Responsibilities of the Elders and the Church

1 Timothy chapter 5 verse 17 is where we will start. Last week we looked at some instructions

1 Timothy 5:17

on who qualifies as a widow and there's certain qualifications there when it comes to supporting

the widows or as some of your translations may have said honor, to honor the widows.

And tonight we're shifting gears. We're talking about those who are elders or pastors. Timothy's

already dealt with that or Paul I should say has already dealt with that as far as the

qualifications for those who are going to be elders or overseers or we might call them

pastors. And here he's back on that giving some more instructions. So let's pray and

we'll get started. Father God we come to you tonight. We thank you for these words. Dear

Lord I pray that you would help us to understand what your word says. God I pray especially

for me as one who's leading this church that you would help me to hear these words dear

Lord and listen to them and to live by them dear Lord that I would do a good job. Dear

Lord should I fail that these people would hold me accountable to that dear Lord as your

word says here. So God I pray that your word would be good for us tonight and it will.

I pray that your Holy Spirit would just speak to us and free us from the worries of the

world and hide me behind the cross that I may preach and teach in a way that brings

glory to you tonight. And I ask these things in Jesus name. Amen. All right. First Timothy

chapter five verse 17 the elders who are good leaders should be considered worthy of an

ample honorarium. Some of your translations may say double honor especially those who

work hard at preaching and teaching for the scripture says do not muzzle an ox while it

is treading out the grain and the worker is worthy of his wages. Now here he's talking

about those elders that is those who are leading the church position and we might be more familiar

with calling pastor. That is the one who's going to preach the one who's going to teach

the one who's going to be a leader. And what he says here is that the elders who are good

should be considered worthy of an ample honorarium are of double honor. Now it could just be

speaking of honor in a sense of respect. However it appears in the context that it's speaking

of support that that is there is some obligation for brothers and sisters in Christ that meet

together to support those who are leading them those who are good leaders those who

are doing a good job those who are being faithful to the ministry those who are preaching and

teaching and doing the work that comes along with being an elder or being a pastor and

Paul says for those who are among you it is good to give them double honor to give them

an honorarium. That's a word you may hear sometimes is honorarium. You may perhaps maybe

we're most familiar with that in terms of a wedding or a funeral. Now sometimes people

say how much do you charge to do a wedding or a funeral and I say nothing. I don't charge

anything. I don't expect anything. I don't need anything. I don't want anything. Now

I suppose some pastors have a fee as this amount of dollars is that amount of dollars.

But but an honorarium is something that's not required. It's not it's not something

that's established that I'm charging X amount and you owe me for this. An honorarium is

something that that that that is is is meaning that it's not something that's being charged

for it's just something that's being done. It's something that the person wants to do

that the pastor wants to perform a wedding ceremony for example or or do a wedding for

example. There's no money expected. There's no money required. Sometimes however people

would choose to give money to a pastor. They would say here take this. We want to give

this to you and that would be considered an honorarium. I suppose that in the grand scheme

of things generally speaking I suppose any pay that anyone gives to a pastor even when

it comes from a church body I suppose that that would even be considered an honorarium

as well something that's maybe not expected. Perhaps a good example of this is Brother

Ernie. Now Brother Ernie's not able to preach anymore but he was a faithful servant to this

church for years and Lord Lord knows he would love to be here today. He would love to go

see people today. He still would go visit people if he could but he's not able to but

the church still gives Brother Ernie money every month. I would consider that an honorarium.

That's something that we have acknowledged and recognized that he is a good leader. I

say he is. I don't say was because even though his health is declining and his mind is declining

he is still a man who's strong in the faith. He's still a man who prays and he's still

a good leader for us. He's still a strength for us as a church and so we respect that.

We respect his years of service and what he has done and we continue every month to give

him an honorarium. Some of you may not know that but that's something that we voted on

years ago and we have continued to do praise the Lord and so that may be a good example

of this passage that's being spoken about here and he gives an example. He says it's

good to give this honorarium. It's good to support those who are in the ministry and

he says because the scripture says do not muzzle an ox while it is treading the grain.

Now that's a quotation from the Old Testament from Deuteronomy chapter 24 and the idea of

Deuteronomy 24 · chapter mention

being there is okay the ox is treading the grain and he's doing the work but the ox

also can eat a little bit of the grain and there's nothing wrong with that. That's the

way it needs to be. The ox needs to be able to eat a little bit of the fruit of the labor

and that gives the ox strength. If you just made the ox work all day and you didn't feed

him then the ox wouldn't do very good but it's alright the scripture says. The ox needs

to eat a little bit of grain along the way and it's okay for the worker to eat from the

fruits of his labors and this is the illustration that Paul is giving here. And then he gives

a quotation of Jesus from Luke chapter 10 verse 10 where he says the worker is worthy

Luke 10:10

of his wages. Now in this passage Jesus sends out 70 or 72, depending on your translation,

disciples to go out and do the work and Jesus says look if you go to a house go to it and

bring peace. Speak peace on the people and if they invite you in, if they give you a

place to stay, if they give you a food then eat it, partake of it. That's a good thing.

You're doing the work of the Lord and it's okay to partake of those things. That those

would be kind of the fruits of your labors that the Lord has provided. You're not going

asking people for anything but if someone wants to support the work of the Lord then

that's a good thing for those who are doing the Lord's work. Now certainly there is some

difference of interpretation and difference of opinion among Christians as to what this

should look like in churches. Now some would say that pastors shouldn't take any type of

pay from a church, that they should be willing to preach free of charge and I think that

that's probably a good belief. I think that that should be the heart of a pastor. Some

would say that you know what it shouldn't be the job of a church collectively but anyone

who wants to support the pastor could do so and that may be by giving them groceries or

giving them food or giving them money or whatever it may be and let the Lord provide that need

as it sees fit. Some would say that it's wrong for a church body to pay a pastor. Some would

say it's not wrong that the church collectively says hey we see that there's a man who's serving

us and serving our community and preaching and teaching to us and we want to give that

and we choose to give that and so you can decide for yourself what you think is right

or what you think is wrong. There's certainly differences of opinion there but I'll tell

you as a pastor for me it's a blessing to be able to serve. It's a blessing to be able

to get to go see people. Now some would say a pastor needs to work a full job and preach

on the weekends and maybe that's correct. However I'll say as a pastor that it's a

blessing to be able to not have to work a full job during the week to be able to be

at the hospital with people and to be able to go where people are sick and to be able

to help people when there's a need. I think that there's a need for that too. I think

that that's important and so I think it's good for pastors to serve in those ways if

they can. Sometimes pastors have to work a real job if we can call it that. Other times

pastors may not have to be bivocational but I think that the Lord provides and I think

that that's what Paul is saying here that it is good for the people to support those

if they see them doing the Lord's work. If you don't see me or whoever may be here in

the future doing the Lord's work then it doesn't need to be supported. You don't want to support

those who are not doing the Lord's work, who are not preaching and teaching, who are not

taking care of those in the community. But Paul says do support those who have been good

leaders and are being good leaders. Offer support to them. It's good for the church

to do that. Verse 19, don't accept an accusation against an elder unless it is supported by

two or three witnesses. Now elders probably being in that position to be an elder, to

be an overseer or be a pastor, you kind of set yourself up for attack to some extent.

If somebody is not happy with what you're doing or somebody wants to do something or

say something to try to tear you down if they don't like you then you're kind of a prime

target because you're kind of in the spotlight so to speak as a pastor. All eyes are on you

so if somebody really wanted to hurt you then they could say anything or they could come

up with some accusation. Well what does Paul say here? Don't pay attention to every accusation.

Somebody might come up with an accusation against a pastor that they don't like. There

are certainly plenty of people in the world that don't like a pastor for whatever reason

and some would use their dislike or even hatred of a pastor to say things to try to tear them

down or to spread rumors or say things that aren't true. So what does Paul say? He says

look, if you hear somebody that just comes out of the woodwork and says something then

pause for a second and make sure that it's true. Let there be two or three witnesses.

Don't just listen to one person that comes out of the woodwork but give your elder the

benefit of the doubt. If he's been a good leader, if he's been a good pastor, if he's

been a good elder then he deserves the benefit of the doubt. If there's no history of him

doing a bunch of crazy stuff and you hear something that's pretty crazy then give him

the benefit of the doubt. That's not to say that maybe he didn't fail or do something

wrong. It is certainly possible that sometimes that pastors will fall in some way or fail

in some way. But generally speaking, if somebody comes with an accusation kind of out of the

blue then you might not want to put too much emphasis on that. If two or three people come

forward and say hey, here's something I've seen, here's something that's going on, well

then we need to pay attention to that. We need to deal with that. And that's what Paul

is saying here. Look, pastors and elders need to be good, faithful men of God that are above

reproach. We've already seen that in the qualifications. And so he's holding him to a high standard

but he's also offering a little protection here. He's giving the people a little instruction

here. Look, pay attention and be careful when somebody comes against your elder and make

sure that the charge they're bringing against them is a legitimate charge. Verse 20, publicly

rebuke those who sin so that the rest will also be afraid. Now this passage is kind of

an interesting and difficult passage in a sense. Now it would seem as though in the

context that he's speaking of elders here when he speaks of rebuking those. However,

you could argue that he's speaking generally of anybody. And this is a scary passage because

this is one of those you could kind of just pluck out of context and just take by itself

and you may get yourself in trouble. Cause what does it say? Publicly rebuke those who

sin so the rest will also be afraid. So does that mean that if we find out somebody's sinning

among us that Sunday morning in church and announcements when I say, does anybody have

anything to say that you stand up and say, sister so and so has been sinning in this

way? Well, I don't think that that's the way that we should handle it. I don't know that

that's appropriate. Now, perhaps, perhaps there is occasion for that. As the scripture

says, look, if somebody sins against you, then you go to them. If they keep sinning

against you and they don't change, then take somebody with you. If they still continue

to sin against you, the scripture says, bring it before the church. So perhaps there is

a time that things need to be brought before the church, but always in a very prayerful

way. This is one of those passages that we probably never, we never, we never carry out

or very seldom carry out. And, and, and maybe rightfully so it's probably good that we don't

carry this out very often. If we come in here every week pointing people out for sins, then

we would have a lot of trouble on the flip side of that. There may be other times that,

that maybe there is sin that's going on in the church and people know that that sin's

going on, especially with an elder. That's, that's serious. It needs to be addressed.

It needs to be dealt with. And I think in the context here that Paul is speaking about

elders that it needs to be made known, Hey, look, the leader of this church has been living

in sin in this way and it's not acceptable. And we are not going to support that. Now

we'll help him. We'll try to restore him, but he is not fit to lead this church. And

sometimes churches have to do that. There, there are times and you may have known of

churches or pastors that have failed in some grievous way. And the church had to say, look

brother, we love you, but this is not acceptable. And there has to be times where you have to

stand up and say, brother, so-and-so is not fit to lead right now. And, and maybe that's

what it's talking about here because to be a pastor, to be an elder should be held in

the highest regard. It should be something that should not be taken lightly for those

who are going to serve in that way. And so this just adds a little more, a little more

seriousness to it. Hey, if you fail, this, it's going to be a big deal. And this is how

Paul says to deal with it, to publicly rebuke those who sin so that it, the rest will also

be afraid. And so when it comes to rebuking those who sin, we want to be careful. We never

want to be those who just go around pointing the finger at everybody else and using a passage

like this at justification. Certainly we're all sinners, but in the same, in the same

vein, sometimes we know as brothers and sisters in Christ, that there are other brothers and

sisters that are sinning and it's not right. And sometimes out of love, we have to sit

down and say, look, what you're doing is not right. You don't need to do this. And so oftentimes

we don't like to hear that. We take that as an attack. We respond with who are you to

call me a sinner? You're a sinner. But sometimes maybe we need to listen to what people are

saying. When we, when we tell somebody, I love you and I'm worried about what you're

doing, we're not implying that we're perfect. We're not saying, I'm telling you this because

I'm perfect and better than you. We all as brothers and sisters in Christ, we kind of

sharpen each other and there are all, for all of us, there are times maybe that we need

somebody to say, look brother, look sister, I'm worried about you. You know, this isn't

a good way to live. And I don't think that there's harm in that. I think that there is,

there is love in that, but we just have to be careful about how we do it. And we have

to be very prayerful about how we do it and when we're going to do it and let the Lord

lead us and he'll give us the words to say, should those times come. Verse 21, I solemnly

charge you before God and Christ Jesus and the elect angels to observe these things without

prejudice, do nothing out of favoritism. So we might be tempted sometimes if there's somebody

we really like to let them get away with a little more, but we don't want to show favoritism.

God doesn't show favoritism. And that's what Paul tells Timothy here. Don't, don't show

favoritism in that way. Verse 22, don't be too quick to appoint anyone as an elder and

don't share in the sins of others. Keep yourself pure. Well, this is good advice. You don't

want to just pick somebody out of the blue that you don't know very well and say, Hey,

would you be the pastor of this church? Would you, would you come? We want you to be our

elder. We need to get to know people a little bit. You need to be able to kind of gauge

them for years and years and years, probably some long period of time. You need to be able

to kind of know who somebody is to kind of understand whether or not that they really

are somebody who's living for the Lord. And, uh, I think that's important. If, if, you

know, sometimes people from other churches, uh, might, you know, if they're looking for

a pastor, they may say, Oh, you know, what should we look for or what should we do? Or

we're not sure. I always advise them first and foremost to look for somebody local. Now

you can get a stack of resumes for people from Timbuktu, but you don't know them. You

don't know them at all. But if you find a man of God that is local, that you know, that

feels called a preach, then I think that's the best place to start because you got a

good idea of who you're looking at. You got a good idea of what their life is and how

they have lived their life. And that's important. So don't be too quick to appoint somebody

to be your elder, to be your pastor. If you don't, if you don't know them, if you don't

know a little bit about them, if you don't know if they really are living for God or

not. Okay. So don't be too quick to point in one and don't share in the sins of others.

Keep yourself pure. So perhaps if you are an elder and you see other elders around you

that are sinning in some way, you may want to justify that. You may want to say, well,

you know, other, other preachers are doing it. So maybe it's not that bad, but we shouldn't

justify sin. Whether we're a preacher or not, we should never justify the sin of those around

us. We should strive to keep ourselves pure. And I think that's super important for those

who are going to be elders and those who are going to be pastors to keep their self pure

and to try in every way to do that. Billy Graham perhaps is a good example of that.

And he was kind of in his prime. I think this was back in the seventies. Uh, I forgot what

they call it. Uh, it was some name that he and the group that was, he was ministering

with called it. But, but anyway, they, they came up with these, these rules that they

gave theirself about when they were out doing all these evangelism tours, that they would

never be alone with another woman. They would never eat a meal with another woman. There

were all these ways in which they were trying to protect themselves from any temptation

they may have. And from anything anybody might try. There's a famous story about once, and

I've heard this story multiple ways, uh, that either Billy Graham had got on an elevator

and there was a woman on there. And as soon as the door closed, she took her clothes off.

And when the doors opened on the next floor, there were people there to take pictures.

One version I heard she was in his hotel room. I'm not sure which version of that is true,

but that was one of Billy Graham's rules is he would never ride an elevator with anybody

else. He'd ride it alone, especially not a woman unless his wife was with him. Why? Because

he was trying to protect himself. He wanted to remain pure. And even if he didn't have

any temptation to sin, he didn't want anything that someone else may do to take away from

his ministry. That's a good example of if you got, if you got something like that, that

happens. Well, take a long look at somebody's life and somebody's ministry. What are the

odds that they're going to do that? Well, in his case, it was probably pretty slim.

So that's easy to figure out that there was somebody kind of out to get him. But anyway,

he and the group that was with him, they had all these rules for this reason so that they

could remain pure and that they would never give anybody any kind of reason to doubt the

work that they were doing. Verse 23, don't continue drinking only water, but use a little

wine because of your stomach and your frequent illnesses. Now, this is an interesting thing

to kind of throw right here in the middle of this. It seems a little out of place. Now,

maybe it's just in the middle of rightness. Paul just happened to think about this. He

said, Oh, you're having some trouble with your stomach and the water's probably not

good. So mix a little wine with it and that'll, that'll help purify the water. That'll help,

that'll help clean it up, kill anything that's in it. Maybe it just popped into his mind.

Some have suggested that, that maybe Timothy was trying to refrain from, from drinking

any wine whatsoever. And maybe Paul is saying, look, it's okay to drink a little wine is

okay. To be a drunkard is not okay, as we have seen in the previous chapters, but having

a little wine is okay. And maybe, maybe he's just telling Timothy, it's all right. You

know, you're sick and a little wine in your water is not going to hurt anything. Now it

has been suggested by some that the water in those days was not always pure, that it

was not always safe. And that it would, it would have some things in it that would cause

you to get sick. But by mixing your water with a little wine, it would kill whatever

was in there and it would make it safe to drink. And there are still, as best as I can

understand some places in the world today that do this same practice, mix a little wine

with their water so that it will be safe for them to partake of. So he gives, he gives

Timothy this instruction here for whatever reason, he just kind of, he kind of throws

it in the middle of this passage. And then it seems like he gets back to the point and

that is elders, verse 24. Some people's sins are obvious going before them to judgment,

but the sins of others surface later. Likewise, good works are obvious and those that are

not obvious cannot remain hidden. So when you're looking for those who are going to

be elders and those who are going to be pastor, there are some people that you could write

off off the bat. You could say he is not qualified. He doesn't meet the qualifications. You see,

you see the sin, you see the troubles in his life. Other people, however, you got to be

patient because some things Paul said they could remain hidden for a little while, but

ultimately they're going to rise to the top. They're going to, they're going to kind of

work their way up.

Now I remember when we first bought our, our house, there was a spot right out there that

it was just grass. And lo and behold, after almost three years, there's some roots that's

kind of boiled up to the top of the ground. I didn't know they were there before, but

over time they kind of boiled up to the top of the ground. Well, that's how it is with

our sin. Sometimes we can kind of keep things hidden, but, but ultimately if somebody's

got some trouble, give them a little time, watch them and you'll be able to see things

that aren't right. Now that's not to say again, that there are not going to be times that

a pastor's got going to say something or act in a way that he shouldn't have acted in.

But, but when you see those things rise to the top, if you see those things be pretty

persistent, you see a pattern of those things. Well, that's what Paul's being telling us

to look out for. He said, you can't hide those things forever. But on the flip side, he ends

with a positive. He said, the good works are obvious as well. So sometimes good works are

obvious. You just see somebody and you see that they're doing good works of God. Maybe

you don't see those good works. Maybe there's somebody you're thinking, man, maybe that

needs to be our next pastor. And you look at him and you say, Oh, I'm not too sure.

I don't see, I don't see anything bad, but do I really see any evidence that they're

working for the Lord? Well, Paul says, eventually the good works will rise to the top. They

won't be hidden either. So the point being, I think is time will tell the tale. And sadly

in our, in the kind of in our, in our church structure today, in the way that things are

laid out and the way that churches call pastors, very seldom do they know who the pastor is

very seldom do they have other than a resume and maybe a few people they call. But, but

I believe probably in these days that the elders and the pastors that are being spoken

of here were people from the community, people that, that the congregation would know and

people that they would choose and say, all right, we think you, you have what it takes.

We see the way you live your life and, and, and laying on of hands and appointing people

to be elders. And I suspect that maybe some of our churches would be better off today

if the people of the church knew who the person was that they were going to call. So Paul

gives some good instruction here for Timothy and some good instruction for elders too.

It's good for me who's in the ministry as a pastor, and it's good for you as a church

to look at these things. And, and we want to make sure as a church that, Hey, hold me

accountable. Am I doing a good job? We, I want to make sure as a pastor to look at passages

like these and say, Hey, am I being obedient to the word of God in the future? Should you

go to another church or when the time comes that I leave this church, we want to remember

these things so that as a body of Christ, wherever we may be that we are, we are under

a person who's going to be a good leader and who's going to serve God, not one who is hungry

for money. That should always be a red flag that, that if somebody says I want X amount

of dollars or I'm not coming, well, I would tell them, thank you. Have a nice day. We

don't want you to come, but everybody's got to do their own thing. But we don't want people

who are, who are greedy for money. I think it's good. Praise the Lord. If churches can,

can, can provide for a pastor and allow them to do the work, that's a good thing. But those

who are seeking money and seeking more money, well, that's not a good sign. And so Paul

says, look, there's an obligation to support the pastor, but make sure that they're doing

a good job. Hold them to a high standard. And if they're not held to a high standard

or excuse me, if they're not doing right, then address that. And so Paul gives us kind

of some hard instruction here, but it's good instruction nonetheless. Let's pray. Father

God, we thank you for these good words. And I pray that you would help us to be a church

who is faithful, dear Lord. You would help me to be a faithful leader, that you would

help us as a church to be faithful in all we do, dear Lord. We want to be about your

business. We want to be about your work. And so I pray God that we would all work together

to accomplish that goal. I pray that we would take passages like these and kind of let them

simmer and to dwell on them and to know how we need to respond and how we need to react

and how we need to deal with certain situations, dear Lord. And I pray that you would help

us to be careful. If we ever try to restore a brother, dear Lord, we need to look at the

log in our own eye before we take the speck out of our brother. So help us to examine

ourselves so that we will be fit, dear Lord, to help restore someone else. So God, let

us never have a heart of being judgmental, but let us only have a heart of love that,

God, we would seek for others to be restored as you seek for us to be restored, dear Lord.

I thank you for your word and I pray that you just bless it. And I ask these things

in Jesus' name. Amen.