Speaking about relationships within the church community, Paul, of course, does not accidentally liken them to family relationships...
Speaking about relationships within the church community, Paul, of course, does not accidentally liken them to family relationships, reminding Timothy that everyone he has to instruct must be treated as members of his own family (vv. 1-2). Of course, he is speaking here first of all about that love for one's neighbor without which it is impossible to fulfill the Torah. But there was also something else in the apostle's instruction. It is no accident that the Yahwistic tradition, already from the time of Hosea, likened the relationship between God and His people to a family relationship. Of course, relationships within a family by no means always have a spiritual foundation; otherwise the Savior's well-known words about members of one's household becoming one's enemies would never have been spoken. And yet in our still untransformed world, the natural bonds joining husband to wife or children to parents are the closest, though natural, analogue of the relationships that join people in the Kingdom.
Of course, this is only an analogy, but it allows us to see the main quality that distinguishes the relationships of the Kingdom: their obviousness and unconditional character. Family members are loved, if they are loved, as a rule not for some natural or spiritual qualities of theirs, but simply because they are "one's own"; here the fact of relationship, of "belonging to one's own," determines everything and outweighs everything. In our still untransformed world such natural love can prompt a person not only to throw aside all social norms, but even to break a commandment given by God. In the Kingdom, of course, this is impossible, because for the inhabitants of the Kingdom the Torah is written on the heart; but the unconditional character of the relationship remains, now connected not with old, untransformed human nature, but with the breath of God's love that permeates the Kingdom.
Such, in Paul's thought, should also be the relationships within the church community, because for the apostle the Church is the Kingdom entering the world. That is why he responds so sharply to every possibility of profaning these relationships, especially when the matter concerns church widows ("widows"). In this case, of course, he is not speaking simply about widows who are members of one church community or another. He is speaking about widows who, after the death of their husbands, voluntarily gave up a second marriage, which the Church by no means forbade, and dedicated themselves to church ministries. There lay the danger of profanation: instead of doing God's work, the widows, especially the younger ones, occupied themselves with anything at all except church ministries (vv. 11-13).
In such a case, according to the apostle's words, it would be more honest before God and more correct to enter a second marriage, without playing at "spirituality," and to live an ordinary family life (vv. 14-15). Paul clearly considers any attempt to evade family cares and duties under "spiritual" pretexts inappropriate for a widow (vv. 4-8). And the matter here is not only the responsibility a woman takes upon herself when she enters marriage, a responsibility that is by no means removed from her by her husband's death. The matter, above all, is that playing at "spirituality" has nothing in common with genuine spiritual life; it only distances from the Kingdom those who seek it.
5
5:1 Rebuke not - Considering your own youth, with such a severity as would otherwise be proper.
5:3 Honour - That is, maintain out of the public stock.
5:4 Let these learn to requite their parents - For all their former care, trouble, and expense.
5:5 Widows indeed - Who have no near relations to provide for them; and who are wholly devoted to God. Desolate - Having neither children, nor grandchildren to relieve her.
5:6 She that liveth in pleasure - Delicately, voluptuously, in elegant, regular sensuality, though not in the use of any such pleasures as are unlawful in themselves.
5:7 That they - That is, the widows.
5:8 If any provide not - Food and raiment. For his own - Mother and grandmother, being desolate widows. He hath - Virtually. Denied the faith - Which does not destroy, but perfect, natural duties. What has this to do with heaping up money for our children, for which it is often so impertinently alleged? But all men have their reasons for laying up money. One will go to hell for fear of want; another acts like a heathen, lest he should be worse than an infidel.
5:9 Let not a widow be chosen - Into the number of deaconesses, who attended sick women or travelling preachers.Under threescore - Afterwards they were admitted at forty, if they were eminent for holiness. Having been the wife of one husband - That is, having lived in lawful marriage, whether with one or more persons successively.
5:10 If she hath washed the feet of the saints - Has been ready to do the meanest offices for them.
5:11 Refuse - Do not choose. For when they are waxed wanton against Christ - To whose more immediate service they had addicted themselves. They want to marry - And not with a single eye to the glory of God; and so withdraw themselves from that entire service of the church to which they were before engaged.
5:12 They have rejected their first faith - Have deserted their trust in God, and have acted contrary to the first conviction, namely, that wholly to devote themselves to his service was the most excellent way. When we first receive power to believe, does not the Spirit of God generally point out what are the most excellent things; and at the same time, give us an holy resolution to walk in the highest degree of Christian severity? And how unwise are we ever to sink into anything below it!
5:14 I counsel therefore the younger women - Widows or virgins, such as are not disposed to live single. To marry, to bear children, to guide the family - Then will they have sufficient employment of their own.And give no occasion of reproach to the adversary - Whether Jew or heathen.
5:15 Some - Widows. Have turned aside after Satan - Who has drawn them from Christ.