Notes – How Do We Look

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Today we are going to take a look at 1st Timothy chapter 3 as it defines the biblical requirements for leadership. But something I would like you to keep in mind through this whole message is that while this is written by Paul to Timothy as a checklist for those in leadership positions it is equally as applicable to every Christian whether they are in the pulpit, in the children’s ministry or parking cars outside. It is just as applicable to you if your present place in the body is simply in being here and participating in the fellowship and worship and hearing the Word of God. You see because while that may be your present place it is not your last place, it is not your final place.

Ephesians 2:8-10 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, 9 not a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

To me this clearly says that God has a plan to use each and every one of us to accomplish things in and for His kingdom that we have no knowledge about when we first arrive at salvation. You’ve been saved—Not your own doing. We were created for a purpose—Good works. God prepared these works without our knowledge—before we were saved. He prepared them so we would carry them out—after we were saved. You may have just come to the Lord and you are in that honeymoon place, loving church and all of that but you are in a season of preparation. So as we read through 1 Timothy chapter 3 today don’t think of it as just being for me and Dawn, or Deacon Garrett, or Rich and Lisa. No rather understand that we are all called to lead. That is what a Christian should be doing, leading. I am so sick of the image of the Christian as being some milk toast wimp with no fire in his bones. You can generate a couple of atmospheres around you. One is the atmosphere of contempt and disdain, even ridicule. Here’s the scenario. You’re standing around the parking lot looking at the waves or around the lunch truck at work. Some knuckle head searches around in his little pea brain until he finds something offensive to say and then he says it intending to clown you. You can take it all personal and shlepp off feeling all persecuted in which case he has won. Or you can laugh and say, “Oh man, you want to hear something good?” This is the second atmosphere you can create around you. Then if you’ve been reading your Bible like you are supposed to be doing you have a treasure chest full of amazing stories that are ever so much better than some dirty joke. You can tell them about Gideon defeating 120,000 Midianites with just three hundred men. Go read Judges chapters 6-8. Hot story. Or you can tell them about David taking down Goliath. Read 1st Samuel 17, another great story. You see that second atmosphere is an atmosphere of passion and that passion is based on being firmly convinced of the truth and the fact that a Christian is God‘s ambassador on earth and has the authority to command respect and honor. But get this straight and ambassador does not command respect and honor for himself but for those who sent him. So as we look at this passage today understand that as a Christian we are called to lead, and appointed to represent a great and awesome God, so this passage is applicable to every Christian.

Let’s get to it.

1 Timothy 3 The saying is trustworthy: If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task. 2 Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, 3 not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. 4 He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, 5 for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God’s church? 6 He must not be a recent convert, or he may become puffed up with conceit and fall into the condemnation of the devil. 7 Moreover, he must be well thought of by outsiders, so that he may not fall into disgrace, into a snare of the devil.

8 Deacons likewise must be dignified, not double-tongued, not addicted to much wine, not greedy for dishonest gain. 9 They must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. 10 And let them also be tested first; then let them serve as deacons if they prove themselves blameless. 11 Their wives likewise must be dignified, not slanderers, but sober-minded, faithful in all things. 12 Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well. 13 For those who serve well as deacons gain a good standing for themselves and also great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus.

14 I hope to come to you soon, but I am writing these things to you so that, 15 if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of truth. 16 Great indeed, we confess, is the mystery of godliness:

Right away verse 1 reinforces what I said earlier.

1 Timothy 3:1 The saying is trustworthy: If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task.

The word aspire means to long for, aim for, or seek ambitiously; be eagerly desirous of, especially for something great or of high value. to climb up to, to endeavor to obtain, to breathe upon, pant after. When someone is exceptionally passionate about something we say he lives and breathes that thing, aspires. So when Paul says this saying is trustworthy if anyone aspires to a pastoral position he is desiring a noble task. Since it is our place as stones in this living temple which is the body of the Lord, the church, since it is our place to seek our highest and best use then we should all be seeking to lead. By the way that doesn’t mean that you should all be lobbying to get my job, cuz I love my job and we’ll have to fight for it. But what it does mean is that as you pursue your gifts if it turns out your gift is teaching then we will facilitate that in the Lord. Whether that looks like you going to school or teaching a home group or getting sent out to plant a church. The point I am trying to make is that since our God is so great then we should all be seeking greatness. Let me say something about humility. Humility is staying right sized in the Lord. It is not staying small in the Lord. Right sized and small are two completely different things. Right sized in the Lord for some of you might just be huge. Someone who is unwilling to consider how God might accomplish anything great through his or her life suffers from false humility or apathy. “Oh I could never do anything like that!” No maybe not but God certainly can. I’ll point back to Gideon in Judges 6-8. I really hope when I give you guys these little undercover homework assignments that you do them because it is that stuff that will make you rich. Trust me. Pastor Pete where do you get all this stuff every week? I read the Bible every day, I pray and God paints pictures in my brain, it’s not rocket science. So let’s look at Paul’s list.

1 Timothy 3:2-7 Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, 3 not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. 4 He must manage his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive, 5 for if someone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he care for God’s church? 6 He must not be a recent convert, or he may become puffed up with conceit and fall into the condemnation of the devil. 7 Moreover, he must be well thought of by outsiders, so that he may not fall into disgrace, into a snare of the devil.

So you look at this and say, “Yeah that is absolutely what I expect from my pastor”, and I promise you that is what you will get but how many of us look at this and also say this is the standard I am reaching for in myself, in my own life? Check this out.

1 Peter 2:9-11 But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. 10 Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.11 Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.

That sounds like it might be describing the pastors and the leadership but is talking about all of us together. So back to the list which I think really doesn’t require explanation, it is clear cut. However Paul says a Pastor should be above reproach. To me this means that he should be transparent and open, nothing hidden. When he fails he openly confesses his failure and does whatever it takes to right the situation. We are all going to fail but it is what we do with that failure that is important. The husband of one wife means he is to be a one woman man, one woman is all he thinks about, the only one he is intimate with in any way, emotionally, intellectually or physically. That one woman is his friend, partner and confidant and there is no other. That woman is to be his wife, not his cuddle buddy… Sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach. He is on an even keel caring for the people and that his life is devoted to relating God’s Word to the people God has appointed to him. Here’s something for you, Christians sometimes set the terms service and leadership in opposition to each other. Jesus said the definition of leadership is service, having a servants heart.

Mark 9:35-36 “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all.”

He exemplified that in His life.

Mark 10:45 “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

So Paul moves on in verse 3.

3 not a drunkard, In speaking of deacons later in the passage he says, 1 Timothy 3:8 Deacons likewise must be dignified, not double-tongued, not addicted to much wine.

I personally don’t think a Christian has any business at all drinking anything or taking anything or smoking anything. It is a bad testimony to those who are struggling with addiction. You might say, “That is not my problem.” Well if it is Jesus problem then it is our problem and alcoholism and drug addiction are things that, trust me God is very concerned with. Paul talks about this very thing but it is in regards to eating meat sacrificed to idols, the principle remains the same.

1 Corinthians 8:10-13 For if anyone sees you who have knowledge eating in an idol’s temple, will he not be encouraged, if his conscience is weak, to eat food offered to idols? 11 And so by your knowledge this weak person is destroyed, the brother for whom Christ died. 12 Thus, sinning against your brothers and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ. 13 Therefore, if food makes my brother stumble, I will never eat meat, lest I make my brother stumble.

So if you are presently drinking a little or smoking a little do I think you should quit? No I do not, absolutely not! I think you should stand under the spout where God’s glory comes out and lift your hands in praise and voice in prayer until you are so full of God that there is no room for a drink or a bong hit and no reason to want them. Get yourself so full of God that you can’t imagine anything else taking up space where a little more God could go. Because I promise you this, God and booze or God and drugs will not live in the same house. And if after all of that you still want to drink but you also want to be like Jesus and imitate Him remember what He said at the Last Supper.

Mark 14:25 Truly, I say to you, I will not drink again of the fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new in the kingdom of God.”

So that’s my position on that. I am going to forego explaining the rest of this list pertaining to pastors as well as the list pertaining to deacons, it is in plain English and there is no mystery to it. What I do want to begin to wind this down with is these next few verses.

1 Tim 3:14-16 I hope to come to you soon, but I am writing these things to you so that, 15 if I delay, you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, a pillar and buttress of truth.

We do not serve a god of stone, like and idol made with hands. We do not serve a god who cannot hear or see or speak into our lives.

Isaiah 59:1 Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, that it cannot save, or his ear dull, that it cannot hear;

Pillar; any upright, supporting part.

Butttress; any prop or support built to steady a structure.

So the question we must ask ourselves is, “How do we look?” Are we behaving ourselves the way we should as a member of the household of God? Do we ever find ourselves in places or doing things that if someone from church saw us we would be ashamed? Because there is someone from church who does see us and that is the head of the church, the Lord Jesus Christ.

Romans 6:19-23 For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to lawlessness leading to more lawlessness, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness leading to sanctification. 20 When you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. 21 But what fruit were you getting at that time from the things of which you are now ashamed? The end of those things is death. 22 But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. 23 For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.