Introduction
Perhaps you’ve heard the humorous song entitled “Excuses” sung by the Southern Gospel quartet The Kingsmen. The song tells the story of how Satan might try to get professing believers to stay out of church by giving them excuses. It’s quite the humorous song, but one verse sticks out to me about the excuses that Satan might try to use to keep people out of church:
Well, the preacher he’s too young. And, maybe he’s too old.
The sermons they’re not hard enough. And, maybe they’re too bold.
His voice is much too quiet-like. Sometimes he gets too loud.
He needs to have more dignity. Or, else he’s way too proud.
Well, the sermons they’re too long. And, maybe they’re too short.
He ought to preach the word with dignity instead of “stomp and snort.”
Well, that preacher we’ve got must be “the world’s most stuck up man.”
Well, one of the lady’s told me the other day, “Well, he didn’t even shake my hand.”
If you get a chance you might look up the song, it’s quite humorous. But it brings up the issue that everyone has something they look for in a pastor, a preacher. There are so many ideas about what a pastor should and shouldn’t be, and some people are looking for the perfect pastor. They have all sorts of expectations. And people can easily get disappointed when their reality isn’t the same as their expectations.
Pastors face an expectation challenge—there are all sorts of expectations for pastors! I’ve heard one man describe it this way: “People want a high powered visionary leader who sees the future and knows how to get there, while having personal humility that makes you sensitive, a highly visible commitment to reproduce yourself in the next generation of leaders, but you have to play a prominent role in the community. You have to be a wonderful team player that befriends and motivates and supervises church staff and volunteers, but you also have to open up your home for hospitality and in your spare time, be an effective fund raiser. Be involved in your association but don’t neglect your local church. And counseling, you need to be as effective a counselor as Jay Adams wishes he was as well as a commitment to marriage that brings you to spend 6 weeks in pre-marital counseling with every couple who wants married in the church. Along with that a personal commitment to marriage that causes you to spend quality time with your family—keep those boundaries high we’re told, but don’t neglect your spiritual life—spend time in prayer seeking God, instantly answer email and on occasion, write a best selling book. But do it on your vacation because we don’t pay you for that.” We want excellence in all of these things! How can you achieve excellence at a time like this?
Which leads us to the question of what should you expect from a pastor? What should his goal first and foremost be? What should you expect from a sermon? What even is a sermon? I hope to answer these questions this week. But we focus specifically today on the focus of a pastor—on what should a pastor focus? What should you expect from him? How does he know if he is successful in his ministry and what ought his ministry to consist of?
Our text today helps us to answer these questions, and it helps us to understand what God expects of pastors and how we ought to support a pastor in achieving God’s expectations and approval before God. So as we unpack this text I want you to keep one big idea in your mind today:
Big Idea: Successful pastoral ministry takes place in the field of the Word
An as we unpack this text today we will find two biblical descriptions of successful pastoral ministry and what we ought to expect from a pastor. So lets read our text as we unpack it together:
14 These things remind them, solemnly charging them in the presence of God, not to fight about words, in which is nothing beneficial, and leads to the ruin of the ones hearing. 15 Be diligent to present yourself approved to God, a worker having no need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of the truth. 16 But avoid pointless chatter, for it will lead to much ungodliness. 17 and their talk will spread as gangrene, among whom are Hymenaeus and Philetus. 18 who deviated from the truth, saying the resurrection already has taken place, and they are ruining the faith of some. 19 Nevertheless, the solid foundation of God has stood, having this seal: The Lord knows the ones who are His, and everyone who names the name of the Lord shall abstain from all wickedness.
Two weeks ago we looked at this text as whole—the entire 6 verse, that’s not what we’re going to do today. Our key text for today is verse 15. It’s a verse that is often misquoted and misused. I mentioned before how that I grew up in AWANA, hearing this verse used in reference to me as a child, and how God wants me to study His Word so I can be approved before Him. And while I won’t deny that God wants us to study His word—Scripture makes that abundantly clear, I was never given the true context of this passage. This passage first and foremost is about pastoral ministry—as a pastor it’s a text that is near and dear to my heart. It was written to Pastor Timothy about his ministry of the word and I believe it applies most directly to pastors today concerning how to view their own ministry and what they should strive for in ministry.
So were’ going to look at this text today and think about what to expect from a pastor. How should you evaluate your pastor? What you you look for? What should you expect? Our text gives us two descriptions of successful pastoral ministry:
1. Successful pastors seek the right approval
“Be diligent to present yourself approved to God”
Explanation: the first description of successful pastoral ministry is that successful pastors seek the right approval—they seek the right approval. We opened by talking about all the different expectations people have of pastors. Everyone has their own idea about what a pastor is, what pastoral ministry should look like and what pastors should do. But pastors that succeed seek the right approval . Boys and girls, you can draw seeking the right approval.
Who’s approval should a pastor seek? Men in ministry could go crazy trying to seek the approval of all of those around; trying to please and appease and meet everyone’s expectations. But they could never make everyone happy—there’s always going to be someone upset or who things a pastor needs to focus his efforts in ways other than what he is focusing on. So a man could work himself into a tizzy trying to meet everyone’s changing expectations and meeting their approval, or a pastor could focus on the approval that matters. Paul teaches Timothy who’s approval really matters—God’s. God is a pastor’s number one audience! We find this in the opening phrase of our verse—Be diligent to present yourself approved to God.
Let’s start mining through this text by looking at the specific words Paul used. The KJV says study to show yourself approved unto God. That’s how many of use grew up learning this verse. But Paul does not use the word for study here. There is a word for study that he could have used, but he didn’t. The word used here means to be zealous or eager or diligent—that’s why I translated it in the translation I read a few moments ago as “be diligent.” It carries the sense of to show a keen interest in something or to be eager to do something. God expects pastors to be eager or diligent in two areas of their lives—first, to seek the right approval. Ultimately, pastor’s work for an audience of one. Yes we like to make people happy and we desire to have people like us and approve of our ministry, but there really is one approval that matters—that of our Lord Jesus Christ!
Explanation: it’s significant that Paul tells Timothy to present himself to God. It means to stand by or come alongside. This means a pastor is one who comes alongside of God to declare His Word. This goes along with the next concept of being approved. It means tested or proven genuine. A pastor is to work diligently to come alongside of God and be unashamed because he has been tested and proven worthy before God! He comes alongside of God and declares God’s message to God’s people and to the degree that it actually is God’s message he will be worthy and approved before God! This is what makes a good pastor—he makes maximum effort to please God and stand approved beside of Him, and that takes place as we’ll see in a few minutes through his expertise in handling the Word of God.
Application: Many times pastors can feel the pressure of everyone who has an opinion on one thing or another; anyone who wants things their way. They can feel the pull to be a people pleaser and try to make everyone happy while knowing that is an impossible endeavor. They can feel the strain of people who leave and lead others astray as we learn Timothy was battling in Ephesus. And especially as a younger man in ministry, perhaps Timothy was feeling this. But Paul reminds Timothy that there is only one approval he ought to be seeking—Gods! He works for God’s approval and if he has found himself to be approved before God, he is a successful pastor!
I can’t help but wonder if this was something Timothy specifically needed to here at this time. Timothy had been brought in to set things right at the church in Ephesus, and we know he faced some problems. We know Timothy was a young man, he was constitutionally timid, probably didn’t have a lot of experience in ministry, maybe wasn’t very bold. We might think of a 25 year old man starting his first church, green and inexperienced. And perhaps he felt like he was in over his head—people wouldn’t follow his leadership, false teachers had sprung up in the church, others tried to take authority and lead people astray. There were false apostles with ungodly lifestyles. And Paul sent Timothy to Ephesus to straighten them out. But Timothy was struggling; ministry was tough. Maybe he was exerting his last efforts before he gave up on ministry and so Paul writes to him to encourage him to stand firm and keep his focus. How Paul’s words must have ministered to him like medicine to his aching heart! “Timothy, don’t worry about all of that other stuff! Don’t get bogged down by those who are against you! Don’t let them despise your youth; don’t worry about those who are disrupting the unity of the body; don’t seek their approval, seek God’s approval! And if you have God’s approval, you do well, and you will have a clear conscience before God as His laborer! You don’t have to feel awkward or insecure or out of your depth, all you have to do is follows this verse! Want to be a successful pastor, Timothy—I know you do! It’s not going to happen by focusing on your ratings; after all, ministry isn’t a popularity context anyways! Don’t focus on your ratings, only God’s approval matters!”
Imagine how these words must have filled Timothy with passion and joy as he got up to preach that next Sunday with only one person in his mind—Jesus Christ!
Explanation: Paul continues in our text, telling Timothy, and pastor’s today, exactly how to seek the right approval.
A. As a worker
Explanation: first, he is to be a worker. This is the basic word for a laborer. A man who has a specific occupation or trade. Just like someone might be a worker in the field or a worker with their hands, so pastors are workers of God.
B. As one who doesn’t need to be ashamed
Explanation: not only is a pastor to seek the right approval as a worker, but he is also to seek the right approval as one who doesn’t need to be ashamed. That’s what we find in the text—a worker having no need to be ashamed. “Having no need to be ashamed” is actually one word in Greek—literally the unashamed one or unashamed worker.
Application: Well what might cause a worker to be ashamed? Perhaps if he does a poor job, if he slacks off. A worker who takes too long at lunch and on break time. One that is unreliable and can’t be trusted. Pastors are not to be that, and if they are, they are not approved or genuine before God! God expects pastors to eagerly and diligently present themselves before God for approval—to seek the right approval so they will not be ashamed.
Illustration: I remember when I was in construction we were working on a water treatment plant, and we were doing all the piping—the PVC piping. And we would often dry fit the pipes together before gluing them. I am not a plumber, I was a laborer, but things were tough for the economy so our company had us doing a lot of things were weren’t skilled at just so they could save money. Well on this occasion, when we went to run water through an area of pipes I had been working on the man who was inspecting them got soaked. Apparently I had dry fit the pipes together and forgotten to come back and glue them! Let me tell you, I was ashamed and embarrassed!
Application: God expects pastors to be diligent workers in the Word who are not ashamed to stand before Him. This is what your ought to expect from your pastor. This is what your pastor should strive for. Successful pastors seek the right approval. They seek approval from God as a worker in the word and as one who has no cause to be ashamed because they are laboring where God wants them to labor.
Big Idea: Successful pastoral ministry takes place in the field of the Word
2) Successful pastors master the right instrument
“accurately handling the Word of truth.”
Explanation: successful pastors seek the right approval, they also master the right instrument. Every worker needs an instrument, a tool in which they practice their trade. A field or arena in which they work.
Illustration: Boston Scientific—microscope
Paul says here that God expects pastors to master their instrument; to excel in working in their field. And the field that Pastors are workers in is the word of God. If they are a worker, then they work in the field of the word. If they are a craftsman, then the Word of God is their instrument, and God expects them to be skilled in using that instrument! Boys and girls, you can draw a pastor and his instrument.
This idea of successful pastors mastering the right instrument is wrapped up in Paul’s phrase accurately handling the Word of truth. There’s a lot of richness in the word choice Paul uses here. The word here for “accurately handling” is only used here in the New Testament. It literally means to cut or guide along a straight path, which is why the KJV translates it as “rightly dividing the word of truth.” The sense is to interpret or analyze properly or accurately.
Illustration: the root of this word is quite interesting. It could be used of cutting a straight line in many different ways—a line in a field, cutting a trail in the woods, using a straight edge in building, it was used of any sort of cutting something straight to fit something together. John MacArthur points out, and I agree, that it is highly likely that this is the sense Paul had in mind as he wrote. Paul was a leather worker. I know we like to think of him as a tent-maker, but some scholars suggest that the word actually means leather worker, and would include making tents because they were often made out of leather. But get that image in your mind—of Paul sewing together pieces of leather. You had to cut them straight for them to turn out right. Everything had to be cut just perfect for it to fit together just right.
Application: this is the job of the preacher. If you don’t know how to cut the pieces, it’s never going to fit together. The point, for pastors, is that you can’t be a theologian until you’ve been an exegete. You can’t put a text together and present it as a whole unless you’ve done your work in the text and cut and diced it straight so that everything fits together. If you don’t cut it right it won’t fit together—all students of Scripture need to understand this—those of you who have preached in this pulpit before need to learn this too, but this is especially pastors! You can’t develop your system of theology unless you have the right parts fitting together and then that becomes your bases for theology and then your basis for how you practice ministry.
And Paul tells Timothy, and all pastors today, if you only give yourself to one thing, give yourself to this! It is your job to cut a straight line in the text so you can give people the sense of what it means. This is not all too different from what Ezra did when he found the book of the law and Nehemiah 8:8 says:
Nehemiah 8:8 NASB95
They read from the book, from the law of God, translating to give the sense so that they understood the reading.
Paul’s meaning is clear for pastors: “if you play fast and loose with Scripture, you’re going to be ashamed! You’re not a workman, you’re lazy! You’re an unreliable worker who doesn’t rightly or accurately divide the word of truth, and you will be ashamed before God for how you’ve dealt in his word!” What a serious thing it is to trifle with God’s Word!
Explanation: Paul concludes by calling this Word what it truly is—the word of truth. There is only one word that matters to pastors—it’s the word of truth. Not the people who were teaching false doctrine in the church, not the people who would overlook Timothy because of his youth, not those who were trying to gain power and authority and lead people astray. The only word that matters to pastors is God’s Word, because it is truth!
Application: And God wants his truth to be made known! This is the wonderful thing about God, that he has given us the truth of His Word to reveal himself to us.
Paul says this carries over to the ministry of a pastor. “If pastors ought to know and give themselves to knowing one thing, it is this word! This is the truth! Pastors need to give themselves to knowing this truth!
Argumentation: Notice Paul didn’t say: Timothy, go visit more people. Go see some shut-ins, make some house calls. Meet with your opponents and give them what they want, see if you can pacify those who are leading in an opposite direction, none of that; though some of those things are important. He told him “here’s how you find success and approval before God—give yourself to the Word. In fact, in I Timothy 5:13 Paul tells Timothy that pastors who labor at preaching and teaching are worthy of double honor—this is a high cause!
This is what you should expect from a pastor! That’s what you should expect from you pastor. And if you have a pastor who gives himself to this sacred task, and I believe you do, he has no cause to be ashamed before God, and you ought to praise God for him!
The Pastoral Epistles for Pastors (Chapter 2)
My success in ministry is in direct relationship to my commitment to gaining facility and skill in the use of the Scriptures.
CONCLUSION
In the book of Hosea we see outlined for us what happens when God’s men stop speaking for God. The situation in Israel was quite dire. Hosea ministered in awful times. There was government approved pagan sacrifices, King Ahaz burned his own son to death in a pagan sacrifice; he looted the temple of God to find bribe money for foreign dignitaries. How could Israel have sunk to such a low state? Hosea answers this question in Hosea 4:6:
Hosea 4:6 NASB95
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I also will reject you from being My priest. Since you have forgotten the law of your God, I also will forget your children.
Notice what caused this situation in Israel—lack of knowledge. Who was supposed to give them knowledge? Priests. The people who were supposed to speak for God. Instead, they have ignored the law of God. It was their job to do biblical instruction and they failed! And because they didn’t do their job, people were destroyed!
Paul didn’t want that to happen to Timothy, and as a preacher, I don’t want that to be said of me. Paul gives high expectations for pastors! Their first and foremost priority is to speak for God! They need to be diligent, to stand with God as a worker who has recieved his approval, because they dig deep and cut straight into the text. Successful pastoral ministry takes place in the field of the Word!
Next Steps
What does this mean for us? For all of you, who aren’t pastors? How does this text apply to you? I have several next steps for you today:
1) Develop Biblical expectations of your pastor
You should expect that when you come to church on Sunday, your pastor cuts straight the text. You should expect that he has spent time working with and dealing with the text, and that he understands what God says in His Word and is prepared to give it to His people. That’s the main goal of a pastor! Develop Biblical expectations. This means that I’m not going to try to push my own expectations on my pastor. I won’t get upset, if a deacon visits me, or if the pastor doesn’t reach out to me as often as I think he should, or if the pastor doesn’t always do what I think he should do—he’s ultimately accountable to God for how he works in the field of the word, and if he is doing that I should be content.
2) Encourage and pray for your pastor—pray on Mondays!
Pray for your pastor to be diligent. It is taxing work! Your mind has to be at 100% capacity! And it’s hard to focus when there are other things going on at the church—issues to deal with, people grumbling, confrontations to make, comfort to give, all of those things. Pastoral ministry can be like a roller coaster—you jump from what you thought was the greatest sermon in the world to an email Monday morning—”pastor I’d like to talk to you about something, can you meed on Friday?” And on Tuesday you’re dealing with church members who are fighting and not getting along, and Wednesday you rejoice with a church member who took an incredible step in a discipleship meeting, and Thursday you’re doing a funeral for a couple who lost their young child, all the while wondering what your Friday meeting is about—are they upset? Are they leaving? Do they need encouragement?
And you walk into the Friday meeting after waiting all week to find out what it was a about, only to find out something insignificant and someone just wanted to talk. It’s a roller coaster ride! Encourage and pray for your pastor—pray specifically on Mondays, they are often discouraging for pastors. Find out when his big study days are—for me it is Mondays. That’s when I do the bulk of my exegetical and translation work. Encourage your pastor—send him a note, give him a text, share what stood out to you from a recent sermon. Sometimes we don’t know if we’re hitting it out of the park or if we didn’t even make it to first base. I remember one pastor in ministry sharing that for a period of 7 years he had a dark cloud over every sermon time, wondering if his sermons were effective and if God was doing anything through them. Share how you’ve grown under his ministry. I appreciated it so much when my people just send me a text “that was an interesting illustration” or “wow, you caught me off guard there.”
3) Free up his time for study and sermon prep
Make sure your pastor has adequate time for study. If there’s a menial task you can do to free him up, do it. If you can take care of some other aspect of ministry—administrative duties or something like that, do that so he can follow his mission to be diligent in the word. Deacons, that’s why they have you—that’s why the first deacons were selected in Acts 6. Deacons, when you agree to serve you are agreeing to do this—free up your pastor for study and sermon prep. Don’t expect him to do all the ministry, that’s why we have a body. I like how John MacArthur put it at a seminary graduation:
Fling him into his office. Tear the “Office” sign from the door and nail on the door, “Study.” Take him off the mailing list. Lock him up with his books and his computer and his Bible. Slam him down on his knees before texts and broken hearts and the flock of lives of a superficial flock and a holy God.
4) Submit yourself to the truth of the word
If your pastor is the one who speaks for God, whom God has called to declare the Word of the Lord to you, then you need to submit yourself to the truth of the Word. This means first of all you have to be here—make this gathering a priority! This means you need to pay attention—that you take notes if that helps you, that you remove distractions—put your phone on silent, don’t talk during the message, don’t wander around the building. God has a Word for His people, submit yourself to the truth of the word by giving priority to the Word he speaks through His shepherds.
We ought to all be able to listen to and hear the Word. If you cannot sit under the word, you have to be somewhere else doing something else during the sermon, or you don’t like preaching and you don’t pay attention—a sermon is kind of like water off a ducks back, you have a heart problem! There is nobody who is exempt from this! Even me! That’s why when we have guest speakers, I sit and listen. That’s why I listen to sermons regularly. Sometimes people joke if I have a guest speaker “oh, have the week off today”. Well, not really, because I’m still pastoring whether I’m preaching or not. But truth be told I need to model for our congregation what it looks like to sit under the word, and just because i’m a pastor doesn’t’ mean I get a pass on that!
5) If understanding God’s Word takes so much effort, then you need to give yourself to understanding and knowing the Word of God
Here’s where this text does apply specifically to us. Pastors are not the only ones who need to know the Word. We all need to know the word, and this takes time, effort, energy, and diligence. We should all aspire to be an accepted worker in the word who cuts it rightly. Doesn’t mean we’re all going to be pastors or going to preach sermons, but we all need to know the word and interpret it rightly. We need to commit ourselves to the same diligence Paul instructs to Pastor Timothy and pastors today.
God cares about the preaching of His Word. God has tasked pastors with the responsibility to declare his word to the congregation of God’s people. Successful pastors work diligently in the field of God’s Word. Let’s make sure we develop the right expectations from pastors and model a commitment to the word ourselves in our own spiritual lives.
