House Rule # 15 Teach the Widows to Take Care (1 Timothy 5:9-16)

Kootenai Church

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and to worship you to fellowship with one another and you made that all possible through our

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Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and I pray now father that you would help us to understand your word to apply it to our lives and to the life of this fellowship that you may be glorified in all things and we just thank you for this time we have in Jesus name we ask it amen well last week we looked at the first part of this passage from verse 3 through 16 and we saw that God has a very powerful care and concern for those who cannot help themselves and in particular widows from this list right here and we saw from a brief survey of the

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Old Testament that God is very much concerned with those called the travelers or the sojourners or the

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Levites or orphans and widows who these are people that cannot help themselves they either do not own land or and are not able to provide for their own food and care or in the case of obviously orphans and widows people who have no one to support them we also saw that the same standard extends right into the

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New Testament and Jesus delivered severe public rebuke to the religious leaders of his day for among other things their abuse of widows and we saw that widows were and are a vulnerable segment of Jewish society and with the death of their husbands they would be in a very precarious financial position if they did have a piece of land in order to be able to grow crops to eat oftentimes they were swindled out of their property and they were done that oftentimes by lawyers they were called and these were often the scribes who were transcribing the

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Word of God who became lawyers and experts in the law they were experts in the law because they were working with the

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Word of God they were transcribing it and so they knew how to swindle people out of things and particularly widows and you remember

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Jesus words of indictment you devour widows houses he said to these people and I think we only need to look at one more passage perhaps to illustrate

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God's great compassion for the widow so turning your Bibles to Luke chapter 7 Luke 7 and would just very quickly look at verses 11 through 17

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Luke 7 verses 11 through 17 in the ministry of Jesus he encounters a woman whose son had died and so verse 11 says soon afterward he went to a town called

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Nain and his disciples and a great crowd went with him as he drew near to the gate of the town behold a man who had died was being carried out the only son of his mother and she was a widow and a considerable crowd from the town was with her and when the

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Lord saw her he had compassion on her and said to her do not weep then he came up and touched the beer and the bearer stood still and he said young man

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I say to you arise and the dead man sat up and began to speak and Jesus gave him to his mother fear seized them all and they glorified

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God saying a great prophet has arisen among us God has visited his people and this report about him spread through the whole of Judea and all the surrounding country so Jesus not only manifested in his ministry his great compassion to all people but and his demonstration that he is truly

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God in human flesh right being able to to exercise his lordship over life and death here but it was a display of compassion for this woman to give her back her son he did a great miracle in this case and it was sort of like creation when he spoke life into existence and his compassion for widows is on display there well back to first Timothy chapter 5 and in our study this morning and and remember that this passage is sort of a unit from verse 3 all the way down to verse 16 and in the first section we saw last time verses 3 to 8 that Paul wants

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Timothy to to correct some things that are wrong in Ephesus and one of them is that he wants him to honor widows who are truly widows and we saw then that this definition of widows is built by the

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Apostle Paul and it continues all the way down through this entire passage it is a little bit difficult to to outline because it it doesn't follow just a pure linear outline like we might like to to see that makes it a lot easier to outline right a b c d or like some of my outlines a b 3d but whatever it sort of operates in sort of a cyclic way as you walk down through here and so why don't

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I just read down through from 3 to 16 and we'll get the picture here again Paul says honor widows who are truly widows but if a widow has children or grandchildren let them first learn to show godliness to their own household and to make some return to their parents for this is pleasing in the sight of God she who is truly a widow left all alone has set her hope on God and continues in supplications and prayer night and day but she who is self -indulgent is dead even while she lives command these things as well so that they may be without reproach but if anyone does not provide for his relatives and especially for members of his household he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever let a widow be enrolled if she is not less than 60 years of age having been the wife of one husband and having a reputation for good works if she has brought up children has shown hospitality has washed the feet of the

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Saints has cared for the afflicted and has devoted herself to every good work but refused to enroll younger widows for when their passions draw them away from Christ they desire to marry and so incur condemnation for having abandoned their former faith besides that they learn to be idlers going about from house to house and not only idlers but also gossips and busybodies saying what they should not so I would have younger widows marry bare children manage their households and give the adversary no occasion for slander for some have already strayed after Satan if any believing woman has relatives who are widows let her care for them let the church not be burdened so that it may care for those who are truly widows and of course one of the first observations we make here is

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Paul's use of that phrase truly widows he starts with it in verse 3 honor widows who are truly widows he ends with it in verse 16 who are truly widows and he uses that one more time in verse 5 she who is truly a widow so clearly

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Paul is distinguishing widows in general from widows that he considers to be truly widows so this morning from verses 9 through 10 on your outline there number one widows to enroll on the list and there again there's another interpretive issue here what is this list well let's look at this morning and we'll just walk through and talk about these issues widows to enroll on the list the idea of being enrolled on a list of widows clearly has to do with widows who are truly widows they're the ones that get on this list and as we have seen being placed on a list of widows has to do with the widows that are being supported by the church now there's various interpretations about from this some have thought this was a group of widows who were placed on the list of the church to be supported and then were expected to provide ministry to the church almost like a a class of deaconesses except that a better way to understand it is simply widows who are being supported by the church for a variety of reasons they can't really demonstrate that there was a a group of widows who were supported by the church to do ministry until a couple of hundred years later from the literature also as we're going to see these requirements that we see here are not really requirements that look ahead to her her qualifications to serve on that group of with that group of widows as they are

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I look back at her life and her qualifications to be considered truly a widow one

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New Testament scholar defines it this way describes it this way the function of the list is to provide a way of measuring the reputation of the widow on the basis of visible acts understood to be the outworking of faith assuming that these things were characteristic of her past life what distinguishes her from godly women in general as a real widow and qualifies her for enrollment are her age the death of her spouse and her situation of destitution so Paul says only enroll widows on the list who are truly widows and from the previous section we know that Paul considers a widow to be a true widow if she is truly alone and if she's truly godly we saw that in verse 5 she who is truly a widow left all alone has set her hope on God and continues in supplications and prayers night and day but now

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Paul adds these other requirements he says there in verse 9 let a widow be enrolled if she is not less than 60 years of age having been the wife of one husband so 60 was considered in that day to be the age of retirement we might even say an elderly person and here again we have one of the challenges of looking at this and oftentimes the big challenges is in the area of interpretation you know we have observation where we look at the text and we try to determine about what it says and then we move to interpretation and then we move from interpretation what it means to application how do we apply it and so on and with this particular passage and I think we saw that in our discussion last week one of the main challenges is in the area of application right because we're we're so far removed in time we're all we're far removed in culture and and so on and so it's really important to start out by trying to the best we can place ourselves back in this situation that Paul is writing to and addressing so that we can build the the real biblical principle and then we can make application even afterwards last time several of you came up to me and we're discussing situations that you had been involved in or that you knew about where you were trying to the church or you individually were trying to minister to widows and some of these same issues kept coming up who is a true widow and that really is the big issue here most of your discussion was trying to figure out if this is a true widow from the biblical perspective and so I think if you get the biblical principle correct it's so much easier than to apply that to a particular situation that you find yourself in but Paul says she has to be at least 60 years old most commentators feel like he's not it's not so much that he's setting a particular age but this was the well -known age where a woman would be retired and she would not be able to support herself and then he says after that having been the wife of one husband this is very literally a one -man woman she is to have been faithful to her husband and just like the requirement that we saw for elders and deacons it is not about so much the number of husbands or that type of thing it is are they have they been faithful in their marriage and then he says having a reputation for good works this is also something that's going to be an objectively verifiable characteristic of the true widow and that's in the next verse here having a reputation for good works if she has brought up children has shown hospitality has washed the feet of the

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Saints has cared for the afflicted and has devoted herself to every good work that little phrase good work there is repeated there in that verse it starts it and it ends it so clearly this is a characteristic of the true widow and on your outline there the five characteristics of being known for good works are listed has brought up children hospitality to strangers wash the

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Saints feet cared for the afflicted and then he just collects it all together has devoted herself to every good work this is basically a way to look at her life and her godliness you notice what is not there that was there up in verse five she who is truly a widow left all alone has set her hope on God and continues in supplications and prayers night and day when we get down to verse 10 there's nothing there about her prayer life there's nothing there really about her relationship to God he's already dealt with that up in verse five right and you remember what we saw about how the

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Bible describes somebody's spiritual life remember what we saw when we talked about from Genesis chapter 6 and we saw that that statement about Noah Noah was a righteous man and then it gives you an objective verifiable criteria for validating that statement about his inner spiritual life that you can't see right well this is exactly what

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Paul is following after that same model here up in verse 5 he talks about her spiritual life set her hope on God continues in supplications and prayers night and day and then in verses 9 and 10 he tells you what that looks like okay he tells you how that works out in a woman's life she's been the wife of one husband and so on so he's simply following along in the same tradition of Hebraic thought and how to describe somebody in the

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Bible does this New Testament Old Testament as well it never does just do to say that person knows the

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Lord how do you know now in our culture and in the big evangelical tent that might be considered a little bit intrusive right but that's what the

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Bible does it describes a person's inner spiritual condition before God and then it gives you a verifiable objective way to to validate that so widows to enroll on the list they're truly widows there at least 60 in other words they are elderly women who cannot provide for themselves they are known for their good works do you have any thoughts or questions before we move on to Roman numeral 2 yeah we did talk about it last time yeah and and I think

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I think the question was did we cover the issue of whether or not she has children or grandchildren that would be available to support her up in verse 4

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Paul says if a widow has children or grandchildren let them first learn to show godliness to their own household so God puts a priority on the family members to take care of that widow and we're going to see that too down in verse 16 so we're going to see that down in verse 16 yeah no but you're right in a sense it does if the other criteria are met so he does put a premium on the family care for the widow and so it's really really really really critical to understand that as well so anything else before we move on and the question was did we talk about the the issue of if that widow has family members that's yeah then then if the family members refuse to help number one that's an indictment on them number two then then that widow should be helped exactly and we're going to talk about that too he does he covers that in this as we're going to see so yep there there essentially is not to be a widow left unsupported as we're going to see you guys are way ahead of me here

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Julie not necessarily

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I think it could be the household hospitality in that day people would come and have to walk in sandals hot dusty streets and roads and so a very common way of showing hospitality if you had a guest come in would be to for the household slave or servant to wash their feet it wasn't necessary necessarily here

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I think listed as part of the liturgy of the church and I don't really think it's that as well even from the upper room

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I think it's pictured as a way to demonstrate her hospitality in fact even a lot of scholars would comment on that and say this became this almost became a figure speech or an emblematic way of saying this is a woman who serves people when they come to her house sure it falls

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I think within the broader aspect of what this woman does when someone comes to her home you know they she would be willing to do that and or as a picture of her service to other people okay anything else okay verses 11 through 15 let the widows not to enroll on the list so once again but we talked about the but being a hinge point between two things

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Paul is trying to contrast it's it's contrastive or even adversity even some in some senses but refuse to enroll younger widows for when their passions draw them away from Christ they desire to marry and so incur condemnation for having abandoned their former faith and he says besides that they learn to be idlers going about from house to house and not only idlers but also gossips and busybodies saying what they should not so I would have younger widows marry their children manage their households and give the adversary no occasion for slander the idea of being enrolled on this list of widows has to do with the widows who are truly widows as Paul says and widows who are notice how he doesn't give an age here he just says younger they're younger so I guess you could you ladies could say well if you're less than 60 years old the

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Bible says you're a younger woman okay and I think what he's doing here and this is one reason why

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I think the 60 is is simply emblematic of an older elderly woman who cannot take care of herself because the counterpart that is the younger woman a woman who is not at an age where she cannot take care of herself and what he says there what he what it really could mean to is younger meaning eligible for remarriage okay and those women are not to be put on the list the list of that of widows who the church is supporting and basically it says there it's kind of an interesting but refuse younger widows and he the translators bring down the verb there from the previous verse refuse to enroll younger widows for when their passions draw them away from Christ they desire to marry and what you'll notice here between verse 11 and verse 14

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Paul said Paul says they desire to marry and so incur condemnation because they've abandoned the faith okay but then down in verse 14

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I would have younger widows marry well there's two kinds of marriage in view here all right there's a kind of marriage that Paul says don't do it and there's another kind of marriage which he says to do all right and we get a little help from this

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I think from Paul himself from 1st Corinthians 1st Corinthians chapter 7 because in 1st

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Corinthians chapter 7 the Apostle Paul is dealing with marriage it's a very extended passage on marriage he gets to the very end of that passage and he says this in verse 39 of 1st

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Corinthians chapter 7 a wife is bound to her husband as long as he lives but if her husband dies now she's a widow she is free to be married to whom she wishes only in the

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Lord so even there he's very consistent with his own theology of marriage that there's that kind of marriage where she marries an unbeliever is prohibited she is free to marry as long as she marries a believer and I think that's exactly what's going on in this same passage here these women who were in the church who were widows in the sense that their husbands had died were not believing widows so they weren't true widows we know that from verse 6 she who is self -indulgent is dead even while she lives that's not the language of a believer in Jesus Christ that's a person who that's a description of a person who is not saved and even down in the passage we just looked at their passions draw them away from Christ there again that's really telling if her passions draw her away from Christ that's not something that happens to a believer they desire to marry and so incur condemnation for having abandoned their former faith some of your translations might say former pledge that's why

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I included it there in the outline those who think that this order of widows was a formal order of like deaconesses which probably later on turned into something like the order of nuns within Catholicism if if that's the case then maybe it's thought that they took a pledge of celibacy like the nuns would do and then if they violate that pledge by then all of a sudden saying hey

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I want to get married then they incur condemnation I think the best understanding of it is it not that was a formal pledge to never be married again but that they abandoned their faith they abandoned their their faith in Jesus Christ I think what's going on here and I think we can sort of connect the dots these are probably younger women whose husbands died that would have placed them in a very precarious position in that culture okay there was in Ephesus as we have mentioned the massive temple of Artemis this this cult temple and this whole thing was was involved in cult prostitution so it would have been very common in that city and in that culture and these women may have been tempted not just to marry outside the faith because they needed support but to get involved in working as part of the prostitution cult that was there that might have been a temptation if they do get married to an unbeliever they clearly are demonstrating their lack of obedience to Christ they violated their faith and they are they're drawn away from Christ and all that he he means and they desire to marry they incur condemnation for having abandoned their former faith that is all language of to describe unbelievers and how they act

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I think it may be possible here maybe probable that the Apostle Paul is dealing with what he dealt with back in chapter 2 let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness

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I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man rather she is to remain quiet we also saw when we got to chapter 4 that there were people in the

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Ephesian assemblies that had departed from the faith very similar language to what he uses here of this of these women that have abandoned their former faith and it doesn't say that all of those that depart from the faith are men right women can also depart from the faith and apostatize as we well know and through the insincerity of liars whose consciences are seared these false teachers in these these

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Ephesian assemblies were quite probably going after these young single vulnerable women and it says part of what they did they they forbid marriage right well we automatically think of maybe

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Catholicism and the the priesthood and all that but I think this entirely probable here that these men who are false teachers whose consciences are seared they're liars they're telling these younger vulnerable single women hey there's no need to get married we can have a relationship you know we can let's say

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I gotta get contemporary here we can be together right how vanilla is that right and so they're being they're being swayed from their faith in Jesus Christ by these false teachers probably what's going on here and in verse 13 besides that they learn to be idlers going about from house to house and not only idlers but also gossips and busybodies saying what they should not first of all when we think of gossips and bitty busybodies going from house to house we just sort of think of a woman flitting around the neighborhood from house to house but remember what

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Paul told the Ephesian elders Acts 20 I do not fail to proclaim to you the whole counsel of God he said

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I I taught publicly and from house to house these are house churches very likely these women consider themselves some sort of a pastor some sort of a teacher some sort of an authority on the

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Word of God and they're going from house to house house church to house church trying to be the people that Paul prohibits in chapter 2 and another indicator of that notice that word saying what they should not well we would just look at that and maybe casually think okay they're just talking about he's talking about gossip well he probably is that would be included in that but I want you to look at Titus chapter 2 for a minute

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Titus chapter 2 Titus very a lot of parallels with first Timothy why

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Titus is being left on the island of Crete to do very much the same thing to go into these churches to to appoint elders and to correct a lot of things that are wrong within these churches and just like in the first part of first Timothy Paul talks about false teachers in chapter 1 and then when he gets to chapter 2 he says for he says in verse 1 to Titus but as for you teach what accords with sound doctrine that is the exact same word that Paul uses there in in first Timothy chapter 5 saying what they should not exact same word and now look in Titus 2 15 down at the bottom declare these things same word again so in the

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ESV at the inverse one teach down in verse 15 declare New American Standard first verse proclaim verse 15 speak the

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Christian Standard Bible proclaim and proclaim this is clearly a word that is also used not just as somebody running around talking but of teaching or even preaching the

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Word of God you could easily translate it there teaching what they should not right and that would fit right in with everything

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Paul has said up to this point concerning false teachers including false women teachers within the church so he says

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I would have younger widows marry bare children manage their households and give the adversary no occasion for slander that's a description of a

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Christian young woman okay so widows not to enroll on the list the ones that are younger that are there of marriageable age because if you do that and you support them they may abandon their faith they may live out alive they need to remarry then they will follow

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Christ and not Satan so verses 11 through 15 do you have any thoughts or questions on that what we just saw okay well then finally verse 16 and here's where Paul's gonna yeah

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Rick yes

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I would say absolutely right the question is when he mentions these people who abandoned their faith these these this is apostasy this is the same apostasy

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I believe that we saw over in chapter 4 depart from the faith they've abandoned their faith and all that language is is not language that would be used of a believer it would be someone who never was saved in the first place okay and we saw that last week up in verse 6 she who is self self -indulgent is dead even while she lives you look at her and she's functioning she's doing all kinds of things but spiritually internally she's dead in her sins that would be someone who was never saved in the first place they gave the appearance of it as we see so many times in Scripture but there comes a point in time when they abandon their faith okay anything else yeah

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I think that's what he's saying yeah I think he's allowing for and the question has come up several times here what if a woman never gets married what if she does get married and then in the providential working of God never has children which happens

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I think this you know scripture and Paul allows for all of those situations and I think that's that's a good example of it right there okay anything else well verse 16

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Paul really does wrap this up in a in a tremendous way I think he he says in a very simple concise statement if any believing woman has relatives who are widows let her care for them let the church not be burdened so that it may care for those who are truly widows there's two options here it's very very interesting to me to see how he puts this he essentially as you can see comes right back up to verse 4 but if a widow has children or grandchildren and this is hopefully going to answer your question

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Rick let them first learn to show godliness to their own household and to make some return to their parents for this is pleasing in the sight of God this would be the first step the first priority does she have family members who can and will take care of her

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God says she they should if they can but here there's a little bit of a shift you notice how he says if any believing woman doesn't say a believing widow says a believing woman and so I think he's he's picking out these children or grandchildren up there focusing in on them and saying if that believing woman has relatives who are widows let her care for them let the church not be burdened so that it may care for those who are truly widows and notice who are widows there the first category of women is he just says widows doesn't say believing widows it doesn't say you know it doesn't there's no condition there just a widow the believing woman is to care for her relatives who are widows so that the church may care for those who are truly widows these believing women who have a history of godly lives who can't take care of themselves the church is to take care of them you see what he's doing here if if this doesn't take place if you don't do what

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God says in here neither one of these groups of widows are going to be properly taken care of why because the widows the believing women are going to take care of the widows in their families and the church is going to be overburdened to take care of the widows that it's supposed to take care of but if you do

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God's work God's way both sets of widows are provided for here that's why the word care happens two times absolute genius right

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I mean that's putting it mildly of course God knows what he's talking about and he cares for these people and so if if you do this then both sets of widows are provided for and I believe even the unbelieving widows who are the family members of the believing women are provided for as well if that answers your question okay so you see you see the sort of the magnificent practicality of this passage and how

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God has provided for those who can't provide for themselves through this teaching do you have any questions from what we've seen so far in this passage okay yeah

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Rick the believing woman well then she is she may very well place herself in the category in her disobedience of not being a true believer the old again we're coming back to what's the evidence of conversion what's the evidence of justification before God there's only one thing in Scripture obedience there's nothing else you know people can say all kinds of things but the

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Bible clearly distinguishes between people who say and people who do if we say we have no sin we lie and we deceive ourselves if we confess our sins right then the church would take care of her sure and that's what that's what he's allowing for here that would put her in the category of being a true widow in Paul's definition and so she then would come under the care of the church sure

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Cornell sure yeah

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I mean I think God provides for this and even the issue of the family that that is not something that happened you know after God called people to serve him that's part of creation that's

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God's created order I mean right after the fall when Cain killed Abel and God encountered him about that what did he ask him am

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I my brother's keeper answer yes yes okay now that was way early on he's your you're his brother's keeper because of God's created order

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God created the family for that purpose okay so yeah there's an example and of course we can think of all kinds of scenarios but I think scripture covers all of those does it not and it just requires the church to to obey and people to obey and again this this is pretty much often here it's dealing with what the church does this does not preclude individuals from ministering to other people to people or to widows or to those if you see a need do what you can to meet that need right okay anything else all right let's pray our father we thank you for your word this morning we know that it is sure it is true and we may have to work through the application of it in all these different situations but we know that if we rely on you and your spirit to lead us we can take your word and apply it and then do what you would have us do so we just thank you for your your scriptures and what it teaches us and pray that you would continue to give us strength to obey and help us to be doers of your word and not merely hearers and we will always praise you in Jesus name amen

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Lord I trust your promises You never fail to hear my prayer

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And if you judged my sin

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I'd never stand again But I see mercy in your hands

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So more than watchmen for the morning Our fears come with new war

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Time is over and I still see no proof The secret mysteries belong to you

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We only know what you choose