Sermon Tone Analysis

Welcome/Notices

Praise: Come O fount

Prayer

Hope church kirmuirhill

Ian Watson — clerk.

Kim & family struggles.

Sean Ankers & Gin.

Here next week.

Building.

Sactuary.

Cafe & manse in progress.

Five new members, one by profession.

Thailand, four boys out.

Grieve loss of one diver earlier in the week.

Pray safety for rest.

Floods & landslides in Japan.

Scores dead.

1.5m must leave home, further 3m advised.

Airlifts.

Jesus shall reign where’er the sun

Reading

King of Kings, Majesty

Introduction

We’re still under the broad heading this evening of church as family.

Remember the first few verses of the chapter set out that paradigm, the broad strokes of how members of the church should treat one another.

Paul then dives into three specific groups; so far we’ve looked at widows in the church, today he’s considering elders, and then there are a few verses in the beginning of chapter six about slaves.

So today, elders.

Those charged with leadership in the family.

As verse 17 puts it, those who direct the affairs of the church.

Paul gives three instructions when it comes to this group.

Firstly, they are worthy of double honour, verse 17. Second he considers the situation where there are accusations against an elder, whether true or false.

Finally verses 22 to 25 are concerned with the ordination of elders — specifically, when should it happen and why?

Remuneration

First up then, the elders are worthy of double honour.

The language here is reminiscent of that used to begin the section on widows.

Just as they were to be given recognition, to be honoured, so are the elders.

Now, the Free Church tends to refer to ‘ministers’ on the one hand, and ‘elders’ on the other.

We often talk about these as two separate groups of people, and indeed in some churches, very sadly, we we find elders who seem to think it is their job to keep the minister in check, and ministers who seem to think they do not need the elders, that they themselves always know best.

That is not a healthy attitude, of course.

And part of where it comes from is a skewed idea of this distinction between elders and ministers.

The New Testament simply does not talk about two clearly distinguished classes.

So when verse 17 here refers to elders, it clearly means both those who we tend to call ‘elders’ and those we call ‘ministers’.

You may remember, for instance, from chapter three, that all overseers, that is all elders, are to be able to teach.

There is not a fast distinction between the elders who direct the affairs of the congregation, and ministers who teach.

No, elders must be apt to teach.

That is because ‘directing the affairs of the church well’, verse 17 here, necessarily implies teaching.

The church is directed by what it believes.

You cannot lead without teaching, without telling people what God says.

There are lots of different ways of doing that, teaching doesn’t always mean standing in front of the whole congregation and talking for half an hour, it can be the quiet word in a time of difficulty which helps you to find a new perspective.

Teaching happens in lots of different ways.

But the elders of the congregation are collectively given responsibility.

The elders will give an account before God, , for those God has entrusted to their care.

It is right and proper that the elders be honoured.

They are worthy of your respect.

So all elders are to be able to teach.

All elders are worthy of your respect.

And yet, this verse does also speak of a distinction of some kind.

There is a reference here to ‘especially those whose work is preaching and teaching.’

There is a recognition here that there are different tasks, and particularly greater and lesser amounts of time given to those tasks.

It is certainly the case now, and it seems here it was the case then too, that different elders were giving more or less of their time to the work of teaching.

The word for ‘work’ here is often used of physical, manual labour.

Paul consistently uses this word to refer to the work of ministry, because he wants people to recognise the effort involved.

He wants those God has called to this work to recognise what is expected of them.

This verse, along with many others, shows us that there is no place for laziness in the life of those who labour to direct the affairs of the church, those who work in preaching and teaching.

Paul would heartily rebuke a minister who filled the charicature of ‘working one day a week’!

Paul wants ministers to recognise the labour to which they are called.

And here, Paul also wants the church to recognise the labour of its elders.

And the particular application at this point is that they therefore deserve to be paid.

If the church wants ministers who will labour to preach and teach well, if we wish to have men devote themselves to long hours of extensive preparation, if we wish them to teach often, then their expenses will need to be met.

If their labours are to be to the extent that they do not have time to earn a living in other ways, they must be paid by the church.

Paul supports this principle with a verse from Deuteronomy which says an ox is entitled to eat when it labours on the farm, and a saying of Jesus which we’ll come to later on in Luke.

Here is where we end up with a functional distinction between those we call ministers and those we call elders.

Leading well will necessarily involve teaching.

But that does not mean that that burden will be equally shouldered.

If we are to have any men in our churches who have spent a few years studying God’s word full time, learning Greek and Hebrew, taking the time out to think things through deeply, it will be natural for them to take on the bulk of the teaching.

The church can be well served by well-educated men.

We tend to call such men ministers, in the Free Church.

But the distinction between ministers and elders is one of function, not one of identity.

The reason why we pay ministers and not other elders is to give them the free time to be able to prepare to teach regularly, not because they are more inherently deserving.

Now, money was a problem in Ephesus.

When Paul gives his requirements for overseers and for deacons back in chapter three, both are exhorted not to love money.

But the false teachers have been preaching for financial gain.

Paul will say in chapter 6 that

but that does not stop him here indicating that teaching elders should be paid for their efforts.

For the person who does not love money, and is not greedy for gain, it will not be a problem to be paid for their labours.

So what difference does this make for us here today?

Because the Free Church of Scotland pays its ministers from central funds, and all ministers receive an equal stipend, I can’t be standing here asking you to give me more money.

It doesn’t really work that way.

So why bother talking about it at all?

Well, because the money that pays my stipend does ultimately come from you.

The Free Church system, we give money from our congregational accounts into the central accounts each month.

We pay what’s called the ministry levy, then there’s the admin levy, and then contributions to the mission board funds.

The ministry levy is designed to cover the cost of me being here, from salary through National Insurance, pension and whatever.

The admin levy pays for us to have staff in the office, and in the seminary too.

A massive, massive proportion of the budget of the Free Church nationally goes on personnel.

Which is a good thing.

But what that means is, it’s a good thing that we pay money into central funds.

I’ve not yet been in a congregational meeting here at Covenant church, but I’ve sat in plenty of others over the years, and it’s all too common to hear complaints about the amount of money being sent to central funds.

Well, my suggestion is that these few verses mean we should do that gladly.

You should be pleased to be paying for the cost of me being here.