Today Paul is going to give instructions for how men and women should behave in church assemblies. Paul has taken a lot of criticism in the modern age for some of his views, especially for his views regarding how women are to behave in a church setting. I think we can take his advice and prove that it is not discriminatory toward women. I believe the things he says are still relevant for church worship here in 2019.
First he begins with how men should behave in worship settings. "Therefore I want the men everywhere to pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or disputing." (1 Timothy 2:8) It would appear that Paul expects the men of the congregation to be the ones who lead the services. In my Baptist church, although we are quite modern and have a very large youth membership, it is still men who are asked to lead the church in prayer and in various other things. As we've studied before in the writings of both Paul and Peter, when God created the family He chose the man to be the leader of the family. This could be because the man was created (generally speaking) to be more physically able to protect the family from harm. Or this could be, as Paul will point out today, that God created Adam before He created Eve. As the first human being created, the man was the first to receive instructions from God about righteous living and God still expects the man to set the example in the home for righteous living. In religious assemblies, God calls the men to lead the church family and to set godly examples for the church family to follow.
Paul says that the man who is praying in the church should "lift up holy hands without anger". Would it be seemly for a man to lead the congregation in prayer while holding a grudge against his brother or sister in Christ? No, and that's why Paul says men are not to lead prayer if they are harboring an attitude of anger toward someone. The Lord Jesus is in agreement with this, for He said something quite similar to what Paul is saying, "If you are offering a gift at the altar and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift." (Matthew 5:23-24) Our offering or our sacrifice of praise or our prayer is not pleasing to God if we are holding a grudge against someone or if we have wronged someone and are aware of it but have not apologized to them. The Lord may hold off on saying yes to our prayer requests if we haven't repented of wronging someone and if we haven't tried to make things right with them. An example of this comes from the writings of the Apostle Peter, who warns husbands that they must be considerate to their wives and treat them with respect or else their prayers will be hindered. (1 Peter 3:7) If a man is not able to remain at peace with the members of his household, he is not likely to be able to remain at peace with his brothers and sisters in Christ, so he should not lead the congregation in prayer if he is holding onto anger and a resentful attitude.
Likewise, a man should not lead worship if he has an argumentative spirit. Paul says he must lead without disputing. It does not honor the Lord or show love to the church members if one of the leaders is argumentative and irritable.
Now Paul moves on to instructions for how women are to behave in the church setting. He begins with how women should dress for church services. "I also want the women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, adorning themselves not with elaborate hairstyles or gold or pearls or expensive clothes, but with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God." (1 Timothy 2:9-10) In Paul's day (and in ours) it was probably the women who were more tempted than the men to dress elaborately when going to church. Paul points out that there's a difference between looking our best and trying to upstage others. In our church congregations we have people of various income levels and we don't want anyone to feel unwelcome just because they don't own fancy clothes. We don't want people in the community to think we have a "dress code" that they can't measure up to. We are not to be attending church in order to be admired for our wardrobes. Paul isn't saying we can't own fancy clothes or jewelry; he's simply saying that church isn't the place to show these things off. After all, we are in church to lift up the name of the Lord, not to make a big deal about ourselves. So instead of trying to call attention to ourselves with our wardrobes, we should instead be occupied by performing good works in the church and in the community.
It isn't seemly for the Christian woman to dress provocatively, and this is why Paul says our dress should be modest. It sends the wrong message when we have cleavage hanging out of our tops or when we have too much leg showing. It throws our virtue into question, and the virtue of the Christian woman should never be questionable. Will a godly man be attracted to a woman in provocative clothing? He may not be able to help noticing it, but if he's a godly Christian single man looking for a godly wife, the woman wearing a too-short skirt or a low-cut top is going to give him the wrong impression. She may not actually be a promiscuous woman, but her outfit suggests that she might be. Her outfit suggests that she wants men to stare at her, and a nice man isn't going to be particularly eager to get himself a wife who enjoys causing other men to have lustful thoughts about her.
Next we move on to the controversial part of our passage today. Paul says he doesn't allow women to teach men in the church. In many of our churches today, this is still the rule. My church allows women to teach classes made up of other women, children, or teens. But it doesn't allow women to teach a mixed congregation. It also doesn't allow women to be ordained ministers. Paul states his opinion on the matter like this: "A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet." (1 Timothy 2:11-12) The word that has been translated into English as "quiet" is the Greek "hesuchia" which means to be "peaceable, not meddling in the affairs of others, to mind one's own business, to be quiet". So Paul isn't saying that women can't ever open their mouths in church; he's saying that they are to maintain a peaceful attitude in church. They are not to be busybodies at church or gossip or argue. In my own church, and probably in most others, women are allowed to give testimonies and prayer requests.
But although it's permissible for women to participate in various ways in the church, Paul says he doesn't allow them to teach the men. He bases his decision on this: "For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner." (1 Timothy 2:13-14) Adam, of course, was a sinner too. In many ways his sin was worse than that of Eve's, for he was created first and had been instructed by God regarding the fruit they were not to eat. Since Eve was created after Adam, Adam's job was to instruct her regarding what God had said about the fruit. He did follow through on instructing her, for in her conversation with the serpent we see she was clearly aware that she was not to eat the fruit. But Adam did not follow through on his responsibility to protect his wife and to set a godly example for her. The Bible tells us that Adam was with her when she picked the fruit and ate it (Genesis 3:6), but he didn't interfere while the serpent was tempting her. He didn't tell the serpent to shut up, he didn't remind Eve that it was a sin to eat the fruit, he didn't lead Eve away from the temptation, he didn't protest when Eve ate the fruit, and he didn't say no when she offered the fruit to him. He failed utterly in his role as a godly husband and in his responsibility to lead his household, and I think he failed because he wanted to please Eve more than he wanted to please God. The men of our day face the same problem: they often want to please their wives more than they want to please God. After all, it's their wives they have to live with every day, and men don't want conflict in their homes. Men want their homes to be peaceful and happy, and you know the saying that has become popular in our times: "Happy wife, happy life." But men shouldn't have to sacrifice their dignity and their relationship with the Lord in order to keep peace in their homes. That's what Adam did, and he suffered for it----in fact, the whole human race suffered for it.
Because the wife has so much influence on her husband, Paul prefers that women don't have authority over the men in the church (in the form of teaching) because this will translate to the women having authority over their husbands at home. This reverses the roles that God ordained for the home. Men are going to have trouble relating to God in the way they should if they aren't allowed to fulfill the roles that God ordained for them in the home. Why study the Scriptures or develop a close relationship with the Lord if their wives are the spiritual leaders of the home? If their wives take on the role of spiritual leadership, men have little incentive to grow in the Lord because there is not much to prompt them to do what they were meant to do. If their wives insist on being the sole authority when it comes to spiritual matters, the husbands may end up sacrificing their calling in the home just in order to keep the peace. But God has called men to spiritual leadership because they will never be all they can be in the Lord unless they fulfill this role. The man whose spiritual opinions are ignored in the home is going to be discouraged from developing spiritually. He may manage to grow spiritually in spite of this, but he won't be able to worship privately with his wife. He won't be able to encourage her in the faith and be encouraged by her in the faith. They won't be partners in the way God intended them to be. The wife who disrespects her husband is not being the helpmate she was intended to be, and as a result her husband can't be the protector and spiritual leader he was intended to be.
In addition to doing their husbands a disservice, women who won't allow their Christian husbands to have their role as spiritual leader are doing themselves a disservice. Our husbands can be the most powerful sources of spiritual support in our lives. The marriage relationship is the closest relationship we can have with another human being, and that relationship should be one of mutual spiritual nourishment. Nothing in the world makes me love my husband more than to see his head bowed in prayer. Nothing makes me feel more attracted to him than seeing him clap his hands in praise during a church service. What if he felt like he had to sit there in silence, showing no emotion, for fear that I might disapprove? What if he thought he could never say anything about the Lord at home in case I might criticize him? What if he was afraid to discuss the pastor's sermon in the car after the service in case I might angrily disagree with his interpretation of what the pastor said? We'd both be missing out on something important that God doesn't want us to miss. When my husband sets a spiritual example for me, I feel closer to him. When my husband grows in the Lord, I grow in the Lord. If we don't allow our husbands to offer spiritual guidance in the home, we are taking something away from them and from ourselves as well.
In reading today's passage, we must keep in mind that Paul is talking to households where both the husband and the wife are believers. But we can still apply these principles to our lives, and I'm going to give us some examples of that now. Of course a husband can't lead the household spiritually if he is not a believer, but even in those cases the wives are not to harangue the husbands with a list of their shortcomings. The wives are not to self-righteously "preach" to their husbands but are to impress their husbands with their godly living. (See 1 Peter 3:1.) Peter's words show us that many times an unbelieving husband becomes a believer because he sees his wife's love for the Lord and because he experiences his wife's respect for him. In a household where only the husband is a believer, many times the wife comes to the faith because her husband fulfills his calling as the spiritual leader of the home. She is impressed by the godly example he sets for her. She is persuaded to come to Christ because her husband loves her in the way the Lord commands him to love her. (See Ephesians 5:25) So even if your spouse is not a believer, you can follow Paul's instructions, and your obedience to these instructions may lead to miraculous changes in your marriage partner.
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