House Rules: Week 9, 1 Timothy 3:4-5

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Each week you'll find biblical teaching, practical encouragement, and conversations designed to help you follow Jesus in everyday life.

To learn more about Celebration Baptist Church in Tallahassee, Florida, visit iCelebration.org.

Now let's get started.

Lord, we're grateful to be here today to gather in this place.

It is special, it is unique.

I'm always reminded that we only get 52 times a year to do this in this way.

I don't ever want to take that for granted because this opportunity, it is rare.

And so we're going to be opening up your word together today as a church family.

And I just ask you to speak to us clearly and powerfully through 1 Timothy chapter 3.

1 Timothy 3 · chapter mention

I pray that you just really grab our attention and our hearts.

Help us to focus, pay attention, to concentrate, to take your word seriously.

Help us to have enough self-control not to be a distraction to others and not to be easily distracted so that we can get the most from what you would say to us today.

We love you, Father.

We pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

All right, so let me just kind of catch you up on where we've been as we've been moving through 1 Timothy.

Paul has sent a young man named Timothy, Paul, one of the great leaders of the early church.

He sends a young apprentice named Timothy to the city of Ephesus.

It's a place where he had planted a church prior.

And false teachers have come to this church and they've begun to kind of blow this church off course.

It's just sort of made a mess there.

And so Paul sends Timothy there to get things back on track.

And he writes this letter to Timothy as sort of a set of instructions.

Here's what you need to be doing, Timothy, as you straighten this church out.

And in chapter one, he takes on these false teachers.

And at the end of chapter one, he even kicks a couple of them out of the church.

So it's pretty, pretty dramatic stuff there.

And then in chapter two, he begins to kind of restore order to worship and just sort of how things ought to be done in the church.

And then in chapter three, he's going to come along and say, okay, now those are the kinds of leaders that you don't need in the church.

Let's talk about the kinds of leaders that you do need in the church.

And that's really the focal point of 1 Timothy chapter 3.

1 Timothy 3 · chapter mention

And we've been looking really in kind of the first seven verses at the qualifications of a church leader called an overseer.

And different churches and different traditions deal with this in different ways.

Some refer to it as the office of pastor or elder or even bishop.

Here at Celebration, we would simply say pastor, okay?

I would be really uncomfortable if you called me Bishop David.

That would just make me all kinds of, no, okay.

So we just use the word pastor here, but different churches, different traditions use that in language in different ways.

And then here in chapter three, Paul gives us 16 qualifications for a pastor.

Can we agree that's a lot?

That's a lot of different qualifications.

And you might be wondering, why so many?

Is this just overkill?

What are we doing here?

And it's not overkill.

As churches are being planted across the Roman Empire, they're all facing the same question, which is just what kind of person who should lead us?

And notice what Paul doesn't say.

He doesn't say choose the oldest men or the wealthiest men or the best speakers or the most successful men.

He says, in effect, choose the men who most clearly reflect the character of Jesus Christ, right?

And so that's what these 16 qualities help us to discern, help us to see.

Okay?

Now, even if you never plan to be a church leader or a pastor, this passage still matters for you.

Because with only two exceptions, okay, the ability to teach and not being a new believer, with only those two exceptions, all of these qualifications apply to the life of every single believer in Jesus Christ.

So you can dig into scripture and you can find these same qualities being given to us as a follower of Jesus Christ.

You need to have this in place.

And that's important because it's clear that a pastor isn't held to this otherworldly standard.

Okay?

The pastor is expected to be a faithful follower of Jesus Christ and to then kind of show the congregation, the church, the body, hey, this is how it's done.

This is the way that God is calling every single one of us to live.

Okay, so uh these qualifications matter to every single one of us, and because of that, we're taking a lot of time to work our way through it.

And today we're gonna be zooming in on the qualifications that have to do with a pastor and his family.

And so to do this, we're gonna reach back into verse two, which we actually covered a couple of weeks ago.

We're gonna reach back into verse two, and we're gonna pick up one qualification there that deals with the family.

And we hit it there a couple of weeks ago.

I told you we're gonna get it.

Don't, don't, don't worry, we're gonna come back and spend some time on this.

And then we're gonna tie it into verse four, which is what we're gonna come to in just a moment.

So let's reach back here.

Here we go into 1 Timothy chapter 3, verse 2.

1 Timothy 3:2

See if you can pick out the one uh quality there that deals with family.

An overseer, therefore, must be above reproach.

The husband of one wife, self-controlled, sensible, respectable, hospitable, able to teach.

Do you see the one that relates to family?

Anyone?

Which one is it?

The husband of one wife.

I bolted it for you.

You know, it should have should have been an easy one.

And we're gonna put that one together, that qualification, the husband of one wife, together with what we find in verse four.

Here's verse four.

He must manage his own house to the hold competently and have his children under control with all dignity.

Okay.

Some of you right now, some of the parents are looking at that going, good luck.

That's what you're thinking.

Okay, that's what you're thinking.

So, Paul, right in the middle of all these qualifications, he puts the spotlight right on the pastor's family.

And you might be wondering why?

Why does this matter for a pastor?

I mean, if he can get it done up on the platform, if he can preach competently, if he can administrate reasonably well, why should the church care what his family looks like?

Why should they care?

And I just remind you that the qualifications here in 1 Timothy chapter 3 are really about someone's character, right?

1 Timothy 3 · chapter mention

Paul is looking for alignment.

He's saying, okay, the man that people see in public on Sunday morning is this ought to be the same man that his family sees at home.

So it's absolutely fair for the church to ask, is the man we see on Sundays the same man that his wife and his children see Monday to Saturday?

That's a fair expectation, isn't it?

All right.

And so just as we've seen with all these other qualifications, this one isn't just for pastors.

The Bible speaks to every single one of us about how we're supposed to live as a family.

Let me just point this out, how we see this in scripture.

Let me just ask you, how many of you all are somebody's child?

Please raise your hand.

If you had parents, you should be raising your hand right now.

If you beam down from another planet, we'll make an exception for you.

But the rest of us, we all had parents, right?

Every single one of us has parents.

And as children, does the Bible speak to us and tell us, here's how you should live your life as someone's child?

Does the Bible cover that?

Absolutely, the Bible covers that.

Some of us in this room have a spouse, husband's wife, right?

Does the Bible address how we should live as someone's spouse?

Does the Bible talk about that?

Absolutely, it does.

Some of us have the privilege of being parents.

Does the Bible address how we should live as parents, how we should raise our kids, all that good stuff?

Does it address that?

Dozens of times.

So regardless of our place in the family, God has, if you will, expectations for every single one of us.

Do you see it?

Do you see it?

And those expectations are not there to make our life miserable.

Those expectations are not there to drag us down, to keep us from enjoying our life.

Those expectations are there because God wants us to enjoy being in family.

He wants our family life to be richer and healthier than we can possibly imagine.

And so if a pastor is called to lead people toward maturity in Christ so that he experienced the fullness of the life that God intends, doesn't it make sense that his own family should reflect the kind of faithfulness God is calling every single one of us to pursue?

Doesn't that make sense?

And so that's what we see.

It's just a matter of basic integrity.

The people who know the pastor best ought to be able to see the gospel proclaimed through the way that he lives.

You get it?

You see how important this is?

So let's take a look then at these family qualifications.

We're going to reach back into verse 2, right?

Where it says a pastor is to be what?

The husband of how many wives?

One wife.

Okay.

Now this seems simple enough, right?

And if you look at that at just at its face value, at least when I look at it at face value, my mind goes to the question of polygamy, right?

Okay, he's saying that you can't have, you know, lots of wives at one time.

Now, let me just ask you, is polygamy a big problem here in Tallahassee?

No.

Okay.

What was that show, TV, kind of the Discovery Channel kind of thing?

Was it Sister Wives, whatever it was?

I don't know.

That's not our world here.

Okay, we don't typically see that.

Now here's the thing: it's not, it was not the world back in the day of the early church either.

Okay?

In Roman culture, Greek culture, and so polygamy was simply wasn't widely practiced.

And so that's not an issue that was likely in front of this church.

Not saying it never occurred, just saying that it wasn't typical, wasn't common.

So I would argue that when you look at that expression, Paul is saying more than simply you should not be a polygamist if you're going to be a church leader.

I don't think that's that's the way you should conclude that.

So what does it mean if it's not pointing at that particular value?

Well, the expression literally means a one-woman man.

And so Paul is using that statement, and he's saying, hey, the pastor is a guy whose marriage is marked by it being an exclusive, faithful, enduring relationship to his wife.

Okay?

That's the idea, that's the point.

And so the idea is, okay, the pastor's marriage ought to be exemplary.

It ought to be something that the church looked at and go, okay, that's the kind of marriage I would like to have.

So does divorce matter when the church is considering a pastor?

Yes, I believe that divorce does matter.

You look at the Bible, and scripture permits divorce in very limited circumstances.

Sexual immorality, abandonment by an unbelieving spouse.

But apart from those biblical expectations, I believe that a man who breaks his marriage covenant and ends up divorced would no longer meet the qualification of being above reproach that Paul is laying out for the church.

And remember, why is this so important?

It's because a critical function of the pastor is to help lead other people toward maturity in Jesus Christ.

And so, as I said before, a church ought to be able to look at their pastor and say, if my marriage looked more like their marriage, we'd be on our way to enjoying something that's biblical and God honoring.

And so Paul is saying the pastor can't simply say that.

He can't live the life and say, you know, do as I say, not as I do, right?

That would not work.

The pastor has to have integrity there.

He has to live it out.

So the pastor should love his wife deeply, he should be faithful to her completely, he should honor her privately and publicly, because before a man ever leads a church, the church should pay careful attention to how he leads his family.

You got it?

Okay.

So now is this true only in marriage and not with the kids?

No.

No, it would apply both to the marriage and to the way that the pastor might lead the rest of his household.

And this is where we pick up in verse 4.

Take a look at it.

He must manage his own household completely and have his children under control with all with all dignity.

So I want you to look very carefully at this verse because if you look at that, especially through our kind of our modern eyes, you look at some of that language and it sort of makes you a little uncomfortable, right?

It makes you a little edgy.

Like, what in the world are we getting into?

But we're just gonna break it down and take a look at it, and and hopefully you'll feel very differently about that verse if it makes you at all uncomfortable right now.

Here, Paul gives us three things that define how a father is to lead his home, okay?

He gives us the role that he's to embrace.

He talks to us about the result that his leadership ought to produce, and then he gives us the recipe for how to do that well.

Right?

You got it?

So the role, the result, and the recipe.

That's what this verse is all about.

So let's start off with the role.

What is the role of the pastor as father?

Or I would argue, what is the role for all of the dads or those who will one day be dads?

What's that role for all of us?

What's it look like?

And here's the role he must manage his own household competently.

Now, you you look at that, you might be bristling a little bit.

You might not like the idea that he's going to manage his family as the head of the household.

Let's dig in to what he really says here.

The word manage there, it means kind of two things that are relevant to what we're talking about today.

It means to lead from the front, and it means to attend to.

Okay?

So think about that.

Lead from the front and attend to.

Okay?

Now, so there's this picture here of a father then who is to lead by example, right?

He's to lead in the front, and he also is attending to the needs of the family.

You got it?

Lead from the front and attend to.

You got it?

Okay.

I've been gone for a lot of days.

I missed last Sunday.

Pam and I were on our anniversary trip.

Before that, I went to Phoenix, Arizona.

I was there for uh church-related business.

So I was there Monday through Thursday.

I got home from Phoenix, Arizona at about one o'clock in the morning on Friday.

Pam and I left at 8 o'clock in the morning to go to the mountains of North Georgia and celebrate a few days there for our anniversary trip.

So it was a packed tight week.

So I get on the plane to head to Phoenix, Arizona.

How many of y'all have ever flown on a plane?

Most of all of us, pretty much.

I think it's common experience, right?

And you know when you're walking down the jetway to get onto the plane, right?

The first person that you see is, well, the very first person you see is the poor person who's trying to take your carry-on bag away from you.

Other than that person, who's the first person you see when you get on the plane?

The flight attendant, right?

The flight attendant.

And I'm assuming that they're not there just to welcome you.

I think there's some sort of screening going on.

You know, they're just there to see if you look like a problem, something like that.

But you get on, you see the flight attendant, and they, what do they do, right?

As the plane's getting ready to take off and all that, they're talking about what?

The you know, the seat position, get your seat back up in the right spot, put away your devices.

Here's how you use a seat belt in case you've never used one before.

Here's how they work, right?

Here's the oxygen mask.

Don't freak out if it doesn't inflate, you know, all that kind of stuff.

Y'all know what I'm talking about?

And they show you all this stuff, right?

What are they doing?

The flight attendant?

They're leading by example, aren't they?

They are showing you how all of this is to be done, okay?

And then they always find a way to work in this little warning.

If you don't do what we say, it's a violation of federal law, and we will have you arrested.

Have you noticed that?

Okay.

Now they say it well, they say it kindly, but they do say it, right?

They want you to know that I'm here to help you.

I'm leading by example, but there are teeth behind this thing, right?

So what I'm doing here with you, it is really, really important.

And then the plane takes off.

What does the flight attendant do?

They're attending to everybody's needs, right?

So if they've got a passenger with a special need, they're there to help.

They're gonna bring you your peanuts, they're gonna bring you your soft drink or whatever you want, right?

You know what I'm saying?

They attend to your needs.

And I want you to think about that experience because what you're seeing there, those two things, right?

Leading by example and attending to your needs, that's actually a pretty good picture of what Paul is describing here, that a father, a good father, plays as he manages his household competently.

He leads from the front and he attends to the people that God has entrusted to him.

And I think sometimes our culture paints a very different picture of a father who is the leader and the head of his household, right?

Sometimes the picture that gets painted is someone who is overly strict and controlling and maybe even abusive.

But you I want to be real clear here there is nothing abusive about godly leadership in the home.

There just isn't.

Abuse happens when somebody uses power and position and fear or force to serve themselves at the expense of other people.

That is the opposite of biblical leadership.

Okay, it uses biblical leadership uses God-given authority for the good of the people entrusted to their care, right?

And that's exactly how Jesus defines leadership.

Look at what he says in Mark chapter 9, verse 35.

Mark 9:35

He's talking to his disciples, and he says, if anybody wants to be first, he must be last and a servant of all.

You know, that's the role of a godly father.

He leads from the front and he attends to the needs of his family, right?

And when a father gets this role correct, okay, when he gets it right, what's the result?

Well, let's look for the result here, okay?

Uh Paul says he will have his children under control.

And you think about that one, and you might be going, that sounds harsh, that might be your reaction to that.

Others of you might be thinking, good luck, that sounds ridiculous.

Okay, I understand both of that.

But you might be hearing here, hey man, if a pastor's, you know, you go to a pastor's homes, his kids never misbehave.

Talk to any of our pastors, they'll tell you that's not the case.

Okay?

Or you might be looking at that and you might hear, when dad walks in the room, everybody snaps to attention out of fear.

Have you ever been to one of those homes, by the way?

You know, maybe you went out, you know, you had dinner at somebody's house, and when you walked in, all the kids are acting like they were terrified, right?

That they would do something wrong.

It is weird and it is creepy when you walk into that home, isn't it?

That is not what we're describing here.

Paul's not saying, hey, you know, uh if you have your children under control, you got to do that as a dictator.

That is not at all what the Bible is talking about.

He's talking about uh the kind of dad who builds a relationship in which the kids recognize their father's leadership and then they respond to it.

Now, that doesn't mean that your kids won't test the boundaries, they absolutely will, I promise you.

It doesn't mean that your kids won't make bad decisions, they will, I promise you.

Okay?

Because how many of y'all have made a bad decision, anybody, or am I the only one?

Your kids are gonna make bad decisions, I promise you.

They may need correction, but they need to know that their dad loves them and that he is for them so that when he leads, they trust him.

I'm just gonna be honest with you, Dad.

You're not gonna get there through fear and intimidation.

It comes from love.

So that's what you work at and that's what you pray for every single day.

And you might be thinking right now, well, well, Dave, I need to be respected.

Well, do fathers need to be respected?

Absolutely yes.

But how is respect built?

It's built by living day by day by day as a protector, as a provider, as a steward, as a servant, as becoming a man who's living a life that's worth following.

And when parents see, or when children rather see that kind of leader in front of them, they're much more likely to trust him, honor him, and follow his leadership.

Now, Dad's I'm gonna ask you, is that not the kind of relationship that you want with your kids?

It absolutely is.

And that raises the next question: how does a father lead in a way that cultivates that kind of response?

What's the recipe?

All right, and you see that just in those last three words there in verse four.

The recipe is there with all dignity.

That's the recipe.

Dads, if you want to see that kind of results, you lead with dignity.

What does that mean?

It means that you do not lead as an out-of-control rage monster, okay?

You don't do that, you're not unpredictable, you don't do that.

You're not you're not the dad that that everybody's like, uh oh, dad's coming home, who knows what's gonna happen, right?

You're not that guy.

You don't want to be that.

You don't be the dad who humiliates and puts down his kids in front of others, and nothing like that.

Instead, you lead with steadiness, you lead with self-control, and you lead a life that just by the way you live, it just draws the respect from your kids.

And then When your kids get it wrong, and they will, they still know that their dad is going to love them.

Their dad wants the best for them.

And because he's worthy of their respect, they recognize the value of his leadership and they're willing to respond to it when he calls the kid back from kind of being off track there.

Okay.

My son's name is CJ.

His name is Christian Josiah.

That's what CJ stands for.

Christian, obvious reason why we gave him that name.

Josiah, the only king in the Old Testament that's mentioned at any length, of which nothing bad is ever said.

That's why he's named Christian Josiah.

We figured as he aged, he'd have nowhere to run and hide, okay?

If he decided you want to go by Christian, there you go.

Good luck with that.

Live up to that name.

Or if he wanted to go by Josiah, again, good luck.

You live up to that name, okay?

So CJ, great kid and everything like that, really appreciated and enjoyed him.

When he was a senior in high school, he was driving this little gold pickup truck, okay?

And it had been my hunting truck.

It was a little Ford Ranger, four-wheel drive, a little gold pickup truck, and it was perfect for a kid, okay?

Perfect for a high school kid because it was, you know, reliable, but it was also woefully underpowered, which is a beautiful thing to give to your teenage son, right?

Also, it was one of those little Ford Rangers with a little extra cab, right?

And so the cab behind the seat, there was about that much space, and there were two seats that folded down from the side.

So you could bring two extra friends in there with you, okay?

You could fit four, but nobody was going to drive around town cruising the city, sitting in the back like this.

That just wasn't gonna happen.

It was perfect.

Can we get four in there?

You can.

Will they want to be in there?

So you just cruise them all over the city?

No, no.

So it was perfect.

Perfect for what you want for your high school boy.

And CJ loved that old truck.

He named it Phil, okay?

And so he went everywhere in Phil, uh, but just ideal for him.

Now, one thing about Phil, Phil was four-wheel drive, okay?

So there was a way that Phil could get you into trouble, and CJ decided he would discover that way.

So one night, it's like nine, ten o'clock at night.

One of CJ's friends, you know how here in the neighborhoods here in Calarne, uh, there's these retention ponds, and these houses are sort of built around them, and these ponds are often dry.

You know what I'm talking about?

Okay.

So one of his friends decides that he's gonna take his truck and he's gonna go into one of those retention ponds at about 9, 10 o'clock at night in the middle of a neighborhood, and cut donuts in the middle of the retention pond because it had rained a few days before and the dirt was really soft, right?

And so he thought he'd get in there and just hoop it up and have a big old time.

What do you think happened to CJ's friend?

He got stuck, he sank up to the axles.

And so CJ has a four-wheel drive truck.

And what does his friend do?

He calls CJ.

And what does CJ do?

Oh, my truck, oh yeah, Phil, he's bad, you know.

And so CJ goes into the retention pond to pull out his friend at 10 o'clock at night in the middle of a residential neighborhood here in northeast Tallahassee.

And what do you think happens to poor Phil?

He gets stuck.

So then what happens?

You think they call me?

No, they called another friend, okay?

Who also had a full order drive pickup truck, who goes over there and goes into the retention pond to pull them out.

And what do you think happens to that friend's truck?

It gets stuck.

So now, in the middle of the night, in the middle of a neighborhood here in northeast Tallahassee, we have three full order drive trucks stuck in the middle of a trench and retention pond with the three teenage drivers.

And it's at this point that CJ says, I think I'll call my dad.

So I go over there and I'm just going, Really?

And I said to CJ, I said, CJ, we gotta get these cars out of here because the police are minutes away.

I guarantee it.

Okay.

So sure enough, car comes out one, car two, the the the second car that comes out is the kid that started it all.

The last car that comes out is whose car?

CJ's car.

And I'm like, CJ, we've got to get out of here.

And by the way, the kid who started off, he was gone.

Okay, he was gone.

Okay.

So we get CJ's truck out, we get it back to the street.

I said, CJ, we've got to go.

Any minute now, the police are gonna come.

Here we go.

Police pull up, and I'm standing in the middle of this neighborhood at like 11 o'clock, 11 30 at night on a Saturday night before I have to preach the next morning, okay?

Trying to explain to the policeman how my son is a really great kid.

Even though he was four-wheeling in a retention pond in the middle of the neighborhood in the middle of the night.

Wasn't that fun?

And one of the neighbors comes out and he is livid, and I understand.

And he walks up to me and he goes, Well, thanks for nothing, Dad.

And he storms off.

And I'm like, Yeah, kind of deserve that.

So we load up, CJ drives home, uh, he beats me home.

I walk into the house, and CJ looks at me and he goes, Dad, I am so sorry.

I am so, so sorry.

And you can do anything you want to me.

You can ground me for the rest of the year, you can take away my truck, you can take away my driver's license, you can do whatever you need to do because what I did to you was wrong, and I am so sorry.

And he was really shaken up, man.

He was really shaken up.

And as we stood there in that living room that night, it just hit me that CJ had gotten plenty wrong that evening, right?

He'd made a lot of mistakes, but he had also gotten something really important right, didn't he?

And in that moment I realized that my son really loved his dad.

And my son really wanted to honor his dad.

And he was brokenhearted because while he knew that he'd done something wrong, he also knew that I loved him and I wanted what was best for him.

And so in that moment, he comes to me and says, You do what you gotta do because I want to be on track, I want to be right with you.

And that's exactly what Paul is talking about.

He's not talking about raising perfect kids, he's given us the recipe for a relationship that's marked by enough love and enough respect that even when a child gets it wrong, he turns to his father and he says, Hey, let's get back on the right track.

So the standard here that's given to us for a pastor, it's not the pastor has perfect kids, is it?

And sometimes even really good kids get it wrong.

Sometimes they they get it wrong and it's tragic.

It's not just a funny story about a retention pond.

Sometimes a kid who's been raised up in the Lord will grow up and walk away from their faith.

And when that happens, it's just a soul-crushing reminder that while a father is responsible to lead and love his family faithfully, he's not sovereign over every decision they make, right?

And for some of us, that's the story right now.

Maybe you've got a child who has walked away from the Lord, and I want you to hear this if that's your situation.

Don't give up.

Don't give up.

Keep on praying for your children, keep on loving your children, focus on keeping your relationship with your children healthy.

Keep on pointing them to Jesus with both your words and your life.

You can't force their heart to change, but you can continue to be a faithful representation of Jesus Christ before them every single day, and trust that God is at work in their life.

You can absolutely do that.

Chuck Swindah is, I believe, in his 90s now.

Well-known pastor and Bible teacher.

He once said this there's been only one perfect father, and even he has a lot of wayward kids.

Love that.

He's right, isn't he?

He's absolutely right.

And that's why Paul isn't asking whether a man can produce perfect kids.

He's asking whether he can lead his family with a kind of dignity that makes his leadership worthy of respect.

Now, why does that matter for the church?

Well, if a pastor can preach and do the other parts of the job, is still important to the church?

What he does at home, is that still important?

You'd better believe it.

Because look at what it says in verse 5.

Here it is.

If anyone does not know how to manage his own household, how will he take care of God's church?

Paul's point is really simple here, isn't it?

The home is the proving ground for leadership in the church.

So how do we know if a guy or man is ready to lead a congregation?

How do we know?

Paul says, Well, you look at his home, you look at his family, and you should see a strong, faithful marriage.

You should see children who are confident and they know that their father loves them.

You should see kids who respect his leadership and who are learning to follow it.

We should see healthy relationships marked by love and dignity and trust.

And when you see that thing, that's what you want because a pastor will likely lead the church in much the same way that he leads his family.

So before we entrust a man with the household of God, we ought to make sure that he's faithfully caring for the household God has already entrusted to him.

Now I want to give you two things right here.

One, I want to give you an affirmation, and then I want to give you a challenge.

Okay?

Here's the affirmation.

Okay.

I have I've been here now uh almost 21 years, just a couple of months.

It'll be 21 years for me.

Tommy just celebrated his 20th year.

Doug has been here, I don't know, something like 18 years.

We've got a lot of staff.

Natalie's been here 20 years.

We've got a lot of staff that have been here a really long time.

And I just want to say to you, I want to affirm to you that I get to watch our pastors up close.

And I'm grateful to be able to tell you that I see our leaders here passionately seeking to live out.

1 Timothy chapter 3, verse 2, and 1 Timothy chapter 3, verses 4 through 5.

1 Timothy 3:2 1 Timothy 3:4–5

And I'm just telling you, you should be proud of the way that they've they've parented.

Okay.

Are they perfect?

No.

They're not perfect.

Are their kids perfect?

No.

Are their spouses perfect?

No.

But I can tell you that your pastors love their wives and they're intentional about their kids, and they're sincerely seeking to model being a good husband and a good father for all of you.

I just want to affirm that.

And I want you to know that that I look at Tommy or I look at Doug of the other pastors, and I see elements of their marriage or of their parenting, and I go, I want to be like that.

I want to be more that kind of dad or that kind of husband.

And I see it from them regularly.

And so I just want just to affirm for you that you've got pastors who seek to live this out.

And I just want to affirm that.

Okay.

Second thing is a challenge that I want to give you.

Husbands and fathers, I just want to challenge you to become a 1 Timothy 3 man in your home.

I just want to challenge you to love your wife faithfully, to lead from the front, to attend to the needs of your family, to lead with the kind of dignity that makes you worthy of respect.

And to make your home a place where your family sees Christ in you.

Men, your family ought to be able to look at you and see the way that you follow Jesus and say to themselves, that's how I must follow Jesus.

It should look like that.

And men, if you're not there, today's a time for a change, isn't it?

Okay?

So what I want to do today, and when I was working on this, I thought this feels a little like Father's Day to me.

But what I want to do right now is I just want to take some time and pray.

And I want us to pray for the husbands and fathers in this room.

Can we do that?

I want us to pray that the husbands and fathers in this room are able right now to just make a commitment to live as 1 Timothy chapter 3, kind of men.

1 Timothy 3 · chapter mention

And let's just ask God through the direction and the power of the Holy Spirit to help them lead their families with confidence and with dignity to love well, serve faithfully, and build homes where their families can flourish under the good purposes of God Himself.

Can we do that right now?

So let's all take a moment and let's just pray.

Father, we come and we stand before you today.

And I just want to lift up the men in this room because they've just been confronted with a tremendous challenge from Scripture here in First Timothy chapter 3.

1 Timothy 3 · chapter mention

And I just want to pray for them, Father, that the men in this room stand up and make any changes necessary so they can look themselves in the eye and say, by all that is holy, I am pursuing First Timothy chapter 3 with all of my heart.

1 Timothy 3 · chapter mention

I'm gonna love my wife faithfully and completely, and I'm gonna lead my family with competency and with dignity.

Because our world is in desperate need to see fathers like that.

In many cases, fathers have a bad reputation because, in so many cases, fathers model all the wrong things.

And so, Lord, I simply pray that the men of Celebration Baptist Church, the fathers, the husbands of Celebration Baptist Church, simply declare not anymore, not on my watch.

That the people of Celebration Baptist Church and the people who live in the community that is Tallahassee, Florida, are able to look at the men of this congregation and see something different, something unique, something special, something that's fueled and powered by the Holy Spirit through the power of the Word of God.

Father, I just pray that that is what takes place today.

We love you, Father.

We thank you for your word, especially when it challenges us as it has today, that we might grow, that we might be more and more like Jesus, because that is the desire of our heart.

We love you, Father.

We pray all of this in the powerful and beautiful name of Jesus Christ.

And everyone agreed and said, Amen.

Thanks for joining us on the Celebration Baptist Church Podcast.

We hope today's conversation helped you take another step in your faith journey.

For more resources, upcoming events, and to join us live, visit iCelebration.org.

Until next time, keep connecting with God, connecting with others, and living on mission.