“A Charge for Church Order” 1 Timothy 2:1-15

Well, let’s take now and turn to, once again, the Epistle of First Timothy. I think it’s a wonderful book. This was a book that my pastor, Nile Fisher, at Emmanuel Baptist Church in Dayton, Ohio, he loved this book, and Second Timothy, and Titus, called The Pastoral Epistles. Because these are, in one sense, these are letters written to me. and to us, Pastor Ryan and I, and the elders. This book is written to give us a wisdom and a sense of not being forgotten on how to conduct church and the things that are important to God concerning a church.

And we live in a day when churches want to be, well, they want to be cutting edge. They want to be on the right side of history. There’s an awful lot of contemporary churches that want to avoid being old-fashioned. Well, I don’t think that something old-fashioned is good just because it’s old-fashioned. But when you talk about old-fashioned, that means like being like it should be in the good old days. Well, how far back do you go to be in the good old days? 1900? Well, there’s a lot going back there that I wouldn’t want to be like. Do you go back to the 1800s? Well, depending upon how far back you go, some of those people and some of those churches were really messed up.

And some of my, you know, I always, in my historical, which is not my wheelhouse, I’m not gonna go say any more than that, but back in the early 1800s, the way that even Christians treated Native Americans was not very nice. And may I just simply say, not very Christian. And then if you go back to 1700s, well, they had battles and you go back to the 1400s, no, that’s not good at all. And so how far back do you wanna go? Well, I’ll tell you how far back I wanna go, the first century. What did the Apostle Paul say? So this morning, when I say that we wanna take a look at the local New Testament church, according to what the Bible says. I’m not just wanting to be a conservative, fundamental, independent, old-fashioned kind of Bible preach and Hellfire Brimstone kind of a church, although those are all nice adjectives and ideas as far as what a local church ought to be. But in this particular passage, we have the inspired, holy, inerrant, sufficient, and this is the important word this morning, authoritative. Word of God. And I will just be really right up front with you that there are passage or there are sections of this passage that we’ve already read and that we’re gonna take a look at and to see the organization of it that flies in the face of churches not far from our location. And all I wanna say is, well, they are not following what Paul wrote to Timothy.

Now, they may get around it in other ways. Well, he was just writing to that church. Well, it says, therefore I exert first of all, and then he goes on, and he mentions this in all these different places. Verse eight, I desire therefore that men pray everywhere. And the idea there is, is that everywhere meaning in every one of the churches. And so this is a broad ecclesiastical statement, a broad ecclesiastical epistle that Paul is giving Timothy, not just for the church at Ephesus, but he wants this reproduced as the letter will eventually be passed around. In the epistle that he wrote to the Ephesians, there’s a section that some newer translations put in parenthesis, it’s called En Epheso. which means in Ephesus, and the reason why it’s in parentheses is not to bring question of whether it’s inspired, but it was written because that’s called an encyclic letter, that when an apostle would write a letter and when the churches recognized it to be an authoritative, inspired letter, they would pass it around, and they may take that section and then put, instead of in Epheso, they might put in Thessalonica, And so it isn’t just the church that we would call Ephesians, but it was the letter first written to the Ephesus church or in Ephesians, but then it was to be passed around to the others.

And that brings us to what we take a look at and say, how did the original readers interpret the passage? That’s how we come to some of the knowledge of the truth. It’s our hermeneutic or science of interpretation. We’re gonna need that in several places in the passage here today. but what makes up a good local New Testament church? Another proof that this is exactly what the Apostle Paul is doing here, if you look at chapter three and verses 14 and 15, these things I write to you, though I hope to come to you shortly, but if I am delayed, I write these things so that you may know how you ought to conduct yourself in the house of God which is the church, the ecclesia, the called out assembly of believers, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and the ground of truth.

So how you know how to conduct yourself, what church is supposed to be like, what is, you know, it’s going to look different in Europe. than it might be in Africa, than it would be in Australia. And so this doesn’t limit and say every church has to be a ditto or a carbon copy of everything exactly the same. But there are some identifying marks of what makes up a good church. So if you by chance find yourself moving away and you gotta go looking for a church, What kind of a church do you look for? Do you want to know what their youth program is? That’s kind of funny because the Bible doesn’t say anything about youth programs or anything else. What makes up for a good church?

Well, we saw in chapter one after he introduces it and talks about some of the bad doctrine that is going to come about. Verse three, for example, it says, I urged you when I went to Macedonia, remain in emphasis that you may charge some that they teach no other doctrine or no other teaching. And then he shows the flip side of that in verse 10, after he goes through a list of sins that are condemned, And he says, verse 10, for fornicators and sodomites, for kidnappers, for liars, for perjurers, and if there is any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust. And chapter one is a section that says that if a church is to be a church, if a church is to have an identifying mark, of local New Testament identity, he gives a charge concerning sound or healthy doctrine. What does a church believe? What is the doctrinal statement? Are they holding to the truth? And that becomes an extremely important thing. It doesn’t talk about whether the church uses drums or not, or whether they have electric guitars, if they’ve got lights and all that kind of thing. But what do they preach? Do they stand for the truth? Are they preaching God’s Word? Are they just trying to be on the good side of history?

And so you could take a historical look in the early part of the 1900s, how churches gave up on sound doctrine. They became more interested in keeping people happy. They became extremely pragmatic that if it works, do it. The proof, if God is on your side, is if your church is growing and you have a big church. Well, if that were the God-given criteria than Jehovah’s Witness and the Mormons and the like. They’re doing pretty good, but yet they don’t have sound, healthy doctrine. In fact, they are apostate at best. They’re pure, simple blasphemers in so many areas, but yet they’re bigger than so many good Bible-believing churches and denominations. And so size. is not the property that’s never mentioned here. But what about healthy doctrine? Now, that assumes that we know what healthy doctrine is.

Well, he says it there according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God which is committed to my trust. When Pastor Ryan’s gone through 1 John, he has mentioned several times about what do you believe about Christ? And those if Christ did not come in the flesh, then you’re not of God. Well, OK, that’s that he was human. But it goes on also in the Gospel of John. In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and the word was God’s such was in the beginning and the word became flesh and dwelt among us. So the flesh. He was truly flesh, he was human, but he was also God. And anyone who doesn’t believe that is not of God. and has to stand for that. And then there’s other, what does the church believe about sin? What does the church believe about the Holy Spirit? What does the church believe about salvation and how one is saved? And on and on, those kinds of doctrines have become important.

So a mark of a good, healthy church is a church that has a good doctrinal statement, but not only that, that actually believes it and preaches it. And so doctrine or teaching and the relationship of the word of God is a mark of a local New Testament church as per what Paul says in chapter one. Now we come to chapter two and it’s kind of an application of that. Hence we see that first word therefore he’s going on and says now because sound doctrine becomes important he’s going to come into an area of practice. And the practice really comes down to two, well, really three different ways, and today what I wanna do is look at three important areas of Paul’s instruction concerning public worship. But it boils down to, first of all, what a local New Testament church, therefore, because they have healthy doctrine, they are a preaching church. There’s a charge concerning prayer. and preaching’s gonna come later on, but there’s a charge concerning prayer. Is this a church that prays?

Secondly, there are directions given concerning men in public worship and concerning women in public worship. And it’s gonna go on, and when we get to the women, that’s where it gets controversial today. and I know Al Mohler gets in trouble apparently every time he says this on his podcast, that this is a reason why we do not believe in women preachers. It isn’t the fact that women can’t preach. Some may be able to preach actually better than men, but that’s not what determines it. What determines how and who is supposed to be preaching is what does the word of God say? And when it says very clearly in our passage that we’re gonna see today, let a woman learn in silence with all submission and I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man but to be in silence. Were there any words there that you didn’t understand? And some say, but as soon as you get the but, then you know that they’re not going to follow what the Bible says concerning directions and women and the preaching ministry of a local church. And where that is really wrong is not the pragmatic, where it’s wrong is it’s not healthy doctrine. And he gives reasons for that, and we’re gonna see that very quickly this morning.

And so this morning, we need to always, as Fellowship Baptist Church, we ask ourselves, are we a doctrinal church? Does doctrine mean something here? Do we preach doctrine? Well, we strive for that. I mean, we’ve just had a series on the Trinity and we’ve gone through and tried to have a Christian worldview with respect to world vision and Christian ethics and a worldview. Doctrine is important here and we want to fight for good, healthy doctrine in the church. But what is our practice? How do we want to conduct ourselves? And so this morning in chapter two, He gives us these three important areas, and they’re broad areas, but they’re important areas in Paul’s instruction concerning public worship. And the first one is he gives us directions concerning prayer.

Now on Wednesday night, since it’s our prayer meeting, I went through some of this, and so I’m not going to spend a lot of time here, but realizing not all of you were in that special service on Wednesday night, we’re going to quickly go through this. But it’s some directions concerning prayer, and in this section, the first seven verses, he talks about different kinds of prayers. types of prayers, the object of prayer, who do we pray for, the motive of prayer, why do we pray when we pray, and then the provision of it all, what is the foundation of it all, and that would be where the good doctrine comes in.

So notice what he says there in verse one, that tells us different types of prayers. Therefore, I exhort, first of all, so this should become important, First of all, in worship services, that all supplications, prayers, and intercessions, and the giving of thanks be made for all men. So one of the marks of a local New Testament church is it’s a church that prays. I always appreciate it when people tell me I’m praying for you. I hear you say one to another, we’re praying for you. Frank Murphy knows that we’re praying for him. that we pray for our elders, we pray for our deacons, we pray for the Sunday school teacher, we pray for those that have particular needs and so forth.

So a church needs to be known for prayer warriors, to be known for praying. I mentioned on Wednesday night that we’ve had visitors come and they will say, do you have services on Wednesday night? And I’d say, yeah, is it called a prayer meeting? And I said, yeah. They said, well, do you actually pray or do you just have a sermon? And that was telling because they said, I’ve been to a prayer meeting and they only prayed at the beginning and the end. And that was it. They didn’t really pray. And so, we need to make sure that we spend time in prayer. Sunday school classes have the initiatory announcements and then they pray for one another, they receive prayer requests.

Well, here he then lists four different kinds of praying. The first is supplications. He says, I exhort therefore, first of all, that supplication, supplications means a request for one’s own needs. Some people never share a prayer request, yet they have some tremendous needs. They sometimes might hide behind, well, I’m afraid what other people will think. Well, God’s people, if they’re spiritual people in a local New Testament church, they’re not gonna think less of you if you have particular prayer requests. How can we pray for you if you don’t tell us something? As pastor, I have had people come to me and say things like, well, I suppose that you know that I’m really going through a really hard time. And I go, no, you’ve never shared that. How can I know? Am I supposed to take it in by osmosis? You know, do I have the gift of prophecy or something? I don’t know. What do you expect? And so, but this is, the term supplications means a request for one’s own need. And so we go to God, one for another, for particular needs of different brethren. And when you pray, that you can pray and request for your own prayer. It’s not just a private thing.

That second word there is prayers. And that particular word is used with respect to the concept of reverence or worship. It was a very broad term. It is our approach unto God with reverential trust and, as it were, throwing ourself upon the mercy of God. Praying should be worshipful. A prayer is talking to God. It is a talking to God, realizing that it’s God that you’re talking to. It deals with one’s spirit and how you approach God. Some like to get around the fact of trying to wanna be cool or contemporary. Well, let’s go into the great big daddy up in heaven and let’s pray. That’s blasphemous. That is not going into the presence of God with a sense of reverence to remind ourselves the fact that our God is a consuming fire. He’s not a big daddy. He’s not, and even in bringing our requests to God, he’s not the great big Santa Claus up in heaven that is to give me my desires because it says you have not because you ask not.

So therefore I should be able to pray. But rather it’s going with a sense of reverence. When Jesus was teaching his disciples to pray, what did he say? Our Father who art in heaven, Holy, Hallowed, holy is your name. The name represents the person of God. That we go until we realize that we come unto him and we can make our requests known, you know, give us this day our daily bread and so forth. But it’s also your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Now just that concept shows the greatness of God. That God is in control of all events. That God is the one in control that has a will. And that we can go and we first of all don’t order God. Prayer is not talking to God and giving him orders. Prayer is with a sense of reverence bringing our supplications and our petitions. And we realize that who he is, who we are, and we want his will to be accomplished.

I heard different ones contemplating and discussing this whole thing about in the assassination attempt. And I just really couldn’t believe my ears when I heard different ones talking about it. And they said, when Mr. Trump made the comment that I am here standing by the grace of Almighty God. And someone said, he should never have said that. That is terribly narcissistic, that he was thinking that God is the one that intervened for him. And I’m thinking, You know, how do you even get around that? Like you just want to see how. And then they say, because there was a man who was killed. Well, that’s like, then should we never pray for the ill and the terminally ill because they might die anyways? You see, it is just it loses sense to what and who God is and when we pray what we ask.

We pray to a holy, sovereign, reverent God, and it’s his will that we pray for to be done on earth as it is in heaven. And a sovereign God, realizing we may or may not get the answer to prayer. And so this idea of supplications, making special requests, but it must be an attitude of prayer of reverence and worship when we do that. And the third word that he uses is intercessions, and that’s making requests for other people. And then he gives us a list here in just a little bit of who individual people we can pray for. But he mentions something that oftentimes we forget. and that is, and the giving of thanks or appreciation to God for his mercies. Philippians chapter four and verse six talks about that. And thankfulness and a sense of a lack of thankfulness in praying is a mark of the last days. Second Timothy chapter three verse two, we’ll see when we get there.

So we should pray. We should be a local church known for praying. There should be a sense of reverence in our praying. There should be the uplifting of our individual needs, the individual needs of other people. We are a church that prays, prays for others with thanksgiving, for the sovereignty of God to move and then he gives a list, and when I was saying that we need to see how did the original hearers get this and so forth, and I think that becomes evident, but it’s not verbal, but you can read into it, and that is this, when it says, and the giving of thanks be made for all men, And that means for all kinds of men, and that’s the way that it’s phrased there, thanking God for the poor, for the rich, for the slave, for the slave owner, because keep in mind, that was a reality. Philemon, the book of Philemon, in the midst of all of that, these churches had all of that. But we pray for politicians and non-politicians. We pray for all kinds of men. And then, no doubt, in the first century, there would have been this light bulb go off in the mind or into the thinking of the people. I gotta pray for all kinds of men.

Well, one person I’m not praying for is the king or for Nero. And what does the verse two have? Thanksgiving be made for all men or all kinds of men, for kings. This even includes Nero, who killed his own mom, who told lies at how Christians had started the fire and burned down so much of the populous area and brought so much grief to the people of that day. You pray for him. You see, to be a church that will pray for a Donald Trump but we’ll also pray for a Mr. Joe Biden. One who doesn’t forget Kamala Harris. You may have disagreements with any or all of those people, but they are men and women in places of authority. We need to pray for them. They are going to be judged by an almighty God and they need our prayers.

Our president is not in good health. I think everybody recognizes that, that’s willing to be honest. And I’m not saying what ought to be done about that, I’m just saying as a statement of fact, he’s not in good health. We need to pray for the health of our president, and we did on Wednesday night. And so, because God saves all kinds of men, he saves all kinds of women, Some who just want to go around saying, well, I’m a good Catholic, and yet they don’t believe or practice what any good Catholic believes, but it doesn’t make any difference. They need our prayers, whether you like their policies or not or whatever. So we’re to pray for all kinds of men.

Different names that have just popped up this week when it talks about Wayne Gacy, We need to have, of course now it’s too late, can’t pray for him, but did we? Ted Bundy, if Hitler were alive, we need to pray for him. He was a wicked, wicked man. He needs our prayer, he needed our prayers. He died in his sins and went to a Christless eternity. He’s in underneath the wrath of God right now. but good churches that were trying to be biblical in their prayer lives, they should have prayed for him. Pray for the kings, for kings, for all in authority, that they may lead a quiet, that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and reverence. And that’d be one reason why is to pray for them, but then also if they realize we’re praying for them, they basically leave us alone. For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior. And then it goes on into this what some count as controversial, who desires all men to be saved. But you see the term all has already been used when it says that we give thanks for all men Now there’s some people in Australia that I don’t know.

So that’s not all men inclusively, it’s all men that is of all kinds. And so it continues on in context for this is good and acceptable in the sight of God, our savior who desires all kinds of men to be saved. Even Nero, even corrupt leaders. and to come to the knowledge of the truth because the gospel will save all kinds of people. And if you think about it, realizing if you want to get theological that God saves the elect, but we don’t know who the elect are. So how can we just pray for the elect? We don’t. We pray for all men without distinction. And we pray for them and God desires all kinds of men without distinction to be saved and to come to the knowledge of truth. And then the basis of that is, and the basis of our prayer is, is that there’s one God and one mediator between God and men, the man, Christ Jesus.

So the object is all men without distinction, all kinds of men, not just our type, even Nero, he needs prayer. It’s evangelistic praying. The motive of the prayer is because it’s good and acceptable and pleases God, that it’s consistent with God’s nature. The provision of the prayer is in verses five and six and seven. It’s because that there is a God and that there’s a mediator between that God and man. And that person is Jesus Christ. And he gave us the basis of that. We can pray for them because he gave himself a ransom for all. for all kinds of men to be identified in due time for which I was appointed, Paul says, a preacher and an apostle. I’m speaking the truth in Christ, not lying, a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth. So his first point and the first charge concerning public worship is prayer. Prayer should be incorporated throughout ours. That’s why we have a pastoral prayer. That’s why we have a prayer meeting, our Sunday school classes and so forth. They pray. That is something that is true for a local New Testament church. How do they pray?

Then after that, Verse eight has another, therefore, I desire therefore, and this is what I desire to write unto you, I desire to see in your church. We already saw that he’s planning on going there, but if he’s detained, he wants them to have this. Therefore, what? Now that he says, I want you praying, he gives more information. I desire therefore that men pray everywhere. lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting. And then he goes on to the role of women. Men only get one verse here, but chapter three is gonna get more into men. He gives a direction or a charge concerning men in public worship.

Now, there’s several things there that become important. I will therefore, I desire that the men, The term men there, in the Greek language, there are a couple of words for men. One is anthropos, which can be a very broad term that means mankind, and that includes men and women. There’s another one that is called aner, and that means, I like to refer to this as men meaning a Y chromosome. What it means is men as opposed to women. Now, there’s so much I could say here. Let me just say, in local New Testament churches, they know who men are and they know who women are because there’s only two genders. The Bible is clear on that. And so there’s men and women and we have particular roles that are God given and need to be recognized, especially in public worship service. The word here is on air. So what is he is saying is I desire therefore that men and he’s excluding or in opposition to women, I will therefore that men pray everywhere, meaning in everywhere in all the individual churches. So men are to be the ones who pray in public worship services.

Now, I mentioned this on Wednesday night, That is not saying that men or that women cannot pray at the family meal. That’s not a public worship service. This is everywhere, local churches. This is instructions for local churches. That’s the reason why when I pray, all you women get a free card that I’m not gonna call on a woman to pray for the offering. or to close the service. And the reason for that is, is because of a verse like this, I will therefore that men pray. That’s not saying that women can’t pray, that women don’t have access to God. That is showing that there is to be a certain order of local New Testament churches when they conduct their services. But it goes on with further explanation. When he says I will therefore that men pray, everywhere in these local churches, lifting up holy hands without wrath and doubting. Now that has led some to believe that when we pray, we should raise our hands. Well, the words do mean raising hands.

Now, it can mean that, but the lifting up of holy hands has also, when it says holy hands, means non-sinful, or this idea was really unpolluted, or washed hands, or qualified, that when men pray, that they lift up their prayers with the sense of having dealt with their own particular sins. And he mentions the two here, without wrath and without doubting. And the word doubting means without dissension. And so this is the idea of praying and realizing that this is a holy activity. Now, part of the raising of hands was an activity as part of the worship of Old Testament, and where a priest may pray with his hands upheld, it does convey the idea, not of showiness, but rather of being willing and able to receive the blessing of God. Now, many contemporary churches, they have taken this over so that they want to raise hands when they sing, The Bible doesn’t really address that.

Definitely, the Bible does not require that. We’re kind of a non-hand raising kind of a church. And unfortunately, we may tend to be a little bit judgmental in all of that. I don’t think that there’s anything wrong with the raising of hands. It can be an act of praise be unto God. A lot of times, preachers, even where they’re not raising hands, do so with a benediction. and it’s the idea of the benedicting and to me that’s almost whether you practice that or not, I think that’s kind of a non-issue personally. What I would tend to just say is if you’re gonna do it, do it with some sense of consistency and that’s what I’ve not seen oftentimes in public worship services where I’ve been where people raise hands. They may sing a verse of a song and a part of that verse they raise their hand, the next time it comes, They don’t. I’m thinking, well, was the first one more spiritual than the second? I’m too analytical. I’ve gotta have reasons on why people do what they do. And I keep looking at that and it doesn’t seem to make sense.

Or sometimes I’ve seen it where people have raised their hands when there’s been something that is said or done and it wasn’t very spiritual. And I’m thinking, did you really pay attention to what’s going on? But this idea is that I will therefore that in public worship services that men pray. And they pray as it were, at least reflecting over the Old Testament, with hands raised, holy, cleansed, and making their bold approach unto God. Now that’s what’s to happen. Then you would second guess that then he goes on to the third area of direction, and this is the area concerning women in public worship. And notice what he says, in like manner, also, with respect to praying and with respect to local churches everywhere, that it’s his desire that, and he basically divides this up into two sections. One is concerning dress and appearance. And the dress and appearance is seen in nine and 10.

In like manner, also, that women adorn themselves with modest apparel, with propriety, with moderation, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly clothing, but which is proper for women professing godliness with good works. Well, let me, there’s a lot contained there, but let me just say, a woman ought to be known for her character, not for what she wears or the kind of hairdo she has.

Now, again, one has to put this into a historical context. It’s not condemning the braiding of hair as per what we might think. Then that became a very, very showy thing, and they would actually braid things in the hair. And it became an ornament of who has the greater hairdo. or the best braiding. Back in the day, this was towards the end of, I think of that, women used to wear a lot of hats to church.

Now some did that out of a conviction on head covering. I do find it interesting, head covering is not mentioned here. It wasn’t his will that all women wear head coverings in all of the churches. but in Corinth they did and that has its own little thing. But the idea here is that you be known for your character and your good works for which proper the women professing godliness with good works. They’re known for their character and not for what they were wearing. In other words, this is good instruction. The women who are welcome to worship services are the poor and the wealthy, Because you see, these churches and these women were also coming and lived in, Ephesus was a very wicked town. Diana, a lot of temple prostitution and a lot of wicked sexual passionate kind of things were going on. One man put it this way, that going to church should be no dress parade. They’re not to be known for the external. The word there to adorn, it has the idea of cosmetics to arrange or to put in order. The hair is meant or to bring self-attention. The jewels were to help bring the attention to as it would be braided within the hair. The idea is to draw attention to self.

When we gather, others should see Christ in us. He goes on and says that it be modest apparel. That is a hapoxlegomenon. He picked an interesting word, but it was a word that simply meant not something that would raise the passion. Now, there are some places that will give strict guidelines. We it’s not I that’s not something that we would do but it is something where some have done like especially in Florida said no No sundresses that are sleeveless and large armholes so that one can see if the hands are raised or are moved to be immodest or the shortness of a dress If you’re, so women, I’m sorry, this is just what the word means and this is you need to hear. If your dress or lack of brings attention to your body, you maybe ought to reconsider not wearing that dress and wear something has a little bit more or shorts. I think it’s wrong to then say, well, it’s gotta be finger length.

Well, some people have super long arms, and what do you do with a person who’s got short arms? There’s no consistency in all that. And the legalistic thing like that is not necessarily a good way to go. But if you, and today, I went to a place yesterday, and there was a girl that had shorts that were so short, and then she had tattoos, And I’m not gonna get into the whole thing of tattoos, but the tattoos were on the legs of the shorts that were too short. Now, I am just gonna simply say that if she ever appeared here and wanted to join, I’d have a talk with her, or I’d have some woman talk to her. Because you see, that does break this. A local New Testament church is not a place where you come with super short shorts, and tattoos that draw attention to pull your eyes to a direct area. Now they may think they’re cool, they may think and you know, and they would be welcome to come. But they’re not welcome to show. Because the showing is going to keep other people from being able to have a reverential prayer life. Because men are depraved but also men have testosterone and some things are just natural.

So that even the inerrant word of God’s got to give some instruction to women. And so it’s important to understand that when we gather in the Old Testament worship, the priest dressed a certain way. Dress is to be important here. We’ve kind of lost that. We gather to the audience of one. And we’re not going to become a legalistic church to say, well, you got to wear a tie or you got to do this or that women can’t wear pants or anything like that. But there would that girl would have been a lot more modest if she would have pants on. And so what we do and how we gather in our appearance now, there are some who may not come and don’t know the Lord and they are welcome to come. But then we, if they were to come again or if they want to come consistently, someone needs to talk. And then be willing to buy more clothes if they don’t have the money to buy clothes. So the concept of being modest or discreet and so forth is part of when you gather. So again, in like manner also, it is I desire that women everywhere, according to the early verbal grammar discussion, that they adorn themselves with modest apparel With propriety, what is proper? With moderation or with modesty? And then he goes on and says, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly clothing to bring attention, which is proper for women professing godliness with good works.

So he addresses the issue of appearance. But then he goes into the area of teaching. and goes to this idea of dominion, and it’s where he’s gonna lead it to, and he says, verse 11, let a woman learn, they should be in worship services, they should gather together in co-ed services and so forth, let a woman learn in silence with all submission, and I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man, but to be in silence. There’s no way you can read that and say that women preachers are okay. But there’s more reasons why we do not believe more in, or that we don’t believe in women preachers, because chapter three, in the qualification of overseers, elders, bishops, the episkopos presbyteros poimen, the office and role of a pastor, preacher, that all of those things are in masculine. He’s to be, to rule his own house well. Women are not to be ruling in the house. and so forth and all those different identifications that clearly in the qualifications, the biblical qualifications of womanhood or of eldership, they all refer to men. And so she is to remain quiet, not having authority, but to be in silence.

Now, that’s not to say that you can’t vote. They did the raising of hands. They probably didn’t give an eye or whatever. They didn’t know what Robert’s Rules was and everything. It’s just not that dogmatic kind of a thing. But it’s talking about the teaching role, that there are roles of men and women. Equality as far as access to Christ, salvation, and so forth, but he doesn’t want them praying or teaching men. And then he gives two reasons why in verses 13 and 14.

Now I will be first to say, I don’t know that I would have come up with these two reasons. But this is the inspired, inerrant, holy, authoritative, sufficient word of God. The two reasons he gives why women are not to preach and women are to remain silent and to recognize male role leadership in the local church. The first is the order of creation. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. I, you know, first time I read that, I go, okay, that’s true, I believe that. But I find it interesting, outside of the fact that God made them in that order on purpose. Now, many churches that believe in women preachers also do not have healthy doctrine. Generally, many of them don’t believe in two genders, and so they’re off-base there, non-biblically. But not only that, that when they see women, Adam was first, and then Eve, most of those don’t believe in a six, literal, 24-hour-a-day creation week, because they’re not reading their Bible and taking it literally. They probably believe in day age, gap, probably not gap, almost nobody believes that anyway, day age, or they just believe in the straight evolution, and that God used evolution to get men and women here and to get us here, and they don’t take Genesis 1 seriously, and they don’t have healthy sound doctrine.

May I also say, the Apostle Paul appears that he did believe in a literal Adam and a literal Eve, just by making this as an illustration. And so, God created men, Adam first, then a woman, and for that reason, men ought to lead in the local church. That’s what the Bible says. He also gives a second reason, and Adam was not deceived but the woman being deceived fell into transgression.

So it’s the order of creation and the order of the fall. Now Adam really blew it, because he did it with his eyes open. Eve did it and she was deceived. But that was good enough for becoming a reason why the Apostle Paul would say, I’m avoiding saying that all women are easier to deceive than men. because men are just as easy to be deceived, but that didn’t have a play out at the fall. And God has said, Eve fell first. And I do not want women to preach in the church and to lead men. Gender roles, complementarianism, and the role of men and women, we are equal in our God image, we are equal in our, but that doesn’t mean we are all equally fit for the same job.

And that really flies in the face of DEI in the world today, where everything is supposed to be the same and we all qualify equally the same. Not according to this. So the reasons given, order of creation, the order of the fall. Now, Paul must have anticipated, well, that’s gonna cause problems to say that. And so we have verse 15, but then he just raised more questions, and we’re gonna look at it Wednesday night. Nevertheless, she, and that is women, will be saved in childbearing if they continue in faith, love, holiness, with self-control. In other words, A woman is delivered from stigma. She is elevated in influence because she can give birth to babies. What on earth does that mean? Saved in childbirth.

Well, we’re going to consider that Wednesday night. But let me just wrap it up to say this. Will we be a church that follows biblical directions? John Knox in his prayer life said, give me Scotland or I die. George Whitfield said, give me souls or take my soul. Henry Martin said, I cannot endure existence if Jesus Christ be so dishonored with my lack of prayer. But we have the ministry to minister. Will we ever have or consider calling a woman to be the pastor of the congregation? Well, I would hope not because the Bible says that’s wrong. Does that mean that you can’t have a woman missionary? I know where the questions are going. Does that mean that a woman missionary that may be single and on the field cannot come back and give a report? She’s not preaching, she’s reporting. Does that mean that Sunday school is the same? That’s not a local New Testament worship service.

So this is where you have to say, he’s talking about individual churches as a worship service. Are women invited to lead the entire congregation including men? The Bible becomes clear. Women teach women and women teach children. But women are not supposed to teach men. Now, I have to say that because that’s what the Bible says. If you have a problem with that, you have a problem with the Bible. That doesn’t make women substandard. In fact, he tries to elevate them. But will we follow that? The Apostle Paul thought it was important enough. Sound doctrine follows over to sound practice. Chapter three, he’s gonna go in sound leadership. So we’re gonna have a whole chapter on qualifications of who the leaders are. Bishops, elders, pastors, and deacons. Now he’s gonna mention women and the whole thing. Is there an office of a deaconess? We’ll maybe talk about that a little bit. But this is what Paul had on his mind on what the churches would be like if they’re gonna follow.

You see, if you give on this sort of thing, but then what do you do when there is no other name given among men whereby we must be saved except at the name of Jesus Christ? We’re gonna give on that? You can’t pick and choose on what the Bible says at what, how, and how we’re going to conduct ourselves in a local church. May we be found faithful.

Let’s pray. Our Father in heaven, May we have a ministry of passion, a passion for the holiness of our God, a passion for people and ministering to people and seeing them born again, and a passion, a passion for the word of God as he gives us instruction, realizing that Those who know Christ have obligations to hold to these things. We may have unsaved and people of the world that come in. May we show mercy and grace and kindness, but Father, may we also show a tenacity for holiness, for godliness, for propriety, and Father, most of all, a passion for our great God. Father, if there be someone here today that knows not Christ, may they see that we desire to be biblical, but we desire to please our God most of all. We pray these things in Jesus’ name, amen.