1 Timothy 5:17-25 Honor and Rebuke

You're listening to the podcast of Recast Church in Matawan, Michigan. This week, Pastor Don Filcik preaches from his series, Blueprints for a Healthy Church, following the plan from Quaker First Timothy.

Let's listen in.

The Centrality of Christ and the Purpose of This Sermon on Church Leadership

Welcome to Recast Church. I'm Don Filcik. I'm the lead pastor here. And I really want to thank you all for gathering in the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord. Really, all that we do here is centered on Jesus Christ and what he's done for us.

And he has done all of it for us. How many of you are glad that Jesus died on the cross for your sins? Go ahead and raise your hand or give a hoop or a holler. I'm glad that he died on the cross for my sins.

Without trust in his sacrifice for me and without his sacrifice for us, we would be hopelessly lost in our self-improvement projects. We might even be religious people, but we would be trying and trying and trying to please God on our own without really any hope or any knowledge of whether we'd done enough.

And he has done enough for us. So praise God for that. In Christ, we have everything we need to grow up into maturity in a relationship with him. And this morning, our text is going to take us deeper into the way that we should respond to leaders.

Now, the fact of the matter is I know that we come from a variety of backgrounds and a variety of expectations on what a sermon is supposed to be. Some of us think that a sermon is supposed to be kind of a pep talk for my week.

It's supposed to be a rah-rah kind of thing. I believe that a sermon is supposed to be an explanation of the scriptures. And so sometimes we get into these kind of passages that are just going to give us some of the detail work.

And you're going to walk out of here and you're going to go, well, wait a second, that was a message that kind of just felt like it was about the internal workings of a church. And that's absolutely right.

Because God revealed it and he wants us to study it. He wants us to know all of his word, not just the parts that are encouraging to us. And I think you'll still find some encouragement, some challenge in any time that you contact God's word, even if it's kind of detailed stuff about how we live and move and breathe within a church body.

And so I believe that God is going to meet us here in these moments. I would ask you and even encourage you just on every Sunday, wherever you're at, to just ask God to reveal himself to you through the pages of the scriptures.

And I believe he will. He will meet you in this text, in this passage, that if we were just reading through the Bible in a year might seem kind of mundane and routine and kind of just like church business.

Honor, Rebuke, and Caution in Church Leadership

But verse, let me give you a little bit of the outline here before we read it. The text this morning has really three movements to it. The first is verses 17 through 18. And it covers the honor due to church leadership that serves well.

Honor to church leadership that serves well. The second in verses 19 through 21 cover the rebuke due to leadership that refuses to repent.

Of sin.

So I titled the message honor and rebuke because those are two vastly different things, all focused on the same group of people, the leadership of the church. And then the text is going to wrap up in a third movement in verses 22 through 25, explaining why Timothy should be slow to put men forward for eldership or leadership in the church.

Because the fact of the matter is we know as you've lived a little bit of your life, sometimes people are hiding sin. So he says don't be hasty in the appointment of leadership. So this is once again a passage about the way that a church should work.

Now many of you could stand up and testify to the ways that churches have worked in your past and it hasn't been that great. Some of you have had all kinds of broken experiences because we're broken people and we don't always follow God's word.

And so we're working and striving to try to follow these things and I want to encourage you to lean into this and for God to show you how you ought to apply these things. Every one of these movements expresses a corrective to some natural human tendency.

So let me express some of the things that might be going on in your heart routinely and you don't really think about it but they're there and this text would seek to correct it. We are often not quick to honor our leaders and I think that that's kind of a thing that is increasing in part because of the abuse of many leaders and so we're not always quick to honor our leaders.

The second thing is we're not always quick to rebuke unrepentant sin. We're a culture that shies away a bit from the public declaration that someone would live in unrepentant sin, that they would choose their sin over Christ and so we struggle with that as a culture.

And then the last thing is we are often quick to propel men forward into leadership for.

The wrong reasons.

They're tall. They talk good. They grab our attention.

They're dynamic.

They're radical. They can be kind of stern. They can be kind of harsh. They can grab attention and hold an audience. And so what would be the reasons to propel a guy forward into leadership? And Paul says, be careful here.

Be careful here.

We see because the reason this matters, church, is God loves us. God loves the church and I want to be clear. God doesn't just love, and a lot of times in our mind we think God loves the big C church, the gathering of all the redeemed of all times and all ages, but I believe firmly, Recast, that God loves us as well.

He loves the local church. He loves Recast church. He loves us and he cares for us and he's concerned for the directions that we go. And so in telling Timothy there, in this text, he's concerned for the Ephesian church and he's left Timothy there to fix it.

And in telling Timothy how to fix the church in Ephesus, he's also giving us a blueprint for a healthy church. That's kind of what this whole sermon series has been about as we've been marching through 1 Timothy.

In order for us to praise him well, church, we need to be well. In order to praise him well, we need to be healthy. And God gives us texts like this one to remind us that God has a standard for a healthy church.

So if you're not already there, I encourage you to open in your Bibles, your devices to 1 Timothy 5, verses 17 through the end of the chapter. Again, 1 Timothy 5, 17 through verse 25. And this is God's holy and precious word.

Recast, this is a word that he desires for us to take on, to study, to learn, and to.

Know.

And so let's get our hearts ready to sing his praises by hearing from his word. 1 Timothy 5, 17 through 25. Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of a double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching.

For the scripture says, you shall not muzzle the ox when he treads out the grain, and the laborer deserves his wages. Do not admit a charge against an elder except on the evidence of two or three witnesses.

As for those who persist in sin, rebuke them in the presence of all so that the rest may stand in fear. In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus and of the elect angels, I charge you to keep these rules without prejudging, doing nothing from partiality.

Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands, nor take part in the sins of others. Keep yourself pure. No longer drink any only water, but use a little wine for the sake of your stomach and your frequent ailments.

The sins of some people are conspicuous going before them to judgment, but the sins of others appear later. So also good works are conspicuous, and even those that are not cannot remain hidden.

Let's pray.

Father, I thank you that you are so concerned for your church. You love us enough to give us very detailed and direct instructions about leadership and how we are to respond. And Father, I even just recognize how this is this kind of kind of awkward elephant in the room is that I'm a pastor preaching about honoring elders and all of these things and rebuking elders and rebuking teachers and all of that.

And Father, I thank you that you press this word into my heart, into the seriousness of the role that you have given to me here in this church that I take very seriously. Father, I know that I am not equal to this task.

I know it is only your spirit working in me that anything good comes of this, that my words are empty and vain and lack power and lack authority without your spirit behind.

Them.

And so Father, I pray that you would speak through me your words this morning with authority and power because it is your word, not because it is my opinion or my thought. And Father, it is this very word that reveals to us the glory of forgiveness and salvation.

In your son.

It is this message that beats in my chest that I desire for all men and women who hear the messages here at Recast to come to the knowledge of Jesus Christ and his saving work. Father, I pray that that would be a reality in our midst, that we would be a people ignited by the gospel and sent out, ignited by the gospel and able to worship you together right now in praise and worship and singing to you because you are the only one who is truly.

Worthy.

In Jesus' name, amen. I encourage you to get comfortable, keep your Bibles open to 1 Timothy chapter 5 verses 17 through 25. Especially this week, I just want you to be able to see that the things I'm saying are not, this could appear a bit self-serving, especially at the start.

And so I want to make sure that you see that the things that I'm saying are coming from God's word and not something I am saying. So, and then if at any time during the message if you need to get up and get more coffee or juice or it looks like there's just, oh wow, there's like two bags of donut holes back there.

So, don't hurt each other running for, oh there's only one Dave says, only one left now. So, yeah, don't hurt each other running for that. But if at any time during the message you need to get up, you're not going to disrupt me at all.

So if you need to use the restroom, those are out the double doors down the hallway on the left hand side. But just whatever it takes to keep our focus on God's word in the remainder of our time.

Together.

Honoring Elders Who Rule Well

This passage indicates for us that a healthy church knows how to honor their leaders. A healthy church knows how to honor their leaders, but also a healthy church knows how to rebuke their leaders as well.

And a healthy church also recognizes that endorsing people to leadership is a serious thing that requires added scrutiny. It requires us to be diligent and attentive and intentional and even being willing to weigh their leadership and analyzing and assessing.

And so that's one thing that we need to take on church. These are things that are real from this text that are injunctions and instructions on all.

Of us.

These are things that God desires everybody that attends a church, everybody that's a part of a church, it's a vital connection to a church to know. Now, Paul is giving Timothy encouragement to honor those who are serving well.

And he's encouraging him to rebuke those who are not serving well. So the text begins with an encouragement right from the get-go, really a command to honor elders. But not just any elders, but rather specifically the church should honor elders who rule, lead, or guide the church well.

Let's be clear right from the get-go that the text doesn't say that the title, the title elder or pastor, by the way, interchangeable. So just to clarify, when I say elder, when I say pastor, I'll kind of use them interchangeably.

They are the same thing in the text. And so elder and pastor are the same thing. We happen to have some paid pastors and some not paid pastors that are doing so on a voluntary basis. But the elders, I'm an elder, Spencer is an elder, and Ben will be eventually if things work out there.

But continuing down that road, we use those words interchangeably. But right from the get-go, the text doesn't say the title, that if you possess the title, if you're given the title pastor, you're given the title elder, that that's where the honor lies.

Those, there are those who lead the church well and those who do not lead the church well. And the honor rests in the leading well, in shepherding the flock well, in caring for people well. I do not believe that the difference is found in strategic planning and administrative acumen.

In other words, I don't believe in context that the difference between elders who rule well and those who do not is a function of administrative skill, as we might tend to think, especially in the corporate world.

Who do you honor? Those who are good bosses, those who are able to take the organization to the next level, those who are able to make sure that the bottom line is looking really good. And so a lot of times, if we take the business idea of what it means to succeed and do well in the business world, and we apply that to the church, we often find guys in leadership who have, are bankrupt with character, but are really good leaders, administrators, if that makes sense.

Does that make sense? And that's where we've got to be really careful and cautious in this. It is not a function of administrative skill. Leading well in the church has already been shown throughout the book of 1 Timothy to be about immersion in the word.

Immersion in the word is what success looks like for an elder, a pastor, a leader. A commitment to study the word, to read the word, to exhort others to follow the word, to be an example, he said in a previous portion of the text, to be an example in speech, to be an example in love and in conduct.

All of that shaped by an immersion and a knowledge and a study and hearing from God through his word. Now, I believe that you'll see, you see the phrase double honor here, and I believe it's a figure of speech in the text.

Honor still retains a financial tone to it, just like it did in the previous section about.

Widows.

We mentioned that the word honor is kind of similar to our English word honorarium, where we would get that notion of some kind of financial compensation that's involved here. But the doubling has no counterpart in the text, so without a counterpart that we are supposed to be doubling, what's doubled here?

A double honor. I believe that Timothy would have understood Paul to be saying this, generously aid and assist elders who are leading well, and especially take care of those who labor in preaching and teaching, he says.

Verse 17 teaches us something about the structure of eldership, something about the way that a church is structured in its leadership. We know all elders must be able to teach sound doctrine. We saw that earlier in 1 Timothy.

Able to teach sound doctrine, but not all did actually preach and teach in that ancient church, and we're not called that way here today. They are all able to. They all can teach. They don't all serve in that function.

So Paul, who preached and taught, called it a labor of preaching, and I would suggest to you that that's true, a labor of preaching. Preaching, if done right, is not an easy gig. If it's easy, I'm not convinced that you're doing it right.

I think that it is a tough thing to let God's word filter through a human life and then try to express that in a half an hour message, or maybe 45 minutes, I don't know. But to try to bring that truth to bear in our context requires a lot of study and a.

Lot of work.

And Paul quotes one Old Testament and one New Testament scripture to support his claim. He quotes Deuteronomy 25 .4, and then he quotes the words of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ found in Luke 10, verse 7.

And I've always loved the word picture here about the ox. He basically calls me an ox. The apt illustration for a preaching pastor is an ox going around in circles, going around.

In circles.

And I wanted to just clarify, I do tread the same grain often. I do follow the same message over and over again. I joke about being a one-trick pony. I've got the gospel, and that's what I have to offer.

It's the gospel.

It's the good news.

I know nothing else. I know nothing else to preach but Jesus Christ and Him crucified for our sins. That's what I have to offer you. And I will keep going in circles, treading that over and over and over again.

And not to read too much into the metaphor, but when the ox is going around, which by the way, the idea of this threshing, maybe some of you don't even know why in the world an ox would be going in a circle.

They would be attached to a, affixed to a central post on a cement or a hard stone floor. The grain would be spread out on the hard stone floor without the husks removed yet because you have to break it up in order to get the hard outer coat off of it.

That husk is hard. And so they would use their hooves, and they would go around in a circle, and that would crush the grain and break off the husk that would then, there was a process called winnowing where they'd toss that in the air in the breeze.

The breeze would blow the hard shell away, and then you would be left with grain. And so that's the image that you have is that the ox, or a team of oxen going around and around in a circle, crushing the grain under their feet.

And this is an argument from the lesser to the greater that Paul is making here. If God in the Old Testament, in Deuteronomy 25 -4 would say, don't muzzle an ox. Don't shut his mouth and prevent him from eating while he is doing that process.

Let him graze a little bit as he goes. Let him reap some of the benefit from that work. And so if he is concerned, if God is concerned for the benefit of the ox, maybe he would also want the preacher to be able to make a living off of his work as well.

So some whole denominations, by the way, I want to clarify. Why does this even matter? There are whole denominations that are opposed to paying pastors anything at all. Meaning that I would suggest to you some entire denominations.

Pretend this passage doesn't exist. I'm glad that Recast is not part of that. So personally, but a word of note on this point. This church has been extremely and very generous to my family over our short history.

And I suggest to you that this passage would be very awkward. It'd be awkward to preach and awkward to bring to you. Primarily in a context where it wasn't being applied. But I can joyfully preach this with a genuine heart of gratitude, church.

Thank you. And I believe that over the 12 years that I've been the lead pastor here, you have indeed granted me a double honor. And I appreciate that. And I thank you from the bottom of my heart.

It's a truth.

But it's interesting and worth noting that Paul quotes Jesus here. And calls it scripture. And I think this is one of the only places in the New Testament that this is done. Paul uses the exact quote from the gospel of Luke.

Which really makes me curious if Paul maybe had a copy of Luke's gospel already. When he wrote first Timothy. Or if you learn this quote from Jesus directly from the mouth of Luke. Who was the traveling companion of Paul during his missionary journeys.

But some way Paul actually comes into a direct quotation from Luke. And gives it word for word here in first Timothy. Basically validating that indeed Luke's gospel is scripture. But either way Jesus said a laborer deserves to get paid.

A laborer deserves to get paid. And at the risk of being mildly self-serving but also authentic. I want to just kind of share with you guys a joke that I hear from time to time. It's the joke that I only work on Sunday mornings.

And it's really cute but it often makes me feel awkward. I will laugh if you say it. But I will also be awkward. And I've always laughed at it. I've never liked it. And I think it's much like maybe those of you who have served in law enforcement.

Who get to see things nobody else wants to see and deal with. And then gets jokes about donuts and coffee on Sunday morning. And it's kind of like that a little bit. And so I'm just bearing a little bit of my own heart here.

That I don't really love that joke a ton. So but now with clear with the clear instructions to Timothy here. To honor the elders who serve well and teach and preach the truth. The text takes a super sharp turn in verse 19.

Rebuking Elders Who Persist in Sin

It goes from honoring to accusing really quickly in the text. Not just honoring but rebuking. How is the church to handle those who do not lead well? We know that the church in Ephesus did indeed have leaders.

Who were not teaching or preaching the truth. And so the text is answering the question. What should be done with them? What do we do with a leader who is not leading well? Is not teaching well? Is not preaching the truth?

And still on the side of grace Paul tells Timothy something here. Do not entertain an accusation against an elder without two witnesses. Now a little bit of clarity on this. This kind of sounds like okay if I mean God forbid.

You know obviously maybe I just go crazy. And go off the deep end and you see my car. And you're like that's Don's car and it's at deja vu. But there's not two of you. Can you bring an accusation against me?

And be like dude was your car broke down there? Or were you next door?

Or what was going on?

Like can you bring that to me? Like do you see how that could be confusing in this text? You absolutely have the right to bring that. Absolutely don't allow this text to get in the way of concern for others.

And like the Matthew 18. Like go to the individual and talk with them. But now if that's going to escalate to the point of a public rebuke or something like that. You need to make sure that somebody else can verify that that's my character.

That there's something else going on here. Does that make sense? So it's kind of like you always have the freedom and the right to lean into my life. If you see things that you think are out of sync or out of touch.

It's not saying every concern that you have needs to. You need to go find somebody else to agree with you. By the way that can be dangerous too right. You know I mean you can manufacture witnesses. If you get my meaning.

And so it requires some care and some caution here. But on the side of grace he says you're not gonna publicly rebuke an elder without two witnesses. And let me state the obvious. Protecting leadership may be far from our minds.

Matter of fact it might be really far from our minds in a world rife with leadership abuses. Any of you ever encountered some leadership abuse? Any of you reading about it? Any of you watching the podcast The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill?

Any of you like and it's a really prominent thing right now. And it is all over the place right. And so we are a culture that's increasingly doubtful about leadership. Every leader should be held accountable.

It's I would suggest you subtly shifting into every leader should not be trusted. Do you feel that in yourself? I mean I think that's the direction that our culture is leaning. Not that they should be held accountable.

But you just don't even give them your trust to begin with. In a world full of sin we should not blindly follow nor should we blindly accuse. Do you see the balance? Should not blindly follow nor should we blindly accuse.

The requirement of two witnesses for the accusation of a pastor or elder is for the purpose of accountability. Pastors do indeed have a target on their back from both the evil one but also I would suggest to you from hurting people.

So let there be a reminder to take the vetting process for eldership seriously here. Elders need accountability but they do not need to be caught up in a string of false allegations that keep the church from being able to move forward either.

And so when a pastor is confronted by two witnesses for either false teaching or sin and they are indeed moving in that direction. They have been given a gracious opportunity to repent. And verse 20 clarifies that the issue comes in when the elders refuse to repent.

And they refuse to turn from their sin or their false teaching and turn toward God and.

Toward his truth.

Those who persist in falling short are to be publicly, this is shocking, publicly rebuked. Publicly rebuked. The word sin can rightly be translated missing the mark or falling short. That's kind of when you see the word sin in scripture especially in the new testament.

The majority of the time it carries that notion it's like an archery term. So it's like you're shooting at a target and it always, always, always misses the mark or falls short. You're shooting an arrow, it doesn't reach the target.

You shoot an arrow, it doesn't reach the target. That's the image of sin. It encompasses all the activities of a person that do not hit the target of God's desires as expressed in his word. That's how we define sin.

Sin is a missing the holiness and the glory of God and the things that he's designed us to be and do. So an elder or a pastor who will not turn away from that missing the mark will continue to miss the mark and say I'm just going to keep doing that even when confronted is to be rebuked in the presence of all.

And a quick side note is helpful at this point. I want to clarify this. I've said this before, you know, we all sin, right? But unrepentant sin. When a person says I will choose my sin over Christ, that cannot be tolerated in the body.

When confronted, I mean consistently, consistently scripture indicates that when a true believer is confronted with their sin, they choose Jesus over their sin and they repent. They turn to him. Does that make sense?

So when we all sin, but the question is how do we process that? Are we battling it? Are we fighting it? Do we love Christ more? And certainly we fail it at many points. And yet the operating system of our heart is to honor our Lord and Savior.

And we're disappointed when we don't. We feel bad when we don't. And we want to get it right. We want to get it right. Now the need for two witnesses for accusing an elder should not make it more difficult to bring an accusation as an elder, as I said, but rather it comes to nothing if after investigation it proves to just be one person's opinion.

But when it's brought and not heeded, when the accusation is brought and not paid attention to or ignored or explained away or justified, and I'm going to continue doing this, the discipline goes public very quick for a leader in the church.

And know what Paul doesn't say here as your next step. He says rebuke them publicly. How many of you are uncomfortable with that? Just go ahead and raise your hand if that makes you uncomfortable. Like a public rebuke?

Are you serious, Don?

Like what does that look like? But what Paul doesn't say here matters. He doesn't say hide it, church, so that Jesus' name is kept pure. He doesn't say hide it so the church doesn't lose members. He doesn't say hide it so that the church doesn't make the news.

No, it is rebuke them publicly in the presence of all. The church doesn't get to choose the actions on this one. You see, we think we're allowed wiggle room to determine likely fallouts and then respond accordingly, but instead we are to follow scripture and trust the results to our God who loves the church more than we do, more than any of us.

Unfortunately, many churches have gone astray on the false premise that we get to figure out what works best and then do that, especially when things go sideways for a leader. But the church is not a pragmatic organization just trying to figure out and feeling around in the darkness, trying to stumble upon a secret formula that will work for us to grow.

We are an organization of obedience to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Would you guys testify with me that he's in charge?

He's in charge.

And he tells us here that when an elder or a pastor is caught in sin and refuses to turn away from it, in essence saying, no, I love my sin more than Christ, they are to be publicly.

Rebuked.

And there's a purpose behind the public nature of the rebuke even. It is so that the fear of unrepentant sin is felt among the elders and the congregation that the others may fear. It's intentional. In verse 21, Paul gives some of the strongest encouragement in scripture to follow these.

Rules about leadership.

And to do so, he says, adding to it, make sure you follow these rules. I mean, he doubles down on this, triples down on this. Make sure, church, that you follow these instructions about leadership and do so without prejudging or partiality.

Paul knows, what he's getting at here is he knows that we're going to be tempted to prejudgment. We're going to be tempted to partiality when it comes to a leader who has been loved by a congregation.

So, Paul invokes God, he invokes Jesus Christ, and he invokes the holy angel saying that these rules have their origin in heaven. That's the place that these rules are coming from. Not some synod over in Lansing, not some judicial body.

These rules for the church come from heaven, do them.

That's what Paul says.

Now, how many times has this verse been ignored while prominent, famous pastors have clothed themselves both in success and sin? Clothed themselves in success and sin, and we go, I think we'll take a pass, a hard pass on these instructions, Paul.

I think we'll just do things our way, we'll handle it internally. God forbid that we would ever become a people who excuse sin because of quote, unquote, good fruit. The proof is not in the pudding, as grandma would say.

We are not merely a pragmatic people who celebrate what works in ministry. We must be a people who celebrate godliness in ministry, a life of good worship in ministry, above all things, a character that loves God first.

And that includes repenting of our sin when it's brought to our attention. That's not a call to perfection among your leaders, that's a call to humility among your.

Leaders.

That's a call to say, I don't always get it right, but I want to. I want to. And when I see where I have gone astray, I will seek to ask for forgiveness, confess.

It, and move forward.

Paul identifies two prominent temptations that all churches will face. I believe all churches face this, it's prejudging and partiality. And in context, this is saying, Timothy, you're going to be tempted to not rebuke some leaders because of who they are or how you feel about them.

But hear me carefully, church. Nobody, nobody, nobody is above correction. It doesn't matter the fruit from their ministry, it doesn't matter what title they hold, it doesn't matter if they lead 50 people to Christ every single week, if they will not repent of their sins when confronted by two or three witnesses, they are to be publicly censured.

How much pain and heartache would the American church have been saved if this had been followed? I think a lot. Do you guys agree with me on that? I think there's a lot of prominent, big-name preachers who, if this would have been followed early in their ministry, we would barely know their name.

They might still be in ministry, they might be successful today if somebody had leaned into them early on and helped to correct them, or they might be out of ministry because they would have had to be publicly rebuked and censured.

Paul instructs Timothy that a healthy church will not make up their mind before they hear the facts, that would be prejudging, and they will not ignore the facts simply because of the person who is being accused, that would be partiality.

No prejudging, no partiality in the church recast. So a healthy church honors leaders who do well and teach the truth, and a healthy church rebukes leaders who persist in missing the mark in both teaching and in their lifestyle.

And lastly, a healthy church is slow, therefore, for obvious reasons, to appoint leadership. Now verse 22 is a command to Timothy to pump the brakes on leadership appointments. The laying on of hands is a metaphor in this text for the appointment of leadership, and interestingly, the verse implies that those who endorse a person in leadership also share responsibility for the sins that they commit.