Sermon Tone Analysis
Overall tone of the sermon
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Introduction
Open with the story about Sas Conradie.
The widows
In the Roman world, widows were incredibly vulnerable.
They had no means of earning an income to support themselves.
Unless they remarried or a family member took them in, they could become destitute or fall into prostitution.
Jesus modelled abnormal respect and care for widows.
In , he happened upon a widow burying her only son.
Out of compassion for her, he raised the son from the dead.
In , a persistent widow heroically prevails upon an unjust judge to grant her justice.
In , a desperately poor widow shames the rich and powerful by giving her last pennies into the collection.
Jesus noted her generous faith.
Perhaps in response to Jesus’s known concern for widows, apostles saw it as the church’s responsibility to provide essentials for widows.
In , a dispute arises because one group feels that their widows are being skimped.
What we must not miss is that the church was providing for the daily bread of its widows.
This practice seems to have continued beyond the Jerusalem church.
Just over thirty years later, the church in Ephesus has a list of widows it has undertaken to support.
It seems that the widows on the list had vowed not to remarry and to dedicate themselves to prayer, but some had reneged on that pledge while others had become known as gossipers and busybodies.
Both actions brought shame on the church and undermined its witness.
Timothy needed to address the practical problem.
Paul wrote some instructions to guide his actions.
Essentially, Paul tells him that the church should support some widows, but not others.
A. The church should support some widows
1.
The church should support destitute widows
2. The church should support devout widows
3. The church should support elderly widows
(Since I was alliterating in “d,” the only synonym for “elderly” I could find that started with “d” was “decrepit,” but that is not the point.)
Jews considered 60 the start of old age.
The specific age might seem arbitrary, but it was probably not intended to be applied legalistically.
The ancients only had an approximate idea of their age.
We should also bear in mind that people did not live as long then, so life prospects beyond sixty were bleak.
The purpose of the age requirement is to ensure that those chosen are old enough to harbour no aspirations to remarrying.
Jews considered 60 the start of old age.
The specific age might seem arbitrary, but it was probably not intended to be applied legalistically.
The ancients only had an approximate idea of their age.
We should also bear in mind that people did not live as long then, so life prospects beyond sixty were bleak.
The purpose of the age requirement is to ensure that those chosen are old enough to harbour no aspirations to remarrying.
Jews considered 60 the start of old age.
The specific age might seem arbitrary, but it was probably not intended to be applied legalistically.
The ancients only had an approximate idea of their age.
We should also bear in mind that people did not live as long then, so life prospects beyond sixty were bleak.
The purpose of the age requirement is to ensure that those chosen are old enough to harbour no aspirations to remarrying.
4. The church should support exemplary widows.
In other words, the church should only undertake long-term support of widows who lived exemplary lives.
I have a slight emotional disease with this.
B. The church should not support other widows
There are some categories of widows that the church should not support.
1.
The church should not support widows who have other means’ of support.
This theme recurs three times in the passage.
The message is clear.
The responsibility to care for widows lies first and foremost with their families.
Even unbelievers accepted this.
Therefore, if a believer does not care for their widowed relatives, they behave worse than an unbeliever, bring shame on the gospel, and deny their own faith in Christ.
The church must care for some of the destitute, but it is not called to care for all.
2. The church should not support widows without proven character.
This idea rears its head twice in the passage.
1 Timothy 5:5:6
The contrast is between living in prayer and living for pleasure.
The allusion to living for pleasure may refer to promiscuity, but it need not do so.
The point is that the church should only undertake long-term support for those widows who have demonstrated long-term, whole-hearted devotion to Jesus Christ.
1 Timothy 5:1
This passage is probably the reason Paul is addressing the issue.
The dominant negative stereotype of women in the ancient world was that of gossips and busybodies.
Here it seems that the Ephesian church had unwisely undertaken to support some younger widows, who had brought shame on the church.
1
The
Some had abandoned their commitment, deciding to remarry.
Paul says, “Thus they bring judgement on themselves, because they have broken their first pledge.”
He is not talking about God’s judgement.
The idea is that they reneged on a public commitment, which brought society’s judgement down on them and embarrassed the church.
Others were bored and idle.
Being “younger,” instead of devoting themselves night and day to prayer, they were going from house to house spreading gossip and meddling in others’ affairs.
This too shamed the witness of the church.
3. The church should not support widows who are able to remarry.
At the time, both Roman and Jewish cultures advocated the rapid remarriage of widows.
Paul support the idea.
Instead of being idle, which gives birth to the sins of gossip and meddling, he want them to be occupied with good work that has eternal value.
They should marry, have children, and manage homes.
Far from being demeaning tasks, these are noble tasks with eternal value.
1 Tim
If you have read , you may find Paul’s counsel here contradictory to his counsel there.
There he advocates for unmarried Christians not to marry, but here he counsels them to marry.
The answer is simple.
If followers of Christ are so sold out to him that they want to spend all their time and energy on mission and ministry, they should remain unmarried.
This is the point of .
However, to marry and raise a family are the normal, godly role.
These are good works and come with the added benefit of keeping believers away from temptation.
There are three important sub-themes in this this text.
The family is responsibility to care for its members.
The church is not responsible to care for everyone.
The church must care for those widows who are truly alone.
The vulnerable
In the Bible, widows are one of the stand-out groups of vulnerable people.
There are five of them:
There are five of them:
The widow
The orphan (fatherless)
The foreigner
The poor
The weak
These groups are particularly vulnerable to exploitation.
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