Husband of One Wife

# 77 Today's Prime Time Devo comes from: 1Ti 3:2 A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, (1 Tim 3:2) Paul continues to pass along the qualifications for men who desire the good office of bishop. Bishop defined as an overseer, and for our purposes in today's church, let us call them pastors. We've talked about being blameless, (free from the possibility of being blackmailed) today let's look at the requirement of having just one wife. There has been lots of debate over this requirement through the years. Some have gone so far as to say that the pastor MUST be married! While it certainly can be helpful to be married in order to minister to those with families in the congregation, it certainly cannot mean they must be married! I mean if that's the case, the Apostle Paul himself would be disqualified! No, the key here is the pastor must have just one wife! He must be a man who is blameless ( cannot be taken hold of or blackmailed) on the score of sexual promiscuity or laxity! In the case of a married pastor........ adultery Remember again the environment of these early church plants. Remember where these recent converts from paganism were coming from! Fornication, promiscuity, sexual laxity of all forms were prevalent in the culture. But these practices were strictly forbidden by the fledgling church of Jesus Christ. The council of Jerusalem made that clear in their letter to these newly formed congregations: Ac 15:29 that you abstain from things offered to idols, from blood, from things strangled, and from sexual immorality. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.” This admonition applied to all members of the church not just the pastors, but the pastors are singled out by Paul because as leaders, they must set the standard in their own personal lives. Any convert who slid back into a lifestyle of the sexual laxity of the culture needed to be dealt with through church discipline, and certainly any pastor who slips back into sexual sin and continues in it, is no longer qualified to be an overseer, and certainly needs to go through the same disciplinary process of other unrepentant sinners, and remember that the disciplinary process is always meant to first and foremost restore the offender's relationship with Christ.