MCC Podcasts
Working It Out - Sassy Younger Widows, Marriage, and Two Temptations We All Have
This is my title ready sassy younger widows marriage and two temptations. We all face Sassy younger widows marriage and two temptations we all face See Ben had covered the first part of this text where he talked about them caring for these widows who didn't have any way to care for themselves And he got to the he kind of addressed and had this conversation around the fact that there was a list at the end of his passage last week There was this list that these women could be on and they could be on the list if in fact They lived a certain way when you look at that list you like well Why would there be a list like that well and then alluded to it and and briefly touched on it that that these were women who once their husbands had died Then committed themselves to serving the church and the saints they became not really an order per se like sort of A nunnery not really quite there yet, but it was pretty organized and it was a list that was written down and the church said you You want to serve us especially you want to commit yourself to not getting remarried? You want to commit yourself to serving the Lord full-time and we're gonna take care of you and You give yourself in service to the Lord so there's this group of widows They were called who serve the Lord and then my passage is Paul goes and then there's some people who shouldn't be on that list And so now I get to deal with that passage. Let's look at it Starting in verse where does it start verse 11? As for younger widows Do not put them on such a list for when their sensual desires overcome their dedication to Christ. They want to marry Thus they bring judgment on themselves because they have broken their first pledge Besides they get into the habit of being idle and going about from house to house and not only do they become idlers But also bitty busy bodies who talk nonsense saying things they ought not to Do Are you guys all laughing at God's word right now Or laughing at me you're having a meat aren't you that I have to so I counsel younger widows to marry to have children to manage their homes And to give the enemy no opportunity for slander some in fact have already turned away to follow Satan And then verse 16 he returns to the topic at hand if any woman who's a believer has widows in her care She should continue to help them and not let the church be burdened with them So that the church can help those widows who are really in need which was where he started the passage and as Paul is Want to do sometimes he ended up then going off and teaching some things But he was talking about caring for widows, but this is the word of the Lord friends and you say thanks be the God This passage is about these younger widows and why they weren't supposed to be on the tech on on the list And so what I looked at is I thought to myself, well, what do I do with this passage? How do I do this and I started looking and breaking down and just reading God's word? And I hope this is another example for us about how to study God's word I'm like well, all right. Well, what's my passage about my passage is about these widows who were not allowed to be on the list Why were they not to be allowed to be on the list and Paul says Timothy? There's two reasons why these people can't be on the list And so then I go that's the sermon because if we can relate to these widows at all then we've got a word and a challenge to us So here's the you know the outline is really about these temptation two temptations that we share with these younger widows This is how you read scripture. It was written in a context right remember This is a church in the city of Ephesus of Christian believers Who was pastored by a young man named Timothy in his 30s who is being mentored by Paul and Paul wrote him the letter to say Hey, listen in this time in this era in 61 AD or whatever the time is close to that Here's what's going on I want to talk to you and we look at that God inspired that word to be written to this church at this time And then we take it and we go now. What does that mean to me? How do I understand what I'm supposed to do with that text? And so this is the kind of question we okay Well, here's these these things that these younger widows are doing and now What do we do that's just like that and how can we learn from it? So two temptations that we share with the younger widows number one in our immaturity we make pledges we can't keep Now remember we did you go back look at verse 11 and and 12 again. Let's look at that text As for younger widows don't put them on the list For when their sensual desires overcome their dedication to Christ they want to marry And so they bring judgment on themselves because they've broken their first pledge in our immaturity We make pledges. We can't keep see they were just like the older widows They were pledging if they were gonna be on this list to not getting remarried This is what happened their husbands passed away and the church said, okay, you're a widow What are you gonna do and some of them said sign me up for the widow list? I'm pledging to not get married. I'm pledging to serve Jesus full-time You guys take care of my needs and I will serve the saints and I will serve the body and I will share my faith And I'll do all the things that I need to do I'm giving myself fully to the service of the Lord including never being married again So that I can be set apart for the service of God Okay, this is what was happening and Paul said come on You're too young to do that because what's gonna happen is your sensual desires are gonna get Overcome you what is the words that he uses? You're that will overcome your dedication to Christ and you're gonna want to marry Friends in our immaturity We make decisions and pledges that we can't keep do you know that? We get all fired up about stuff and we decide we're gonna do something intense for God these guys were so it sounds good, right? They're all excited about serving Jesus But it's very severe and in the end they realized they couldn't and shouldn't have made that pledge I remember when I was about 20 years old I Read a book about Dawson Trotman anybody know that name. He's a guy who began the navigators ministry and Which is a ministry among servicemen and he was so passionate about sharing the good news of Jesus with People and knowing that that role was in our hands and in the hands of the church that he committed himself as a young man To never going one day in his life without sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ with somebody So that somebody in his world and his midst and his that he crossed paths with somewhere along the line Every single day of his life would know how to accept Christ as Savior because he thought that's what I'm left on earth for man Otherwise, I should just zoom when I became a Christian. I got to work some work to do I'm gonna. I mean I read that book. It's probably 20 years old. I'm like That's what I'm doing Lord, I am on this earth to share the good news of Jesus I will not let one day go by without sharing the good news of Jesus Christ with somebody I thought about it about for four or five minutes and I thought that's what I'm doing for the rest of my life Wow, it was awesome. I had a new mission. I had a new passion I had a pledge before the Lord, right? Can you see it? I got up from my my you know I was living in a apartment with a bunch of college guys. I got up, you know bright and early at 11 a.m. Like we always did and Got out into the world and it was on the forefront of my brain for the first week That this is what I was gonna be about and man, I found all kinds of opportunities It was awesome. I ran across people they would people would come up to me and I'd be in line I had my Bible and some of you go Hey, do you have the time and I'd be like, yeah, and they go. What is that a Bible? Yeah, it's a Bible Oh, you know, I'd realize there it is Lord. You gave it to me, right? And Sometimes it didn't happen and so it would be three four o'clock and I'd be at the end of my day class again on my bike You see Davis and I'd be about to ride home and I think I didn't share my faith with somebody So I'd look around the quad for some sucker. I Taught myself so much about it was so fascinating as a as a as a training exercise because I just had to learn how to talk about my Face so I've come up to some dude leaning against a tree and I'd be like hey you want to hear about Jesus, you know And then I'd be like no and I'd be well, okay, but it's my pledge So what I hear is the deal and I would Tell them about Jesus There got to be a number of times where I would get all the way home And I'd eat dinner and I'd be doing homework and be 10 o'clock at night And I would forget that that was what the pledge that I'd made to the Lord It's raining. It's dark. It's winter quarter. I get on my bike in the rain. I go drive to the library try to find something in the library I know we're not supposed to talk That never went well then I drive home mad That happened two or three times by the third time at 11 o'clock at night that I'd forgotten and hadn't shared my faith that day Now I'm just mad at God, right? I literally went up to people strangers on the street and said look here's the deal I made a promise to God. Can you just sit down and listen to me for five minutes? I just think the Lord stood there the whole time so what you get what happened? Then when I stopped then when there were times when the opportunity didn't arise or when I had forgotten I lived with such guilt and Such shame that I'd made this promise before God and couldn't fulfill it or didn't fulfill it And in fact the enemy then would whisper to me and you don't want to fulfill it. You don't really love God You're weak. You're never gonna be a servant of the Lord anybody have those messages ever come your way in our immaturity we make pledges that We can't keep that we shouldn't have made in the first place and the fruit of them is guilt and shame and disappointment and even resignation. I guess it's not gonna work for me You think about your pledges man Jeff challenges me about the Bible I'm gonna start reading the book I want to be a man of God's word. I'm gonna memorize Leviticus, right? I Just think the Lord sits back at those things and goes Dude, I am not asking you to do this I'm way more realistic than you are right now Jeff says the Lord or to you and That so not only is there that guilt and that shame and that the disillusionment and all of that Which by the way is a misread of the gospel because His yoke is easy and his burden is light But sometimes we make pledges in our immaturity that put on heavy stuff on us that God doesn't even put on us Some of you need to be free to hear that this morning He says in verse 12 They bring judgment on themselves when they make these pledges, they can't keep that's interesting word I Think that's judgment of other people who said wow you got all fired up for God and you made a pledge and you I'm watching you not fulfill it I also think he means we judge ourselves when we don't fulfill it, right? Does he mean God there? Maybe? We don't know Do we bring judgment on ourselves meaning God judges us because we broke our pledge? We know there's no judgment and there's no condemnation in Christ, but does God judge us? I think that God does look us and go you know I'm pretty serious about the things you promised to do so only promise to do the things I ask you to do So there's a sense of judgment about having missed God's plan you with me on this a couple more thoughts about pledges before I just Kind of let this go and this this is what the sassy widows did they made this yeah? I want to live for you God and then later. They're like oh means I don't get to get married I don't have to have I what they said they're sensual desires overcome their dedication to Christ. There's no way around that text right there sassy widows Wait, you're asking me never to be in a minute again with a man wait a minute. Oh, yeah. No, I'm out. Okay Couple thoughts more about pledges Your pledges friends should probably be very few and far between in Fact it's from on the Mount Jesus says you've heard that it was said and he talks about oaths and he goes I'm telling you don't make an oath I even make oaths but your yes be yes, and you're no be no In other words, don't talk about what you're gonna do Just do it live out of the conviction that God gives you follow him and then do those things yes Yes, yes, no, no if you want to be a man of God's word get up and read God's word Don't be like I will be memorizing the New Testament by the time I'm 41 don't do that Unless God tells you to go do that Let your pledges be few and far between now That's not to say not to make vows there are times in our life where pledges and vows are absolutely necessary and part of our journey and Paul Made of Val acts 18 Paul made a vow so he's not saying don't ever make vows I Mean man. We were in a wedding on Friday night I mean weddings are powerful realities because you got up and vowed it some stuff. I'm vowing to close the back door I'm vowing to give myself. I'm vowing to trust the Lord in this. I'm vowing to work this deal out I'm vowing to surrender my heart to this person even though it could be incredibly painful I mean that's intense we make vows because what it merges a hard thing There's other vows that we do in our lives our baptismal vows are powerful I take very seriously our vows when we dedicate our children or line those new members up here I take that dead seriously and those are important because I think there's some times in our life where God says I don't want you kind of seeing how it goes You'd make some some vows, but they have to be few and far between friends Second thought about about pledges You got to be sure it's from the Lord You want to be sure that it's from the Lord before you go making a pledge and how are you going to be sure that it's from the Lord by walking with Jesus in That decision for a while Just like you would never in the moment be all inspired and go I kind of like you on the first date I kind of like you you know what I'm committing to you forever You know you don't some people did that and the Lord blessed you and met you in it, you know It's funny. You hear some of our grandparents stories by the way I don't know why it's like that generation, but some of those folks that got married like in the 30s and stuff like that They knew each other for like a day It was awesome, but We don't do that We walk with the Lord and we listen to God And we I mean literally friends come in with this is a living God And we're called to walk with Jesus and his spirit is in us and we can hear him speak and we can learn to discern his voice And we have to be confirmed in those things before we make these pledges before God because the shame and the guilt and the disappointment The disillusionment when we have to break them and the judgment of everybody around us including unbelievers is Such a strong price to pay that we can't make pledges too lightly So we got to be sure and walk with God in those things There's another thought about pledges When something spiritual and awesome it does not then require a pledge from you There's my example I was 21 years old. I went to the Urbana conference International missions conference held the University of Illinois at Champaign Urbana and at the end of this deal They're like hey, there's 20,000 of us in the room. There's 16,000 unreached people groups in the in the in the whole world You each commit we're gonna reach the whole world for Christ in our generation who's in and it's five days of worship and beg and God To come and speak to the world and wanting the gospel to be spread to the ends of the earth man You are not human if the end of that thing you are not like that totally in and I remember standing at 21 years old going I will be a missionary and I remember the Lord going hey, well, what are you doing? But I didn't hear that till later because it was spiritual and it was awesome and it was a powerful moment I thought it required some sort of a pledge on my part But friends I didn't walk with Jesus over time over it and I didn't hear the Lord lead me and I'm I yes And yes, no, no, I just sort of made this pledge We we have to be careful that when we get all fired up and the Lord meets us in prayer about our love for our wise We don't come and we don't say you know what I've decided to do I'm gonna come home every night by five after five and go for a walk with you to demonstrate my love for you And we're gonna spend six nights a week together dating because you know You don't make pledges when you get fired up that you can't keep do not What's the old phrase do not write checks that your body can't cash, you know, don't do that Just because it's awesome and just because it's spiritual it doesn't require a pledge wait and walk with the Lord and real change We'll have its way you with me you understand There's another thought about pledges severe and difficult does not always equal God's will did you know that? So let's look at our lives we go whether it's two paths to take either. We adopt 11 children from Russia and China and India or We send our children off to college and now we have an empty nest and enjoy our marriage for a few years Those are my two options Oh Well, that's selfish and that's clearly from the Lord, right? What kind of trouble do we get into running ahead of the lordship of Jesus? When the hard thing or the thing that seems most spiritual is the thing that we think requires some sort of a pledge from us We get it all kinds of bondage that way The hard thing is not always the thing or the thing that we think is hard is not always again his burden Is easy and his yoke is easy and his burden is light. It might be the other way around Now I say all that and I'm gonna just I have to give this caveat because it's in my personality to preach the opposite sermon And then the one I just gave you The opposite sermon is this do you have no pledges in your life? Do you have nothing that you're stepping up to? Have you not listened to the Lord until he's put deep and powerful convictions on you till you say to him? I Must serve you in this way. Come on church. Do you have none of those because that's the other side of the coin, isn't it? There are a few times where God comes on us in our life and says you be about this get up and be about it and With the intensity of the conviction and the power of the Spirit of God within us we say I'm in So do not always take the easy way out Because I said the things I said before you with me on all that Sometimes in our immaturity we make pledges that we can't keep by the grace of God We Can hear the Lord and walk with him these sassy widows were so young that they didn't understand what was in front of them And they jumped to this commitment and they were gonna end up probably causing some serious damage in their relationship with God Because they couldn't understand that they shouldn't have made that pledge in the first place and people around them said What are you doing you can't even fulfill your pledge? So let us be careful by God's grace about our pledges what pledges are in your life and what pledges shouldn't be in your life And let's settle those with lords the lordship of Christ All right Well the last thing the second the temptation that we share with younger widows is we get distracted and petty as we serve as we go To serve God so look at verse 13 They get into the habit of being idle and going about from house to house and not only do they become idlers But also busy bodies who talk nonsense saying things they ought not to This is a scary awful verse for all of us We should run and hide in fear that we could ever be described as people who ended up being idle and busy bodies instead of busy busy and Gossipers and saying non-speaking nonsense and not helping anyone saying things we shouldn't say this I phrase this is getting distracted and petty as we try to serve God They said we're gonna in their immaturity. They tried to serve God, but they lost their focus They felt like they knew what God had put on their hearts to do And some of these young widows needed probably to have committed themselves to not being married into serving God full-time Yeah, right on God was in that but they would get they would lose focus and they would become instead of building up the church They would diminish it Instead of serving people they would use people instead of helping people they would degrade people This is an awful thought until I started reflecting on it And I thought this happens all the time in our lives and in church where this conviction starts we feel called We understand what this is about we get on a committee to serve God somehow really powerfully And then we start getting distracted and then we start realizing that that I don't really want to do the hard work That it takes or I sort of missed the boat on this deal or nobody around is working as hard as I want to or we just sort of Maybe we accomplish what it was and we sort of get distracted and we feel like we sort of arrived and so now There's no real work to serve the Lord sort of too easy and then we start wasting time and then we waste all of our efforts and gifts and then we're not plugged into other real ministry and then pretty soon we start Even diminishing the church we start doing there have been some committees and ministries friends that have been around way too long and They start diminishing the church Because over time sometimes and in our immaturity we can get distracted and not do the things God's called us to I mean I've got an example of a small group of guys that I was in that we were in that group to powerfully build ourselves up and support one another and be powerful allies in the kingdom of God But we kind of did that and as we got comfortable with each other we weren't on our guard so much and we weren't so attentive to what God had called us to do in the first place and so then we started hanging around and having a couple beers together and just Yucking it up and being buddies and then it went from there to even then sort of church bashing right and it wasn't about you It was way back in my past had nothing to do with you But there was then that we'd sit around and we talk about how ridiculous the church can be and how crazy church leadership can often end up Being and we'd have that kind of conversation and then it was pretty much aren't we smart? Aren't we funny and aren't we the best and isn't everybody else losers? And that was our small group Does it I know that reflects poorly on me, but can you understand where that goes sometimes in your relationships in your ministry and in your heart? We could do that as a church friends We could get all fired up about this building We could get all fired up about raising this money and seeing what the next season of life is gonna be from Marin Covenant How he's gonna serve people and bring more people and be exposed to the gospel We could get all fired up about that and you know when we hit our goal financially and then this building gets built We could start to get distracted and we could waste a lot of time and energy about what we do with this building and even beyond that We could use this thing as an opportunity for disunity because we can start having too much time on our hands And instead of working towards something productive We end up just spinning our wheels and arguing about and we joke about this the color of the carpet Our prayer you can't imagine any times we've prayed this in several different contexts from staff to building committee to leadership team. Our prayer is God Protect us from the unfathomable reality that the enemy could actually cause disunity in our growth and our success Come on not in that God That's what happens when we get all this time on our hands and that's what these young widows did They would have so much time. They would just spend their wheels and end up kind of falling apart So Paul tells them to get married. That's why in my title. I said that I put marriage in there's a piece on married Paul tells them to get married It's almost like it's a punishment. Hello And we don't have time to go into that, but you should probably read about Paul's views on marriage, you know, you Okay We've talked about marriage Marriage isn't easy God's grace has to be unmarried people the way God's grace has to be in single people if they're called to be married You need his grace and you get his grace if you're called to be single you get his grace and you need his grace But Paul goes so tell these people to get married Why because young widows at the time if they got married and then took care of a household friends They weren't they weren't eating bond bonds and watching days of our lives There was a lot to do to manage your household. They would be busy enough to not become idle and spin He's basically saying do something productive in your life. This is how I translate it. Listen Figure out what your call is What's God asked you to do through the lordship of Jesus and Then get busy Stay out on the edge depend on Jesus serve him powerfully serve him with all your might You can't you won't get distracted those teams that are working together to reach students for Christ Don't spin their wheels. They're praying for all of the kids who don't yet know Jesus in this county. You know what I'm saying? We get going he goes you go get married and He says in verse 15 if you look at the text he says in verse 15 He goes and then if you get busy then people the the adversaries those who oppose you have no opportunity for slander that that The enemy is not Satan right there Satan's in the next version of on verse 15 That is the those who oppose you the enemy those who are enemies of the faith have no opportunity to say to you You know what I knew Christianity is a joke because look at how those people spin their wheels and tear down one another What a joke They can't slander us because we're busy with the things that God has given us to do Well, I got plenty more in this text because I studied it long and hard fearful that I wasn't gonna have anything to tell you About this thing, but you know that last thoughts pretty pretty powerful verse 15 some have in fact already Sorry the verse 15 some have already in fact turned away to Satan To follow Satan here's what this says if we do not follow Jesus It's like following Satan Some have turned away They've made pledges they can't keep they've turned away from pledges that they shouldn't have made in the first place They've turned away from the Lord and they're in their their Their shame and their guilt Some have gotten busy in idle and ended up doing a lot of other stuff with their time instead of serving Christ And he says that's just like following Satan Because the devil's having his way in our lives In their immaturity they made pledges they can't keep so do we They got distracted and petty in their service for God. That's what happens to us when we become idle So friends, let's walk with God. Let's hear his call alone and then let's get busy with what God has put on us to do So the body of Christ is built up that's what maturity looks like I'm sassy widows But we can't blame it all on them Let's us be God's followers as we go forward [BLANK_AUDIO]