We Can't Do it Alone - Pastor Tom Loghry
In Acts 6:1-7, the early church is faced with a conflict. The 12 apostles, remaining faithful to their calling as ministers, delegate some of the day to day tasks of caring for church members to 7 men, full of the spirit, who would come to be known as deacons.
Transcript:
Good morning.
In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Hellenistic Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food. So the 12 gathered all the disciples together and said it would not be right for us to neglect the ministry of the word of God in order to wait on tables.
Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them and will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word, a reading from the book of Acts chapter six, verses one through four.
Some of you might know that my son James is in a play showing at the Assembly of theater in Harrisville. The play is Frozen Junior. They have a showing today at 2:00 PM if you want to go. The kids have put in a lot of work practicing their dancing, singing, and of course rehearsing their lines. It takes a lot to put on a play, and you need more than what appears on stage.
You need people who can run lights, run the sound, take tickets, sell concessions, work backstage. It's all important work to make the play a success. As important and essential as these tasks are, you can't have the actors doing these tasks. While they might be able to offer a hand here or there, actors need to be focused on their acting, being ready to step onto the stage. If they go MIA when they're supposed to appear, it ruins the play. Others are needed. The actors are needed to act, and more than the actors are needed to make the play a success. It's tempting for us to try to do everything ourselves. Eventually circumstances can force us to concede that we need help.
As we see the church growing in the first century, we find the 12 disciples reckoning with this reality. And so we pick up in Acts six, looking at first versus one through four. Again, it starts off in verse one by noting that the number of the disciples was increasing, and as the numbers increase, there's a problem that arises.
And the thing that I, I appreciate about this is the reality of kind of rubbing up against each other, of tensions kind of coming about in the course of living in communities is nothing new. It goes all the way back to the beginning of the church. They had to deal with these sorts of issues. We have to deal with these sorts of issues.
It's not, doesn't mean anything wrong, it's just, it's the nature of, of being human beings who have some sin problems that come into the equation, but also just practical problems that we have to work out together. And there's a problem that's arisen here because the Hellenistic Jews are complaining against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food.
Before we can look at the exact problem, the distribution of food, we, I have to give you a little bit of background here because you're probably wondering what in the world is a Hellenistic Jew? Is this like, like a Jew that really likes hell or something? It's like, what? What is Hellenistic? So, so Hellenism or Hellenic refers to Greece, to the Greek people, to Greek culture.
If you're familiar at all with ancient history, you might know a guy named Alexander the Great had a big empire that swept not just the Mediterranean, but even reached towards India. Well, in the course of his conquest, Alexander spread great culture as he went along. Kind of understandable that the force in dominance would have a cultural sort of impression wherever it went, and you can imagine why people might be gravitated toward the Greek culture, seeing how successful Alexander was in his exploits. Well, even after Alexander died, that impression remained and kind of the traces of his conquest remained because his empire was divided among several of his lieutenants.
And so when we go to Israel, we see that the Jewish people also were influenced by this Greek culture. And it created a tension, particularly during the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes, which has occurred about a couple hundred years before, the time that we're in right now, in the first century. And it was a especially divisive time because Antiochus began to really push Greek culture onto the Jewish people, including the idolatrous elements, the immoral elements of it, and ended up kind of turning some of the Jewish people against one another because there were some Jews that favored the Greek culture, and there was others that said, no, we're going to remain authentic to being Jewish, and especially being faithful to worshiping the one true God. And so you have this division going on amongst the Jewish people. While we still have traces of that going on into the first century, where you have these Jews who we're not saying that they're doing immoral things, but they still kind of have that Greek accent about them in the way that they go about their lives. They've grown up their, their culture is different than the Hebraic Jews culture. you can kind of think about it in our modern terms of kind of Americanization, Western values. We see how that can create tensions across the world. and so while they might have not have been doing some of the bad things like idolatry, various elements of immorality, it was still a point of tension and it created some suspicion and it was especially suspicious because in this case, what's going on is there are widows in the community of the church that need help. This, the need for widows to receive help was especially acute, acute at this time because you had no other social support systems and women couldn't just go out and get jobs as they can today. And so they really needed the support of family. And if you didn't have family, then you're in a really tough spot. So in this case, the church is really kind of being that family for these widows.
The issue, however, is that the Hellenistic Jews are saying our widows are being overlooked. And they're kind of thinking, is it because we're coming from this Hellenistic background that we're being overlooked? So the 12 are recognizing this complaint. Okay, they're saying this is an issue. And it must have been a real problem because if the Hellenistic Jews were just getting the facts wrong, I'm sure the apostles would've said to 'em, listen, you think you're being underserved, but actually you're being adequately served.
Everything's fair and square here. Apparently that wasn't the case. Now we don't know the reason why that was, that was the case. Why they were being underserved might have been prejudicial, but it could have just been a practical problem that led to that outcome. In any case, the apostles come together and they realize they need help in sorting out this issue.
And it's an issue that they need to address because it's problematic for them to allow these widows to continue to not receive the help that they need because again, the early church is the fulfillment of what God had always intended for the people of God. And so if you go to the Old Testament, these blessings and curses are set before the people of Israel as they're entering into the promised land. One of those curses is it says Deuteronomy 27: 19, cursed is anyone who withholds justice from the foreigner, the fatherless, or the widow. Then all the people shall say amen. So if the church is seeking to live in accordance with God's word, they say, we have to secure justice for these widows now.
Again, the community is so big at this point. The last count was it's going over 5,000 people. The apostles realized they can't do it all on their own, and so they began thinking, we need to delegate some of this responsibility out to others. And there's a precedent for this. There's a precedent for it in the Old Testament, we see Moses delegating responsibilities, among the elders of Israel to judge between the disputes of the people of Israel. And so kind of following in that, that tradition, the apostles say we need to select seven men that can oversee this issue, make sure the needs are met. And the reason why they come to this conclusion is because they say our priority needs to be the ministry of God's word and prayer, the ministry of God's Word and prayer.
You see the apostles, were gonna get distracted from being completely devoted to those tasks if they had to concern themselves with settling these disputes, making sure people are getting the bread that they need. It is very easy for, actually for the church to get distracted from this essential task of the ministry of God's word and prayer.
We can get so caught up in helping people with some of their practical needs, things that need to be done. Again, the apostles are recognizing these are things that need to be done, but it should not come at the cost of the ministry of God's word, because if you can feed someone for a day, great. Good. If you can give 'em water for a day, good.
You've satisfied their thirst, but in the end, those people will die all the same. What the apostles are bringing in their ministry of the word of God is the bread of life, Jesus Christ, the one in whom, if anyone believes in him, they would receive eternal life, everlasting water, so that they would never thirst again.
So they, they're saying we can't, we can't attend to these things because we have to remain faithful to the preaching of God's word, and we have to remain faithful to prayer. You see, pastors and elders of the church, as well as these original 12 pastors and elders like them, we must be dedicated to the mystery of God's word and to prayer, because if we are not praying, then we're walking in the dark. One of my essential tasks as a pastor is I need to be praying, and I, I can tell you that when I stop praying, I feel it. All of a sudden, all my natural anxieties and fears come to the surface, and I feel directionless. It's essential that we seek God in prayer, in order that we might gain the wisdom that is needed to know how we should walk, what direction the church should go, but also just praying for the needs of the people and praying for the power of God to intervene in ways that are needed because natural powers are not sufficient to meet the need.
Think about the church at this time. Everything's stacked against them. All these, the high priests, the Sanhedrin, they're all militating against their early church. They need to be praying that God would cause the gospel to prosper and overcome all these obstacles.
And so they propose that these, that seven men would serve to meet this need. And again, though. This idea of serving this need, waiting on tables, is not denigrating sort of service. It actually goes right in line with the highest form of service that Jesus identified in in Matthew 20, verse 26 through 28.
Jesus is teaching his disciples on how they shouldn't seek to be like worldly leaders who have basically everyone kissing the ring kind of thing. And he says to them instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave. Just as the son of man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many.
The Apostle Paul picks up on this theme in Philippians two, verses three through seven. He says, in your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus, who being in very nature, God did not consider equality with God, something to be used to his own advantage. Rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness.
We cannot fully appreciate how powerful Christ's example is if we do not remember that he is the son of God. Jesus is no mere man. He is the son of God. God himself come in the flesh. And when he came in the flesh, he did not come as one born into a palace, recognized as all to be king. No, he was someone that was denied, rejected by his own hometown.
Who didn't even have a, a pillow to lay his head on. Christ, though King, made himself a servant.
He washed the feet of the disciples. So if he can do that, God himself can do that, how much more can we do that, and as we do it, are we not honored to be joining the very service, which Christ himself offered to us.
So the apostle say, you need to, we need to choose these seven men, and they should be full of the spirit. And, and they must be wise. They must have wisdom, no doubt, to oversee these matters. I mean, there's a lot of people. Kind of reading between the line here is, I, I think they probably had some help in trying to meet some of these needs, but they're the ones at least in charge and making sure everything was taken care of.
And while the word itself does not appear here, what we have here actually is the first appointment of, of deacons in the church. Now, the word deacon comes from the Greek word diakonos, which simply means to serve.
And when we look to First Timothy three, we find in addition to this best basic standard that they be full, the spirit, that they have wisdom, we find in one Timothy three kind of a fuller explanation of what would be expected of those who would be deacons. Paul says in First Timothy three verses eight through thirteen, he says, in the same way, deacons are to be worthy of respect. Sincere, not indulging in much wine and not pursuing dishonest gain. And they must keep hold of the deep truth of the faith with a clear conscience. They must first be tested and then if there's nothing against them, let them serve as deacons. In the same way, the women are to be worthy of respect. Not malicious talkers, but temperate and trustworthy in everything.
A deacon must be faithful to his wife and must manage his children and his household well. Those who have served well gain excellent standing and great assurance in their faith in Christ Jesus. Now, kind of at the outset, before we consider some of these standards here, I think it's worth noting that it appears that in this passage and then also elsewhere, that the role of Deacon is not exclusive to men and, and that it's for that reason that our church has deaconesses.
In fact, I don't even think we have to call you deaconesses. It's a helpful distinction at times. But the Bible just calls 'em all deacons just kinda like it's, it's just a general term. But Paul mentions here that in the same way women are to be worthy of respect, not malicious talkers, but temperate, trustworthy in everything.
And then we have this little just kind of side note in Romans 16, one where Paul says, I commend to you our sister Phoebe, a deacon of the church in Cenchreae. Now some translators might say that just means servant, but again, we just said the word servant means deacon. It's diakonos in the Greek. So there seems like there's a precedent here for both men and women serving as deacons in the church, and all of them should be full of the spirit, be known to be people filled with wisdom, and they should be known for having self-control.
They shouldn't be drunk on wine. They need to be responsible people that can be trustworthy, not talking bad about people behind their backs because they're in a position of, of trust. They have to be faithful and be in how they manage their households. They have to be faithful to their spouses because if they're not faithful to their spouse, if they can't manage their household, then how in the world would they be faithful to their service in the church? Serving the church requires great care and attention and faithfulness and trust trustworthiness, and so there's great wisdom in testing them, as Paul says, preparing them when it comes to positions like this.
And I think this would actually apply to all positions. We don't just want warm bodies and sometimes we come under this pressure as like, well, we have these positions that can be filled and we should just put someone, no, we wanna put the right people in. Because if you put the wrong people in, it can create all kinds of problems.
Way worse than just having empty positions.
And I can say for my own part as a pastor, there's nothing better than having good and faithful deacons. And we've had many of them here in our church. And the, the greatest thing about those who serve in the, the, that position faithfully is again, kind of like the apostles are talking about here, is.
You don't, as a pastor, as elders, you don't have to worry about those things entrusted to them. They're taking care of that, and that means you can focus on what you're supposed to be doing. Now, looking to verses five through seven, we find how the believers responded to the twelves plan, says this proposal pleased the whole group.
They chose Steven, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit. Also, Philip, Procorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas from Antioch, a convert to Judaism. They presented these men to the apostles who prayed and laid their hands on them. So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith.
Now, something that's just notable here that I think we could have missed in some of these earlier verses is again, the apostles wanted the congregation of believers to choose these men and in verses five through seven we see that they in fact do this. Now, the reason why this is notable is because in some traditions of the church, the congregation really has no say in matters.
It's just the pastor or bishops or the like. Now the Bible doesn't prescribe an a comprehensive plan for how the church is supposed to be organized. It gives basic positions like pastor, elder, deacon, that sort of thing. But it doesn't give you a whole hierarchical sort of str of how denominations are supposed to be structured and things like that.
But I think what we have here, and I think, and this is why our church is a congregationalist church, is we have a precedent that in certain matters it is good for the congregation to be involved and to express their voice as the Holy Spirit leads them. That doesn't mean everything goes before the congregation.
That's why the church entrusts some things to the board or to the pastor or or other various groups. But in certain things it is good that the congregation gets involved and, and we see them do that here and, and we can see the importance of it, especially given the matter at hand. Again, there's this issue, there's this conflict, seeming conflict between the Hellenistic Jews and the Hebraic Jews.
It might threaten to divide the community, but what's notable here is that all of them, Hellenistic Jews that are believers, Hebraic Jews that are believers, all of them decide that the deacons, those who would serve as deacons are actually gonna be all Hellenistic Jews and one Gentile. Now, the reason why we can pick up on that is because these names have Greek influence to them, so, so notice how above and beyond the Hebraic Jews want to go to ensure that their brothers and sisters realize that, no, we do care for you.
We don't want there to be any confusion here about our care for you, so we're gonna put these Hellenistic, these, these Jew Jewish believers that are, come from a Hellenistic background into these positions, and we're even going to include someone who's not Jewish at all. This man, Nicolas, he, he is a gentile, a convert to Judaism.
It's a profound demonstration of, of love and care, and it's an example that we should seek to follow, making sure that each one of us is reassured of our love and care for each other, and we have one guy who's, who's kind of picked out here. It says, Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit.
And we're gonna learn about him in the rest of this chapter and into the next and chapter, we're gonna see just how full of the spirit and wisdom he is. And we're also gonna hear about Philip later. We don't learn so much about about the others, but those two we hear more of and, and we'll see that their, their ministry does exceed beyond just serving tables, but this is, this is their primary task is to look after the material practical needs of the church.
That's what the deacon ministry is focused on, is making sure the people of God are being taken care of. And so the congregation elects these, these seven and the apostles have a hand of involvement still in this also though, they basically install them. They, they lay on hands upon them as they enter into this ministry.
And again, there's a precedent for this. In the Old Testament, we see how in Numbers 8:10, the Levites, when the, they're brought before the Lord, the Israelites lay their hands on them. And we, and we recognize that this isn't just a public recognition of the fact that these men are entering into these roles, but that there is some spiritual reality at play here in terms of them being equipped by the spirit to perform the tasks that they are called to. I think we have an indication of this in First Timothy and Second Timothy, Paul talking about the gift that Timothy received. Not as an elder, but I mean not as a deacon, but as an elder.
He says, Timothy, do not neglect your gift, which was given you through prophecy when the body of elders laid their hands on you. That's First Timothy four, and Second Timothy one, he says, for this reason, I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands.
It's interesting to think about how, even while there are some kind of previous indications that obviously the congregation identified in these men that told them that, yes, these men should be deacons, in the laying on of hands, the God, God is also supplying even more by the Holy Spirit so that these men would be fully equipped for the tasks that they're called to do.
And what we see result from this is, is rapid growth. Says so the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and it says a large number of priests became obedient to the faith, which is quite a profound thing. When you think about, if you're gonna think about anyone who might resist the church, you would think maybe it's those that are in that position of priests, but we see how they're even being turned to Christ.
There can, there can be no doubt. Part of this growth was because of this important development of appointing deacons rather than descending into division, the harm, harmony of the community was upheld by these seven men who are able to minister to the material needs of the church community. The positive reputation of the church would continue forward, and instead of the 12 disciples being pulled into every single little matter, they're able to delegate and focus their attention on preaching and teaching God's word and devoting themselves to prayer.
What stands out to me as I consider this early example of the believers is their collective faithfulness to calling. The 12 were faithful to their calling, which led them to propose that deacons be chosen, who could be faithful to their calling, and the collective body of believers on the whole, were faithful in supporting the 12 in their calling and identifying those who would be called to the deaconate ministry. Sometimes we confuse busyness and faithfulness. If we're always doing something, we must be faithful, right? Or so we think. There are many good things that can be done in the church and in the world, but you must understand this. You're not called to do all the things. Over the past few years, God has been sorting that out in my own mind.
Very simply, I am called to be a pastor. There are a number of things that I might be able to do, things that in themselves are good things, but they are not the things I'm called to do right now in my life. My call is to be a pastor in this place and time, and I dare not neglect what God wants me to do.
The same is true for you. You can't meet every need in this church, and you can't chase every pursuit in life. God offers us a certain kind of peace in just accepting limits. Imagine how frantic the apostles would've been if they tried to deal with everything themselves. Our concern should simply be this.
What does God want you to be doing in his church, in his world? Don't worry about trying to figure it all out on your own. Remember, it was all the other believers who identified the seven men, telling them that they believed God was calling them to be deacon. The Holy Spirit will guide you in how you should serve in this church, both personally and through the congregation.
You also guide you in how you should use the rest of your life.
Might it be that if we would be faithful to our respective callings, singularly dedicated, undistracted, working harm harmoniously together that God would also bless us with growth. I think it's a sure possibility and it's definitely what is required. I think it's an absolute certainty that if we are unfaithful to our individual callings, if we're always busy and scatterbrained, we will not grow. Our church community will not flourish. So then, like the early believers, let us support each other in being faithful to the call that God has placed upon us, helping each other discern what God would have us do. Let's pray.
Father,
we thank you for the work of your spirit, for the work of the Holy Spirit, Father, and the wisdom that you gave to the apostles. So that they would know that they couldn't do it all on their own, and that father you gave your church deacons, who were full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom, so that the needs of the church might be met.
Father, we thank you for their example of being faithful to calling, in not letting themselves be spread thin. Father, we pray that you would help each one of us to be faithful to the calling that you've placed upon us, and that if we don't know what we're supposed to be doing, father, we pray that you would give us clarity in that, that you would use our brothers and sisters here to help us discern what we're supposed to be doing here in the church, possibly outside the church Father if we don't have a sense of what we're supposed to be doing out there.
Father, we just thank you again for equipping your church, giving us everything that we need so that we might be the people that we're supposed to be, the kind of people that care for the needs of widows, that make sure that no one is overlooked. The kind of community where justice is upheld. Father, help us to be faithful so that we would be the church that you desire us to be.
We ask this in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Hey there, Pastor Tom here. I hope you enjoyed this sermon I offered to Rockland Community Church. Rockland Community Church is located at 212 Rockland Road in North Scituate, Rhode Island, just around the bend from the Scituate Public High School. We invite you to join us in person or virtually this Sunday as we continue our series The Spirit and the Church. It's our joy to welcome you into our community.
Intro/Outro Song
Title: River Meditation
Artist: Jason Shaw
Source:http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Jason_Shaw/Audionautix_Acoustic/RIVER_MEDITATION___________2-58
License:(CC BY 3.0 US)