1 Tim. 3 1 Tim. 3:1 The office of a bishop is to be esteemed a good work. 1 Tim. 3:2–7 The qualifications requisite in a bishop, 1 Tim. 3:8–13 and in deacons. 1 Tim. 3:14–15 Why Paul wrote these instructions to Timothy. 1 Tim. 3:16 The important truths of the Christian revelation.

This is a true saying; πιστος, a faithful saying, that which none can dispute, of which none ought to doubt. If a man desire the office of a bishop; if a man desire any office to which belongs an oversight of the church of God.

In the following description there is the complete character of an evangelical bishop, with respect to the virtues wherewith he must be adorned, and the vices from which he must be exempt, and as to the conduct of his person, and the government of his family, and his carriage to the church, and to…

Not given to wine; the word signifieth a common tippler, whether he drinks to the loss of his reason or no; a wine-bibber, that makes bibbing at a tavern his trade: no sitter at wine. No striker; no quarreller, that cannot keep his fists off him that provoketh him.

One that ruleth well his own house; if he he one to whom God hath given a family, one who hath given an experiment of his conversation and ability to take care of a church, by the care that he hath taken of his family, and his ruling in that lesser society.

For if a man hath a family, and hath showed that he neither hath wit nor honesty enough to govern that little society, which hath his constant presence with it, with what reason can any one presume, that he should be fit to be trusted with the care of the church of God? Which is a larger society,…

Not a novice; not a young plant, that is, one that is newly made a member of the church of Christ; such persons are apt to swell in the opinion of their newly acquired knowledge, state, or dignity; and being so lifted up, they will be in danger of such a punishment as the devil for his pride met…

Moreover he must have a good report of them which are without: the apostle would have ministers men of good reputation amongst such as were without the pale of the church, for that is the meaning of that term, which are without; see 1 Cor. 5:12, 1 Thess.

Likewise must the deacons be grave: the term deacon signifies the same with one that ministereth, and is applicable to any that have any service in the church.

Not ignorant or inconstant persons, but such as were acquainted with the mysteries of the gospel, and believed them, and held to them; and men of a holy life.

The higher officers ought to be proved, ( as well as these of a lower order), as by examination or conference, so (which possibly is here more intended) by an observation of their lives and conversation, for some time before they were admitted into this employment.

Even so must their wives be grave: must their is not in the Greek, but supplied by our interpreters, and, as some think, ill, judging that he speaks here not of deacons’ wives, but of deaconesses, of such women as had the deacon’s office conferred on them, such a one was Phebe, Rom.

See the sense of these words, 1 Tim. 3:2, 1 Tim. 3:4, being the qualifications also of a bishop.

Purchase to themselves a good degree; a good degree of honour, so that none hath reason to decline or to despise that office. This seems rather to be the sense, than what pleaseth some better, viz.

I being now in Macedonia, or at Athens, or some parts thereabouts, have wrote to thee whom I left at Ephesus these precepts about the officers of churches, not being sure I shall, but hoping myself soon to come to Ephesus unto thee; which yet he did not, as we read, for he met Timothy at Troas,…

I do not know how God will dispose of me, though I hope shortly to see thee, and therefore I have written to direct thee how in the mean time thou shouldst carry thyself in the affairs of the church, which I have committed to thee, which is a matter of great moment; for the people which constitute…

And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: the various use of the particle και in the Greek, which we translate and, maketh it doubtful what is the force of it here, whether it relates to the truth mentioned in the latter part of the former verse, or shows another reason why Timothy…