The Character of Ministers in the Pastoral Epistles

 Introduction

In very recent years, a new position regarding ministers has arisen in some circles due to the West’s cultural changes.  If the changes fifty years or more ago had to do with whether a divorced person may serve in ministry, today the issue is whether a same sex attracted person might serve in ministry.  This article will not consider the view in mainline denominations that a homosexual or transsexual or a person in a same sex relationship of any sort might be ordained.  The answer to that ought to be perfectly obvious to those following Biblical teaching and the Church’s historic teaching on such matters.  What is in view here is whether someone who says he (or she) is same sex attracted and is celibate might be ordained.  Is there any Scriptural guidance in this regard?  There is, even though the precise question is not addressed directly.  The discussion can proceed with a particular focus on qualifications for ministry set out in 1 Timothy 3.1-13 and Titus 1.5-9, and then additional comments might be added.  The view argued here is that celibate persons who are same sex attracted should be disqualified from ministry.  The reasoning for this will be made clear, and the case seems strong in support of such a stance.

Qualifications for ministry

In 1 Timothy 3.1-13, qualification for those seeking to be overseers and deacons are set out.[1]  The qualifications for deacons may include both male and female deacons, if ‘gynaikas’ (v. 11) refers to female deacons and not ‘wives’, as the ESV translates the word.  Titus 1.5-9 gives similar regulations for ‘elders’ (cf. Acts 14.23) as 1 Timothy 3.1-7 does for ‘overseers’, and these may be two terms for the same role.  In this essay, I will simply refer to ‘ministers’ for those serving as overseers, deacons, or as elders.

The qualifications for ministry in 1 Timothy 3.1-13 and Titus 1.5-9 might be set out in the following comparison:

Characteristics	Overseers (1 Tim. 3.1-7)	Elders (Titus 1.5-6)	Overseer (Titus 1.7-9)	Deacons (1 Tim. 3.8-10, 12-13)	‘Women’ (1 Tim. 3.11)[2]
above reproach	√	√	√
the husband of one wife	√	√		√
sober-minded	√				√
self-controlled	√		√
respectable	√			Has ‘a good standing’
hospitable	√		√
able to teach	√
not a drunkard	√		√	Not addicted to much wine
not violent but gentle	√		not violent
not quarrelsome	√
not a lover of money	√		not greedy for gain	not greedy for dishonest gain
managing his own household well, with all dignity keeping his children submissive	√	‘His children are believers and not open to the charge of debauchery or insubordination’		√
not a recent convert	√
not puffed up with conceit	√		Not arrogant
well thought of by outsiders	√
not quick-tempered			√
A lover of good			√
upright			√
holy			√
disciplined			√
one who ‘holds firm to the trustworthy word as taught so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it.’			√	Holds the mystery of the faith with a clear conscience   Has a ‘great confidence in the faith that is in Christ Jesus’
dignified				√	√
not double-tongued				√
tested				‘let them also be tested first; then let them serve as deacons if they prove themselves blameless’
not slanderers					√
faithful in all things					√

 

In addition to these passages, 2 Timothy 2 also lists characteristics Paul holds up for Timothy in his role as a minister:

So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. 23 Have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies; you know that they breed quarrels. 24 And the Lord’s servant [‘slave’] must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, 25 correcting his opponents with gentleness (2.22-25a).

The following discussion will organize some (not all) of these characteristics of ministers into the topics of (1) Holiness and Marital Purity; (2) Self-Control; (3) Sound Doctrine; and (4) Ordination and the Exemplary Life.  A fifth topic mentioned here will be (5) Service. While characteristics of ministers overlap between what is said about overseers, elders, and deacons and between the three epistles of the Pastoral Epistles, the flexibility of what Paul says shows that he intends to provide some key examples and not an exhaustive list.  Also, the organization of characteristics for ministers and ministry under these topics also covers only some of what needs to be said both in Paul’s context and in ours.[3]

1.     Holiness and Marital Purity

Appointment to ministries in the church is related to proof of purity in marriage.  A minister should be the husband of one wife (not divorced).  This means that he should not be divorced.  While often read as a statement against polygamy, this would not be a relevant imperative in the Roman world, where divorce was prevalent and polygamy not practiced.  The reason that this is implausible as an interpretation is that widows are only to be enrolled on the order of widows if they were the wife of one husband (1 Timothy 5.9).

Two other interpretations that are at times suggested for ‘husband of one wife’ are also very likely wrong.  One interpretation is that Paul is saying that a minister should not remarry after the death of his wife (so J. N. D. Kelly).  This interpretation is put forward because several authors in the early Church argued that Christians should not remarry after the death of a spouse. Yet this does not seem to be plausible in the case of 1 Timothy.  Paul (or the Pauline school, if one insists on the idea that someone else wrote the Pastoral epistles) encourages young widows to remarry (1 Timothy 5.14).  Paul also understands a woman to be bound to her husband as long as he is alive.  She may, therefore, remarry after his death (Romans 7.1-4; 1 Corinthians 7.39-40).  He suggests she may be ‘happier’ or more blessed (makariōtera) if she does not remarry, but there he has no ethical objection to one remarrying after a spouse’s death.

The other interpretation that I believe should be rejected is the interpretation of ‘husband of one wife’ to mean something like a ‘one woman man’.  On this view, Paul is saying that a minister should not be flirtatious with other woman but devoted to his wife.  Such an interpretation would be relevant in the Graeco-Roman context, where men often had sexual relations outside of marriage, although, once again, it is more difficult to apply this to 1 Timothy 5.9 (a widow having been the wife of one husband). 

What makes this and the other views unlikely, however, is that the Old Testament regulations for priests seem to be the basis for these statements in 1 Timothy.  Paul is not coming up with regulations out of his own musings but applying Old Testament precedent to the situation.  Ezekiel’s description of a new temple includes the comment that no priest should marry a widow or divorced woman, ‘but only virgins of the offspring of the house of Israel, or a widow who is the widow of a priest’ (44.22).  This would not disallow marrying a second time on the death of a wife, as long as the woman was a virgin or the widow of another priest.  This verse comes in the midst of a section calling for priests to distinguish the holy from the unclean and common.  They are not to wear garments than cause sweat (44.18).  They must remove garments worn in holy chambers when they emerge to the people ‘lest they transmit holiness to the people with their garments (44.19).  They must trim the hair of their heads (44.20), which likely has to do with avoiding the practices of priests in other religions and therefore defiling themselves with syncretistic religious practices (cf. Leviticus 21.5).  They must not have wine when serving in the inner court (44.21).  The next verse addresses the priests’ marriages, and then Ezekiel states that the priests ‘shall teach my people the difference between the holy and the common, and show them how to distinguish between the unclean and the clean’ (44.23).   Also, priests are to judge cases brought to them, keeping God’s laws, feasts, and the Sabbaths holy (44.24).  Finally, they are instructed not to go near a dead body, unless the deceased is a family member, and then he must become clean again and offer a sin offering (44.25-27).  Thus, Ezekiel’s comments on marriage are given with regard to the holiness of the priest and his exemplary life that gives him legitimacy to judge and teach the people.

The basis for Ezekiel’s comments on the holiness of priests is the Old Testament law regarding priests found in Leviticus 21.  The exhortation on marriage states that the ‘priest shall not marry a prostitute or a woman who has been defiled, neither shall they marry a woman divorced from her husband, for the priest is holy to his God’ (Leviticus 21.7).  The ground for regulations on marriage is the requirement of a priest’s holiness.  This was a very serious matter: a priest’s daughter who profaned herself with prostitution was to burned to death (21.9). 

From verse 10, the regulations are slightly more strict because they apply to the chief priest.  The chief priest must not go near dead bodies even if they are his parents (21.11).  They may not marry the surviving wife of a deceased priest but must only marry a virgin (21.13).  Also,

‘A widow, or a divorced woman, or a woman who has been defiled, or a prostitute, these he shall not marry. But he shall take as his wife a virgin of his own people, ¹⁵ that he may not profane his offspring among his people, for I am the LORD who sanctifies him’ (Leviticus 21.14-15).

Holiness, then, is surely the basis for Paul’s insistence that a minister must be ‘the husband of one wife’.  Relatedly, Paul tells Timothy to train himself for godliness (1 Timothy 4.7).  Ministry is not to be reduced to service in a position or even office; it is a calling to training in godliness.  Several factors work against considering ministers as a holy order, so to speak.  First, the fact of the matter is that many ministers have not demonstrated holy lives.  Second, the Donatist Controversy in the early Church led to the distinction between the effective function of a minister in serving the Eucharist or baptism from the minister’s own faithfulness to God.  Third, the Reformation emphasis on the priesthood of all believers diminished the distinction between clergy and laity.  The result of this trajectory shows up today when people argue for ordaining same sex attracted, celibate persons to ministry on the grounds that everyone struggles with sinfulness—whether desires or acts—to some degree.  The ‘priesthood of all believers’ is thereby turned into the ‘sinfulness of all believers’.  The Biblical correction to this line of thinking is that, while all have sinned and may still struggle with sin, those admitted to ministry are called to a higher standard.  That standard is holiness, which is not simply attained but is a training in godliness that continues as part of the calling in ministry.  This training is not an excuse for failure but is a devotion to the exercises that will develop character.  In this regard, one does not qualify for the ‘bootcamp’ to train for godliness, so to speak, by asserting that one has a condition that will keep one from ever reaching that goal.  Nor is one accepted to the training who wants examiners to accept his weaknesses instead of expecting that God can and does bring transformation and righteousness.  The present thinking of many about ministry is rather that recruitment is open to all (and diversity is even promoted), weaknesses (even sinfulness) should be accepted rather than transformed by training in godliness, and holiness is suspect as a prideful virtue because of the ‘sinfulness of all believers’.

2.     Self-Control

Some persons are not fit for ministry because the responsibilities of ministry could put them in a situation whereby they face greater temptation in their own weaknesses.  ‘Self-control’ is one of the virtues of character that Paul lists for overseers, but related words also listed are: ‘sober-minded’, ‘not a drunkard’, ‘not violent but gentle’, ‘not quarrelsome’, ‘not quick-tempered’, ‘disciplined’, and ‘not a lover of money’.  A priest prone to drunkenness should not be put in charge of the wine cellar!  A pastor involved in many and various human relationships should not be violent but gentle.  A minister dealing with the various arguments that arise, from theological debates to building projects, should not be a quarrelsome personality.  Since money is involved, a minister should not be a lover of money.

We might say that these are examples pertaining to the strength of character needed in ministry situations, and so we could expand the list.  So, for example, being the husband of one wife is more about purity but also about sexual fulfillment in marriage.  Paul counsels men and women in marriage not to deprive themselves of sexual relations lest Satan tempt them due to a lack of self-control (1 Corinthians 7.5).  He says, ‘because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband’ (7.2).  The language of ‘husband of one wife’ in the Pastoral Epistles is similar to the language of a man having his own wife and a woman having her own husband here in 1 Corinthians.  Thus, marriage is the place for the fulfilment of natural, sexual desire.  Paul does not say that heterosexual desire is wrong but that it can become wrong if one is tempted to fulfil it in relationships outside of marriage.  For the same reason, he counsels the young couple not yet married to get married if one’s desires are strong and one’s behaviour is improper towards the other (7.35).

A person experiencing same sex attraction, however, cannot fulfil this desire in marital relationships.  The person is not saying, as Paul does in 1 Corinthians 7, that he has mastered desire but that he has refrained from sexual relations.  From this discussion, Paul’s advice seems clear: such a person is tempted by Satan in his internally disordered desire and should certainly not be put in a position of ministerial oversight.

3.     Sound Doctrine

An important characteristic for both overseers and deacons is that they hold fast to the trustworthy Word, the mystery of faith.  This characteristic requires an intellectual virtue of knowing the Word.  This ‘Word’ is both the Gospel—the faith proclaimed—and the written Word—the Scriptures.  The relationship between the two is that the Church knew and affirmed that the the Scriptures, the Old Testament, proclaimed the Gospel beforehand.  To proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ was to proclaim how Jesus’ incarnation, death, resurrection, ascension, and future coming (the narrative of the Gospel) was a fulfillment of the Old Testament Scriptures.  Thus, an overseer and deacon was expected to know the Gospel and the Scriptures.  This allowed him to be in a position to teach, a significant concern throughout the Pastoral Epistles as there was false teaching that needed to be countered.

The message proclaimed was not something new even if it was something newly revealed.  In the introduction to the letter to Titus, Paul emphasises this point by saying that (1) God never lies, (2) the hope of eternal life was promised before the ages, (3) the proclamation is not his own but something with which he was entrusted as a slave is commanded with a task, and (4) it is manifested (not invented) now at the proper time (Titus 1.1-3).  Paul is united to Titus ‘in a common faith’ (1.4).  The eternity of the message contrasts with the innovative teachings of the false teachers.  Titus is to appoint elders in Crete who ‘hold firm to the trustworthy word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to rebuke those who contradict it’ (1.9).  Thus, he is told to teach sound doctrine (2.1).  This teaching is not outlined in some creedal statement in Titus, but we can say that it is both doctrinal and ethical, and the emphasis falls on the latter in this epistle. 

This point is important, since some in our day have attempted to locate orthodoxy in doctrine while considering ethics to be secondary or even a matter of indifference.  Thus, Paul’s connecting of the two is clear in these verses in Titus:

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, 12 training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in the present age, 13 waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ, 14 who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works (2.11-14).

Timothy is an exemplary minister in this regard because he has a knowledge of the ‘sacred writings’.  He was taught in them by his mother and grandmother from childhood (2 Timothy 3.15).  This verse—and the next—also makes the connection between the Word as Scripture and the Word as the Gospel, for knowing the ‘sacred writings’ means being ‘wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus’.  Thus, ‘All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness’ (v. 16).  So equipped, Timothy is to ‘proclaim the Word’, reprove, rebuke, and exhort in his teaching (v. 17).  As much more might be said about ministry as pastoral care, and in this regard the pastoral care of sinners, I will refer the reader to further writing beyond this essay on the topic.[4]

The second virtue involved in teaching sound doctrine, which has already been introduced, is a sort of courage, as in standing up for the truth, opposing false teaching and false teachers, defending the faith.[5]  The confidence needed for this role comes, in part, from the intellectual virtue of knowing the Word.  It also comes from a steadfast character, not being swayed by the things that pressure a person to go soft on the truth, such as placing relationships over truth or the desire to meet other goals (e.g., church growth, financial gain, applause from others). 

The virtue of standing firm in the truth is a conservative virtue: it preserves the faith rather than transforms it into something else under these other pressures.  Thus, the language used is to ‘hold firm’, ‘rebuke’, ‘clear conscience’, and ‘great confidence in the faith’.  Jude exhorts those to whom he writes ‘to contend for the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints’ (v. 3).  Paul commends the Roman believers because they have ‘become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed’ (Romans 6.17).  In 2 Timothy, he says to Timothy, ‘Follow the pattern of the sound [ὑποτύπωσιν ἔχε ὑγιαινόντων λόγων] words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus’ (1.13).  Timothy is also told that, what he has heard from Paul ‘in the presence of many witnesses’ he must entrust to faithful men, who will then be able to teach others (2 Timothy 2.2).  Receiving and entrusting—receiving from someone trustworthy like Paul and affirmed through many witnesses, and entrusting to faithful and capable persons that they might also teach—are essential to maintaining the faith.

At the time of writing, Paul was concerned about people who received teaching that pleased them.  They would receive false teachers who told them what their itching words wanted to hear so that they could be affirmed in own desires (2 Timothy 4.3).  Paul was well aware of how an audience can determine the message; they were not passive participants in the teaching situation.  He says that a bad audience will be characteristic of the ‘last days’—which, it seems, he believed to be the period that he was already living in:

But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. 2 For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, 3 heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, 4 treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, 5 having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people (2 Timothy 3.1-5).

This is the problem with an audience selecting its own teachers not on the grounds of their capability to expound the Word of God but on the grounds of telling them what they want to hear.  We might further ask what characterises the teachers who depart from the faith once for all delivered to the saints.  Those teaching such audiences

creep into households and capture weak women, burdened with sins and led astray by various passions, 7 always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth. 8 Just as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses, so these men also oppose the truth, men corrupted in mind and disqualified regarding the faith (2 Timothy 3.6-9).

The list of characteristics in 2 Timothy 3.1-5 must also apply to these teachers.  Also, 4.3 would include the willingness of teachers to give an audience what their itching ears want to hear.  This relationship between false teachers and their audiences is what fosters the error—they are mutually affirming.  What has led mainline denominations in the West into error after error is this very symbiotic relationship between false teachers and their audiences.  Because ministers are servants of the message, they must not alter it.  Moreover, they do not have personal authority located in an office but an authority that derives from the message.  Paul tells Titus, ‘Declare these things; exhort and rebuke with all authority.  Let no one disregard you’ (2.15). Timothy was not to allow people to disregard his youth (1 Timothy 4.12) because the message, not his personal authority, was the basis of his ministry.  However, he did bear the challenge to set believers an example (4.12), and Paul tells him to take care himself, watching his own life and teaching (1 Timothy 4.16).

Last Days/Present-Day False Teaching

The development of false teaching in our day are, in part, due to postmodernity’s values of diversity, equity, and inclusion.  Heresies are typically distortions of the truth and these are distortions of universality of the Church, unity in Christ, and conversion.  Three further effects of this postmodern turn are an opposition to truth, an opposition to creation, and a wandering away from the essential Christian doctrine and ethics.

1.     An Opposition to Truth

The postmodern values soften or eliminate Christian convictions and tradition in the interest of prioritising relationships over truth.  Time and again, some scholar or pastor or anyone has changed his or her view on homosexuality or gender because of some relationship (a son or daughter, a sister, a friend, etc.).  Convictions and what Scripture says or what the Church has said are set aside.  The evolution of error begins with this inclusion of diverse lifestyles and welcoming of differences as a major value, continues with a rejection of those not affirming the new convictions as though they are intolerant and unwelcoming, and then declares that what was at first welcomed is now the definitive view.  The call to be a lover of the good, to be upright, holy, and disciplined, and to hold firm the trustworthy Word melts away in the face of relational priorities and the affirmation of diversity, equity, and inclusion on sexuality.

Paul ran into some level of this even his day with certain people from the church at Corinth.[6]  A group within the church affirmed a member having relations with his father’s wife (1 Corinthians 5).  Those opposing this, like Paul, would have Leviticus 18.8 to cite as a rule pertaining to God’s people, but those affirming the inclusion of this person—being a welcoming church!—seem to have argued for freedom in all sexual relations (cf. 6.12-20).  A Scriptural rule is hardly something a person arguing for his own authority—his freedom—would accept.[7]  The ‘freedom’ group also claimed freedom or authority to eat any foods (8.9; 9.4, 12).  Women ignoring distinctions between men and women in regard to the symbol of hair and head coverings also claimed a freedom that Paul challenges (11.10).  This Corinthian position shares much in common with today’s postmodern view in the relationship between welcoming diverse views and practices and affirming freedom and authority to do as one pleases.

2.     An Opposition to Creation

Paul warns that, in the last days, there would be an opposition to God’s created purposes.  By ‘the last days’, he likely has in mind the period beginning with the coming of Christ and lasting until His return.  In his time, this turning away from creation manifested itself in an opposition to marriage and an abstinence from foods God created (1 Timothy 4.1-5).[8]

False teaching about God can especially relate to God as Creator or God as Redeemer.  The narratives of God’s judgement in the Old Testament relate to the theological and ethical rejection of God in these two roles.  Idolatry and immorality led to God’s cleansing Canaan twice, first of the Canaanites, second of the Israelites (both the northern and southern kingdoms).  God’s judgement on people in the days of Noah and on Sodom and Gomorrah in the days of Lot involved a rejection of God as Creator and the consequences of this rejection in their immoral practices.  A core characteristic of today’s postmodern worldview is a rejection of the natural, created order along with a rejection of God.  Mainline denominations in the West have adopted this worldview in their promotion of abortion, assisted suicide, homosexuality, and gender theories opposed to God’s creation of male and female and marriage as between a man and a woman.

3. Wandering from Essential Christian Doctrine and Ethics

One of the problems facing the churches in Ephesus and Crete that Paul addresses to Timothy and Titus is what Paul calls myths and endless genealogies.  The content of this teaching remains somewhat obscure to us, but the main point is that there are teachings that take our eyes off of the sound doctrine that we are to teach.  An important role for ministers is to keep what is essential before people and not let them make minor issues major, let alone false issues the focus of teaching.  In our day, the challenge to the very notion of orthodoxy and orthopraxy has the effect of detracting from the truth and privileging other, even erroneous matters.  So much of the content of the Pastoral Epistles is calling attention to what is central to Christian teaching.

4.     Ordination and the Exemplary Life

Paul says that he is someone to be imitated (1 Corinthians 4.16; 11.1; Philippians 3.17; 4.9; 1 Thessalonians 1.6; 2 Thessalonians 3.9; 1 Timothy 1.16; 2 Timothy 1.13; 2.2).   Paul instructs Timothy to be an example to believers in Ephesus in his speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity (1 Timothy 4.12).  Timothy is told to practice the gift he received when ordained, to devote himself to the public reading Scripture, exhortation, and teaching, and then Paul says, ‘Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress’ (1 Timothy 4.15).

A person living an exemplary life would not be a person whose acquaintance was recently made by the church—a newcomer or a new believer.  The congregation must know the person’s life over time, and one might say the longer the better.  Thus, Paul says, one characteristic for an overseer in the list is that he must not be a recent convert.  He also advises Timothy that he should not lay hands on a person quickly for ministry as an elder (1 Timothy 5.22). 

Ordination: The Laying on of Hands for Separating Someone to the Lord for Service

‘Laying hands’ on a person seems already to have been a practice of consecrating or ordaining a person for ministry in the early Church, as this was done to Timothy (1 Timothy 4.14; 2 Timothy 1.6).  The Hellenistic ministers selected by the Jerusalem church to serve the people were commissioned to service with prayer and the laying on of hands (Acts 6.6).  We might note that the Spirit was given to believers through the apostles’ laying hands on them (Acts 8.17; 9.17; 19.6; cf. Hebrews 6.2).  When the church at Antioch sent Paul and Barnabas out on ministry, they laid hands on them after a time of fasting and praying (Acts 13.3).  The practice of laying hands on someone to give a blessing is mentioned in Genesis 48.14, 17—it is an ancient custom.  It was also a practice in the ordination of the Levites for ministry.  They were to be cleansed for service by having water sprinkled on them, being shaved, having their clothes washed, and washing themselves.  Cleansing from sin was also part of the ordination service.  One bull was offered for a burnt offering along with a grain offering.  Another bull was offered for a sin offering.  Then the people laid their hands on the Levites while Aaron offered them before the Lord as a wave offering from the people to do the service of the Lord (Leviticus 8.5-13).  This offering of the Levites for ministry meant that they belonged to God (v. 14).  They were to do the service for the people and to make atonement for them (v. 19).  Relatedly, when Joshua was commissioned to take Moses’ place, Moses laid hands on him (Numbers 27.18, 23; Deuteronomy 34.9).

‘Laying hands on’ (manum conserere) something was a term in Roman law having to do with making a legal claim (vindicia) against someone also making a claim of ownership, as Aelius Gellius notes (Attic Nights  XX.X).  This was done in the presence of the magistrate as it was a legal matter.  In a similar way, one can see that laying hands on someone for ministry is a claiming of the person for ministry.  The church’s practice of ordination was directly drawn from the Jewish practice of ordaining Levites for ministry, but it would have been understood in the Roman world as well.

The Exemplary Life

The exemplary life is not a life of ministers ordained because their sins are evident to all so that everyone can celebrate God’s incredible grace.  Nor is it the life of someone with a besetting sin or public struggle with desires. Rather, the exemplary life is a demonstration of godliness, good ministerial practices, and progress in the faith.  The minister has been cleansed, received the Spirit, and set apart and offered to God.  This is what makes him an example to the people.

Paul understands that Christians (cf. Galatians 6.1) and ministers are not perfect and may fail.  Elders may fail, though charges against them require two or three witnesses and not the accusation of one person.  Should he prove to have failed, he may retain his role if he does not persist in his sin.  If he persists, he is to be rebuked publicly so that the other believers may stand in fear (1 Timothy 5.19-20).  Even the judgement of an elder provides an example to the congregation of how they should live.

Marriage is Paul’s solution in 1 Cor. 7 for releasing sexual desire.  This applies to married couples who must not deprive spouses of sex except by mutual agreement for a limited time.  It also applies to those struggling with sexual desire who need to get married.  It should go without saying that the Scriptures do not contemplate sexual relationships outside of marriage between a man and a woman.  Same sex attracted, single people are persons frustrated in this solution to their sexual desires.  This is not an exemplary minister for the church, and he is not a person one would put in situations that only play toward his weaknesses.  Instead, pastoral care calls for helping the person struggling with temptation and sin to avoid such situations and impossible challenges in serving as an example of godliness and purity. 

Such an example is similar to others that Paul identifies.  No person with a weakness or need of money should be accepted into ministry since it would involve handling church funds.  Another example is not to put a new convert into a situation of ministry as it might be assumed that he is growing in and learning the faith.  A young and eager convert desiring to become a minister is too young a believer to be put into situations of great testing.  A further example of a qualification that requires time and testing before ordination is that a person should be one who has ruled his household well.  The church is an extended family, and a man who has does not have control over his children should not be given the weightier responsibility of a whole church.  All such examples point to the need for a minister to be above reproach, respectable, and even thought well of by outsiders.  People may wish to be recognised by the congregation for ministry, but the good will of a congregation towards such people must not override the tests of character and abilities necessary for both the congregation and those seeking positions of ministry.

5.     Service

Throughout this discussion, as also throughout the Pastoral Epistles, the words ‘leader’ and ‘leadership’ have been avoided.  Instead, the words ‘minister’ and ‘ministry’ have been used to cover the roles of overseers, elders, and deacons.  The language of leadership emerged in recent decades as business leadership literature was first used to guide persons leading Christian educational institutions, denominations, and ministry organisations.  It quickly came to be applied to pastors and others in Christian ministry.  People use the language of leadership without thought now, but it is noticeably almost wholly absent from the New Testament.  The reason for this is that it is such a poor term to describe ministry.  Jesus Himself is not presented as a ‘leader’ of some institution but as a servant.  Paul identifies himself as a ‘slave’ in his ministry (Titus 1.1).  While he identifies himself in 1 Timothy as an ‘apostle’ (1.1), remember that an ‘apostle’ is someone who has been sent (ἀποστέλλω), as slaves regularly were by their masters to deliver messages.

The difference between a leader and a minister is the difference between someone in authority because of an office held in an institution and someone with a responsibility because of a function in an operation (mission, ministry) or intentional community (like a family or church).  The former operates out of authority in the office he holds; the latter out of the authority of the message he delivers or service he provides.  The dominance of the leadership paradigm in discussions of ministry today is so widespread, and so much can be said to challenge it from the New Testament understanding of ministry that I need to refer readers to further reading on the subject rather than expound further on the subject here.[9]

The three terms that Paul uses for ministry in the Church are ‘overseers’, ‘elders’, and ‘deacons’.  Most likely, overseers and elders are the same group, since in 1 Timothy 3 elders are not mentions, In Titus 1, overseers and elders are both mentioned, but possibly as alternative terms for the same group.  The similarity of characteristics in these two passages also suggests the terms refer to the same group.  ‘Elders’ is a continuation of the Jewish group of elders in the synagogue, and the title appears to indicate a familial authority and responsibility due to age and respect.  Homes and estates had overseers, who were often slaves.  ‘Deacons’ is a technical term, but the Greek word is the word for ‘servants’.  The terminology, then, is not that of an institution with offices exercising power but that of a home with roles of oversight responsibilities, elders with domestic and communal seniority, and servants.  The extended household of the church requires persons to run it just as a household does.

The familial role is explicitly stated in regard to overseers in 1 Timothy 3 and elders in Titus 1.  The former passage says that overseers must have managed their own households well, with children in submission with all dignity (3.4).  In Titus, the parallel thought is stated differently.  Elders appointed in the church are to have believing children and not open to a charge of debauchery or insubordination (1.6).  

This requirement was, no doubt, standard in the thinking and literature of the day about what is required in one who is responsible for harmony in civil society.  Plutarch says, ‘A man therefore ought to have his household well harmonized who is going to harmonize State, Forum, and friends’ (Plutarch, Conjungalia Praecepta 43).[10]  Much earlier than Plutarch, Hesiod noted the correlation between a person’s maintenance of domestic order and an upright life.  He wrote that ‘men who neglect their households are the very ones to live by injustice’ (Works and Days 309, as quoted by Plutarch, Comparison of Aristides with Marcus Cato 3.4).[11]

While having some amount of authority is part of the thought, we must rule out any notion of dictatorial power.  The concern is one who has a well-ordered home, with obedient and Christian children.  We may object that some children simply rebel, no matter how good the parents are and how well they have raised their children.  Such contingencies may well go into decisions made in specific church appointments to service, but the general point is well stated: proof of a good home is supportive of one being considered to the similar responsibilities to keep harmony in a church.

Applied to the question of ordaining someone with same sex attraction, though celibate, one might state the obvious.  Such a person is hardly one for the role of oversight in a home or an extended home situation like a church.  A home might have such a person associated with it, but the person should be under pastoral care rather than aspire to the role of an overseer or elder.  Everyone in the home is involved in contributing gifts and in service, but only a few are selected to the roles of responsibility and oversight or to special roles of service, and, Paul insists, such people must be persons of tested and exemplary virtue.  They are not show-cased for how they bear up under their internal disorder but for the virtues they possess.

Conclusion

Many particular thoughts about the character and practices of ministers in the Church have been identified in this essay, with special focus on the Pastoral Epistles.  This essay has organised thoughts on ministry under five headings: (1) Holiness and Marital Purity; (2) Self-Control; (3) Sound Doctrine; (4) Ordination and the Exemplary Life; and (5) Service.  Paul did not intend what he wrote to be a complete discussion of the characteristics of ministry, and what is discussed here is also not a complete discussion of the topic.  Some application to contemporary matters has also been presented, but this discussion is, of course, also not exhaustive.  Some further thought might be given not only to the characteristics of ministers but also to the types of ministries in the Church and how they are differently understood in different traditions.  What Paul discusses about ministry covers calling, theological competence, ministerial ethics, and ministry practices, and in this he presents much that is worthy of further reflection in our own contexts.  This essay is intended to further that reflection.

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[1] Cf. Philippians 1.1.

[2] This verse is in reference either to female deacons or to the wives of deacons.  The Greek simply says ‘women’, and the virtues of the ‘women’ appear in the middle of virtues for the deacons (masculine noun) in 1 Timothy 3.8-10 and 3.12-13.  We know that persons designated ‘deaconesses’ existed in the early Church, we just do not have clarity on which understanding of 3.11 Paul had in mind.

[3] One subject that I have avoided here is whether women might assume a teaching role in the Church (let alone the larger subject of women’s ordination).  See further, Rollin G. Grams, ‘1 Tomthy 2.12-14: What We Can Learn from Paul’s Chiasm,’ Bible and Mission blog (26 February, 2017); https://bibleandmission.blogspot.com/2017/02/1-timothy-28-15-problem-of-disruption.html.

[4] See Rollin G. Grams, The Pastoral Care of Sinners, available at Bible and Mission bookshop; https://www.blogger.com/blog/page/edit/6624706296388983899/1088130052748490023.  Individual chapters of this booklet are available on the blog itself: see, ‘The Church 18’ titles.

[5] See Rollin G. Grams, ‘Toward a Biblical Theology of Division from False Teachers, Theological Errors, and Immoral Persons in the Church,’ Bible and Mission blog (15 July, 2023); https://bibleandmission.blogspot.com/2023/07/toward-biblical-theology-of-division.html.

[6] Cf. Stephen M. Pogoloff, Logos and Sophia: The Rhetorical Situation of 1 Corinthians (SBL Dissertation Series, 134; Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1992).

[7] To have authority is to have license to do something—the Greek word ‘ἐξουσία’ means both authority and freedom.  When Paul argues in Galatians for Christian freedom over against submission to the Law, he is not arguing against the laws as rules of righteousness but against a view that accounts the work of Jesus and the Spirit as of no avail.  Paul’s point is that the power of Christ and the Spirit makes the slave obedience to the Law unnecessary—even a backward movement that undermines the Gospel.  Clarification comes later in the chapter when Paul declares that one will not gratify the desires of the flesh if one walks by the Spirit (Galatians 5.16).  The restraint of the Law in regard to the flesh is not necessary for one led by the Spirit (5.18).

[8] Cf. Rollin G. Grams, ‘False Teaching in the “Later Times”: A Look at 1 Timothy 4.1-5,’ Bible and Mission blog (26 October, 2023); https://bibleandmission.blogspot.com/2023/10/false-teaching-in-later-times-look-at-1.html.

[9] See Rollin G. Grams, Ministry or Leadership?  Challenging the Leadership Paradigm for Christian Ministry (2024); available online at ‘Bible and Mission’ blog bookstore (https://www.blogger.com/blog/page/edit/6624706296388983899/1088130052748490023).

[10] Plutarch, Moralia, trans. Frank Cole Babbitt (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1928).

[11] Plutarch, Plutarch's Lives, trans. Bernadotte Perrin (Cambridge, MA. Harvard University Press., 1914).