1 Timothy 5:17-23 (January 26, 2025)

Honoring Elders Who Labor in Word and Doctrine

And then when you can open up your Bibles to 1st Timothy chapter 5. 1st Timothy chapter 5. We're gonna be in verses 17 through 23 this morning. 1st Timothy 5. Verse 17 through 23. I want to remind you of the theme of this entire book of 1st Timothy that Paul is writing to Timothy.

Timothy is pastoring the church in Ephesus and he has given him instructions for his ministry. Instructions for the church. And the purpose of all of it is so that they would order the church for the godliness of the church.

They would order the church for the godliness of the people. Godliness is that the the blazing center of this letter from Paul to Timothy. Let me read verses 17 through 23 and 1st Timothy 5. And then we'll we'll go through this passage a couple verses at a time.

God's Word says this in verse 17. Let the elders who rule well be counted worthy of double honor especially those who labor in the word and doctrine. For the scripture says you shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out the grain and the laborer is worthy of his wages.

Do not receive an accusation against an elder except from one excuse me except from two or three witnesses. Those who are sinning rebuke in the presence of all that the rest also may fear. I charge you before God and the Lord Jesus Christ and the elect angels that you observe these things without prejudice doing nothing with partiality.

Do not lay hands on anyone hastily nor share in other people's. Keep yourself pure. No longer drink only water but use a little wine for your stomach's sake and your frequent infirmities. I mean this is God's Word to us.

This morning I want to give you a quick outline of how we're going to approach this passage. In verses 17 and 18 we see Paul's instructions for honoring elders. Then 19 through 21 we see his instructions for judging or disciplining or receiving an accusation against elders.

Verse 22 is about selecting elders. And then verse 23 is this little pastoral aside from Paul to Timothy about Timothy's health. And so what I want us to do is work through this outline. Work through this passage these verses a couple of verses at a time beginning in verses 17 and 18 which is about honoring elders.

Let me read verse 17 one more time. Let the elders who rule well be counted worthy of double honor especially those who labor in word and doctrine. For the scripture says you shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out the grain and the laborer is worthy of his wages.

Now I want to get to the main point of those two verses in just a minute. But to get there I really need to make a couple of side points in order to get to the main point. It's kind of like the children's book if you if you give a mouse a cookie you know and that just that just that book just keeps on going.

What happens if you give a mouse a cookie. Well it's like if you give a preacher a Bible verse he'll go through every little tangent that he possibly could. I promise not to do that for every verse in this passage but I will do it for the first one.

So let's go through. Verse 17 said let the elders. And the first thing I want to mention here is just a reminder of what we saw when we looked back at first Timothy chapter 3 and that is there are three words in the New Testament that were that are synonyms.

They all refer to the same office of leadership in the church. You have it. The New Testament uses the word elders like it does here. It uses the term pastors elsewhere and it also uses the term overseers or bishops.

And all three of those words they are synonyms. They can be used interchangeably. They're synonyms for the same office. So Paul used elders here we generally use the word pastors in our church but it's all referring to the same thing.

That's the first thing. Second thing we see here is that there's an there's an S at the end of it says let the elders. And again this is a reminder of what we saw when we looked at first Timothy chapter 3 that the New Testament pattern the pattern in the New Testament churches was to have a plurality of pastoral leadership let the elders plural.

And so there are that again the New Testament pattern is to have a plurality of pastoral leadership. And then we see well what are these elders. What are these pastors do at least part of what they do let the elders who rule.

Well there's two words they're all take each in turn. First one is rule that that implies that the the office of elder or pastor or overseer it implies authority in the church. There is spiritual authority invested in that office especially as it relates to discipline that is the the ministry of correction and and bringing about repentance from straying church members.

And so there's authority in the church especially as it regards discipline but also administration and specifically or maybe primarily includes the teaching of of the church and also just general leadership.

But that word right after is important as well. So those who rule well that means that that that we that we evaluate a ministry we we make judgments about it. The context here as you keep on reading that sentence is worthy of double honor.

And so there is a qualification those who rule well those who do that work and that ministry well and the point here is that it is the is the work it is the ministry that is important that is worthy of the honor not the office or not the title.

Nobody's entitled to honor just because they hold the the title of elder or pastor the office of elder or pastor but you know they're worthy of it based upon the ministry that is done that is the important thing.

And so a church is called to judge the fruit of that ministry those who rule well. Fifth thing I want us to see here is I think this verse gives us the category of something we talked about briefly when we went through 1st Timothy chapter 3 in the qualifications of elders and that is the category of lay elder.

And this is related to the point made about the plurality of pastoral leadership. I think we get a at least a glimpse at the concept of a lay pastor or lay elder here because what you have you have a category of people of elders who rule well but are separated from other elders who rule well who also labor in the in the word in the doctrine they labor in the teaching.

Now all elders 1st Timothy 3 says must be able to teach. But there are some we look here in 1st Timothy 5 there are some who rule well they share in the common council. They share it in the common authority in the common office with say the lead teaching pastor.

But they are their primary duty isn't to labor in the word in the doctrine. And so you see that there is this category of one who shares an office but not the the extent of the duties in word and doctrine.

And he is saying all who rule well or worthy of double honor but especially those who labor in the word in the doctrine in the ministry of the church. And so I think we see this category of lay or lay elder or lay pastor all of that is just side points bringing us to the main point of what Paul is saying in verses 17 and 18 which is those who rule well elders who rule well especially those who labor in the and word and doctrine are worthy of double honor.

Now what does that mean. We said last week when we looked at the concept of honor in relation to taking care of those who are true widows in the church that has financial connotations. One historic interpretation of this double honor is and the concept honor is it is twofold.

There's the respect and the remuneration the the honor in terms of respect and the honor in terms of financial support. Some would say that it's relative to the widows here and so when he says double honor it's in relation to that.

But I think the main point here is that it is okay and it is good to to pay your pastor. And so as I just want to say thank you I think you do that really. Well I don't want to belabor the point there.

What I really want to do is see what's behind that. I want us to see what's behind that. And the principle there is that the church needs teaching. God's people need teaching. Why do they need teaching.

They need teaching that leads to godliness. God has made us in such a way that we need to be taught all of us. God has made us in such a way that if we're going to live godly lives we need to be taught according to the word and not just taught once not just taught when we're in elementary school in Sunday school or vacation Bible school.

But we need teaching all throughout our lives so that we are constantly course-corrected so we are constantly growing in our knowledge of the Lord so that we're constantly growing in godliness constantly growing in our walks with the Lord.

God has made us in that way that we we need someone to explain God's Word to us. We need someone to be a guide to us in his word and someone who someone who knows our troubles who knows our challenges not the challenges of elsewhere but but those in this room who knows our afflictions our weaknesses our proclivities our strengths our needs.

And to plot to apply it specifically to those things to apply the Bible specifically to specific people to preach to our consciences to say this way not that way like this not like that. God has made us to need that our godliness is dependent upon it.

We need someone to to separate true teaching from false teaching and guard our doctrine. How many times have we said that first Timothy talks about watching our life in doctrine. We need help there because we don't get there on our own.

God has not made us to get there on our own. He has made us to be interdependent. And we need teachers. And we need that for godliness. We understand that in all sorts of vocations all sorts of callings in life law medicine education business.

We know that we need guides. We need teaching. Why not the vocation of following Jesus. So the point here that Paul is making I believe the thing that's behind the instruction to financially support the elders of the church is do not deprive the church of the teaching that is needed for godliness by disincentivizing men from pursuing that calling.

In other words if you have somebody and and they can't you know give the church the teaching that they need without going and pursuing other employment they can't pay the mortgage or feed their kids. You're disincentivizing people from that.

And what that does is it leaves the church without the teaching that they need. The point is the godliness of the church. Now verse 18 Paul goes to give some scriptural support for this. And he quotes from Deuteronomy chapter 25 verse 4 you shall not muzzle an ox while it treads out the grain.

He quotes. So he quotes Moses and he also quotes Jesus from Luke 10 7 and Matthew 10 10. The laborer is worthy of his wages. And so Paul gives some scriptural support now this is interesting if you see his what he what he quotes is about it's about farming and agricultural.

So I want to make a little side point here about how Paul gets there. But I want to tie it back to the main point of the godliness of the church. So how does Paul get from oxen and grain in the field to pastors and money and supporting the teaching ministry of the church financially.

How does he take a command about you know giving to farmers and get to the church. Well I gave two words that explain the concept general equity. General equity general equity of the law. This is how you apply a law from one specific law in a specific context and how you apply that to other many other situations is that you take the general equity of it and you apply it.

So this is how that process works. You take the law that is given do not muzzle an ox when it's treading out the grain. You extract the principle that governs that law. And then you use prudence and use wisdom to apply that same principle in another context to another situation that's not addressed specifically.

So wisdom translates one law and applies it in a different situation. This is the basis of case law. It's what the mosaic law is. It gives case law and then you find you have give judges who make decision.

You have Moses appointing elders throughout Israel to make decisions for different situations based on the cases that God gave them. So what we have in our American tradition of law the English common law tradition is is based on this approach.

It is the process of thinking biblically about everything applying God's Word to God's world. So we see Paul he does this with Deuteronomy 25 chapter chapter 25 verse 4 do not muzzle an ox when it's treading out the grain.

He does it here. He also does it in 1st Corinthians chapter 9. I'm not gonna go and read it but he but he making a much more detailed argument there. And it's one of those arguments argues from the lesser to the greater.

And so if it's true in accordance with the Word of God and God's law that you don't muzzle an ox when it's treading out there. If it's true for a beast how much more true would it be for a man if it's true that you don't muzzle ox when it's treading out the grain because you want the you got to take care of the thing that's doing the work.

You take care of the ox that's doing the work so that it treads out the grain so that you can eat. So it's ultimately this is a this is about taking care of those who are doing the work. But it's also a matter of of your stomach because it's the grain that you're gonna eat.

Right. If it's true for that and that whole process how much more true is it for the care not of your physical body but of your soul that will live forever. He's making a lesser to the greater argument there.

What we see is that he is he's applying the Bible using wisdom using reason. He's applying the Bible from one area to another. And being able to apply the Bible in this way rightly and justly is godliness manifest in real life.

And it requires to do it well and to do it rightly it requires teaching for the church. And again that is the underlying point that Paul is making all of these verses is we need teaching for godliness.

That the honor for elders is tied to the ordering of the church for the purpose of godliness. And so that's Paul's instruction on honoring elders. Move on. Verse 19 through 21 he gives instruction for disciplining elders for judging elders.

For for dealing with when their accusations of sin by an elder with when somebody brings an accusation against one for sinning how do you how do you handle this. It calls for three things. We'll use Kent Hughes's outline of these verses.

It calls for caution verse 19 courage verse 20 and fairness. Verse 21 calls for caution courage and fairness. So let's take the first one. Caution verse 19 do not receive an accusation against an elder its pastor except for two or three witnesses.

So this is this is a warning about receiving an accusation of sin against an elder. And it says you must have two to three witnesses. Now when it says two to three witnesses there this is biblical language for dealing with accusations and charges and doesn't necessarily mean two to three eyewitnesses.

That may not be always but we'd see the general equity of that would be you need two to three lines of evidence that you never convict somebody based upon one line of evidence you need to corroborate that with at least two preferably three lines of evidence.

And so if you're making a case and in a criminal court you need to show multiple lines of evidence. That's the it's the biblical standard. That's a that's a standard for everybody. Why does Paul then apply it specifically to pastors here and the con you gotta remember it's the context of ordering the church and ordering the church for godliness.

And so it's a standard that is available for all. We're all entitled to do process that's just basic justice. But he mentions it here in relation to elders or pastors because the elders of the church pastors of church are often targets.

Meaning that if you can take out the pastor then you can undermine the whole ministry. You've seen it before when pastors fall the whole like the whole ministry of the church is at the very least undermined and oftentimes it blows up blows up the whole church.

And so if you can take out it's like if you have an intruder in the house and you pull out a weapon to neutralize the threat of that that intruder. But you know if you keep on he keeps on families threatened you can shoot to the toe or you shoot to the head.

One of those is going to neutralize the threat. If you take out the head you can take out the whole threat. And that is often what happens here. If you can take out the elders then you can undermine the entire church.

And what happens is you undermine and discredit the teaching of the church. And again what is that teaching needed for godliness. All of that could be an attack on godliness of the church. Now this can be done by bad actors who bring false charges against the pastor and elder in order to attack the church be done by those who are resentful of pastors teaching or correction.

We we saw last week that you know Matthew Henry's quote that I read last week was that that pastors are reprovers by office correctors by office. And so people oftentimes don't like correction and could be attacked in that way because people are resentful.

But regardless the instruction to the church is to use caution so that you don't. You don't easily surrender the credibility of the church. Don't easily surrender the credibility of the teaching of the church but hold the biblical standards of justice and due process.

It may be that the the accusation is is true and we'll get to that in verse 20 in just a moment. But it may be and particularly if you only have one line of evidence that it's not. And so the instruction is you know do not be swayed by the mobs and do not be swayed by the sobs.

Do not let anyone weaponize empathy against the church and the teaching ministry of the church rather be sober minded. It's a call throughout the New Testament be sober minded and hold to biblical justice not admitting a charge against an elder except if you have the two or three witnesses lines of evidence.

There's also a ninth commandment duty implied here and so this is probably something I know I've mentioned it before probably need to do a series on the Ten Commandments and just show how all sorts of other duties are bound up in the Ten Commandments.

So we have the Ten Commandments but each one of those contains a multiplicity of duties and commandments in them. And so ninth commandment shall not bear false witness means that we should not believe false witnesses meaning that we need to have those lines of evidence.

I want you have multiple lines of evidence to corroborate a testimony but also bound up. If you look at the Westminster larger catechism it says in the ninth commandment duties include to preserve and promote the good name of our neighbor as well as our own.

Or the Orthodox catechism which is a Baptist catechism says that one of the duties of the ninth commandment is to defend and increase the good name and estimation of others. And so again we protect against that but not admitting an accusation not receiving accusation unless there's two to three lines of evidence two to three witnesses.

So we use caution. That doesn't mean that we don't ever admit and publicly deal with real actual sin by a pastor or an elder. And that requires courage. We see that in verse 20 those who are sinning talking about the elders who are sinning those who are sinning rebuke and the presence of all that the rest also may fear.

So one commentator said it like this that whenever any measure is taken for the protection of good men and that's what the that's what verse 19 is for for the protection of good men who aren't sinning but they're being falsely accused.

And whenever that set it up says that bad men seize upon it to prevent their own condemnation and so bad men will hide behind those protections. But when there are two to three witnesses lines of evidence that an elder is sinning the instruction from Paul here is rebuke and the presence of all.

Do not let him get away with it. Do not sweep it under the rug too often we sweep things under the rug now maybe we do that for legal reasons. Maybe we do that for reputation reasons because we want to protect the name of the church in the community.

And sometimes we might do it just because we're Southerners and that's what we do. But Paul's instruction is that it needs to be public so that the church fears God and learns wisdom. And the lesson that the church should learn is the elders don't get away with it.

They don't get away with sin and neither will I I should watch my life and doctrine closely again. The point is godliness. Now Paul's talking about public scandal here. He's not talking about necessarily private sin but public scandal sin that becomes public and besmirches the name of Christ and the name of the church.

That's the that's the sin he's talking about here. And so public scandal deserves public rebuke. Private sin deserves private rebuke personal rebuke. And so a good rule of thumb for us is that rebuke for sin and repentance for sin should be as public as the sin.

And so if Shannon and I get an argument not that that ever happens Shannon and I get an argument and I pop off and and say something in anger that's really disrespectful to her and it's just the two of us and that conversation the kids have gone to bed.

Then I should repent of that sin to Shannon but I don't need to make a public spectacle of it. We'll restore fellowship and I'll apologize and we'll be good now. It happened earlier in the evening and the kids are still around now.

I should apologize to Shannon for that but also should acknowledge it in front of the kids because they were a party to it they they saw it. I should apologize to them and and let them acknowledge my sin to them.

Public as a sin is. But I don't necessarily need to come stand up here on Sunday and and make a public spectacle of it just there within the house. But it happened down the fellowship hall and I just made a scene all right.

Now I need to acknowledge it to Shannon and to all the rest of you that were down there in the fellowship hall with us. The rebuke for sin and the repentance for sin should be as public as the sin. And that doesn't mean like there might be some you know sin that's done in private but it has public ramifications.

It brings public shame and scandal. Then those will be considered public sins that need to be dealt with publicly. And the point is so that others see and fear. That leads them to godliness that leads them to obedience.

That's the point of the public rebuke. The point is godliness. And then all of this should be done with fairness. Verse 21 should be done with fairness. I charge you before God and the Lord Jesus Christ and the elect angels that you observe these things without prejudice doing nothing with partiality.

This whole deliberation process when an accusation is made should be dealt with with fairness. So in making these judgments such as when an elder is accused men are tempted to be swayed by various things.

They're tempted to be swayed by emotions. The church is tempted to be swayed by emotions. They're. They're tempted to be swayed by personality. If you got a lively personality of somebody who could be a charismatic person and win people over you're tempted to be swayed by friendship past prior relationship.

And the result ends up being partiality. Fairness means we must make judgments based on the facts alone. Emotion aside personality aside past relationship aside. What are the facts of the case. Are there multiple lines of evidence says without prejudice.

That means no judgment beforehand no show no showing favor based on any other factors not on their family name or on your long-standing friendship what happened. And so again. This is a call for due process.

Biblical justice witnesses evidence equal weights and measures all things Bible talks about no partiality not to show partiality to the elder because they're the ones you know the one that's up front and everybody knows.

Maybe they like nor show partiality to the accuser. Leviticus chapter 19. Verse 15 talks about this says. You shall do no injustice in judgment. You shall not be partial to the poor nor honor the person of the mighty in righteousness.

You shall judge your neighbor. You're not allowed to to show partiality to to the mighty the one powerful just because he's powerful. You're not allowed to show partiality to the poor just because they're poor.

You make judgments without prejudice without partiality. It's interesting the way he says. He kind of puts this oath in there. I charge you before God and the Lord Jesus Christ and the elect angels that you observe these things without prejudice.

You're to make you to make your judgment. You to make your decision as if God the Father the Lord Jesus Christ and the elect angels are right there with you in the courtroom. You should you should do it as if God is right there.

That's the reality is he is. God is watching. Christ is watching. And again the stakes are high here because the credibility of the church is at stake the godliness of the church is at stake. The teaching ministry of the church is at stake.

And so we must get it right. So we must make these judgments that were called upon as spirit-filled believers in the church. We're to do this without prejudice without partiality because we must get it right because the stakes are high.

Then lastly as it pertains specifically to the elders verse 22 his own selecting elders. Verse 22 says. Do not lay hands on anyone hastily nor share in other people's sins. Keep yourself pure. And so the lay on hand refers to ordination talking about specifically with ordaining new new elders new pastors.

We could apply it to ordaining deacons as well leaders in the church. And the instruction here is to do that slowly. Select your leaders slowly observe their life and doctrine. That's the whole point of first Timothy chapter 3.

Go back just a couple of pages and you get this list of qualifications for deacons. You get this list of qualifications for pastors. And the point is that you know them well enough to to look down that list and observe their life and observe their doctrine and observe their doctrine lived out in their life.

You don't make those decisions quickly. You make them slowly. You test them. You do your due diligence. You don't get caught up in emotion or swept up in personality. Because if you do and and the unqualified elder who shouldn't have been installed isn't installed and then sins grievously.

And you in the church are implicated and share in that sin. Do not share in other people's sins it says. But you'll you'll share in that sin because you shouldn't have been there and should have ordained slowly.

And so we apply that to our church. We are nominating deacons and selecting deacons. We should do that slowly. We should observe someone's life and take those qualifications seriously. When we you know ordain pastors talk about the category of lay pastors lay elders earlier.

If we ever get to the point where we say ha yeah we see that in the Bible we should do that here we ever get there we should ordain lay hands on slowly be thorough trained beforehand. Why. Because the godliness of the church is at stake the godliness of the church is at stake.

And so you do these things diligently purposefully slowly for the sake of the church. Then verse 23 Paul has this pastoral personal aside to Timothy these instructions for him to take care of himself and says no no longer drink only water but use a little wine for your stomach sake and your frequent infirmities.

And so what this is. This is connected to his you know earlier I think is in chapter 4 beginning of chapter 4 Paul sharply rebukes the ascetics those who are those who who make their godliness bound up in what they abstain from.

Do not touch do not taste. And so it's connected to that rebuke. Here we're saying don't just abstain but use a use a little wine for your stomach. Because it asceticism as we saw in chapter 4 undermines godliness.

And here it was undermining Timothy's health. And so he says drink a little wine. And in that phrase you see both moderation but not teetotalism. But the point of it the point of it the why behind it is so that he takes care of himself so that he can serve God and his neighbor so that he can serve the church for the purpose of their godliness.

And so that's where I want in today with is with this thought. If the point of avoiding the church and this instruction that Paul gives if the point of it is for the godliness of the church when I ask you are you.

Are you applying the teaching of the church. Are you living godly. Are you obeying the scriptures fully. Are you keeping biblical standards for justice. Are you protecting the reputations of others. Do you know the Bible well enough to apply it broadly and rightly.

Do you have wisdom. And are you cultivating wisdom that leads to godliness. Are you watching your life and doctrine. Are you watching your godliness. Let's pray together our Father in heaven. We love you.

We praise you. We thank you father. I pray that we would watch our lives and doctrine. That we would heed to the teaching of the church. That we would protect the teaching of the church at all costs forsaking our sin upholding your word and your standards for justice.

Father I pray that I will teach rightly and all you know rightly devise your word for this church. And I pray that it will lead to our obedience and lead to our holiness and lead to our godliness so that you are honored.

But father we know that apart from you we can do no things we can do no good works we need your grace for all of this. And so we ask for it in the name of Christ. Amen.