ray choi

A follower of Jesus

1 Tim 3: Save Yourself First, then Family, Church, the World

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Sermon Outline

Text: 1 Tim 3:1-13

Context

  • Today, I want to talk about character

  • Letter written by Paul to Timothy – pastoral counsel on how to choose leaders in the church, specifically male elders and male deacons and female deaconesses

Wrong Approach to Choosing A Leader

How did Solomon choose a leader?

  • 1 Kings 11:26-28

  • Jeroboam REBELLED against Solomon

  • Yet Solomon choose him to be a leader over the entire labor force of the house of Joseph

  • Why, what his criteria?

  • “He was getting things done.”

  • Import world’s value system into the church

Talbot DMin student in leadership – honest feedback – competence

Other reasons why leaders are selected in churches: loyalty, commitment, availability

Paul’s Advice to Timothy

  • When looking to appoint overseers/elders/pastors/leaders in your church, look for one thing–character

  • We are not born with character – babies are not born with character

  • How would you define character?

  • Many different ways to define character

Quotes On Character

  • Billy Graham: “When wealth is lost, nothing is lost; when health is lost, something is lost; when character is lost, all is lost.”

  • Abraham Lincoln: “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.”

  • Charles Spurgeon: “A good character is the best tombstone.”

  • Mahatma Gandhi: Seven Deadly Sins – “Wealth without work, Pleasure without conscience, Science without humanity, Politics without principle, Commerce without morality, Worship without sacrifice, Knowledge without character.” [order changed]

  • Arnold Schwarzenegger: “The resistance that you fight physically in the gym and the resistance that you fight in life can only build a strong character.”

  • Dwight L. Moody: “Character is what a man is in the dark.”

  • John Wooden: “Be more concerned with your character than your reputation, because your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are.”

  • Bruce Lee: “Knowledge will give you power, but character respect.”

Two Different Understandings of How Character is Produced

Difference between the secular understanding of character and the Christian understanding of character

Looking at this list in 1 Tim 3, it dawned on me that there are some non-Christians who can qualify on paper to be decent leaders in the church

  • They are self controlled, they never get drunk, they are generous with their money

  • They don’t have bad tempers, they are great husbands and fathers, they are gentle by nature, they are always inviting people over to their home

  • Everyone loves them–bosses, co-workers, other parents in the community

Misunderstanding of where character comes from

  • People who suffered in life – wow, they are deep, they have good character

  • Is character the byproduct of suffering? Is that true? Is that the same thing as godly character? Partly.

  • Rom 5:1-5

  • Affliction and endurance without Faith does not produce godly character

  • Suffering can produce maturity but maturity is not the same as godly character

  • Key element is faith – faith in Jesus must grow in order for the trials/affliction and endurance to produce godly character

Fruit of the Spirit = Godly Character

  • The Bible’s definition of character = fruit of the Spirit. Gal 5:22-23.

  • Jonathan Edwards – concatenation of the graces

  • Singular fruit – cluster

  • Godly character is produced by the Holy Spirit

Spiritual Gifting vs. Character

  • It’s interesting that when evaluating potential leaders at your church, Paul doesn’t mention the supernatural gifts like speaking in tongues or prophesying or healing.

  • More than the overt, external gifts of the Spirit, Paul said to look for the internal fruit of the Spirit like gentleness and self-control and maturity of character.

  • It would be easier to say, can you speak in tongues?  Yes?  Okay, you’re hired.

Take for example a seminary grad in his mid-twenties

  • Single, wants to save the world, proud and untested

  • Only ministry he has done is leading a small group and reading a bunch of ministry books and hearing about other people’s ministry during conferences

  • Grew up in church – everyone said he was great

  • Already susceptible to conceit – suppose that on top of everything else, he received a spiritual gift of healing and prophesy and when he prayed, regularly, God would give him a word of knowledge

  • Those spiritual gifts would ruin him because he would become so proud

God can give you grant you a spiritual gift right at this moment

  • Like speaking in tongues – instantaneous

  • But normally, God doesn’t cause spiritual fruit to be born overnight.

  • If you are a farmer, you have to prepare for months

  • The fruit of godly, Christ-like character takes time.

  • God could make it sprout overnight because He is God and He has that kind of power

  • But maybe due to our sins or idols or character flaws, God has to go the more traditional route of planting seeds and watering the seeds and then waiting and waiting until finally a little shoot breaks through the soil.

Why is character more important?  

  • Because you could be the most spiritually gifted person and have all 9 supernatural gifts listed in 1 Cor 12, but if you have a bad character, you will end up ruining many lives, including your own.

Important distinction between spiritual gifts and spiritual fruit or character

  • The gifts are optional, but character is not

Paul could have told Timothy to use Gal 5 (fruit of the Spirit) to determine character and who should lead the church

  • Problem: Fruit of the Spirit characteristics are a bit abstract – more internal and therefore invisible

  • This is why he gives us another list in 1 Tim 3

Characteristics in 1 Tim 3

  • This list is more visible and verifiable

  • What does godly, Spirit-generated character look like?

  • How the fruit of the Spirit manifest in the home and in the life of the church

First thing to note – 1 Tim 3:1

  • If you desire to be an overseer/elder, praise the Lord

  • If you aspire to be a deacon or deaconess, praise the Lord

  • Shouldn’t we all aspire to grow in our relationship with God so that we can be a blessing to others?

  • But right after Paul says, good job for desiring to be a spiritual leader, right after encouraging them, he discourages them

  • He lists out all of the qualifications and these are not easy qualifications

  • So those who are eager to be leaders are brought back to the reality of what is expected of God’s chosen leaders and the difficult road ahead to prepare you to be a leader

10 Qualifications for Elders

  • Overseers/elders/pastors – interchangeable

  • v2 – “the husband of one wife” – faithful to his spouse – that is verifiable

  • v2 – “self-controlled” and “sensible” and “respectable” – self-mastery outward expression of inward self-control (fruit of the Spirit) – verifiable somewhat

  • v2 “hospitable” – hospitality was important in the first century – no hotels, travelers love for the stranger – does the pastor-elder have an open home?

  • v2 – “an able teacher” – teaching – teaching gift – easy to determine – can the guy teach or not?

  • v3 – “not addicted to wine” – drinking habits – you can’t tell completely but you can ask their spouse or someone should know unless they are sneaking in a few beers without anyone knowing

  • v3 – this one is key and we will cover this in depth shortly – “not a bully but gentle, not quarrelsome” – his temper and temperament

  • gentle (fruit of the Spirit) = graciousness

  • If the guy has a temper and likes giving people verbal, emotional uppercuts and jabs, then he’s probably not your guy to lead

  • v3 – “not greedy” – attitude toward money (important theme in 1 Tim 6)

  • Maybe not easy to spot, but over time, I think you can tell

  • v4-5 – “manage his own household competently” – home life – domestic discipline

  • Physical family and church family, family and church mirror one another

  • The former is the training ground for the latter

  • v6 – “not a new convert” – spiritual maturity

  • Not hard to figure out – when did the guy get saved?

  • If he was saved a few years ago, maybe you should be a bit cautious to make him a leader

  • v7 – “good reputation among outsiders”

  • Somewhat verifiable: you’d have to talk to their co-workers and their neighbors

Qualifications of Deacons

  • Book of Acts – distinction between the 2 offices – office of deacon arose out of need

  • Elders – v2 – “an able teacher” – more of the teaching responsibility and overall spiritual oversight – elders

  • Think of elders and deacons + deaconesses as a team

  • Why am I mentioning deaconesses?  Hold that thought.

Qualifications of deacons – 4 categories

First category: v8 – character – self-mastery

  • “worthy of respect” – blameless  in terms of behavior

  • “not hypocritical” – literally means not double-tongued – self-controlled in speech

  • “not drinking a lot of wine” – self-controlled when it comes to the consumption of alcohol

  • “not greedy for money” – self-controlled in finances

Second category: v9 – “holding the • mystery of the faith with a clear conscience”

  • Having orthodox convictions and living by those convictions

Third category: v10 – “tested” and proven “blameless”

Fourth category: v12 – home life – faithful to spouse, managing their household

Deaconesses

Why am I mentioning deaconesses?

  • 1 Tim 3:11

  • Depending on your translation, you might have “wives” (HCSB) or “Their wives” (ESV)

  • Greek – the actual word is for “women”

  • A woman of any age, whether a virgin, or married, or a widow

  • Ambiguous word: depends on context

The Word of God is awesome

  • I studied this text many times but never saw this. I could be wrong, but I want to make a case that Paul is talking here about deaconesses

  • Paul doesn’t talk about elder’s wives so why would he suddenly talk about deacon’s wives?

  • Also, if it were deacon’s wives, you would expect some kind of possessive pronoun like “their”

  • There is no such possessive pronoun (don’t know why the ESV added that)

  • You don’t need to talk about wives because husbands and wives are two halves, one flesh, one new person, one leads, one submits

  • That’s why I believe Paul is talking about women leaders in the church – SINGLE women who are qualified to be deaconesses

  • Rom 16 – describes Phoebe as a servant of the church – I believe she was a deaconess

  • I could be wrong. This is my best interpretation as of now.

  • This is why at the Hill, we have male elders and male deacons as well as female deaconesses

If you will grant me the possibility of female deacons or deaconesses, then the qualifications of deaconesses are listed in v11

  • worthy of respect”

  • “not slanderers” (speech)

  • “self-controlled”

  • “faithful in everything” – not just “spiritual” things

Entire Leadership of a Church

Summary: Consists of male elders, male deacons and female deaconesses

Men + women

If we look at the qualifications of elders and deacons together, I think we can group the qualifications under 5 major sub-headings.

  • First: self-controlled in terms of drink, money, temper and tongue

  • Second: in terms of one’s family – faithful to one’s wife and able to discipline children

  • Third: in terms of relationships – hospitable and gentle

  • Fourth: in terms of our interactions with outsiders – highly esteemed

  • Fifth: in terms of faith – strong faith, having the strength to hold onto faith during tough times, elders esp – gifted to teach others about matters pertaining to faith

Family is a Good Training Ground for Church Leadership

  • I want to focus on the leader’s household

  • It was mentioned for the elders as well as the deacons so it is pretty important

  • 1 Tim 3:3-5

  • After mentioning a few traits for the elder…

  • Then Paul mentions managing his own household completely: wife and kids

  • Drops bomb: anyone who fails in the home should not even think about serving in the church

Not prioritizing family or church but Integrity

  • Two extremes

  • First: Family only and nothing else

  • Second: Ministry over family

  • God wants everyone to be saved – 1 Tim 2

  • Don’t stop with family, move on to the church and to the world

  • Also, don’t idolize ministry and missions to the neglect of your family

Do you see how both ministry to family and ministry to the church are connected to each other?

  • The qualities that make effective as a spiritual leader in your home are exactly the same qualities you need to be effective in church.

  • Neither can be neglected.

  • In fact, family is an effective training ground for anyone aspiring to be a minister in God’s household.

Interesting choice of words (1 Tim 3:3)

  • “Not a bully but gentle”

  • Easy for parents to become bullies

  • One on one – many kids are all saints, esp when they are sleeping – so innocent

  • Just like you are saintly when you are by yourself

  • Add a roommate, add a spouse – then your true self starts coming out

  • More than one kid – fights, complaining, blaming, wrestling matches, tears, anger, sarcasm, disrespect

When a fight breaks out in our home, it’s really, really hard to be gentle

  • It’s easy to be a bully and lay down the law

  • Understandably, my kids are still immature and they need to be taught do’s and don’ts

  • They need rules: Don’t touch that! Eat that! Don’t do that! Eat that!

  • But how can we as parents teach our kids to obey the commands while maintaining gentleness?

How do you balance truth and grace?

  • It’s really hard to balance discipline with gentleness

  • Jesus is described as being full of grace and truth

  • How do you give the law simultaneously with the Person behind the law, the Person that the entire Law points to, Jesus Christ?

Simple: you have to encounter Jesus

  • You need firsthand knowledge of Jesus interacting with you

  • You have to know His character – Jesus describes himself as humble and gentle in heart

  • You need to know that each time you sin, He doesn’t pull out a big stick

  • If God treated us harshly as our sins deserved every time we sinned, who among us could stand?

  • Hasn’t He been so gracious, so gentle in disciplining you and pointing out your sins?

Jesus is not a bully

  • He says, Follow me, but he doesn’t put a gun to your head, He doesn’t twist anyone’s arms, He’s gentle with you

  • He offers a pretty incredible deal

  • Give me all of your burdens. Give me the heavy burden of your sins, your anxieties, your false dreams, your vain hopes

  • I will take all of your heavy burdens away

  • In exchange, I give you a burden that is easy and light

  • This is a GREAT deal!

  • All you have to do is to follow

  • Come on, come join me, I want to be with you, I want to love you, I want to set you free

A person who has been with Jesus displays a godly character

  • What is godly character – it’s Jesus (1 Tim 3:14-16)

  • Someone who has encountered Jesus displays the character of Jesus

It comes out in parenting

  • You can’t fake it

  • Being a father is really, really hard

  • Having spiritual responsibility for my wife and kids is a heavy responsibility

  • I try my best to discipline my kids and teach them the Bible and model for them how to love Jesus

  • But they can tell, and I can usually tell, when my instruction is flowing out as grace and truth vs just truth, laying down the law

  • There is no verse in the Bible that tells me what to do when my kids are fighting and I’ve warned them 6 times to calm down and they don’t listen.

  • Do I have right to rebuke them?  Do I exercise patience?

  • Balance of grace vs truth

This is exactly the kind of skills you need to have as a leader in a church

  • You can’t treat adults like you do your 2 year old and yell at them because they wet their bed

  • When there is sin in the church, do you lay down the law or do you show grace, or do you teach the law with grace so that you can build the other person up?

  • Woudln’t you know it–the same skill set to parent well is needed in church ministry

  • God is so smart

  • As a parent, when I am impatient with Jackie or kids – sign that I need to fill up with the Holy Spirit again

  • Spend time with Jesus – I am reminded how God treats me

  • I’m His child. Does God blast me every time I mess up?  Thankfully He doesn’t. He’s very, very gentle with me. He waits patiently for me.

If I haven’t been filled with the Spirit and if I haven’t had quality time with Jesus, it comes out in my relationships at home.

  • At church, you can be ON for a couple of hours on a Sunday

  • No one can be ON all the time

  • Who you are comes out at home

  • Character

  • Jesus’ character – full of Grace and Truth, humble and gentle in heart

Testimony

  • Before I became a pastor, I really, really wanted to be a pastor.

  • Save the world

  • Esp a church planter, I felt a burden to get this thing off the ground

  • So easy to prioritize ministry over family

  • Recently, God has been teaching me that I need to save myself before I can save anyone else

Work from left to right

  • Me and God – most critical, Me and family, Me and church, Me and the world

First me and God

  • I need to be saved each day by encountering Christ each day

  • As I encounter Christ each day, I become more and more Christ-like.

  • Serving out of a gentle, generous spirit because Christ has been so gentle and generous with us.

  • God loves me so much and so out of overflow, I feel compelled to love others.

Ministers can focus so much on the biblical principle or the practice or both as a Christian minister trying to teach the principles and live out the practices while looking nothing like Christ.

  • No gentleness, no grace, no joy

  • Just dutiful service, just me and my white knuckle commitment

  • Is this what we want to teach to our family and our kids and our church members?

  • Is this the Jesus we want to show the world?

Get to know Jesus. Let His character rub off on you.

Jesus – Perfect Man + Perfect Woman

  • After all, Jesus fulfills both the male and female gender roles (1 Tim 2)

  • Male role: head of the Church and he laid down his life for the church

  • Female role: though an equal with God, Jesus did not clutch onto his equality with God, but He submitted himself under the will of the Father, eventually to die on a cross

Jesus fulfills both the role of the Elder + Deacon

  • Elder – spiritual leader, prayerful, an able teacher

  • Deacon – literal meaning is “table waiter”

  • Jesus – merges both offices in His person – He didn’t come to be served but he came to serve

  • He is both a servant and a leader

  • He leads through His service

Working from left to right

  • After sorting out me and God, next is family

  • Family is a testing ground for godly character

  • God has been dealing with my impatience, moodiness, need to conquer the world for Christ when I am not even leading my household adequately

  • Before I think about ministry or world evangelism, am I leading Jackie?

  • Next, am I leading my kids?

Being responsible parents and being responsible fathers in particular is serious business.

  • Far more serious than most of us think.

  • When we see ourselves as responsible for our children’s submissiveness and respect as 1 Timothy 3:4–5 says we are, our response should be Lord, help me!

  • Lord, forgive us for upholding Christ and balancing grace and truth. We should fall on our knees before God and cry for the salvation of our children and for their protection from Satan and their perseverance in faith.

Family and the local church – 2 tools in our sanctification

  • Through marriage, we learn how to be more like Jesus

  • See life through the lens of another gender

  • Through family, God shows us how we truly are

  • Learn how to balance grace and truth while raising kids

  • I can’t fake it at home with my family

  • I can fake it elsewhere

Through church, we learn how to be more like Jesus

  • Learning how to serve instead of being served

Family is a training ground for ministry in church

  • Parent – how can I serve my kids?  They are not here to serve me.

  • Leader of this church – how can I serve my fellow brothers and sisters here?

  • Attitude: there is no task below my pay grade. I’ll take out the trash.

There is an order (not priority) in Christian life

  • When God looks at you, He doesn’t see what you can do for Him

  • He is interested in you, more than what you can do

  • You are His child

  • He wants to save you first

  • Save Yourself first, then family, then church, and eventually the world

  • If you are single, same principle – save yourself before you try to save others