Now as we have been introducing this subject of deacon qualifications, some of you might be thinking: “I don’t have any plans to become a deacon, so why do I need to hear these things?” There are at least a few reasons: First, as we work through these qualifications, it will be obvious that the list basically describes a faithful Christian, not some super category of spirituality that only 1% of Christians ever attain to. There is no way to ignore these standards due to some kind of thinking like: “I’ll never be in church leadership, so these things don’t really apply to me.” Really? So as long as someone isn’t in church leadership, it’s okay to be a drunkard or a crook or live with a dirty conscience? Of course not. But does that mean all faithful Christians are called to be in church leadership? No, God has not ordained that, but all should seek the Lord about it and strive to be as useful as possible in serving the body and as individuals do that, the church body will recognize some as being worthy of the honor of being in church leadership.
In addition to these qualifications representing faithful Christianity, a second reason that this is important to study is because it’s the church who recognizes people whom God is raising up to be in leadership. We will do this same kind of study on elders, once we see that local church office appear in Acts. But how will the church body recognize them if they don’t know what they are looking for? Furthermore, how would the body know what to expect from deacons and what to hold deacons accountable to unless there is a study on the subject. 1st Timothy was written so that you will know how one ought to conduct himself in the household of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and support of the truth (3:15).
Lastly, this is an important topic because we should be convinced that all of God’s word, and especially the NT, is meant for our edification. With that in mind, how should we think when we come to the book of 1st Timothy, which has almost an entire chapter devoted to qualifications of leaders? We trust that God gave us the revelation that we need to grow in Christlikeness and to identify godly characteristics of a church. Biblically qualified leadership in biblically stated roles is arguably the greatest weakness in the church today. Unqualified leadership has led to improper goals of ministry, superficial messages, and pointless meetings which are categorized under the heading of discipleship.