Three. We'll be in chapter three, verses eight through 13 today. First Timothy, chapter three, verses eight through 13. I'm glad that I was able to pull myself together before I got up here because I was crying in tears of gratitude for the faithfulness of the Lord in my life. And the prayers that were prayed over me were exactly the things I needed to be prayed for. And so very grateful to the Lord.
A couple of housekeeping issues I want to present to you this morning. First of all, we actually have this thing where we do like a congregational feedback period before we put somebody forward in leadership of any kind. And we've done that with the majority of the names you've heard. But I want to give you a couple of updates. First of all, we are putting Noah Larson before you as a congregation today as someone we've identified that we would like to serve as a deacon. And Noah has been attending deacons meetings for some time and so on and so forth. But if you have any concerns or feedback, let's go ahead and start the clock. We'll give you 30 days to come. Find me and let me know if you have any concerns or questions. We just think that's a healthy practice and want to do that. And it would be conceivable for a lesser known person we might give you more time, 60 minutes or 60 days, 90 days, whatever. But we feel like Noah is a very known quantity in our church. And so. But if you have any feedback for me, please come find me about that. Also wanted to let you know that our progress in getting know a plurality of elders, which has been an aim of ours for quite some time. Dov Cohen is in the process of getting his ordination finished with sovereign grace. And that's really kind of a necessary part of how we appoint elders at Providence. We can choose those men, but they have to pass a fairly rigorous set of examinations. And so Dov is pretty far down the road in that process and will keep you abreast of that information as it progresses. But he's taken three very difficult four hour tests each and has a couple more things to do before he is approved in the eyes of the denomination to be an elder. And then we'll walk through that together as a church at that time, I think just to give you like, it's kind of, it's sort of foreseeable how this will play out. Probably December is probably when we're going to begin talking about that.
So today, as Josh mentioned, we're going to be talking about deacons. And this is as he said kind of part two of a two part series on leaders within the church. I've had a quote from John Calvin, I've wanted to share for quite some time about this, where he writes, it is a great and splendid thing for men to be put in authority over the church to represent the person of the Son of God. They are like the friends attached to the bridegroom to celebrate the wedding with him, though they must observe the difference between themselves and what belongs to the bridegroom. It's a very polite way of talking about something kind of ugly. He says in another place, they church leaders should not stand in the way of Christ alone having the dominion in his church or ruling it alone by his word. Those who win the church over to themselves rather than to Christ faithlessly violate the marriage which they ought to honor. And so what we see in this quote is sort of the blessing of leaders who will lead us to Jesus, but the danger that some leaders would lead us to themselves instead.
And you know, I've known a lot of pastors for a lot of years and some who have lost their way. And I will tell you that that saying never ascribe to malfeasance. What can be attributed to incompetence. You know, of course we can look out and see men who are as serving as church leaders who are leading people to themselves rather than to Christ. And I think we always assume that's malfeasance. But the truth is, is that we all lose track of Jesus from time to time. And I think when one of the things we need to remember about church leadership is that a lot of times it goes wrong, not out of any kind of sense of, out of intentional malfeasance, but it's like, okay, if I'm supposed to lead you and I've lost Jesus, then all I can do is lead you to me. Like that's all I can do.
And so it just re instills the practice that we just engaged in earlier, which is to pray for those who are put in positions of church leadership. Almost all of the terrible things that you've experienced or seen happen more because of just sin and Satan and the world and the flesh than they do some sort of guy who goes into the business from the beginning to be. To be rotten. There's better, more lucrative ways to be rotten. This doesn't seem to be the ideal target. You know, I'm gaming for these maroon chairs, like my whole thing, like I'm here to wind up, I'm going to ruin this church and Steal a chair. It's like why people don't enter into ministry to be bad, bad guys typically. So you need to pray for your leaders and pray that God preserves them and that they have a spirit of humility and a desire for holiness and so on and so forth.
So we're talking about deacons today and I thought before we got into the text we would talk about what is the origin story of the deacons.
6 · Establishes the biblical-theological foundation that generosity is a reflexive response to encountering Jesus, tracing this pattern from the Gospels through Acts
And that is something that Josh has already mentioned. What's going on in Acts chapter six is something that I think you need to be aware of in order to appreciate what a deacon does. From the early days of Jesus ministry all the way into the moments of the early church, people who had been with Jesus responded to their being with Jesus with generosity. This is essentially a fundamental to the nature of the Christian life. When you walk through the pages of Jesus earthly ministry, when you walk through the pages of the early church, what you'll find is that people who actually are with Jesus tend to be very generous.
7 · Explains the theological logic behind Christian generosity—meeting Jesus displaces money as a backup god—and connects generosity to the deacon origin story as the solution for distributing church resources justly
I think it's because we use money as a backup God makes sense, right? Like, what if he doesn't come through? Or what if I don't know who he is? So I'm going to use, I'm going to, I'm going to hoard wealth as sort of like a backup God because he might not take care of me, he might leave me or forsake me and then they meet the God, Jesus and a liberality, a generosity just reflexively takes place. And of course there have been poor churches in church history, but you know, those are often the exception more than they are the rule. The general pattern we see throughout the New Testament is that when Christians gather in Jesus name, resources multiply and people give those resources to the local church and they give those resources to the local church as an expression of love for those that both live in the church and those that live outside the church. So now we've got essentially sort of baseline understanding of what deacons are about. I feel like if we don't talk about stewardship, we really can't understand deacons because in the end, in Acts 6, deacons need to happen. They come into being. The deacon origin story is essentially we've got resources, we've got people that could use these resources. How are we going to get these two things connected in a way that honors God and does justice to the gospel?
8 · Recounts the Acts 6 narrative: widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution due to ethnic tensions between Hebrews and Hellenists, prompting the church to create the deacon role to ensure impartial distribution that honors the gospel
And so a church without resources does not need deacons. Well, maybe, maybe they need deacons to get the resources. I don't know, like, but These two things are tied very tightly together. And so it is in Acts 6, there are a group of widows already in the early church. The church has grown substantially, and a number of widows are a part of this body. And they don't have the means to take care of themselves financially. And so the church has money because people that are around Jesus are generous. And so they do a daily distribution, a daily meal, probably for the widows. And there was some feeling, because this was at the early church when all of the socioeconomic classes were being blended for the very first time in human history in some respects. And there were even different ethnicities that were kind of adjacent to each other in Judaism, that the Hebrews and the Hellenists, and they were starting to interconnect in the church. But there was some feeling that the more Jewish Jews, let's say, were getting extra and the less Jewish Jews, the Hellenists were getting less. So there was some dispute and they did what is right to do. They didn't talk about this quietly one Sunday. And they didn't build up bitterness. They didn't slander the church. They didn't deconstruct by the inequity they observed. They just went and said, hey, we've got this concern. Could you do something about this, please? And the elders are like, absolutely. We don't want that to happen. The gospel is at its core, an impartial gospel. And so we want to make sure that the gospel is honored in the way that we care for people. And so let's go come up with a plan. And deacons are that plan.
9 · Expounds the Acts 6:3 qualifications for deacons—good reputation, full of the Spirit, full of wisdom—emphasizing that the core requirement is trustworthiness in handling church resources
Deacons were assembled based on their qualifications. They had to be men of good reputation. It says in verse 3, as Josh read in Acts 6, Therefore, brothers, pick out from among you seven men of good repute, full of the spirit and of wisdom. And the whole idea of these qualifications in Acts 6 is simply, let's get people. Let's get men that everyone would trust to handle the church's resources with wisdom, impartiality, and so on and so forth. Make sense?
10 · Uses a self-deprecating pastoral anecdote about deacon jokes to make the point accessible and memorable: deacons manage the flow of generosity from Jesus-encountering people to those in need
Now, before we go any further, I have to share a joke with you that I grew up hearing. My pastor growing up was the king of making fun of deacons. He had a great relationship with his deacon body. Those. My dad was a deacon. These guys served together forever. But my pastor was just brilliant at deacon jokes. He had so many good deacon jokes. But one of the things he would every once in a while say is, let me make this so simple, even a deacon can understand. Well, I think it's important to like make this as simple as it really is. When people around Jesus, they become generous, that generosity flows into the church. The church has tons of opportunities to care for people. Who's managing all of this? The deacons. That's what a deacon is for.
11 · Defines the deacon role in functional terms as ensuring even distribution of God's blessings, illustrated by current deacons welcoming newcomers and by the memorable nacho pan analogy
I think one way you could describe this is you could say a deacon is someone who ensures the even distribution, the wise distribution of God's blessings to the church. And I see the men that serve as deacons now going out of their way every Sunday morning. If someone here is new, I will, I can almost guarantee you that they won't leave this building without having met at least one deacon. They've got the instinct to look for. You ever see somebody like this? This is an important kind of person. The person who looks for the people who are being left out. That's deacon vibe. The person who looks for uneven distribution. It's like this is the person in an ecclesiastical way who would make sure that the nachos on the bottom have cheese on them too. Right? Right. Because no one wants a top heavy nacho pan. You know, someone needs to carefully go in there with like, maybe like a twist and lift up a chip and toss a little shredded cheese in there and so on and so forth. A deacon is someone who is concerned that all people have access to the blessings that God has put into the local church.
12 · Bridges Acts 6 and 1 Timothy 3 by arguing that respectability and trustworthiness are central because deacons fundamentally manage the church's financial resources as stewards
And you can see why both in Acts 6 and also in 1st Timothy 3, that respectability ranks very high is essentially you just want people that you can trust to handle God's finances. I personally come at the deacon question with a very heavy emphasis on resources and finances. I don't think I'm entirely off. I may be overstating that simply based on some biases that I have. But I really believe that one fundamental task of the deacons is to manage the church's treasury. Okay. And to make sure that it is being productive to be good stewards of it. Like in Matthew 23, the parable of the stewards. I think a deacon is a steward of the varied physical blessings in particular within the local church. And you want someone who is trustworthy. And so in Acts 3 we have men of good repute. And in 1 Timothy 3 we have deacons. Must be dignified. And the word dignified there is just worthy of respect. You need to have people you can trust.
13 · Expounds 1 Timothy 3:8 qualifications—not double-tongued, not addicted to wine, not greedy—as variations on the theme of trustworthiness, each guarding against a different threat to faithful stewardship
Indeed, the rest of the qualifications. And now I am in 1st Timothy 3, the rest of the qualifications that follow in verse 8 are really just about trustworthiness, not double tongued what does that mean? It means they say what they mean. They mean what they say. They're not talking out both sides of their mouth, not addicted to much wine. So this is like no vices that could lead them to sudden debauchery, to sort of falling off of the cliff of morality. And addiction to alcohol will do that. Not greedy for dishonest gain. No secondary motives, no side angles for accessing the church's wealth, no Judases managing the money bag. That's kind of meant to be a one off. I think in the purposes of God one's enough.
14 · Introduces 1 Timothy 3:9 as the most interesting verse in the passage and poses the interpretive question: what does it mean to hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience?
Now what about verse nine? It says, this is the verse that I find to be one of the most interesting. In this passage it says that deacons must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience. So what does that mean?
15 · Illustrates the interpretive challenge of 'the mystery of the faith' through a confrontational wedding rehearsal conversation, setting up the three-fold explanation that follows
I did a wedding this weekend and during the rehearsal I sat across from an 80 year old man whom I'd met a couple of times before. And the first thing this man asked me sits down in front of me, I'm just trying to enjoy my salmon. And he sits right in front of me and says, what is the mystery of God? It's like if you weren't older you would be wearing my salmon right now. I'm in no mood to tell you what the mystery of God is. No, I immediately, he's a Jews for Jesus guy, which I'm not a huge fan of. So I immediately found the most objectionable pot stirring thing to say because I was already miffed and I said the mystery of God is the inclusion of the Gentiles as equals with the Jews, which is actually biblically true. That's Ephesians 1. But I definitely had an ulterior motivation in saying that I was trying to pick on him and he said, oh, that's very interesting because I think it's Jesus. Well, you can't pull the Jesus trump card too soon in a theological discussion. It just shuts down all discussion. Like there's, I mean obviously he's right at some level and probably more right than me.
16 · Expounds the three possible meanings of 'mystery of the faith' in the New Testament: (1) inclusion of Gentiles, (2) the incarnation, (3) grace-based salvation, each representing something previously hidden now revealed in Christ
The truth is, is that this saying they must hold the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience is actually, it's actually worthy of your consideration. Some really interesting things going on here. There are three things that this phrase, the mystery of the faith refers to in the New Testament. And the one is, as I've said, the inclusion of the Gentiles into the redemptive purposes of God. Impartiality, a brand new concept in the history of the world. Do you understand what I mean? When I say that a brand new concept, impartiality across all socioeconomic, that's new with Jesus. Really. Okay, so one of the things that was a mystery hidden for the ages, Paul says in Ephesians 1 is that all nations would be welcome into the redemptive purposes of God in Christ elsewhere, including we'll see this next week, first Timothy 3. He talks about the mystery of godliness. And the mystery of godliness is something to do with the incarnation of Jesus. So that was what my 80 year old dinner mate was getting at, the incarnation. That's the mystery that the creator of the universe took on flesh and dwelled among us. And then the third mystery is we have created a brand new religion and that is one that does not tell you you must get better to get saved. Which is we have a completely new thing over here with Christianity. It's a grace based faith, not a works based faith. And that is also described in several places as a mystery.
17 · Applies the three meanings of mystery to the deacon role, arguing that deacons must hold all three—grace, impartiality, and incarnation—because each one grounds the practice of gift distribution, while acknowledging uncertainty about Paul's exact meaning
So when Paul says that a deacon must believe with a clear conscience in the mystery of the faith, I'm not sure which one of those he means. I know this because a deacon is fundamentally a gift distributor, he must believe in grace. And I know that because a deacon is fundamentally a gift distributor, he must believe in impartiality. And because a deacon is fundamentally a gift distributor, he must be like Jesus who dwelled among the people he came to serve. Incarnation. Yeah, deacons need to believe in that and they need to do it. Impartiality of the gospel. Yeah, deacons need to do that too. Grace. Yeah, deacons need to value that. Which one is Paul talking about? Is there a way that all three are the same thing? Well, come back next week, I have more studying to do. I'll let you know.
18 · Expounds 1 Timothy 3:10 as requiring practical testing of deacons' stewardship abilities, using Providence's building as an example of the kind of asset deacons should manage wisely
Now, what about verse 10? It says, and let them also be tested first, then let them serve as deacons if they prove themselves blameless. What does that mean? Here is another reason why I think that deaconing and stewardship are closely aligned. Because what I think is happening here is essentially let's make sure they know how to steward the blessings of God, that they're honest, that they're wise, that they're impartial, and so on. But I think that the testing here is a very practical one and it has to do with like, let's give them some things to manage, let's give them some resources to manage and make sure they manage those things with wisdom, impartiality, love, and so on and so forth. So really, ideally, I don't Know how many years ago it was that Providence bought this building. But ideally we would have created at that time a group of deacons who saw this building as essentially the church's wealth and said, okay, let's manage this asset for the good of as many people as possible. Let's try to increase the value of this asset. Let's make sure the value of this asset doesn't decrease. This would be our greatest financial asset. This building is worth somewhere around $2 million, although it is insured for 5 million. If anyone's feeling arsony, I don't think we could post this sermon online. Alright, if this church burns down, someone get online immediately and delete that video. So this church is worth about $2 million and we owe about 600,000 on it. So this is the primary asset, this is the primary physical asset of our church. And this is something that is its own world to be managed, and so on and so forth.
19 · Makes a doctrinal claim against gnostic pietism: the church's materiality matters because incarnation matters, and deacons must take seriously the management of church finances as an act of faithfulness to God who distributes talents to be maximized
So we have asked the deacons to do all sorts of crazy things over the years to help in various ways. But really, you know, as I'm continuing to grow my understanding of deaconing and the stewardship of assets and so on and so forth, I really want to see a group of people come together to really just own everything in the financial vertical of our local church. This idea that anyone that I would ever want to do all the things. No, no, no, I don't want to do all the things. I just want all the things to be done. That's all. There's a difference. And I can really see how if a group of people were devoted to taking the finances of a church seriously. See, we've grown up in such a gnostic and pietistic age. We've grown up so suspicious of materiality, even though we wouldn't be saved if Jesus didn't take on flesh, right? Like we've grown up with all of this. Like, as long as you love Jesus, it'll all work out. It's like, no. Matthew 23, God distributes talents. We are wicked and lazy if we don't maximize those talents. God has distributed wealth in our church. We are wicked and lazy if we don't manage and maximize that, not only because it's God's, but also because it does so much good, it can do so much good. So that would be my. As I've studied this, I spent a lot of time thinking, you know, I don't really think I have as much clarity on deacons as I want to. And that's what I walked away with. Deacons really should be managing the inflow and outflow of the church's finances, its assets, its property, its ministry. Like there should just be this highly practical core of people who are caring for these things.
20 · Expounds 1 Timothy 3:11 by offering three interpretive options for the qualifications of deacon wives, ultimately favoring either option A (wives' character reflects a man's leadership) or B (wives participate in deacon ministry), while explicitly declining to resolve the question of female deacons
Verse 11. What do we got here? Their wives likewise must be dignified, not slanderers, but sober minded, faithful in all things. Well, I will tell you that I grew up Southern Baptist and it was very common in Southern Baptist Church for a deacon to simply be the man who shows up to tell the pastor what his wife thinks. I have seen in many a deacon board essentially men who were following their wives and bringing their wives instructions into the deacon board. Is that something what Paul's talking about here? I don't know. Here's three options for what this means. What does it mean when it says their wives likewise must be dignified, not slanderers, but sober minded, faithful in all things. What does that mean? Well, okay, so I think the most natural reading of this would be that this verse, verse 11 belongs with verse 12. Let me read those together to you. Their wives likewise must be dignified, not slanderers, but sober minded, faithful in all things. Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well. So I think the most natural reading is just that as children are held up as a sort of proof that a deacon is the kind of guy who is competent, so his wife's character is held up as evidence of a man who is competent and knows how to lead and knows how to manage the things that God gives him. I think that's the most natural reading. It seems to be the one that requires the least amount of twistiness. It simply would fit verse 11 and verse 12 together and you've got essentially household and qualifications of deacons are does this deacon manage the people in his life? Well, so that's probably the simplest reading, may or may not be the right one. The next one would be that Paul assumes that the ministry of a deacon will invariably involve his wife's participation. So deacon wives must have certain qualifications as well. That one makes a lot of sense to me too. After all, if deacons started out as ministry to the widows, well, you know, I mean, I'm sure, you know, it would be nice to have your wife with you when you're doing ministry like that. So Paul might be speaking into the particular ministry of deacon and saying wives that go with their husbands, that serve with their husbands in kind of an Aquila and Priscilla way, need to also have qualifications. That's possible. And then the third reading would be that Paul believes that both men and women should serve as deacons. And so he is providing a list of qualifications for female deacons. Well, I will tell you it is not super concerning to me for women to be deacons. I would also tell you I don't see that, that clearly as the first meaning that jumps out of this text. That's not what I see when I read this text. I think that reading would be an attempt to justify something that you would like to see true in the Bible. There are better texts if you're going to argue for women deacons than this one, I guess is what I'm saying. So what do I think Paul is saying here? I think what Paul is saying here is probably either option A or option B, either wives and the character of wives is another comment on a man's leadership. Or B, deacons will often have their wives as part of the ministry and therefore their wives must be of a certain character. Am I dodging the question about whether women should serve as deacons? Yes. I personally have zero problems with this. I am realizing I just do not have a firm opinion on this. Now, this is where plurality of elders would be wonderful. And by the way, the denomination offers no guidance on this at all. Because if I had a few elders and everybody just agreed this is what we're going to do, this would be one of those areas that, fine, like this is what we've decided to do. But as for whether women can be deacons or not, whether. Whether God wants that or not, I am literally undecided. I apologize for that. I feel like I've gone a long time in ministry to have an opinion that is unformed, but that's where I'm at. So I think it's this text, though, I don't think is super complicated. I think it's either option A or B.
21 · Expounds 1 Timothy 3:12 as revealing the church's nature as a household, arguing that household management qualifications establish that church and home must complement not compete, with a pastoral promise to protect that complementarity
What's going on with verse 12? Let deacons each be the husband of one wife, managing their children and their own households well. Well, I think one of the things I just draw your attention to is if you're trying to understand what a church is supposed to be, you gotta notice how in both the qualifications for elders and in the qualifications for deacons, their function in the house is a major qualifier. And what does that tell you about what the church is most like? A church is a household. This is a beautiful thing to me. In the very next section, which we'll look at next week, Paul actually says, I'm writing this so that you know how to behave in the household of God. So one of the things going on here is just we really have to be a church that is exceedingly, expressingly, expressively, unapologetically for the home. The home and the church can never compete with one another. They can never compete with one another because they have to complement each other in order for either to do what they're called to do. So I am one that has always said, like, far be it from anything happening in the church to ever compete with anything that's happening in your home. There is always a way. Men, leaders of your home. There's always a way. There's always a way to serve both the church and your family. Those two things are not in contradiction. I do not want to, and I've gone to great lengths as a husband and a father to never pit those two things together. And I can promise you that if you aspire to leadership at Providence Community Church, I will be your greatest advocate to help you make sure that those two things complement each other and not compete.
22 · Pivots from qualifications to rewards, framing verse 13 as the encouragement portion of the passage and signaling the shift from examination to motivation
Now, verse 11 is really where I want to end on a strong point. Verse 13. For those who serve well as deacons gain a good standing for themselves and also great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus. Now, remember, we use these passages all the time for examination, and I suppose I've done that a little bit so far. But we can't sleep on this idea that if we don't encourage men to serve, we'll have nobody to examine. So encouragement is a part of both of these lists of qualifications, both for the elder, which we saw last week, and for the deacon, which we see this week.
23 · Expounds the first reward of deacon service—good standing—arguing against pietism that it is right to desire honor and reputation, but these must be subordinate to God and surrenderable like Christ's reputation at Golgotha, which led to exaltation
For those who serve well as deacons gain a good standing for themselves and also great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus. Let me go through these two reasons, these two blessings that Paul offers out to deacons who serve well. The first is a good standing. A good standing. The first thing to see is that it's okay for you as a human being to have some regard for your own dignity, honor, respect and reputation. Did that register? It's okay for you as a human being to like, want to be respected. It's okay for you to have some desire for a good reputation. If wanting to be respected was a bad thing when Paul would not hold it forth as a reward for being a deacon. So that's. That's job number one. The truth is we've got to keep digging ambition from the rubble of pietism and keep saying over and over again that God made us as people to have regard for our reputation and for our standing. And we are indeed commanded in Romans 2 to seek glory, honor, and immortality by doing good. Romans 2 and this passage lock in really well. Desiring good standing is a good thing, but it's not a God. That's just where we are. We're just in that classic territory where it's a good thing, it's just not God. Desiring a good reputation is good. Desiring money is good. Desiring fitness is good. Desiring to get married is good. God would bless and sanction all of those desires, but he would require you at all times to submit them to him and to keep them subordinate to him. And yes, there may be times when God calls you to throw your reputation on the fire and stand with him as you watch it burn. There are times when this is what God calls you to do. But let it be a thing you value that you throw on the altar, not something that you don't care about at all. We should desire to have a good standing. We should just go about getting a good standing in God's way. And we should surrender our good standing to God, just like Jesus did when he in Golgotha or when he in Gethsemane surrendered his desire to not be reproached, to not be scoffed, to not be naked and, and ridiculed and doubted. He surrendered it. He put his reputation on the altar and watched it burn. And what did God do in return? Did God say, see, those reputations are just nasty, terrible things. You shouldn't want to have a good standing. What did God do for Jesus when Jesus surrendered his good name? What does Philippians 2 say? That he gave him a name above all names. And so there are certain pathways in life that appear to be in a demeaning direction that wind up being massively glorious.
24 · Places the deacon title in its original cultural context—where 'servant' was demeaning—and argues that in the gospel's new economy created by Christ's exaltation, serving God as his steward brings honor rather than shame
And in the time when Paul was writing 1 Timothy 3, choosing a title so Diaconus Deacon, it just means servant. Think about this. This is power and honor. Culture like this is choosing a pathway where you, you have on your name tag, servant would have been in that culture, fundamentally demeaning. See, we are so built up on Gospel presuppositions that we have some respect for people who serve. But in that day, it was not so. And so Paul is helping these men, at least men, perhaps women. No. Hey, if you decide to go down the pathway of servanthood and you're going to, you think that you will, you will be demeaned and looked down on, because who would want to be a servant? I want to be an overseer I want to be over, not under. And Paul's like, no, no, no, no. Remember, we live in a new economy created by Jesus Christ, who was crucified, dead, buried and raised and seated at the right hand of the Father and given a name that is above every name, upon which every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that he is Lord. So Paul's saying, like, don't think that being a deacon makes you a less than. It actually gives you incredibly good standing. And there was kind of one category for exception for servanthood in the ancient days. You were kind of a nothing. Just generally, if you were a servant, there's one exception, as if you were serving the servant of someone really important, right? And then you were considered a big deal. Deacons, those that aspire to deacons, you are God's butler, you are God's house manager, you are God's steward, you are God's servant. That's a pretty big deal. That's a pretty good standing. Deacons who serve well in that role will gain a good standing.
25 · Illustrates the paradox of gospel standing: even a wealthy, powerful CEO gains kingdom standing by becoming a deacon, showing that serving increases honor in God's economy
Think about it this way. We could have someone join our church who's a faithful Christian. He's a CEO or a tech founder, super wealthy, super educated, whatever. And the day that man, if he did become a deacon, he would gain standing in the kingdom of God. To become a deacon gives to gain standing.
26 · Expounds the second reward—great confidence in the faith—through a cultural-historical analysis: the shift from volunteer-heavy churches (1:300 clergy ratio) to professionalized churches (1:75 ratio) has produced spiritually weak Christians because serving is what builds confidence and strength
And then we see, in addition to gaining standing, Paul says that they will gain great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus. As I mentioned last week, if you want to stir your faith and feel greater confidence in the truthfulness of the gospel, get out there and serve. There's a study that has kind of rocked my world ever since I became aware of it a number of years ago. And it measured the number of clergy, paid clergy to church attenders over the history of several dec. Over the period of several decades. And did you know that back in the 1960s, the ratio of clergy to attenders was 300 to 1? So you had one paid pastor and you had 300 members. And do you know what that ratio is today? It's 1 to 75. What's happened? Think about this. Back then, the average pastor taught at least three times a week, often four. So he often led a Sunday school class, he often preached a sermon, he did a Sunday night service and a Wednesday night devotional prayer meeting or so on and so forth. This is how I started out. This is what I did when I started out. And so you had a pastor extraordinarily busy. How was he able? How were men Back then able to manage churches with 300 attenders, just with one clergy. Now think about the consequences of this shift. If you manage a business, if you're involved at any level of hr, you understand the outsized cost of payroll in any area, including church, right? It is expensive to hire people. It is expensive. So think about what's happened just to the church's finances, the big church, over the last four decades. We were once humming along with one paid pastor for 300 members, 300 attenders, it's different. And now we have to pay a pastor every time. We have 75 attenders, so to speak. Think of the financial consequence of that. Think of all the money that's not going out the door anymore. So what happened, friends, really what happened is the development of the entertainment and recreation industry that pulled massive volunteer labor out of the church and put them on the lake. Essentially what wound up happening was, is that there was a massive shift away from the church body doing the majority of the ministry work and the pastors doing the majority of the teaching. And so one of the consequences of this is that the finances of the church have just been completely backward for decades now. And the other consequences, of course, overworked pastors who are even more likely to stumble into foolishness and so on and so forth. Well, overworked isn't quite the right way doing a bunch of stuff that they might not be mostly called to do. And also because pastors are doing all these other things now, they're basically just majority of pastors anymore are just paid to be the kind of church members there were in the 1960s, 70s and 80s. Just the average church member now from the 60s or 70s is now sort of hired to do the work of the ministry. There's a financial consequence to that, there's a consequence to pastors. But honestly friends, the biggest consequence is, is that Christians who do not serve are not very strong, they're not very anti fragile, they're not very rigorous, they're really easily disrupted and disturbed and tossed to and frozen.
27 · Illustrates the fragility problem through the 20-mph car analogy: Christians who never serve have a faith that cannot handle stress because it has never been tested at 'highway speeds
Now you know full well that I've had a long history of cars, some of which are a bit sketchy. And friends, honestly, I think I want to just challenge you. Just carefully, if you told me that you have a great car but it can only go 20 miles an hour, you'd be like, well, I don't know how great the car is. You're like, I mean it can go $20 miles an hour and it's just like, it just hums along and it's wonderful. But it can't go too fast. I can't push it too hard, because then it all falls apart. Friends, many people think of their faith in those exact terms. The only reason they have a faith at all is because they are doing absolutely nothing in the world with it. They're like, I need massive amounts of rest. I need massive amounts of breaks. I need massive amounts of spiritual food because my car can't. My relationship with Jesus can't sustain highway speeds. Like, well, that's probably not true. And secondly, a real concern if it is.
28 · Expounds how serving produces confidence by reading Matthew 25:31-46 as a test: serving reveals whether you are a sheep or goat, not by earning salvation but by demonstrating God's work in you, which produces assurance
You see, serving is in many respects the greatest gift God has to give us in terms of giving us what Paul mentions here for deacons, a greater confidence in the truthfulness of the gospel. And if you will serve, if you will serve, God will keep you, help you to see that you're on the right side of the sheep and the goats. In Matthew 25, Jesus tells a parable. It's not a parable, it's a prediction. In verse 31, when the Son of Man comes to his glory and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people from one another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on his left. Then the king will say to those on his right, hey, come you. I'm very tired. I'm sorry. Come, you who are blessed. Hey, you. Come who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. Now you know this story, probably what separates the sheep from the goats. For I was hungry and you gave me food. I was thirsty and you gave me drink. I was a stranger and you welcomed me. I was naked and you clothed me. I was sick and you visited me. I was in prison and you came to me. And then the righteous will answer him, saying, lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you or thirsty and give you drink? And when did we see a stranger and welcome you or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or imprisoned and visit you? And the king will answer them, truly, I say to you, as you did it to the least of these my brothers, you did it to me. And those are the sheep. And then we get the goats in the next section. And Jesus is like, you guys aren't in. And here's why. When I was naked, you didn't clothe me. When I was in prison, you didn't visit me, and so on, and so forth. And they're like, when did we see you like this? And he's like, when you did not do it to the least of these. How do you have confidence that you're not a goat without serving? I don't know. Serving doesn't make you a sheep. It just reveals your sheepiness to yourself. It just reveals that God is at work in you. When Paul says in First Corinthians 15:10, I worked harder than any of them. Nevertheless, it was not I who worked, but Christ who worked in me. Paul is celebrating something he sees God doing in him and through him. This is how serving gives you great confidence.
29 · Expounds a second pathway to confidence: serving allows believers to see the fruit of the Spirit manifested in their lives under pressure, which is the only true test of its reality, producing assurance that God is at work
Here's another way of thinking about it. When you serve, you see the fruit of the Spirit in your life. Galatians 5:22. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control. Against such things, there is no law. And what I think people are thinking is, yeah, if I really avoid a ton of commitments and difficulties and really, really go out of my way not to be around people who provoke me and annoy me and bother me, then I can have the fruit of the Spirit. I can be patient when no one's around to test my patience. Like, yeah, your car is an awesome 20 mile an hour car. No, if you want to see whether you have the fruit of the Spirit, you have to engage in ministries that test the evidence of the fruit of the Spirit. This is what Paul's saying when he says, deacons gain great confidence. They serve and they see God serving through them. Friends, there are aspects of Jesus personality you will never experience until you start caring for other people like Jesus cares for them. Until you surrender to a life of service. Not pulling service opportunities from a menu that have been carefully curated according to your likes, interests and abilities. But hands God, just like I have. And so many a blank check and says, here you decide how much you decide when you decide where. Well, that seems scary, but it turns out it's the exact opposite of scary. It's the safest way to live. It produces the most confidence that I am not running in vain, as Paul would say.
30 · Illustrates a third benefit of serving through a historical example: serving helps God make sense of your story by revealing why God shaped you the way He did, though this is usually a downstream benefit rather than an immediate reward
And here's one other thing I'll leave you with. Serving will help you make more sense of your story than just about anything else. Why has God brought me through the things he's brought me through? Why is my life like this? I read recently of a guy who grew up feeling like a total oddball because he didn't have any interest in sports. He was completely unathletic. His dad was frustrated that he wasn't athletic. And so he just grew up feeling like a total oddball. He loved art and classical music and chess. Nerd. No. And he just always felt so insufficient. But, you know, he did his best. He knew God was calling him to serve. So he went through life serving and doing what he could. And one day, God called him to move to a country in Eastern Europe where ballet and opera and chess and math are everything. And suddenly this guy found healing for all of these hurts he had had and all these insufficients that he'd had for all of these years. Because not immediately, but eventually God put him in a place that said, see, this is why I raised you this way. This is why your story has the contours it did. Now, the problem with us is that we want that to be the first experience in serving. But that's something we get down the road after we become habituated to serving. But the truth is, is that the thing I'm finding as I get older is that among all the varied gifts God has for me in serving, one of them is, is that he is still making sense of my story. He is still making sense of this or that question I have about my past, this or that struggle, this or that sin, this or that disappointment, this or that trial or adversity. He's still making sense of all of that. But it's almost always within the context of putting someone else first for communion.
31 · Closes by reading Philippians 2:1-11 in full, framing communion as participation in the servanthood and exaltation of Christ, who both models and empowers the deacon calling through his redemptive work
Thank you for your patience for communion. I just want to leave you with Philippians 2. So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord of one mind. Do nothing from selfish ambition or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant. Being born in the likeness of men and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name of that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of the Father. So as you come for communion, today we gather in the name of Jesus, who did everything we're talking about. And not only did he do that so that he could be our model, but he actually did that so that he could buy you, redeem you, and fill you with his spirit. And it's that very spirit you'll encounter when you go out to serve your brothers and sisters. So in faith in Jesus, in faith in his provision for you through the Gospel, would you come now and partake of the table?