God calls elders to lead the church and care for the spiritual needs of believers.
Some are responsible for the preaching and teaching of God's word, but what else does this role entail? And what characteristics should we be looking for in our elders? Alistair Begg walks us through the Bible's answers today on Truth for Life. For those of you who are visiting this morning and may wonder why it is that we're dealing with these particular verses, it's because the last time we got as far as the 16th verse of chapter five, and we are fulfilling what is essentially a pattern for us in working consecutively, verse by verse, through various portions of the Bible.
Now it's not always important to point it out, but as will become apparent this morning, since it has to do with money, it's probably a good thing to point out, because people will often assume that whenever the question of money is mentioned in the church, that there must be some particular concern about money, and that is often the case when money is mentioned in a church. It's sometimes mentioned with such frequency that people think that that's all the place is about. And in other cases, it is only mentioned when there is some kind of crisis.
Well, you should know that the only reason there's any mention of it is because Paul is addressing it here in First Timothy. And since we're studying First Timothy, we come in the course of events to these verses.
Now, with the verses before us and our Bibles open on our laps, let's pause and ask for God's help. Gracious God and loving Father, we pray now that you will take my words and speak through them. You will take our minds and help us to think through them, and that you will take our lives and fill them with a passionate desire to live in obedience to the truths that you are teaching us, for Jesus' sake. Amen. Contrary to so much popular opinion, the Church is not a democracy.
The fact that many churches may try and operate in that fashion does not make them right. The Church is neither a dictatorship, and the fact that some churches may operate with a little pope who rules them does not make it right. There is no place in Scripture that you can go to to either democratize the church or determine that it should be ruled by an individual in terms of a dictatorship. In fact, when we turn to the Bible, we discover that the church is a theocracy, namely that it is God who rules and governs, and He chooses to mediate His rule. Through the direction of godly men, that God has appointed some to be responsible for the leadership of others, while He has He has appointed all to be responsible to the leadership of Jesus Christ.
And this is not unfamiliar territory to those of us who have been here over a period of time. The English word that is most used to describe the Individuals who are involved in this responsibility of ruling the church is elders, and you will find that the word comes almost exclusively in the plural form, because there is no suggestion that there is only to be an elder in a church, but rather that this responsibility is to be exercised in plurality and in a biblical form of parity. These elders are to be men of spiritual maturity. The Greek word presbyteros is the word which conveys that notion primarily of maturity. They are to be men who exercise a God-given spiritual authority, and the Greek word episkopos conveys that.
And they are to be exercising this authority in the realm of specific spiritual responsibility. And this specific responsibility is, as we discover in Acts chapter twenty and verse twenty-eight, to be shepherds of the church of God. And the Greek word for shepherd is simply the word poimain, which, if you were to try and anglicize it, would be p o i m e i n.
So these individuals, set apart by God, acknowledged by the congregation, are called to act not as the representatives of segments of the congregation, taking up the interests of particular groups within the congregation, in the way in which a congressman might represent his district. It's very important to point out because in many churches who are prepared to acknowledge the idea of eldership, they regard the elders as being representatives of little caucuses within the church.
So every little group tries to get an elder represented in the hope that this elder will represent their charge and their concern. In point of fact, the representation that the elders bring is the representation of God to the people, not the people to the rest of the elders. The elders are not responsible to the congregation; they are responsible for the congregation. They are responsible as brothers to brothers, as brothers to sisters, as we've seen in Paul's instruction to Timothy. As a pastor, he should treat the younger men as brothers, the older men as he would fathers, the older women as mothers, and the younger women as sisters.
And within that framework of relationships, there is all kind of accountability.
So it is not that once the elders are appointed to the task of eldership, they are somehow now immune from the one another dimensions of Christian living. It's not that, but it is that in the exercising of their God given responsibility, they are accountable to God for those under their care. And that, of course, is the most chilling form of accountability that could ever be conceived of, and it is addressed in Hebrews thirteen seventeen, where the writer says they keep watch over you. That is, the elders do as men who must give an account to whom? To God.
Now, in chapter three, Paul has already addressed the qualifications for serving as an elder in the first seven verses, and he now returns to this particular group to provide further direction for the way in which they function within the church. And the link between what he has said about the widows in verses. Three to sixteen, and what he's now about to say concerning elders, I think, is simply this question of honor. The widows were to be given, according to verse three, proper recognition or honor, and the way in which they were to be honored had a direct reference to the providing for their practical needs.
Now he is saying that the elders in the church are also to be given proper recognition. They too are to be honored, and it is impossible to think in terms of honoring elders without also entering into this matter of compensation and remuneration. And so, in verses 17 and 18, we're going to think for a moment or two about the matter of compensation. And then in verse nineteen, and in verse twenty, we're going to consider the issue. In twenty-one, the issue of accusation, and then in verse twenty-two, to which we will come this evening, we'll deal with this matter of ordination.
So there are just those three words that help me as I go through: compensation, accusation, ordination. I say to myself, "Okay, I know where I am in this passage." And I share that with you in case that might help you around. Of course, if it doesn't, then you can think up three words of your own, or twenty words of your own for that matter. But anyway, compensation is the issue here in verses 17 and 18. The elders are those who direct the affairs of the church.
That's what they do. They are responsible for the spiritual oversight of the congregation. The King James Version uses the word "rule," and they are to rule the church.
Now, how do they rule the church? Not on the strength of their personality, not on the basis of peculiar whims that they may have picked up along the journey, but they rule the church by the crook, the shepherd's crook. Of the Word of God. In other words, all of their ability to bring oversight, all of their expressions of pastoral care, all of the matters of teaching, are established and governed by this book. And that is why you see it is imperative that elders are men of spiritual maturity, and their maturity is directly related to their knowledge of the Word of God.
Because if you put a man in a position of leadership in the church simply because he was financially successful or was uniquely competent in the realm of business, But is not a man of spiritual maturity, then you will do a disservice both to that individual as well as to the flock under his care, because when it comes to the issue of ruling. He will immediately revert to business practices, or he will revert to the power of his personality. But if he is unfamiliar with the scriptures, he will not be able to go to the Bible and to say, "This is why we do what we do, and this is why we believe what we believe, and this is why we are going where we are going." It is all wrapped up in this matter of directing the affairs of the church, and it is these individuals we are told who are worthy of double honor.
Now, this matter of double honor is important, and I think it is simply this, or this is at least a pointer in the right direction. That the double honor is this: they are honored for the role that they fulfill as elders, and then on account of the excellency of their work, they are honored all over again.
So there is an honor which attaches to the privilege of eldership, and there is an honor which then attaches to the doing of the work well. Isn't that the distinction there? The elders who direct the affairs of the church well.
Now that should be all the elders, but maybe he's making a point there. Maybe he is, you know, putting a little barb into the seat of the pen.
So some who are reading, some who are hearing the letter read. I wonder, am I one of the ones who directs the affairs of the church well, or am I just directing the affairs of the church? And these who do so well are worthy of double honor, especially. Those whose work is preaching and is teaching.
Now, notice that the word "work" is used. Their work is preaching and teaching. It's customary for people to say of those who labor in the word and in doctrine. Of course, you don't really work, do you? You know, you don't really have a job.
You you just you know read your Bible, pray every day, and grow, grow, grow, as it were. But you don't work well. The word here, "kapaao," is a word for toil, and Paul uses it purposefully. It's the word that he uses in two Timothy two when he uses the various pictures of an athlete and of a farmer. He says it is the hard working farmer who deserves a share of what he is providing.
He should be the first to receive the benefits of his work, and the word there is for toil. And Paul, interestingly, uses this whether he is referring to physical or the mental toil that is involved in the responsibility of eldership. First Corinthians fifteen, and in verse ten, he says, "By the grace of God, I am what I am. It is grace to me, was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them." I was a hard worker, he says, and the word there is copaow.
I was toiling. When he writes in Galatians and chapter four, he uses the same word in verse eleven. I fear for you that somehow I have wasted my efforts on you. The word there is my toiling. When he writes to the Philippians, he uses the same word in the sixteenth verse of chapter two.
As you hold out the word of life, in order that I may boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor, and the word there is kapaao. I did not labor, work, toil, expend myself for nothing. In other words, he says this responsibility of laboring in the word and in doctrine, of directing the affairs of the church. He says, let nobody be in any doubt. This is work.
And anyone who engages in the responsibilities of pastoring, of teaching, of being involved as an elder, and doesn't break a sweat, or doesn't break their back, or it doesn't break their heart, or it doesn't keep them awake, or it doesn't lift their spirits, or it doesn't devastate them, doesn't know what it means to be an elder. The word here conveys the fact that it is both vigorous. And it is laborious, and at the end of the day, it has the ultimate examination.
Now, some of you did your examinations and passed the bar, and it was tough, but it's over. Others of you did your examinations and were entered into a trade, and it's over. Or you still work, but you no longer face examinations. You pass the examinations, and now you do your work here. You do your work, and then you face your examinations.
You work all of your life, and then you get examined, and on that day you will discover whether your work, your kapaao, was wood and hay and precious and and and stubble, or silver and gold and precious stones.
Now, I express this with conviction because it comes to me with conviction. All the elders, he says, rule. The directing of the affairs of the church falls to all the elders. All the elders teach, insofar as they are men who, according to what he writes to Titus in Titus one nine, are men who are apt to teach. I don't think that means that every elder has to be somebody who can stand up and preach in a public fashion.
Some teach that. I disagree with them. I don't know if I am right, but I know that I disagree. Because the phraseology of apt to teach. Does not necessarily mean the gifting necessary to do so in a public forum, but it does mean that every elder needs to be mature enough in the scriptures that when a member of the congregation approaches them with a matter of doctrine or with a matter of practice or whatever it is, that the elder is able to go to the Bible and to turn the scriptures up and to teach from the Bible and to rule and direct the affairs of the church from the book.
So, in the same way that you would see a shepherd, and you would identify a shepherd as indistinct from other workers in fields and other caretors of cattle, you would identify that shepherd by the fact that he would move around with his crook. Then you would be able to identify the elders because they would be moving around. With theirs as well, because they would want always to be ready to shepherd the congregation, to direct the affairs of the church, and to do so well by means of this vital instruction.
Now, verse eighteen leaves us in no doubt that it is impossible to divorce the notion of honor from remuneration. For the Scripture says, "Do not muzzle the ox while it's treading out the grain." Somebody in hearing verse seventeen read maybe say, "Well, what do you mean, worthy of double honor? How should we honor them?" Paul says, "Well, just in case you're missing the point, I'm actually talking about the way in which you provide for them." Now, if you turn back to Deuteronomy for a moment, and you should put a marker in Deuteronomy because we'll go back here again a couple more times. But in Deuteronomy chapter 25, God is giving instruction to His people about various practical matters, and it is right in the course of all of this vital practical instruction that He says, "Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain." It's interesting the way that just drops down there in the midst of all these other instructions.
Now, in the time of Deuteronomy and the time of First Timothy, people would have been very familiar with this picture. A flat, often rocky area, circular many times, a piece of level ground exposed to the wind would become the place in which the grain was brought and laid out symmetrically around in this circle. And then the oxen, often two of them, maybe three of them, would be harnessed to a central point, and they would move just laboriously round and round. And as their hooves crunched into the grain that had been cut. And they they they split it apart.
Then the wind would pick it up and blow it. And as the good stuff would be gathered and set aside for consumption. And the instruction of God is, when the oxen are doing that, don't put a muzzle on them. Allow them to eat some of the grain, in order that they are well cared for.
Now, why was God so concerned about oxen?
Well, actually, he wasn't ultimately concerned about oxen, although he was in passing concerned about oxen. He was concerned about his name and his glory, because pagans were tempted, on account of greediness, to put muzzles on the oxen, so they would engage in the same process. But when the poor oxen would try to grab some of this stuff, They couldn't because they had their mouths all jammed up with one of these leather gubbinses. Paul says, when the pagan nations see that we don't muzzle the oxen, and they say, "Why don't you muzzle the oxen?" You'll be able to tell them because God is a kind God. The God and Father of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob is a God of kindness.
That they might also understand the principle that is conveyed here: that every worker, whether it is an oxen, whether it is a manual worker, or in First Timothy five, whether it is someone who labors in the word and in doctrine, that all of these situations. In every case, the individual or the beast has the right to partake in the fruits of his work. In other words, if God ordained ample provision for oxen that were treading out corn, it is incumbent upon churches to see that those who devote their time and energy to preaching and the teaching of the word are adequately remunerated. That's the principle. He says, if God is concerned about the oxen, don't you think He's concerned about the pastors?
Now, it's a dreadful shame when congregations conclude that eldership and particularly the teaching eldership, the responsibility of labouring in the word and in doctrine, that somehow or another, congregations conclude that this is not really work, and any notion of honouring them will come when they die. And we will honor them in their funeral sermons, but we're not going to honor them now. We don't want them to get whatever we don't want them to get.
Now I don't speak here out of personal experience. I speak here out of observation. God knows that if I were to die right now while I'm preaching, I could never. Have been as graciously and wonderfully and well cared for over all of my life as I have been, far and beyond deserving and or expectation. But in moving around the country and in going from place to place, not all enjoy such benefits.
You're listening to Truth for Life with Alister Beg. We'll hear more about the role of church elders as we continue our study in First Timothy tomorrow. In the meantime, be sure to request the resource we are recommending today. It's a brand new release from Alister, titled "Guarding the Truth," and it's a verse-by-verse study guide through Paul's second letter to Timothy. In the book of Second Timothy, Paul continues encouraging his young apprentice, reminding him to hold fast to the gospel and continue to trust in Scripture in a time when false teaching was rapidly spreading and luring many away from the true faith.
This study guide is designed to be used as a companion to the ESV text, and as you read your Bible, you'll refer to the corresponding commentary and the helpful explanations from Alister that you find in the study guide. There are twelve sections, each includes questions for reflection or for group discussion, which makes this a perfect resource for a twelve-week group study. Encourage all the members of your group to obtain their own copies of. The Second Timothy, Guarding the Truth Verse by Verse Study Guide, by supporting Truth for Life with a donation today. Simply visit truthforlife.org/donate or call us at eight eight eight five eight eight seven eight eight four.
And if you'd rather mail your donation along with your request for the book, write to Truth for Life at P.O. Box thirty nine eight thousand, Cleveland Ohio four four one three Nine. I'm Bob Lapine. Thanks for listening today. While those in leadership deserve to be honored, that doesn't mean their sins are to be covered up.
Tomorrow we'll consider how to deal with accusations and allegations against church leaders. The Bible teaching of Alister Beg is furnished by Truth for Life, where the Learning is for Living.
