An Overseer, Then, Must Be...#1

This morning we're going to be studying the qualifications for pastors and elders. Last week we looked at verse 1 of 1 Timothy 3. This week we're going to be starting into the actual qualifications. What is the standard? What is the expectation? What is the benchmark for men who aspire to the office? We saw last week that a simple aspiration is not sufficient, but that a man actually has to possess certain character traits, certain qualities, certain gifts. to be able to be an officer in Christ's church. And so we're going to begin our study of those qualifications this morning. Now, as I was reading these, I recognized there's a bunch of them, 13 to be exact, a baker's dozen, and too many to study in one week and to do it well. And so we're not going to be studying all 13 of them, though we will read all 13 of them. We're also not going to be spending one week on each topic. So we're going to...

The goal is to take them in small groups. Some weeks we'll take two or three. Some weeks we might take four. Some weeks we may settle on one for a week as the need of our day arises and our need of instruction on that particular requirement exists. Now, before we get into reading these qualifications, you have to come into this realizing that these qualifications... are set out for men who are sinners and what's that mean it means that if you were to rank any one of any man on any one of these qualifications on a scale of one to ten there is not one man who would get a ten and so the judgment isn't pass fail it's not perfect or fail it's okay what's his trajectory where is he at where's he going does he possess the gift can he grow in it or not So judgments have to be made, and you have to recognize that these judgments are made about sinners. One of the hardest things you realize as an officer in Christ's church is when you have to make judgments as an officer of Christ's church, no time more acutely than at that point do you feel your own limitations and your own frailty. Because you realize you're a sinner having to make a judgment about someone else's.

life and practice or decisions that they've made, and you recognize, they're me. Part of the difficulty in doing the work of overseeing God's people is you identify with them and their struggles in a very intimate way. And one of the dangers is that God's people would say, these men are different than me. And I want to say to you from the very beginning, no, they're not. Not in the sense that they're less sinful than you. that their temptations are not as strong, or that they are somehow just of another class and they don't struggle and fall. We're sinners all the same. You remember in the Old Testament, these priests, these holy men, who was the first person they had to offer sacrifice for? It was for themselves. And then they could offer sacrifice for the people.

then they could intercede for the people. But first, their own sin had to be dealt with. So as we read these qualifications and as we study them, I want you to see that this is not setting out some other class of men, these spiritual Nephilim who are holy, unlike the rest. Overseers are sinners. And to some of you, that might be disappointing, but what I'd actually prefer it to be is encouraging. Because what man would aspire to the office if he thought that's not for sinners? It is for sinners. Because there couldn't be an officer in Christ's church if it wasn't sinners that filled the role. Is the fact that a man is a sinner mean that these qualifications don't matter? You say, oh, well, he's a sinner. You can't actually expect him to meet the qualifications. And I say, no, that's not true either. These qualifications actually are a standard. They are a bar. And there actually have to be judgments made about whether the man meets the bar. Knowing that he doesn't meet it perfectly, does he meet it sufficiently?

And you go, that's not very objective. And I say, welcome to leadership. So much of it is subjective. So much of it is gray and not black and white. So you have to live in the tension of it. That's the reality of leadership in any sphere, whether that's in the home, whether that's in the workplace, whether that's in the church, whether that's in the government, wherever it is. Leadership requires judgment. Leadership is far more subjective than we'd like it to be. And we can't do away with it. the difficulty by just making an impossible standard, because it only sets us up for pride in ourselves and to look down on everyone else. So as we study these standards, I want you to say, sinful men, by God's grace, can meet these standards, but it's only by his grace that they're able. Would you please stand now for the reading of God's word? From 1 Timothy chapter 3, verses 1 through 7, this is the word of the Lord, and it is eternally true. It is a trustworthy statement.

If any man aspires to the office of overseer, it's a fine work he desires to do. An overseer, then, must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate, prudent, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, not addicted to wine or pugnacious, but gentle, peaceable, free from the love of money. He must be one who manages his own household well, keeping his children under control with all dignity. But if a man does not know how to manage his own household, how will he take care of the church of God and not a new convert so that he will not become conceited and fall into the condemnation incurred by the devil? And he must have a good reputation with those outside the church so that he will not fall into reproach and the snare of the devil. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. Amen, buddy. Who was that? Was that your son? It was your son. It would be your son.

That's sweet. I was talking recently about interactions and sermons and the feedback that I get watching each of your faces. And someone was like, yeah, you mean like Luis. And I said, yeah, Luis is the most overt in his. You know what Luis is thinking. Because if he's here or there or wherever he's at, he'll tell you. He'll tell all of us at once. And it's sweet. So what I want to do is just dive in and start with the first qualification and say, what's it mean? All right? Our goal this morning is two qualifications. Above reproach, husband of one wife. That's as far as we're getting it, just so you're not sitting there wondering, how many are we going to get through? Just two. Just two. But my goal is to do a good job of it and to have us understand what it means and not just be like, well, I wonder what that means. I want to say, oh, I got a handle on it now. Okay? So what does it mean to be above reproach? Well, to start to answer that question, we have to figure out what reproach is. And it is a real question because how many of you use the word reproach in your daily life?

You don't. Dan does. Do you use the word reproach? Dan uses the word reproach. The rest of us don't. So what does reproach mean? Well, it means to, if something is reproachable, it means to evoke or cause a sense of disapproval or disappointment. Do you ever look at something and go, ugh, no, that's reproach. You look at it and you go, he shouldn't have got the promotion. He is a lazy dog. That's reproach. You say, that's not, they don't deserve that. They've done something that disqualifies them from that. I'm not happy about this decision. And so scripture says that an overseer must first be above reproach. Now we have to say, knowing what approach is, what leads to reproach? Well, most simply, basically we say, well, sin. Sin leads to reproach.

If you wanted to use a word that's more familiar to you than reproach, you should use the word scandal. Okay? Very close. Scandal, scandalous. Okay? What sorts of things are scandalous? This requirement says that an overseer must not lead a life of scandal. He must not do things that are scandalous, that are offensive to people. So what sorts of things are scandalous? How about adultery? That's scandalous, isn't it? If you found out one of the officers of the church was committing adultery, you'd go, he can't be an officer. Why? Because he's not above reproach. He's done something scandalous. Embezzlement, steals something, steals money. It's scandalous. Substance abuse. Some of those things are scandalous. Now, whenever we talk about scandal, you have to realize that different people will find different things scandalous.

So what ought we as Christians to find scandalous? Well, we ought to find the things that Scripture says are scandalous. We ought to be offended and go, ugh, at the things that Scripture says, ugh, about. Here's an example from Scripture about reproach. 1 Corinthians 5.1, Paul says this. He says, it's actually reported that there's immorality among you, and immorality of such a kind as does not even exist among the Gentiles. That someone has his father's wife. Now what is the scandal? Do you understand the scandal? You're a church, a church of Jesus Christ, and it is known far and wide, publicly, that you have in your midst a man who is having an affair with his stepmother. That is scandalous. Is that scandalous only to Christians? No.

What's the verse say? There is a kind of immorality such as does not even exist among the Gentiles. Even those who don't know God would not do the sort of thing that you have going on in your church. That's how scandalous it is. Even unbelievers know that ain't right. That's scandal. That's reproach. Anyone who heard about that sort of a sin would be scandalized, and they wouldn't have to be a Christian, right? Now I want to ask you about this sort of a test, these sorts of qualifications. Is it a once you're in, you're in? Or is this a continuing sort of test or bar? And we all understand somewhere inside of you, this is a perpetual bar. It means that at some point, a man may well have been above reproach, but then at the course of his life, he may have done something that was reproachable, that was scandalous. So what's that mean about his qualification?

It means he's no longer qualified. And so I want you to know as we go through these qualifications, it's something that you don't just look for at the beginning, but you keep tabs on. And if you were to look at all of these qualifications, you're not going to find that it's something that a man is and then is no more. What you find is that these are characteristics and attributes that that man is to possess for his whole life. So I want to ask you, are these requirements... only for elders. Well, it says if any man wants to be an overseer, does that mean all the women are exempt? Does that mean all the men who aren't officers are exempt? Well, it certainly doesn't. What it means is that these are basic Christian virtues and attributes that every Christian ought to possess. It's not okay for an unordained man to love money. It's not like, oh, well, he's not an officer, so it's okay. He doesn't need to be hospitable because he's not an elder.

No. But what it means is that when a man comes forward, there's going to be a judgment made about whether he actually possesses what all Christians should be pursuing or not. And that judgment is going to continue on as he rules over the church. And one of the things that will often happen is if a man comes into office and then does something that was reproachable, that was scandalous, the question will be, how come you didn't know ahead of time? He should have never been put into office. And my response is, how could I have known? How could we have known? He hadn't done it yet. And so actually this requirement that a man be above reproach is a requirement for all of his life. That he live his whole life above reproach. Not just before he's an officer. Not just when people are watching. But all of his life. All of his life.

And part of the reason it's important that we understand the term of these requirements is because you need to understand the consequence of if they're broken. I've known people, as an example, who've grown up as kids, and their parents were married. And then they reach adulthood, and their parents get divorced. And they find out things they never knew about their parents' marriage when they were growing up. They didn't know that there was... substance abuse. They didn't know that there was adultery. They just didn't know because mom and dad didn't ever deal with it until the kids were out of the home. Is that bad? What does that cause that child to go through when he's an adult and his parents get a divorce? What questions does he ask? The question that's very common for that child to ask was, was my whole growing up a lie? Was everything that I was told untrue? Can I believe anything?

Of what my parents told me and taught me. Or not. It's a very difficult, painful thing for a child to go through. Because these are the questions of ones like them that they have. The same is true in the church. There are things that are reproachable. And what do you want to do with the things in your life that are reproachable or scandalous? Well, if you're like me, you want to cover them up and hide them and bury them and wish them away and just let them fade off into the past. And when he says someone is to be above reproach, as a part of the examination, there are actually questions about your past. What have you done? What did you do? Is there anything we should know? Because there's lots of danger in not having those things addressed on the front side. It's very painful. Better that they are addressed later than not at all. But the pain is present. And so if a man is to be above reproach, he's to look at his life, not just what he's doing now.

But he's to look at his past. You know, if we went outside the church and we talked about reproach or disqualifying offenses, we'd recognize that the world has some concept of this, right? For instance, there are some jobs you cannot, are not allowed to perform if you've done certain things, right? Like you can't be a police officer if what? If you're a convicted felon. Just not allowed. Can't do it. You say, well, that was so long ago. And I say, it was. And you're not allowed. You actually lose a lot of job availability to you if you're a convicted felon. I'm not going to take the time to go through and enumerate them. But there's all kinds of jobs that's just like, nope, you're no longer allowed to even get in that industry.

And so when we think of something being above reproach, I don't want us to just think here and now and in the present. I don't want us to think just like in the future, but we actually have to look into the past and say, have you done something in the past that is scandalous, that would be a scandal if the people found out? And you realize that in the course of life, we all have things in our past that the people around us don't know about or don't understand because they weren't there at the time. They didn't walk through it with us, but it's there.

They're the things we don't want anyone to know about because they're scandalous. Even though it happened a long time ago. Even though it may have happened before we were Christians. We have to recognize there's still an association, a scandal, and a what with things that have happened in the past. You did what? And so to be above reproach is a high bar. And the measure of it is if that knowledge of that behavior, even if it was in the past many years ago, Would it be scandalous? If it would be, then there has to be a judgment made about whether or not the man is qualified. And you may say, well, he didn't know anything. Well, he did that when he was a kid. But I tell you that now to say most of you are quite young. The vast majority of us aren't even 50. You're young. You have a lot of life ahead of you. And the things you do now will have lasting implications in your life.

And this is true not just with regard to coming into office in the church. It has to do with your marriage. It has to do with your work. It has to do with your children and your grandchildren. The things we do crop up later in life in some ways or another. And so the encouragement to you, especially to those of you who are young, is bear that in mind. That the things you do now won't just go away. You tell couples when they're single. When they're getting married, you say, be pure. Be pure. Because if you're impure, you're going to carry that with you for decades into your marriage. It will not go away. Getting married will not change the impurity. And they say, what? It's so hard. And I say, and what I've said to numerous couples, I said, listen, if you never kissed her again until the pastor says you may kiss your bride, you will not regret it after you're married. You will not regret it.

You will be thankful. And they're just like, oh. And I say, you're going to go, oh, the rest of your life about your lack of discipline right now. Be above reproach. Don't give yourself to the fleeting pleasures of sin because they will have a cost that lasts. And when a man comes up for office, these are the things that get talked about. Now, do you go through every little detail of every little part of his life? Inevitably, you don't. You can't because he's a sinner. And we'd be here until, you know. until everyone just got tired of it because he has a whole life of sin and bad decisions and failures behind him. And yet there are things that as you comb through a man's life, you pick up and you go, that's scandalous. If the people of the church knew, they would be scandalized by it. That's the sort of stuff we're looking for.

Now, one of the things that will come up in this discussion of scandal or reproach is, well, what if they repent? What if they did something and they repent of it? And I think that too many Christians have been hoodwinked by what repentance demands or what it makes available to you. If you worked at a bank and you stole money, you used to work in a bank, what do even tellers, they have to be bonded, right? Before they can handle money. They have to go through the training of sorts, and at the end of it, they have to promise, I'm not going to steal any money. Yeah, that's right. So if they do, they're fired, and what else? Are they done working in banking? Yeah, they're done. But they repented of it, and they paid it all back, and everything was done. Now can they go get a job in a bank? Sure can't, even though they repented of it. It's done. And it's hard for us in our own hearts and in our society to take hard,

definite, lasting consequences for brief actions. You say, but he repented. If a pastor gets caught in adultery, what should happen to him? He should be removed. Now, we don't need to know all of the details. You're immediately suspended. You are no longer allowed. And you're not going to come to church and talk to the people about it. You're not allowed here. I mean like that. You're not allowed. And then what? You're going to sort through the whole thing. What's the pastor want? He wants to repent. He wants his job back. Maybe not at that church, but he wants a job somewhere else. Now, should another church hire a man to be their pastor who's an adulterer? You're like, I don't know. I feel like you're being too general. Isn't there ever a case when maybe you should? And I say, yes or no. Don't make all of your decisions based on the outliers and the extremities.

Do you want a pastor who's an adulterer? No, you don't. You don't want the worst men to be the ones who keep watch over your souls. You want the very best men to be the ones who keep watch over your souls. Do you understand that? You want the men who've lived the most exemplary life, not the ones who've got scars all up one side and down the other from all of the sins they've committed. The most exemplary men will have plenty of sins to tell you about from their own life. You want a man who's above reproach. Another way of saying it is that an officer's godliness really is important. And the reason it's important is because all of the people who feed from their hand take his life as an example. And if they know in the back of their mind that he did this thing, it will affect their own temptations. You actually want a man who's been faithful to his wife. You actually want a man who's not stolen. You actually want a man who...

isn't struggling with substance abuse. He's not going to be helpful to those of you who struggle with it. An officer's life is an example. Even as we read in 1 Peter this morning, he says, show yourselves an example to the flock. Paul tells Timothy just in the next chapter of this book, 1 Timothy, he says, let no one look down on your youthfulness, but rather in speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity, show yourself an example of those who believe. An overseer actually isn't just qualified by his ability to meet the requirements because the people are watching. I remember when this first made sense to me and scared me. This church was very new. I don't remember if we'd started having Sunday morning services or not, but we were at Joseph Bailey's house for small group or for church. I don't remember which. And there was this young couple that was coming. And I had known them previously. They were friends.

And they were asking, they had young children. He was asking a question about his young child. I don't remember if they just had their first baby or something. But what he said during his prayers, he says, help me to be a father like Dave Abusar is a father. And the hair on the back of my neck stood up. I didn't want him to say that. Are you kidding me? What do I know? I've got young little children. What do I know about this? What I learned in that moment was that the people look up to you. And they don't learn everything you teach only. They also learn what you do. They watch what you do. And then they think, well, I guess that's what you're supposed to do. So it actually matters if the man is above reproach or not because the people are watching and they're learning. And they're making judgments about what's godly and what's not and what's acceptable and what's not based on the life of the men who rule over them. So you want those men to be above reproach. But it's not the congregation only that watches. Who else watches?

The world watches. That man, in a particular way, if he's an overseer, he represents Jesus Christ in a way that a regular layman, a congregant, doesn't. If people say, you're a leader in the church, you're not just one of the followers, you're one of the leaders. He has a greater burden of responsibility to represent Christ well. And it's even more difficult because Satan does actually get after the leaders harder than he does the regular people, if we're honest. And I tell you the truth, if you aspire to being an officer in Christ's church and being an overseer, what you aspire to is a greater attack from Satan. Not an insurmountable one. God's grace is sufficient. But you will face a more difficult fight in your life. You will suffer more. You will sacrifice more. That's the nature of the work. And yet these men are to be above reproach. The fact that their temptation is greater does not mean that they're allowed to have more sin. They're not.

The people of God, as well as the world, are looking on to see. What kind of man is he? What kind of God does he serve? So you want men who are above reproach, the very best men. If a man's behavior is scandalous, the people will suffer, and Jesus' name will be maligned and blasphemed as a result of that man's conduct. It's quite a heavy burden, but it's glorious when you see God work. I can tell you that it's harder work for an elder. or a pastor because they face greater temptations, and that's true, but they also have the benefit of seeing God work in people's lives up close and personal in a way that the rest of you don't either. It's very sweet that they get to see repentance, and they get to see growth and holiness, and they get to see confession of sin. And so there's great benefit that comes with it. So that's what it means to be above reproach, at least in part. Now we move on to what it means to be the husband of one wife. And this is something that there are various...

What does it mean to be the husband of one wife? Well, simply you'd say, yep. If a man says I'm married, he goes, yep. I remember a man one time, we were doing the test that I told you about. It was Dan. He's raising his hand. When our elders were coming through, we made, you guys went through a six-month class, right? Weekly, during men's Bible study, Daniel, Abram, and Dan are original elders. And Luis as well, though he became a deacon. Six months. weekly, for an hour and a half with Joseph. And Dan's like just getting beat up, just pummeled. Do you know what it means? Do you know what you're getting into? Are you fit? Are you qualified? Are you sure you want to do this? Are you going to want to do it when it gets hard? One of the things that they got asked was they took the qualifications. Okay, scale of 1 to 10, rate yourself. And they're all like 4, 5. Yeah? Yeah. So then we come to...

husband of one wife, and finally all the men are like, yes, yes. And so Dan went, yes, a 10. He pulled his score way up. But it's because he didn't understand what it meant. He thought, I'm married. I did it. Just one wife. But as we got to talk about it, Dan went, oh, that's not all it means. It doesn't simply mean, oh, he's married to one wife. What did it mean in the original context? Well, first, what it meant primarily was that he only had one wife. As opposed to two or three at the same time. At Paul's time, polygamy was very common. So do we need to talk about polygamy? Well, it's not legal right now, is it? Right. Abram's going, yes, yes, talk about it, say something. And it will. But it's going to anyway, not just because Abram asked me to. I have notes about it. Polygamy is sin. It happens to be illegal right now. It wasn't illegal at this time.

But it is a deviation. It is a perversion of God's intent for marriage. And of the men who are being watched as an example, they ought to do what God says at this point. They ought to be the husband of one wife. And you might say, well, that's not even, I mean, how, I can't. I'm not going to marry two women. Some men would laugh it off and say, one woman's hard enough. Why in the world would I want another one? Some women are thinking, well, I would never share a man with another woman. It was interesting when I was reading about about this. John Calvin was talking about it, and he says, this practice has to die, and the church has to lead in it, and part of the way it's going to die is that the second wife has to understand the misery she's signing herself up for, because women are nothing but jealous. This is what he says, and it's true. Women don't want to share, and they shouldn't want to share. They're men. No, I don't. I think she doesn't want you to gain any more weight.

I know she says that. That's why I'm telling you guys. You're all offended. I know what his wife says. So this was a wicked practice at the time. And Paul says, if the men who are going to lead the church are going to do a good job of it, then they need to be faithful at this point. They need to have one wife. And you say, well, that's not really an issue for us. And I say, if I'd asked you five years ago, if you thought gender reassignment surgery was going to be a thing, what would you have said? How about men winning? athletic events in women's divisions. Do you think that would be a thing? A worldwide thing. Do you think that would be an issue if I'd asked you five years ago? You'd have been like, you've got to be kidding me. This is impossible. How about Target letting boys go into girls' restrooms? Did you think five years ago this would be an issue? And we'd all be like, no, no, no, no. Well, guess what?

It was not that long ago that we were not having those conversations. And so if you think polygamy, just because it's illegal and it's not in vogue right now, is something that we just don't have to ever think about and worry about as Christians, you have your head stuck in the sand. The husband of one wife, literally one wife. Christians may not marry more than one woman. May not. May not. Now why were all the Jews at this time, why did they think it was okay? The patriarchs. Oh yeah. Abraham. Isaac, Jacob, what was true of all of them? David, Solomon, they all had multiple wives. They thought, well, if the patriarchs did it, now what are we supposed to learn from that? That it's okay to do what the patriarchs did? No. What we ought to learn is how easily sin gets a foothold in a society and corrupts the entire thing. Well, the patriarchs did it, so they all did it. And so Paul comes in and he says, uh-uh, not in leadership in the church. If we have to suffer this perversion in the people,

We will not suffer it in the leadership. They will be the husband of one wife. Because that was God's original intention. You say, what do you mean? And I say, in the garden, when God instituted marriage, one man, Adam, one woman, Eve, forever. Until they die. That's the model. And you say, I'm committed to that. And I say, I know you're committed to it. But if and when it becomes a question in our society. you'll see how committed you are to it and how well you understand it and what you're willing to say against it. Let transgenderism be a warning to you of how much pressure you'll feel to capitulate and take heed now and know that it's not God's design for a man to have more than one wife. Now, there are other issues surrounding a husband of one wife. The question of divorce. We talked about it a little bit earlier. You can have two wives at one time. That's polygamy, and that's a no.

Can a man have a wife, be divorced, and get married again? Can he be an officer in the church? That's a real question, isn't it? It's a hard question. In most situations, a divorce and remarriage should be prohibitive. And there's a cost to me saying that. In most cases, if a man is divorced, he ought not to hold office in the church. And if I ask for a show of hands of how many of you know men who hold office in the church who have divorced and remarried, I bet most of you would raise your hand. And part of the reason is because when you ask this question, you have to discuss the circumstances of the divorce. Can a man hold office in the church if he's a believer and his wife's an unbeliever and she's divorced him and left him? Does he fail to meet the requirement? Well, you realize that's not as easy of an answer as he committed adultery and took another woman but then repented of that later. If a man just decides, I'm tired of my wife and I went and found another woman and I divorced my wife.

But I've repented of all of that. You might say to that man, no, you can't be an officer in the church. What if the man wasn't a believer? What if he was early on in his life and he got married and divorced and there wasn't adultery or anything, just got a divorce, didn't like each other. Society didn't help them say, no, you can't do that. They weren't a part of a church. No one was helping them say, no, you can't do that. You need to work it out. But later on in life, much later on in life, they've repented. They've been married. They've been married 20 years, 30 years, raised a family.

Can he be an officer? I don't know. I don't know that he's unequivocally prohibited, and I don't know that he's unequivocally admitted. I think that the men who are making those judgments are going to have to examine that particular man and the circumstances of his divorce, and they're going to have to process that question carefully. And they're going to have to process it in part about whether or not it would be scandalous to the people. And that's hard work, isn't it? That's hard work. If you've known people who've gone through a divorce, maybe it was your parents. Maybe with someone else, his friends. Does it have a lasting effect on them? Yes. Do you think it will affect their ability to rule and to lead when they're caring for people who are having marriage trouble? It will have an impact. It doesn't mean it's insurmountable necessarily, but you have to recognize that that will have an impact because they've been there. And so it has to be taken under careful consideration.

to ensure that that man's leadership at that very point, if he's an officer, is not compromised because of his past. It also, I can tell you that if that man ever is to become an officer in the church, it should never be hidden from the church. It should just be set up front. Bill is up for nomination for elder, and we recommend him, but we want to talk to you because Bill is divorced. And there ought to be real room for the congregation to know exactly the terms of Bill's divorce and what happened with Bill and how Bill has come from where he was to where he is and why he's being recommended in spite of his divorce. If he's being recommended. You understand? It won't be scandalous later because everyone will know. They'll know exactly what they're getting into. And that would be good. What about single men? They're not the husband of one wife. They're not the husband of any wife. Can they hold office in the church?

It's another hard question. And it's not just an up or down, yes or no question. Can they hold office? Yes, perhaps. Do any of you know what the percentage of likelihood of marriage is? Like people are going to get married. What percentage of people get married? The vast, vast, vast majority of men get married. Okay? Now, if a man's not married, should it raise a question in your mind? Yes. The answer is yes. What question should it raise in your mind? Generally speaking, is something wrong with him? And particularly, is he homosexual? You should ask the question. Is he tempted that way? You're sitting here and you're just like, I can't believe you'd ask that question. And I'm telling you, men like to get married. They generally like to get married. And if a man makes it into his, you know, I'm not talking about a 22-year-old guy who just got out of college, but he's also not up to be an officer.

I'm talking about a man who in all other ways would be qualified to be an officer of the church, but he hasn't seemed to get married yet. It should be asked of him. If by his late teens and early twenties a man hasn't shown interest in women, in marriage, in relationship that way, the question arises naturally. And we're all going, well, who do they think they are to make such judgments? And I go, they just have two eyes in their head. Does it mean he's necessarily homosexual? Should you go around talking about him that way? No. But somebody ought to ask the question. Do you want him being your youth leader if that's the way he's tempted? No, you don't. You don't. Do you know how many homosexual men fled to the priesthood of the Roman Catholic Church so that they would escape the pressure that Luis is talking about of society to get married? Very, very common. Has it been good? No, it's been terrible.

And so when you look at this requirement that a man be the husband of one wife, you have to actually look at him and say, why isn't he married? Maybe he's just terrified of women. And that's true increasingly in our society, that men are afraid of the rejection of a woman. And they'll get into their late 20s and early 30s afraid of a woman telling them no. He ain't cut out for leadership in the church then. Because if you think a wife will bring conflict, you should try being an officer. So generally, yes, you ask the question, is there something wrong with him? Is there something preventing it? And particularly, is there a temptation, a hidden temptation of same-sex attraction that's preventing him? And it's not so you can lampoon him and rake him over the coals and make him feel terrible. It's so that you can minister to him. Give him a place to repent and to grow. And say, office isn't for you right now. You have to remember that God said it's not good for a man to be alone. And so when a man's alone, you have to ask why. You really have to ask why.

of your officers, and you have to actually answer why. Not just ask, well, why are you single? Oh, I just haven't found a woman yet. Are you looking? Do you want a woman? Are you just too doggone selfish to take on the responsibility of a wife? You can't be an officer if you're afraid of responsibility of a wife. You just can't. Later on, it comes to saying that the man must manage his own household well, with all dignity, keeping his children in control. Because if he can't do that, how's he going to rule over the church of God? If he can't exercise leadership in his own home, if he's afraid of the responsibility of a wife, he's not fit for office because he will not take on the responsibility of it. What else about being the husband of one wife? How about various types of sexual sin? Say, well, I've never married. I've just got one wife. I've never married. Are there sexual sins that would keep a man from holding office in the church? Uh-huh. You want a man with a pornography addiction being your pastor or elder?

Do you know how many pastors and elders, when they're asked anonymously, admit to having those sorts of troubles? Well over 50%. Do you want that kind of man caring for you and your wife and your children, your husband? Do you want that man helping your husband with purity? He might not be that much help. The reason I'm going into all of this is because this question, this qualification, is speaking not just to whether a man is married and has a ring on his finger. It's actually talking about sexual fidelity. And again, you want the best men. They're not going to be perfect. There's not a man in this room who can say, I scored a 10. No sexual deviancy in me anywhere. You're just lying. It's not true. And yet, there has to be a judgment made about the nature of the man's sexual deviancy. Present and past. And there has to be a judgment made. So as we go through these, you start to realize how difficult it is.

what the responsibility is, how important it is that the men who keep watch over your souls be qualified to do that work. That it's not a simple work. Could you imagine sitting and being asked personally and actually having to answer the questions I'm talking about now? Could you imagine being a 30-year-old man and having to sit in a group full of men and having them say, are you tempted? And being expected to answer and tell the truth. And if they didn't believe what you said, having follow-up questions. If a man won't submit himself to that sort of scrutiny in his own life, he's not going to do your soul any good. Because he has a principle against hard questions. And every one of you needs to be asked hard questions. All the things you want to skirt and scream away from and, you know, I know, well, you know, and it's hard, you know, and you know. No. You need a man who's going to say, set that all aside. You know what I'm asking you. Tell me the truth. Please. For your soul's sake, tell me the truth. I'm not going to run away. I'm not going to hide. I want to know the truth.

A man can't ask you that sort of question if he's compromised himself. It's a big deal what Paul's telling Timothy here. There's something to reach for and to aspire for as men. There's something to want for you women and your husbands and your sons and your brothers. Maybe God will call them to office. Maybe he'll call you to office. Maybe he won't. But this is not only true of pastors and elders. This is true of all Christians. They ought to be these things. They really ought to be. And so you might think, well, I'm glad I'm not an officer. I'm glad I don't have all that pressure on me. And I think, you're setting yourself up for more pain later. Because this really is the standard. What we're talking about here is an examination to see if the man meets the standard. It's not that there's a special new standard for them. Every man ought to aspire to these things, whether God calls them to office or not. You follow? That's really humbling. Kind of heavy.

And this is where the grace of God comes in and comforts us and holds us up and strengthens us and shores us up to be able to stand. Because if not, you're just going to despair. We've only talked about two of them. Are you ready to say uncle yet and say, ah, just no. You think it's hard for you, you should try being me. Having to stand up and tell you when I'm sitting here looking at 60 sets of eyes going, so do you mean it or not, Dave? This is our life as Christians. You don't have a private life that's secret and silent and hidden away from the eye of God. You just don't. Or at least you won't when you stand before God. All of the secrets of your hearts will be revealed. Everything that you've done in private will be broadcast on the rooftops. There will be no more shadow to hide in. Better for us to know that now, to repent of our sins, to confess our sins, and to seek the...

seek healing and mercy in the blood of Jesus Christ than to hide them our whole lives live a life of of being eaten from the inside out how David describes when I kept silent about my sins my bone wasted away within me that sort of life better to have it out now and to say you know what I've done something scandalous through tears and weeping I've done something scandalous and I need help you don't have to be an officer to say that sort of thing We all ought to have that in our minds, that there are times when we're going to need to conduct ourselves just like that. Here I am, and here's what I've done. There's no more half glancing blows and half truths. Here's the scandal. Here's the sin. Here's the struggle. What do I do now? Yeah. Yeah. Nope. And so this is the reality of a Christian life, the confession of sin. Your elders are not going to be perfect.

We're going to learn all kinds of more ways that they do fail. You want men who rule over you, who know their sin, and who repent of it, and who trust God, and who lead you to do the same thing. Because that's what each one of us needs. Let's pray.