1 Timothy chapter
three. And recently I spoke with a young lady that lives quite
near to our house. And just speaking to her, she
said, you know, I'm not anything. You know, I kind of believe in
God, kind of not. And she said, but I grew up Christian.
And I said, oh, I said, what church did you go to? And she
goes, I don't really know. I said, well, was it the parish
church? And she said, yes. And I said, well, that's a Presbyterian
church, all right? And she didn't know that. And
I think maybe there's a lot of people that kind of look at church
like that. One church is as good as the
next and they're kind of all the same and that sort of thing.
But what we're talking about when we speak about Presbyterian
or another religion is a denomination. It's a religious organization
that has certain beliefs and whatnot. We are Baptists, okay?
Our church is Independent Baptist Church, which is a local Baptist
assembly. We'll talk about that a little
bit here tonight. Others are Catholics. They call themselves
Christians. Obviously, there's some that call themselves Christians
that are, there's some that call themselves Christians that really
aren't in what they teach, but there's Catholics, there's Methodists,
there's Lutherans, there's Anglicans, and all these would say that
they're Christian. Again, some more evangelical, some less evangelical,
and whatnot. And so, In the Bible, has anybody
ever seen the name Baptist? Well, yes, John the Baptist,
but has anybody seen Independent Baptist Fundamental Bible Believing
Church as an organization? No, it's not there anywhere in
the Bible. Catholic is not there in the
Bible. Methodist is not there in the
Bible. Lutheran is not there in the
Bible, okay? So denominations, though they're
not there in the Bible, are important. because every denomination has
certain beliefs that identify them. Because somebody could
say this, why does it matter what religion I am as long as
they're Christian and they believe the Bible? And that would be
a common way that people would think about it. So the question
would be this, do they really believe and teach the Bible. Okay, so you have Catholics. Catholics teach many things that
are not in the Bible. They teach that tradition is
as authoritative as the Bible. So, I mean, you go to a Catholic
church and it's very formal and they've got incense waving and
different things taking place. And they say, this is the way
that we should do this. And because we've done this so
long, this is as good as the Bible in authority. They believe
that the Pope can't speak ex cathedra. In other words, when
he speaks, he's infallible when he's speaking. Obviously that's
false. And just to give you their definition,
issued with the full authority of office, especially that of
the Pope implying infallibility as defined in Roman Catholic
doctrine. Okay, so they really do believe
that. They pray to Mary. Well, the
Bible says very clearly, we just studied the book of Hebrews,
that we go to God through the Lord Jesus Christ. And I mean,
praying to Mary is no different than somebody in an Asian country
praying to their dead relatives. I mean, it's nothing. Even today, I don't try to talk
to my dad without calling him on the phone, all right? Because
I know that's the only way he's going to hear me, but they think
they could just speak to the dead. They do that in a Catholic
church to Mary. Purgatory. They believe kind
of a temporary hell idea. Transubstantiation. The idea
that we just had at the Lord's table here on Sunday night. They actually believe the wafer
becomes the flesh of Christ, or that it is the flesh of Christ,
and that the juice is the blood of Christ. That when they take
that into their body, it somehow becomes that. Well, we know cannibalism
is wrong and that it was figurative and whatnot. Now, the Catholic
Church is right on some things. They're right on the sanctity
of life. Right? I praise God that they stand
up and say abortion is wrong. I praise God that they do that.
They say in the sanctity of marriage, though this Pope says that you
could be homosexual, you just can't practice it. And we understand
the Bible says, as a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. All right? So we understand that that's
not correct, but praise God, they have stood up for the sanctity
of marriage. Is it possible then in our day
to find a religion that truly strives and largely succeeds
to follow God's word in doctrine and in practice? I mean, that's
a big question, isn't it? I mean, somebody that, a religious
group that truly looks at the Bible and says, if the Bible
says it, we believe it. If the Bible says it, we practice
it. Again, I believe that independent
Baptist churches have largely succeeded in doing this. I'm
not saying that an independent Baptist church is a absolutely
perfect church, that there is absolutely no error whatsoever
in any doctrine or any practice, but I would say this, that they
strive to look at the Word of God and say, what does God say? And to the best of their ability,
with the guidance of the Holy Spirit and the guidance of the Word
of God, they do follow God in doctrine and in practice. And the reason I believe that
independent Baptists in particular, Baptists in particular, have
succeeded largely in doing this is because of what makes us distinctly
Baptist. It's called the Baptist distinctives.
All right, the things that we hold as tenets of our faith that
are fundamentals, that are non-negotiables, that help us to maintain the
purity of the church and of what we do. And so let's think about
that briefly as we come into this tonight, because it does
bear upon what we're going to look at. And so several things
about a Baptist church protect them from error. We believe in
the absolute authority of Scripture. And so when we look at the Bible,
we believe in the literal interpretation of the Bible. In other words,
the Bible says what it means, means what it says. It's not
figurative, it's literal. Unless it's clearly figurative,
like when the Bible says she had a nose like the cedars of
Lebanon, all right? We're not picturing a woman that
actually, when she turned her head, knocked people over because
she had such a long nose. We know that's figurative, and
there are some places like that in the Bible, where the Bible
speaks poetically. But there's other times where
it's very clear, God created in six days. You know or that
Jesus walked on water we understand the Bible says it and again We
believe it verbal inspiration of the Old and New Testaments
in other words It's it's not just God gave us the concepts
is that God gave us his word word for word and in doing that
he inspired it that it's God breathed that It's not just penned
by man, but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy
Ghost, so that when we pick up the Bible, we actually have a
book that is what it claims to be, the very Word of God. We believe in the completion
of God's revelation. You know, it's not ongoing. 66
books, 44 or so human authors, and that it's complete, and that
it's done, that it is finished. And that revelation when it says
at the end, if you add to this or take away from this, there's
gonna be curses upon you. We believe that because that
is what God said. We believe God's gonna preserve
his word, and has preserved his word, and will preserve his word.
Therefore, you go 100 years from now or go back 500 years, it's
the same because God has kept it. So how does that help us? Well, we go to the book and we
say, what does God say about this? And again, that's a great
protection in faith and practice. Secondly, we believe in believers'
baptism and then church membership. so that we don't have a church
today that is made up of people that are unsaved, lost people
that do not have the Spirit of God in their heart and a true
understanding of what the Word of God teaches, because the natural
man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they
are foolishness unto him, right? But we've got, by God's grace
and through this practice, we've got a church made up of saved
individuals that discern the truth of the Word of God with
the Spirit of God and are able to protect the church. Again,
saved ministers, saved membership. And then third, the autonomy
of the local church. And so what that is, is like
a Catholic church has all these churches underneath different
hierarchies. An independent Baptist church
is just a local assembly. There's nobody that is looking
at us and saying, you've got to believe this, you've got to
practice this. There is no general assembly for an independent Baptist
church. It's just a local church made
up of saved individuals that call their pastor, they call
their deacons, that make decisions for that local assembly. Again,
that's great protection because there is no outside control of
that church. We believe in individual sole
liberty, that there's no control over an individual in the church,
that everybody has a right to be guided by the spirit of God,
guided by the word of God, accept or reject the truth, whether
that's somebody that's lost or somebody that's saved, but in
the context of our church, it just means that we all have that
opportunity to let God direct us, let God guide us through
his word and the spirit of God to what is true. And then tonight,
We'll look at this, but again, the two offices in the local
church, the pastor and the deacons, again, in a congregational government,
they are appointed not, again, by a general assembly or some
outside source, but within the church, prayerfully, considering
what the word of God teaches, this local assembly makes decisions
and says, that's the pastor we'd like to have. Obviously, in this
case, I started the church, you'll have to kick me out. But generally
speaking, you choose your pastor, and then you choose your deacons.
And obviously, always, yes, there is that opportunity, truly, to
say, pastor, this is the word of God, this is where you're
at, this is where we're at. And you could vote a pastor out
because of the government that we use, and that is a great protection
for our church. Now again, the Baptist distinctive
that's taught In 1 Timothy 3 is the two offices in the local
church. You got the bishop and the deacon. The bishop watches
over the church, praying for them, feeding them, giving guidance,
comfort, encouragement, okay. His primary responsibilities
are spiritual, where the deacon primarily watches over the business
of the church. We'll look at this tonight. Rent, mortgage,
salaries, insurance, management of property, finance. Those kind
of things fall more into the scope of what is a deacon's responsibilities. Now, again, many churches who
say they're Christian do not follow this idea of bishop and
deacons, okay? Two offices in a local church,
pastor and deacons. I mentioned the Catholic Church.
Catholic Church has pope, cardinals, bishops, priests. It's got this
other system going on. Anglican Church, you got the
queen, all right? And if it's a king, in the near
future, it's the king that's over that church and then whatever
else they've got, archbishop, priest, whatever. In evangelical
circles, there are some that do not follow God's Word, and
evangelical, when I say that, I mean, gospel preaching, Bible
believing in the sense of Christ is it, he paid the price for
our sin. It's through his death, his bloodshed, his resurrection
that man receives God's gift by faith of salvation, right? Evangelical. Now, I praise God
for brethren churches. I've got some good friends that
are brethren. But brethren, churches do not
have a pastor, and they do not have deacons. They have lay leadership,
multiple leadership, but again, we look at the word of God, what
does God say? Well, 1 Timothy 3, you got a bishop overseer,
and then you have deacons. Now, the need for deacons came
quickly after the birth of the church. When the church was born
at Pentecost, it wasn't very long at all until the church
understood that they needed an office to meet the business needs
of the church. If you want to turn your Bibles
to it, Acts chapter six shares a story of the development of
the office of deacon, all right? So Acts chapter six, and we begin
reading at verse one. It says, and in those days when
the number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a murmuring
of the Grecians against the Hebrews, because their widows were neglected
in the daily ministration. And what that was, it was like
a soup kitchen, okay? But the needs of these widow
women, these Grecians, were not being met. They were being overlooked
somehow. And they needed provision, and
so they let it be known that that was taking place. Then the
twelve called the multitude of the disciples unto them and said,
It is not reason that we should leave the word of God and serve
tables. Wherefore, brethren, look ye
out among you seven men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost
and wisdom, whom we may appoint over what? this business, this
duty, this physical need that's there. But we will give ourselves
continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word. Again,
the focus of the bishop or the focus of the pastors is on the
spiritual needs of the congregation. Obviously, these were apostles
as well. And the saying, please the whole multitude, And they
chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Ghost,
and Philip, and Prochorus, and Nicanor, and Timon, and Parmenas,
and Nicholas, a proselyte of Antioch, whom they set before
the apostles. And when they had prayed, they
laid their hands on them." Okay, and so the office of deacon was
born right there. The Bible tells us this story
because it's vital, because it's one of the offices that we need
to prayerfully consider as we start Baptist Church. Now, our
church is young, relatively speaking. Now, it's amazing for me to think
about, we actually began in 2010 in March, or July, July. And
so, we're 11 and a half years old, but relatively young, especially
young in the sense of the size of our congregation, the development
of our church. We are able to charter the church,
as you know, last year. Praise God. We thank God for
that step. We have trustees in our church.
For legal purposes, we have trustees. Brother Tommy, myself, and my
wife. My wife's secretary, Tommy, is
treasurer, and I'm the chair, I guess. All right, and that's
important for legal purposes, as we're recognized as a charity.
Now, with regard to deacons, we continue to wait on God to
give us deacons in His timing. Now, we could have godly men
in our church, but for whatever reason, they're not qualified
to be deacons. And that's fine. That's going to happen. If you
go to the average independent Baptist church, there's a lot
of godly men in the congregation. Not everybody's a deacon. Not
everybody will become a deacon. But it's something that in God's
timing, when God raises up men that meet the standards of the
word of God and who are willing to step into that position, that
office, it's something that we need to add to our church. As
we think about that as a church, We can't make exceptions to the
word of God. No more so than, say there's a church that really
needs a pastor and they're burdened about it. We talked about last
week, not a novice, being lifted up with pride, he'd fallen to
the condemnation of the devil. But there's a young man in the
church that shows promise and seems like he'd be a great fit
and they've got a real need for a pastor. Well, they can't just
go, well, we're gonna bypass the word of God in this, we really
need somebody, so let's put this guy in, no. you've got to wait
on God and say God's gonna send somebody that meets the standards
that he has set out in his word. So as much as a church would
love to get deacons, as our church would in God's timing, it's not
something that we could step forward and say, well, let's
rush this. We got to wait on God and say, let's make sure,
first of all, that they're qualified. And then secondly, that they're
willing to commit to the responsibility, a great responsibility to serve
God. All right, so that's kind of
introduction, but I'll tell you, it gets us a little further along
than that and helps us with what we're gonna consider tonight.
We should hopefully look at every detail here briefly regarding
the qualifications and such for a deacon. All right, let's pray
and ask the Spirit of God to help us as we come to the word
of God. Father, we thank you again for the Bible. Without
this, we wouldn't know how to structure our church. Father,
we wouldn't know that, well, we're to have two offices. You
got a pastor and then you have deacons. But Father, because
of the word of God and this pastoral epistle, we understand. And because
we understand, we can implement it into our church. And it's
just right because it's what you intend. And Father, I praise
you for that. So God, I know some of this is
just kind of practical stuff and may not really be the stuff
that a lot of times we're looking for in the Word of God as far
as devotional and whatnot. There are challenges in this.
But Father, it is vital to our church that we understand this.
And so I pray, would you give us ears to hear? And obviously
we can come back and review this when needed. But I pray, Father,
for the power of the Spirit of God to work in our hearts, work
in our lives. Father, our need is great. We need leadership
in our church. And Father, I praise you for
the men that we have. And I thank God for them. And I thank God
we can get on our knees and pray together and whatnot. And in
your timing from our men, you're gonna raise up deacons. And Father,
I pray that the Spirit of God would do that good and gracious
work in your perfect time. Help us to know your will. And
I pray for your enablement tonight as I speak. I can't speak without
your enablement. So I pray, Spirit of God, would you guide me in
my preaching? And I pray tonight for the young
people in their class. Mrs. Shore is still feeling a
bit poorly. I ask right now in the name of
the Lord Jesus Christ that you'd strengthen her with your strength.
And Father, I pray that you speak to the hearts of those kids.
We would love to see one of them trust Christ as their Savior
tonight. And Father, I pray for your blessing now. It's in Christ's
name we pray. Amen. Amen, all right, so four
things, and again, we're just gonna be brief, look at these
things. Some of these things we've already touched on under the
bishops, so we'll just mention them and move on primarily from
them, okay? And so the deacons' requirements. It says in verse eight, likewise
must the deacons be, okay? Likewise must the deacons be.
One thing first, I wanna point out that the bishop is singular
and that deacons is plural. There's one primary overseer
in any church. You might have assistant pastors,
you might have youth pastors, but there's one primary head
that God has appointed as bishop, but the deacon is plural, and
therefore, that's why we have a deacon board, or multiplicity
of deacons. But notice it says, likewise,
but must be is in italics, okay? Likewise, but then must be is
in italics. But what it does, when it says
likewise, it just shoots it back up to verses two through seven.
where it said about a bishop, a bishop must be, all right?
And so it comes down to this verse here, and the italics means
this, the words themselves are not actually in the original
language, but that they're put in there by the translators to
help us have a full sense of what the scripture is saying,
okay? And so what the scripture is
saying is, likewise, shoot it back up to the requirements,
must be, And so it comes down to deacons and it's must be,
it's requirements of them as well. And so what must he be?
Well, he must have gravity. Likewise, must the deacons be
grave. The word grave in Greek is semnas. It means venerable, that is honorable,
grave, honest. You know, God blessed my home
church, Bible Baptist in Hudson, Wisconsin, with good deacons.
I wish I had them here for you to meet. Because these men, when
I was in my teen years, some 25 years ago, these were godly
men. These were good men, middle-aged
men. But now, I don't wanna say they're elderly. Some have passed
away. But they're older, but they're
older in the faith. And you know what? They stayed
true. They were honorable. So back then, if you looked at
their life, they had a trajectory that showed they were gonna stick
by it. And so as we look for a deacon, we're looking for somebody
that has that trajectory, that has that steadfastness and that
honor, honorableness or that venerableness that's in their
lives. And then secondly, the Bible
says they're not to be double-tongued or no double speaking. So this
isn't somebody that says one thing in one case and says another
in another case. They're not somebody that flatters
and then slanders. They don't tell the truth and
then tell a lie. They don't complain and then compliment, okay? So
there is, you know what you get is what you get. It's kind of
like the saying, straight from the horse's mouth, right? You
heard that saying? It means get it from the source
or as close to the source of somebody that certainly knows
the truth. And there's no source better than the person themselves.
And so what this man says, he says to one person, he says to
another person. And so they're not a double tongue,
not contradicting themselves. And then a third, No drunkards. It says not given to much wine. And again, we dealt with this
in more depth when we're talking about a bishop. And so I'm not
gonna spend a lot of time on these points, some of these points
tonight, but it just means this, they're not intoxicated. They're
not somebody that becomes intoxicated. They're not somebody that will
become intoxicated. In Bible times, we did talk about,
you generally had to tarry long at drinking to become drunk.
It's not that way in our day. It's very easy to become intoxicated
very quickly. And so you think about it, just
practically speaking, if somebody's gonna watch over our church finances,
They're gonna be making business decisions for the church. It's
very important that they be somebody that is always in control of
their faculties, right? It's just practical, we understand
that. And so they should not be somebody that drinks alcohol
or is given to drinking alcohol. never intoxicated, and certainly
our position as a church is teetotal, and if you missed some of that,
we could go back and look at that another time, but certainly
we believe that alcohol is not something that we're to provide
for our flesh, make no provision for the flesh to fulfill the
lusts thereof. And so not drunkards. And then
not materialistic, not materialistic. It says, not greedy of filthy
lucre. Okay, why would it be important
for a deacon not to be somebody that is seeking after money and
really wants money? Because like Judas, they carry
what? The bag. You know, this is very sad to
speak about, but embezzlement happens in churches. It has happened
many times in churches. I did my internship back in 1998
with Dr. Ed Nelson, and this story isn't
in the book, by the way. But I did my internship with him,
and he said to me, he said, you know, one time in our church,
we had an embezzlement taking place, and I knew money was going
missing, so I hid under the desk in the office. And he actually
hid under the desk, and he caught him in the act of embezzlement.
At a church that my father pastored, when we got there, we found out
the books were messed up, and lo and behold, there was a couple
involved with the finances, and they were embezzling finances. And the church, very graciously,
rather than take them to court, as the Bible says, not to take
believers to court, dealt with it, and they left. There was another young man,
believe it or not, that came into the same church that, I don't
know if he was a deacon or not, but had access to the finances.
He also embezzled at that church and later arsoned the church.
Now, those are horrible stories. They're very sad stories, but
they are real stories of what could happen if you put somebody
in a position of authority that is somebody that is greedy of
filthy lucre. Now, again, in our church, praise
God, We've got great protection on our finances. We always, when
the offering's counted, always counted by two people and recorded
by two people. Two people sign the checks in
our church. We have independent audits of our books annually.
Anytime anybody wants to see the books, they're welcome to
see it. And we have public annual meetings where we go over our
accounts. Again, it's all important to the integrity of our church.
And as you think about deacons, it's something worthy of consideration
that they be somebody that's not greedy, a filthy looker. And then blameless, blameless. It says, holding the mystery
of the faith in a pure conscience, okay? When the Bible speaks about
the mystery, the mystery is the revealed mystery, and that is
the gospel that God became a man, that as a man, he lived a sinless
life, that he died on the cross for our sins, shed his blood,
paid the price completely, and that, again, by grace through
faith, somebody could be saved. Somebody gets saved, they take
hold of that by faith, That being the case, they're to hold that
with a pure conscience. I started, I said, when we came
into this new year, I started reading through the Bible again.
I started at Genesis, all right? I've just finished Exodus last
night. You read through Exodus and what
you'll find is that God's requirements for his servants is purity, right? that God desires the purification
of his people. You read about the water and
cleansing with water, the blood, the incense, the offerings, the
sacrifices. And as you read about that and
you read that in the story of Exodus, what you realize is God
wants his people to be pure, but especially his leadership. especially those that are gonna
be involved in ministry. Again, it's important, it's vital
for every Christian to be blameless, but it is a must-be requirement
for those in ministry. Isaiah 52, 11. It says, depart
ye, depart ye, go ye out from fence, touch no unclean thing,
go ye out of the midst of her, be ye clean that bear the vessels
of the Lord. Somebody who's gonna be serving
God as a priest, as a spiritual leader in the Old Testament,
they were to be somebody that is pure. Okay, spoiler alert,
plug your ears, because you've got the book. But Dr. Ed Nelson,
in his book, when he talks about taking a church, he took that
church And when he got there, the deacons were outside, and
I think there was like 16 of them. There was actually a lot
of deacons, and about half of them were smoking. And he gets
there, and this is back in the day where smoking was becoming
better understood to be something that really hurts your body,
not something a believer should be involved in. And he said to them,
if I take this church, you've got one year to get over that
habit. Why? Because B, he claimed that
bear the vessel is the Lord. Nobody should be able to point
a finger at somebody that is in leadership in a local church
and say, you got a sin habit in your life. You got something
that is a disgrace to God in your life. They ought to be blameless.
And again, like our text says here, holding the mystery of
the faith in a pure conscience. And it's what Paul spoke about,
having a conscience pure before God and with men as well. And so that's the requirements
briefly there. And then the deacon's trial. The trial. This is similar
to the command, not a novice, that we talked about last week.
All right, so this is similar to that. They must prove themselves. It says in verse 10, it says,
and let these also first be proved. First be proved. Say we have
a new family come to our church, and they're a Christian family,
and we look at that and say, praise God, mom and dad married, got
the kids, they love God, they're having family devotions, and
we look at them and say, hey, this is exactly what we're looking
for, for leadership for our church, but we don't really know them.
Well, there's a couple things we can do. One, we can contact
the church that they came from, and I ask them if it's okay,
do you mind if I talk to your pastor? I'm kind of thinking
about, we need deacons in our church, and I'd like to consider
that with you, Let's talk to their pastor, right? Let's see
what their life's about through the eyes of somebody that was
involved with them in ministry. Or, maybe even more so, let's
take time. Let's take time and let's get
to know them. Let's see where they stand. And
let's see how they live out their Christianity. Make sure, because,
I mean, we could have somebody come and at first we're like,
wow, you know, and I don't want anybody to think if I go to that
church they're gonna be scrutinizing me, you know, or anything like
that. But as we look for leadership and desire leadership and we
see something, again, we're to be patient and say, okay, let
them prove themselves. Let's see how they do. And that's
why, again, it may take a little time to get somebody involved. Because they can make use of
the office of the deacon only if they prove themselves blameless. And so the Bible says, then,
okay, if they can prove themselves, then let them use the office
of a deacon being found blameless, okay? And with our church, let
me say this too, the deacon is plural, deacons, okay? But we
might start with just one. And that's okay, the Bible doesn't
forbid that. But they have to pass this test. We can't make
exception to this and say, well, you know, there's one thing in
their life or two things in their life. We gotta be able to say,
you know, by God's grace, their life works in accordance with
the word of God. Now, having said that, does a
deacon have to be perfect in the sense of nothing at all wrong
in their life? No, because this pastor's not
perfect either, right? There's nobody that's perfect
in that sense. But there are people that are perfect in the
sense of what we talked about largely last week. Remember the
focus of what we looked at last week was that We are to be mature,
not a novice, but somebody that's mature as a believer. They can
be a minister, they can be a deacon. So we're not looking for perfection,
but we are scrutinizing, rightly so, and saying, does this person
have a life that meets the requirements of the Bible? Okay, that's the
deacon's trial. We looked at the deacon's requirements. Third
thing, the deacon's family. the deacon's family. All church
leadership must be proved in their leadership ability in their
family. So if somebody's a pastor or a deacon, their family's got
to back them up. Okay, so it's not just, is this
man okay? Is his family also okay with
regard to what the Word of God says? So first of all, his wife,
and this applies, by the way, back to bishop's wives as well.
The Bible's not gonna ask one thing of deacon's wives, but
not something of a bishop's wife. But it says, even so, must their
wives be grave, not slanderers, sober. faithful in all things,
okay? And we've already considered
gravity and soberness in the study, so I'm gonna leave those
tonight and just take the other two with regard to leadership.
And the first of those would be not slanderers, okay? Not
somebody that maligns somebody else. Now imagine this, a church
where a deacon's wife is abusing her husband's position in the
church, and she shares with someone in the church, you know what
my husband heard? He heard this, he was at a meeting and he heard
what so and so said. So I got this from a good source
and they're maligning somebody. That would be a very bad situation
in the church if they slander the leadership of the church.
Again, a pastor's not perfect, but it'd be a very bad thing
if you got a deacon and you got his wife maligning the leadership
of the church. That could be something that
would undermine the strength of that ministry. Slandering
someone in the community. You know, saying something and
offending the community by their tongue, again, that would be
a very bad thing. So we understand the Bible is saying, watch out
for this. Be careful that that wife be somebody that's not a
gossip, not somebody that's going to be speaking behind somebody's
back and saying things they ought to say about them. And then faithful. In all things, okay? Faithful,
it says, in all things. And with regard to that, let
me just say this. If you're gonna serve God in ministry, as a bishop
or a deacon, your wife can make or break your ministry. I mean,
that's a sober reality from this text, what the Word of God is
teaching. They can make or break it. Some
men today are not in ministry because of their wives. Wow. You know, and maybe in Bible
college or whatever, they didn't think it was that important.
I mean, I'm the one that's gonna be up preaching. I'm the one that maybe is gonna
be leading in the local church as a deacon or something like
that. That's the important thing, it's me. It's not about my wife.
Well, wait a second. It's not what the Bible says.
The Bible says if the wife is to be faithful in all things,
and if she's not, that man may be very well qualified. He may
be gifted, he may have it, he may be great, but if his wife
doesn't back him up in the ministry, then very sadly he can't be in
the ministry because of that. Some men are not in the ministry
because of their wives. Some men have incredible ministries because
of their wives. I look at some of the great men
that I know that are in ministry and I look at them and I say,
you know what, your wife is incredible at what she does that supports
you. And I'll tell you this, I praise God for the wife God's
given me, and she is excellent at this. And I'm not saying that
to flatter my wife. I praise God for my wife. And
without a strong wife in ministry, it wouldn't work. And so that
is vital. So it's very important for somebody
that's looking at ministry to consider that, but we have to
understand as a church, we can't just say, well, the man is great,
okay? He needs a strong wife as well.
And then his marriage. his marriage, it says, let the
deacons be the husbands of one wife. Okay, now we consider this,
again, under the office of the bishop, so we're not gonna dwell
on it, but it's a one-woman man. It's not flirtation, it's not
somebody that is showing infidelity in any regard, but very faithful
to his wife. And then, with regard to his
kids, if his kids are in his home, it says, ruling their children
and their own houses well. Okay, and we've dealt with this
under the bishops, so again, I'm not gonna spend a lot of time here.
If you can't lead your home, how can you lead the church,
right? That's what Paul said with regard to bishops. And if
you can't manage your home, how can you manage the business of
the church? So imagine we've got somebody, they're a great
guy, they seem to love the Lord, but financially, their house is in
shambles. Well, we gotta look at that and
say, well, that's not gonna be somebody that God desires to
be a deacon because they're not somebody that is ruling their
own houses well. And so all those things are part
of it. We got to look at that and say, well, that's part of what
God said. We're examining somebody as a possible deacon. We've got
to consider this. And I'll tell you this, praise
God, we're talking about this now. It's a lot easier in the sense
of future hypothetical than real so that we can examine it and
say, who do we suggest and say, this would be somebody that would
make a good deacon. And then fourth, The deacon's
blessing, and this is final, okay? This is the conclusion
of what we're looking at. The deacon's blessing. If God in
his grace allows somebody to become a good deacon, it's a
privilege with a blessing, okay? If they succeed in doing this
for God, it's a privilege with a blessing. The blessing is conditional,
it's conditional, upon them doing well. It says, verse 13. For
they that have used the office of a deacon, well, not every
deacon's a good deacon, not every bishop's a good bishop, okay? But those that do succeed, God's
got a blessing, all right? And I'll tell you this, I've
seen bad deacons. I've seen deacons that I look
at that they should never have been appointed into leadership
in the church. And the future after that proved
that. These men that I think about,
when I look back and I say, they should never be a digging, you
know, in two cases, they're not in the church anymore. One wasn't
faithful to the Lord or the church. The other wasn't faithful to
the church. You know? And so, again, you gotta have
somebody that is gonna do well at that office, but if they get
in there and they do well, there's a prize the Bible speaks about,
and that is this, they purchase to themselves a good degree,
okay, and that means this, they obtain a step of dignity, a step
of honorableness, it's a good position to have. It's a great
thing. Someday, by God's grace, again,
we'll appoint deacons, and it's a church servant. It's what we
talked about on Sunday, a great Christian. And if they're like
what we talked about on Sunday in the office of a deacon, that
is honorable and that is something that we respect as a church and
say, praise God for our good deacon, that God's given to us
for good deacons. But not only that, but the Bible
says, they purchase to themselves a good degree and great boldness
in the faith, which is in Christ Jesus. If they are what the Bible
speaks about here, you know what you've got in that man? You've
got a man that unashamedly stands for God. The Bible says, the
wicked flee when no man pursueth, but the righteous are bold as
a lion. That man has courage. Let me
give you two examples from the Bible and we conclude. Remember
Philip, one of the first deacons, great evangelist, preaching revival
in a city, seeing the Ethiopian eunuch come to Christ. Honorable
man, he was a preaching deacon. By the way, I didn't say that
some deacons preach and teach. My home church, a lot of our
deacons were Sunday school teachers, and they were adult Sunday school
teachers, they were children's Sunday school teachers. So sometimes
with the office of a deacon, there's also the giftedness of
leadership in teaching, and praise God for that. Not everybody. Stephen. the great martyr, the
first recorded martyrdom in the New Testament. You wanna look
at a man that was bold. I mean, he just preached it to
the face of those that are gonna stone him to death. Yeah, I think
the verse is true. I think somebody that qualifies,
and again, we're gonna get on our knees as a church, and we
need to do this tonight, and say, you know, God, raise up
deacons. And again, not everybody in our church is gonna become
a deacon. We understand that. That doesn't mean that man's
not godly or anything like that. But when it comes to those that
God does desire to be a deacon in our church, we cannot make
exceptions. We've gotta look at the word
of God and say, what does God say? Well, God says this, he's gotta be
qualified, his wife and family must meet requirements, and if
they prove themselves, then they can step in, and if they do it
well, Great. That's honorable, and you're
gonna have somebody there that's bold for Jesus Christ. So that's
a great thing, isn't it? And that's gonna be a great person
to have in our church as a servant leader, and that's why as a church,
we're gonna continue to pray and say, God, okay, we're almost
12 years old, but we'd really like to see you provide deacons
in your perfect timing. God's able, and so we'll just
trust God for that. All right, let's pray. Father,
I thank you for the Word of God. Again, we come to it and we've
got to go through it. We've got to consider it. We've
got to look at it. But Father, what we've examined
tonight is the Bible. It's what God says. And Father,
I know that you're going to raise up deacons in your perfect timing.
And I'm praying for that. And Father, it'll be exciting
what it takes place. And as a church, we're going
to get behind those men, we're going to get on our knees, going to pray that
they'll fulfill that office well, so that they can be bold for
God, so that they can have the honor of that position. And Father,
I pray that our church would aspire to leadership and desire
that, and desire to be godly. And Father, whether somebody
is or is not a deacon, we pray, God, give us godly men. God,
give us godly women. God, help us to have good families.
And God, may you be glorified through it. It's in Christ's
name we pray, amen. Amen, praise God, glad you're
here tonight in your faithfulness.
Lesson 15, 1 Timothy
Series 1 Timothy
How to select a deacon.
| Sermon ID | 11222215744209 |
| Duration | 41:05 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | 1 Timothy 3:8-13 |
| Language | English |
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