1 Timothy 5.8-If Any Christian Does Not Provide For Widows Especially Those In His Family, He Has Rejected The Christian Faith And Is Worse Than An Unbeliever
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Thursday August 4, 2011
1 Timothy: 1 Timothy 5:8-If Any Christian Does Not Provide For Widows Especially Those In His Family, He Has Rejected The Christian Faith And Is Worse Than An Unbeliever
Lesson # 103
Please turn in your Bibles to 1 Timothy 5:3.
The apostle Paul in 1 Timothy 5:8 teaches that if any Christian does not provide for Christian widows especially those of his own family, he has rejected the Christian faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
1 Timothy 5:3 Honor widows who are widows indeed; 4 but if any widow has children or grandchildren, they must first learn to practice piety in regard to their own family and to make some return to their parents; for this is acceptable in the sight of God. 5 Now she who is a widow indeed and who has been left alone, has fixed her hope on God and continues in entreaties and prayers night and day. 6 But she who gives herself to wanton pleasure is dead even while she lives. 7 Prescribe these things as well, so that they may be above reproach. 8 But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever. (NASB95)
“But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household” is composed of the conditional particle ei (εἰ) (ee), “if” which is followed by the post-positive conjunction de (δέ) (theh), “but” and the nominative masculine singular form of the indefinite pronoun tis (τις) (teece), “any” and then we have the articular genitive masculine plural form of the adjective idios (ἴδιος) (ee-thee-oce), “their own” followed by the conjunction kai (καί) (keh), “and” and the superlative adverb malista (μάλιστα) (mah-lee-stah), “especially” and then we have the genitive masculine plural form of the adjective oikeios (οἰκεῖος) (ee-kee-oce), “for those of his household” followed by emphatic negative adverb ou (οὐ) (oo), “not” which is emphatically negating the third person singular present active indicative form of the verb pronoeo (προνοέω) (pro-no-eh-owe), “does provide for.”
The conjunction de is introducing a first class conditional statement that stands in contrast with Paul’s statement in verse 7, which has Paul commanding Timothy to continue making it his habit of passing along to the Ephesian Christian community the commands that he issues in 1 Timothy 5:3 and 4.
Therefore, the contrast is between the Ephesians being irreproachable as a result of obeying his commands in verses 3 and 4 with that of their bringing reproach upon themselves and the cause of Christ as a result of disobeying these commands.
The conditional particle ei introduces a protasis of a first class condition that indicates the assumption of truth for the sake of argument.
The idea behind the first class condition is not “since” but rather, “if-and let us assume that it is true for the sake of argument that, then...”
This would encourage Paul’s audience to respond and come to the conclusion of the apodosis since they already agreed with him on the protasis.
Therefore, Paul is employing the first class condition as a tool of persuasion with his audience.
Here the protasis is “if and let assume that it is true for the sake argument that someone absolutely does not provide for his own, especially those of his own household.”
The audience would respond that there were Christians who were not taking care of their parents and grandparents who were in financial need.
That this was going on is indicated by the fact that the church in Ephesus was suffering from poor leadership from many of their pastors who were in apostasy as noted in chapter one.
They were seduced by the Judaizers false doctrine, which was described in 1 Timothy 4:1-5.
This poor leadership not only resulted in ungodly conduct among these apostate pastors but also among those who obeyed their false doctrine.
Furthermore, the Pharisees, from whom the Judaizers originate, were condemned by the Lord Jesus Christ in Mark 7 for rejecting the commandment to honor their father and mother so as to obey the commandments of men.
Remember, Paul wrote Timothy to stop certain unidentified pastors in Ephesus from teaching false doctrine, which was the result of these apostate pastors being seduced away from the gospel by the false doctrine of the Judaizers.
Consequently, this led astray many Christians resulting in ungodly conduct.
Thus, the occasion of the epistle suggests strongly that many Christians in Ephesus were guilty of not taking care of their parents or grandparents financially and as a result were burdening the church.
This was the result of being exposed to false doctrine that was being taught by certain unidentified pastors in Ephesus who were seduced by the false doctrine of the Judaizers and thus had rejected the Christian faith.
Therefore, in 1 Timothy 5:8, the protasis of the first class condition is “if and let assume that it is true for the sake argument that someone absolutely does not provide for his own, especially those of his own household.”
This is a responsive first class condition as indicated by the occasion of this epistle.
This means that the audience would respond that there were Christians who were not taking care of their parents and grandparents who were in financial need.
The apodasis is “(then) they have denied the Christian faith and are worse than an unbeliever.”
The indefinite pronoun tis introduces a member of the body of Christ without further identification.
The verb pronoeo refers to caring or looking after those who are widows in one’s extended and immediate family with the implication of continuous responsibility.
The word’s meaning is emphatically negated by the emphatic negative adverb ou and means “absolutely not.”
Thus, these two words indicate in the protasis some Christian who “absolutely does not provide” for his immediate and extended family members who are widows.
The adjective idios refers to a Christian’s extended family since it stands in contrast with the adjective oikeios, which refers to one’s immediate family and corresponds to ekgonos, “grandchildren” in 1 Timothy 5:4.
Thus, idios corresponds to teknon, “children” in 1 Timothy 5:4 and refers to the members of one’s own immediate family.
The adverb malista is used to single out those who are members of a Christian’s immediate family, i.e. parents and is emphasizing the Christian’s responsibility to care for his own mother who is a widow.
“He has denied the faith” is composed of the articular accusative feminine singular form of the noun pistis (πίστις) (pee-steece), “the faith” and this is followed by the third person singular perfect middle indicative form of the verb arneomai (ἀρνέομαι) (are-neh-owe-meh), “he has denied.”
The verb arneomai means “to reject” and its object is the articular form of the noun pistis, which refers to faith in an objective sense and denotes that body of doctrine taught by the Lord and the apostles.
Therefore, the verb refers to the Christian refusing to obey the teaching of the Lord and the apostles, which constitutes the New Testament.
The term speaks of the Christian refusing to obey Christian doctrine, which requires honoring one’s own parents, by not supporting them financially when they are in need.
The word does not mean “deny” since this word implies a firm refusal to accept as true and Paul is speaking of a Christian refusing to adhere to the Christian doctrine to honor one’s parents by not supporting his mother if she is a widow in need.
The perfect tense of the verb is an intensive perfect emphasizing the present state of a Christian rejecting Christian doctrine as a result of the past action of not honoring one’s parents.
The middle voice is an intensive middle emphasizing their failure to take personal responsibility for their parents as a result of rejecting the teaching of the Lord and His apostles.
“And is worse than an unbeliever” is composed of the conjunction kai (καί) (keh), “and” which is followed by the third person singular present active indicative form of the verb eimi (εἰμί) (ee-mee), “is” and then we have the genitive masculine singular form of the adjective apistos (ἄπιστος) (ahpee-stoce), “than an unbeliever” followed by the nominative masculine singular form of the comparative adjective cheiron (χείρων) (hear-roen), “worse.”
The adjective apistos is used as substantive and means “unbeliever.”
This use of the word also occurs in 1 Corinthians 6:6, 7:12, 15, 10:27, 14:22, 23, 24, and Titus 1:15.
The adjective cheiron means “worse” and is used to describe the severity of the Christian’s rejection of the Word of God and in particular their rejection of the command to honor one’s father and mother by not providing for those widows in his immediate and extended family that are in need of financial aid.
The expression ἀπίστου χείρων implies that the unbeliever is characterized as taking care of the widows in their families when they are in need.
Knight writes, “Such a person is ‘worse than an unbeliever’ because Paul regards unbelievers as having ‘the word of the law written on their hearts,’ and therefore, even unbelievers are known to ‘do instinctively the things of the Law’ (Romans 2:14, 15; cf. also 1 Corinthians 5:1). Thus, for a professed believer who has God’s law (‘honor your father and mother’) to fail to do what even many unbelievers instinctively do warrants the verdict that he is ‘worse than an unbeliever.’” (Knight, George W. III, The Pastoral Epistles: A Commentary on the Greek Text; page 221; William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., Grand Rapids, Michigan/Cambridge, U.K., The Paternoster Press; Bletchley)