Download 2017 04 09 Men and Women Together in Christ

“Men & Women Together in Christ”
“Fight the Good Fight” 1 Timothy Message Series
April 9, 2017
Pastor Mike Clark
Today we examine some of the most controversial verses in the Bible. These verses cause a great
deal of debate and confusion. Let’s hear what all the fuss is about: 1 Timothy 2:8-15 Therefore I
want the men everywhere to pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or disputing. 9I
also want the women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, adorning
themselves, not with elaborate hairstyles or gold or pearls or expensive clothes, 10but
with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God. 11A woman should
learn in quietness and full submission. 12I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume
authority over a man; she must be quiet. 13For Adam was formed first, then Eve. 14And
Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a
sinner. 15But women will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love
and holiness with propriety.
There are 4 startling teachings of Paul in these verses.
1) Men are to pray by lifting up holy hands.
2) Women are not to wear elaborate hairstyles, gold, pearls, or expensive clothes.
3) Women must be quiet in church.
4) Women are saved through childbearing.
Now, we have some choices to make about these teachings. The first choice is to ignore the verses,
thinking they are old-fashioned and no longer relevant. However, we cannot do that as we believe
and have experienced the Bible to be God’s Word of Truth; His manual for living with Him and each
other. So we need to deal with these verses.
Our 2nd choice is to take these verses literally and obey them as Biblical teachings. If we do so, it
means the following: Every time a man prays, he must lift up his hands or it is not a prayer. No
woman follower of Jesus can wear rich hairstyles, jewelry or clothes. Women cannot talk in church.
Women are saved through childbirth so those who don’t give birth to children cannot be saved. I
think I can accurately say that no person in this room chooses to take these verses literally. The men
in this room don’t always pray with lifted hands and the women in this room don’t follow the other
three teachings. So we have a problem with taking the literal choice.
There are some people who do take these teachings literally. Some groups of Jesus’ followers don’t
allow women to wear fancy clothing or jewelry. One of my grandmothers was in such a group. Her
father was pastor of a church that taught that women had to wear plain clothing and bonnets on their
heads. Talking of her childhood, my grandmother would always remark how she detested bonnets.
Other groups of Jesus’ followers don’t allow women to teach in church or serve as officers. They use
these verses as key teachings on their decisions. Yet, most of these same groups don’t make the men
raise their hands every time they pray. They choose which teachings to take literally and which
teachings to not take literally. That is not right. We can’t choose which teachings to follow and ignore
the rest. Yet this happens all the time. Parents do this with children. They share Ephesians 6:1-3 with
their children: Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2“Honor your father
and mother”—which is the first commandment with a promise— 3“so that it may go well
with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.” Yet these same parents often ignore
the next verse, 4Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the
training and instruction of the Lord. We cannot choose verses we want to follow that best serve
our desires. If we believe the Bible’s teachings are the Word of God to be taken literally, then we
must follow every one of them.
No one follows all the teachings of the Bible literally. We certainly don’t follow many of the Old
Testament teachings, such as this one from Deuteronomy 21:18-21. If someone has a stubborn
and rebellious son who does not obey his father and mother and will not listen to them
when they discipline him, 19his father and mother shall take hold of him and bring him to
the elders at the gate of his town. 20They shall say to the elders, “This son of ours is
stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey us. He is a glutton and a drunkard.” 21Then all
the men of his town are to stone him to death. You must purge the evil from among you.
All Israel will hear of it and be afraid. I am sure many of us are glad that rule was not followed
when we were teens.
We don’t follow all the teachings of Jesus literally. Jesus, as recorded in Matthew 5:29-30, said, “If
your right eye causes you to stumble, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you
to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. 30And if
your right hand causes you to stumble, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to
lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.” If we took these verses
literally, then we would all be blind and without hands. So our choice to take literally every verse of
the Bible, is not really a choice for us, nor should it be.
So, what can we do? How do we deal with these troubling verses or any other troubling verses in the
Bible? Our 3rd choice is to deal with them in the ways Jesus and the Apostles intended us to
understand them. Followers of Jesus understand the teaching of the Bible by some clear principles.
Let me list them and then apply them on these verses in 1 Timothy. The basic principles of
understanding the Bible are:
1) Always read the teachings in the context of the immediate verses around that passage. In other
words, don’t take a verse out of context. One man was looking for direction for a difficult decision. He
wanted to follow the Bible’s counsel, so he took out his Bible but did not know where to turn. He
decided to open his Bible, place his finger down on whatever verse and do what it said. He opened
the Bible and his finger fell on the verse, “And Judas hung himself.” Not liking that verse, he tried
again. This time his finger landed on the phrase, “Go and do likewise.” He tried one more time and
the verse said, “What you must do, go and do quickly.” So much for taking a verse out of context.
Read it in the immediate context of the other Bible verses around it.
2) Always let the Bible interpret the Bible. If you have a hard time understanding something in one
book, see what the rest of the Bible teaches about that topic. The Bible has a lot of teachings about
how to pray or how women should behave that can help us understand Paul’s teaching here.
3) Try to understand the specific situation that the Bible passage addressed. For instance, here in 1
Timothy 2, Paul talked about how to worship. So we can investigate what worship was like in Paul’s
day. This understanding will greatly help us to understand what Paul was dealing with in this specific
situation.
Then, after we examine carefully the immediate context, the Biblical context and the situation
context, we are ready to do apply the 4th principle of understanding the Bible’s teaching to apply it to
our lives - to discover the universal truth we can apply from the specific teaching of the Bible
passage. What is the truth that carries over from a specific situation in Paul’s day that we can apply
to specific situations in our day?
Let’s apply these 4 principles to our passage today. 1st, the immediate context of the verses concerns
how to worship in ways that honor God. Thus, the key point is how to pray, dress and speak so that
the Lord receives His due honor and praise.
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In prayer, we approach God in humble ways with the focus on Him not on us in any way. So Paul
taught to pray not with hands raised in anger or debate but in holiness. When people get upset they
raise their hands and gesture wildly. This was true in mid-eastern culture and still is true there today.
So Paul taught that in worship there is no wild arm waving. Raise your hands in humble prayer. That
is what he means by raising holy hands. Is that the only way to pray with arms held up high? No,
other Bible teach we can pray with hands clasped, on our knees, in a prone position, or with
outstretched arms. All of this shows we are humble and open to the Lord’s direction. Paul does not
teach here to only pray with arms raised. He teaches to pray in humble, worshipful ways, open to the
Lordship of Jesus, and one of those ways is to raise holy hands.
What about the subject of what women wear to worship? If we want attention on ourselves, we wear
fancy clothes, gaudy jewelry and extravagant hairstyles. If we want the focus on the Lord, we don’t
wear those things. In Paul’s day, women who slaved as prostitutes in the false temples wore
extravagant clothing, gaudy jewelry, and very big hairdos. In contrast, women who follow Christ
wanted to honor him, so they dressed modestly. Paul conveyed this message for Timothy to teach his
church people. That is what we should understand from this passage. I wear a wedding ring as do
many of you. That is fine. Just be careful as to what we wear and how concerned we are over our
appearance. If we spend more time concerned over how we look rather than how we prepare to
come spiritually to worship the Lord, we have a big problem.
Women were new to worship in Paul’s day. In the Jewish Synagogue women were not allowed to
enter into the men’s section. They were often required to stay out of sight behind a latticed wall.
Then, in Christ, men and women could freely worship together. This was new for the women, so Paul
instructed Timothy on how to teach the women to worship correctly. We understand this. We usually
inquire as to what is appropriate to wear to events we will attend. Paul tells Timothy how to answer
that question here in this part of his letter; with humility and respect for the Lord.
Let’s turn to the more difficult question on women talking in the worship service. Remember, the
immediate context is how to worship in proper ways. Paul continues instructing Timothy on how
women should properly conduct themselves verbally in a worship service. Why, because they did not
know when to speak. In a politically incorrect statement that has been backed up by scientific studies,
let me state that women like to talk much more than men. Studies show women speak thousands of
more words each day than men speak. Women speak about 20,000 words a day - some 13,000 more
than the average man who speaks just 7,000 words per day. Women like to talk, especially with other
women. So when women went to worship, they were talking more than they should. They were
speaking out when they should keep quiet. The women needed to understand that silence was
important in worship. Many other Bible verses tell us of the need to be quiet and listen; to be still and
calm before God to hear Him speak to us. There is a time for talk, but there is also a time for quiet.
Should women always be quiet in worship? Should women ever teach in the church? This is where we
need to look for guidance to other Bible passages, even others from the Apostle Paul, about women
in leadership in the Church. Other passages show that Paul allowed women to be in ministry
leadership. We don’t have time to go into this deeply, but I have a study paper to share with you if
you are interested. It is available at the welcome center today. It studies several Bible passages about
women serving in ministry as co-pastors, deacons, leaders of house churches and even apostles for
the Lord. For instance, 1 Corinthians 11:5 contains Paul’s teaching about women praying in worship
times, But every woman who prays or prophesies with her head uncovered dishonors her
head—it is the same as having her head shaved. The debate in this verse is over whether
women should wear a head covering in worship. (By the way, a head covering then was not a hat nor
a bonnet, but a full cloth covering all the head, hair and face included. So also, if we were to take this
teaching literally today, and not just for Paul’s time, we would ask all the women here to wear a full
head covering like they still do in Muslim countries.) Notice what many fail to grasp when debating
what a woman should wear on her head in worship – Paul wrote about women praying and
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prophesying in worship. That is talking aloud in worship. To prophesy means to speak the truth of
God out loud to those around them. The same Paul who wrote 1 Timothy wrote 1 Corinthians. So it is
not that Paul does not allow women to speak aloud in worship always. They are to learn to speak at
appropriate times in worship; otherwise, like the men, they are to be quiet.
Paul taught about a woman in marriage being under the authority of her husband. Now this is a really
difficult thing to understand in our culture today. In Paul’s time, everyone understood this. Today,
almost no one in America understands this. Submission is a dirty word to American women today. I
have preached on this before and, again, have no time to say much about it today. (Read my
Marriage Manual book) Understand this at least, submission in the Bible is a holy, good and righteous
word. It in no way diminishes the person or places them in a subordinate position. Jesus submitted
Himself unto God the Father for us on the cross. He served all to lift all up to God. So anyone who
serves others for Jesus practices this holy submission. That is what Paul taught about with wives and
husbands. Read Ephesians 5:21, Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ. That
command includes both men and women, wives and husbands, employees and employers, and
parents and children. All in the church submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.
4th, are women really saved by childbirth? No, we know that is not the case, and we know that is not
what Paul meant. It is a strange phrase, but the best commentators on this passage believe, as I do,
that this childbirth refers to the birth of Christ. We all, men and women together, are saved by Jesus,
who was born of the virgin Mary, to bring us back to God the Father for eternal life.
Paul wants all men and women to come together in Christ in holy worship. He taught us to come
together humbly in His grace and love. He desired that we lift each other up, listen to God the Holy
Spirit, and place all the emphasis on Jesus our Savior and Lord. Don’t do anything that detracts in
worship from Jesus. Instead, we come together as men and women to worship Jesus.
This leads me to instruct you on one more thing that Paul would share with COV if he were here.
That is be more careful with our applause. Our worship leaders; such as the choir, praise band or
individuals, present music to lead us to a greater worship of Jesus. They don’t present music as a
performance for our appreciation. There is a time for clapping and applause, but sometimes it is not
appropriate. It is appropriate to give praise to Jesus in worship, but not to praise any group or
individual who shares in worship. In some churches, when they truly appreciate what anyone has to
offer in worship, they clap with hands raised up to the Lord in a sign of thanks for Jesus, and they
don’t do so loudly like is done at a concert hall or arena. Keep Jesus central in worship.
If any of you would like to talk more about any of these things, let me know and I will be happy to do
so. We can understand and apply the Bible’s teaching to our daily lives as we learn to seek the
eternal wisdom of our Lord offered in its pages. Would you do that with me?
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