Fathers, Brothers, Mothers, Sisters

By Jonathan Faulkner

I must confess to you, reader, I love the book of 1 Timothy. It has long been one of my favorite books, and I have devoted many hours to its study. As far as books of the Bible go, there is a lot going on. It begins with Paul’s charge to put right the wrongs done by false teachers; contains teaching on worship, deacons and elders; and includes one of the greatest summaries of the Gospel in 3:14-161 and some of the most personal instruction we have from Paul to a church leader in the Bible. The book has been debated and interpreted many different ways. Some try to tear Chapters 2-6 away from Chapter 1 and make it a little book about how to run a church, but this book is more than that. It is a command to put right a church that has gone very wrong, with people following myths and legends, ascetical teachings and syncretization with the Temple of Artemis and its fertility cult. It is a book to help us hold false and abusive teachers accountable and to put a church back together after it has fallen apart.

It is the accountability aspect that I want to discuss. Accountability, simply defined, is this: “The act or condition of being responsible.” When someone is accountable for a task, they are responsible for fulfilling that task. When someone does not do that task there is a consequence that places a condition of accountability on the person who failed to complete the task. If the editors of a magazine give me a deadline, I am responsible for meeting that deadline; if I miss that deadline, there is a consequence that places the condition of accountability on me: my piece does not get published as planned.

image from allsidesnow on instagram (https://www.instagram.com/p/CeMbsKauVsm/)

If you are a regular on the platform formerly known as Twitter or you have been paying attention to news reports concerning one of the largest American denominations2, you might come to the con­clusion that there is a severe lack of accountability within the church3 in a lot of places when it comes to the treatment of women and young people. Women in particular, in our culture, have been objectified and used for the pleasure of leaders within the church or have found themselves in abusive marriages where they are little more than someone there to birth and raise the kids, clean, and cook. This dehumanization has even been cod­ified into certain theological veins popularized by some Christian organizations. Some have even ar­gued theologically that women do not actually have the image of God. This of course flies in the face of Genesis 1:26 where God says: “Let us make man­kind in our image, in our likeness…” and He does it in 1:27: “So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.” Much Scripture has been twisted into knots explaining why women are “less” than men which is then used to justify the mistreatment and abuse of women.

But in Paul’s letter to Timothy at Ephesus we see a better way. We see the standard that Timothy is held accountable to, and because the Holy Spirit included it in the Living Word of God, we too are accountable to it and Paul deals directly with how leaders are to demonstrate healthy relationships be­tween men and women in the Church. Before I get to the verse at hand, I want to point out that this letter would have been read publicly, it was not just for Timothy’s eyes only. This reading aloud would mean that Timothy was accountable to those who heard the letter to live up to that standard. 

Paul’s instructions to Timothy that we will focus on are found in 5:1-2 which reads:

“Do not rebuke an older man harshly, but exhort him as if he were your father.

Treat younger men as brothers, older women as mothers,

and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity.”

This advice applies both directly to the situation at Ephesus, but also to Timothy’s general example that he is to set.

In the situation at Ephesus, Timothy is young, so Paul tells him in Chapter 4:12: “Let no one look down on you because of your youth.” In that culture, the older a person was, the more deference they were paid. A young man had much less authority. Since Timothy is acting as Paul’s authority, he is likely correcting men at least 10-20 years older than he is. His job is not to “rebuke them” but to “exhort them.” Exhorting means: “to address or communicate emphatically urging someone to do something.” Like a child might encourage their parents to listen to the message of the music they are listening to or a parent might encourage a child to be careful on social media. Timothy is to treat younger men as though they are his brothers and older women as mothers. Timothy’s mother and grandmother were the reason for his faith (2 Timo­thy 1). They had taught him the faith, and taught him well, for that he held them in high esteem. Younger women are to be treated as sisters.

Paul’s injunction here has two outcomes in mind:

1. To hold Timothy accountable to how he treats peo­ple as a leader, setting right a church that has clear relational dysfunction within its ranks. The stan­dard for Timothy is to be nothing but what Christ’s sacrifice demands of us, as a people reconciled to God and one another (Ephesians 2:1-20).

2. Paul is ensuring that Timothy sets an example for how the body is to live with each other. Not in disharmony, infighting and abusing one another, but in the hon­or given to fathers, mothers, sisters and brothers.

It is a continuation of Paul’s command in 4:12-16. Timothy’s conduct is to point others to what the body is to believe and how what they believe is to inform how they behave towards one another.

This kind of reset is needed today on both person­al and institutional levels. As it offers a corrective to:

1. The way pastors approach relationships with women specifically.

2. How we encour­age younger couples to interact with one anoth­er.

image from @womnofvalor on instagram (https://www.instagram.com/reel/CoF9G7xPumO/)

Much secular and Christian debate has been had over the cultural idea that men and women “cannot just be friends.” Evangelicalism has even gone a step farther in purity culture’s teachings to men by the popular “Every Man’s Battle” se­ries to teach that “Women are temptation grenades launched by Satan” (144). This view fails to treat women as full human beings made in the image of God. One of the nation’s largest denominations, the Southern Baptist Church, is embroiled in a sex abuse cover-up scandal that has shaken it to its core. Pastors have been credibly accused of sexual assault on women and girls and still been allowed to preach and teach within the Church. Such an offense should biblically disqualify them from even fellowship in the church as long as they remain unrepentant, and yet many remain in leadership positions.

It is true that we live in a sex-obsessed culture. It is all around us, but even popular culture has started pushing back against the objectification of women. The Church is the place where it never should have begun in the first place. If Christ’s death and resur­rection has brought about the total reconciliation of men and women who are reconciled to God through Christ and if we truly have the Holy Spirit, it should then be true that we treat each other as though this is true within the body of believers.

If I view the older man or woman in the congrega­tion as a father or a mother, then it eliminates the need to argue with them over cultural issues, it cre­ates a chance for me to learn and for me to learn from them in mutual teaching and love. If I treat the young men and women around me like brothers and sisters, it holds them well above the level of mere utility. They are not here for my use, but for my edification and I for theirs. In the book of Philippi­ans, Paul talks about the entire body being built up into Christ. Treating one another as Paul commands Timothy here ensures that we do just that. My sis­ters in Christ can benefit from my spiritual experi­ence and biblical knowledge and I from theirs.

One of the laments I hear from my sisters in Christ all the time is that they would like to be discipled by wiser men in their congregations. But in some cases because they are seen as mere helpers of men by those men or they have to be afraid they might assault or harm them, they have to settle for whom­ever will teach them. This doesn’t sound like the body, made up of men and women reconciled to one another through Christ’s reconciling us to God, does it? It sounds like secular dehumaniza­tion and objectification of women.

The first step here is to disbelieve that lie I mentioned earlier, that men and women cannot just be friends without some sexual component to the relationship. It simply is not true and is dehumanization4 of both men and women. I have many wonderful relation­ships with women that are founded on this principle in 1 Timothy 5. I’ve had the chance to disciple and be discipled by these women who are either much more mature than I am in the faith or growing in the faith. These have been some of the most fruitful and meaningful relationships, many of which have continued into my married life. My wife does not see them as threats because she understands the biblical idea that governs those relationships. They are quite literally my sisters by the blood of Christ and my wife has formed great friendships with some of them.

If we are to ever move beyond our “#ChurchToo” moment in the Evangelical Church in America, it has to come with a complete paradigm shift, a better way of seeing one another. In part II of this series I will elaborate on what that looks like. I may even try to incorporate one of my sisters in Christ’s tes­timonies about how that relationship has benefited her spiritual growth. This is only possible when we view one another the way Paul instructs Timothy to demonstrate for the Ephesian Church: as fathers, mothers, sisters, and brothers in all purity. So that Christ may be glorified when we build one another up into Christ, living out our reconciled state in the kingdom of heaven now.

---

References

[1]“Beyond all question, the mystery from which true godliness springs is great: He appeared in the flesh, was vindicated by the Spirit, was seen by angels, was preached among the na­tions, was believed on in the world, was taken up in glory.” - 1 Timothy 3:16

[2] Julie Roys and Hannah-Kate are two prominent accounts which have long documented abuse in the Southern Baptist Convention of churches.

[3] The Guidepost Report on Sexual Abuse in the SBC can be found here: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/22031737-final-guidepost-solutions-inde­pendent-investigation-report.

[4] Dehumanization is the removal of humanity, reducing humans to mere objects or for mere utility.

---

Rev. Jonathan David Faulkner is a graduate of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary holding Masters in Divinity and Church History, a pastor, musician and writer. He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Christian Education & Administration with a concentration in Urban Ministry. He lives with his wife and two daughters in Spokane, Washington.

You can read more from Jonathan below, or on his dedicated site: godsheartforthose.com