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NASB | 1 Timothy 3:2 An overseer, then, must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate, prudent, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, |
AMPLIFIED 2015 | 1 Timothy 3:2 Now an overseer must be blameless and beyond reproach, the husband of one wife, self-controlled, sensible, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, |
Subject: A divorced pastor in ministry? |
Bible Note: Hello, Raul. You have posted an imposing list of "witnesses" -- and for the several with whom I'm acquainted I have an enormous amount of respect and admiration. Unlike one of your other correspondents on this forum, I come to make my case in favor of the experts. For a large part of my half century as a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ I've supplemented my study of the biblical text with any number of exegetical helps. Early on in my efforts to learn more about this Book of Books, God granted me sufficient light to be able to see the wisdom of consulting, via the written word, with gifted and insightful men of God down through the ages, from Justin Martyr to John McArthur. These saints have been endowed with vision and rare insight, and I am far the gainer for having borrowed from them riches that I could never have amassed alone...... If it may serve to illustrate a principle, I'll present an analogy from the profession of law. If you will exempt me from any suggestion of sacrilege, I'll drawn a comparison between the Bible and the laws of the land. As the Bible is our text, so are the laws themselves the text of the legal profession. But anyone who has ever had occasion to observe the impressive array of books in a law office knows that those massive books contain a great deal more than the laws (text) themselves. They are casebooks. They cite not only the law but the ways that the law has been interpreted and applied in actual practice, in case after case that have involved the lives and destinies of human beings. The practicing attorney-at-law lays out considerable sums of money to acquire these books because he knows the value of availing himself of the insight and wisdom of keen legal minds who have gone before him. He knows that he does not have to "re-invent the wheel" of every legal case that he must argue...... And, in like manner, neither do we have to re-invent for ourselves (or take a wild guess at) the meaning of every biblical text, when we have at our beck and call a host of God's servants who have walked where we walk and stand ready to share their candle with us. With that, to copy what the lawyers say, I rest my case. --Hank |