Ok I fell behind again. I need to bring some of my sermons up to date so here's mother's day with the next few to follow soon.

What does it mean to be godly? The dictionary definition means to have qualities like God. A godly person will demonstrate Characteristics that God would demonstrate. Surely we are supposed to be godly. This morning, actually I would like to talk specifically to the ladies in church church about being a godly woman. You men are not allowed to tune out because quite frankly the same lessons can apply to you.

What does it mean to be a woman of God?

What does it mean to live in grace? Grace as I've often defined it means getting what you don't deserve. The official definition of theologians has been “unmerited favor”.

As recipients of grace you gain the benefits of Christ in you even though it is unmerited. In one portion living in grace means living eternal life now because of the grace you've been given. In another portion living in grace means dwelling restfully within the grace of God realizing that His grace is your salvation – it means getting off the treadmill and relying upon his Grace. And yet in a third portion, living in grace means letting your life be shaped by the grace that you have received.

With Independence Day right around the corner, the Topic often at hand is freedom and the tremendous cost by which we achieved it. But it seems these days that Freedom alone is the hallmark of American Liberty - America has forgotten that her foundation is not a freedom based upon lawlessness. And gaging by the stereotypical lawyer mentality the plethora of laws which we do have in this country are written full of loopholes so that they can be ignored or rather talked around by wrestling the relevant semantics out of their clearly intended meaning¹ with phrases like, " that all depends on what the meaning of "is" is.²

But America and Her laws and thus by extension her freedoms cannot live in abject lawlessness. If America is to continue she must as a nation be subject to the Law of God. If she will not be subject to God's laws than she who was formed thereon may well come to slavery and non-existence. Even our founding fathers knew this to be the case. Our second president, John Adams wrote:

"[I]t is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand. Religion and virtue are the only foundations...of republicanism and of all free governments."³

We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.⁴

President Adams was merely quoting the concept of Scripture. The sad reality is that we have become an immoral and irreligious nation. Yet worse than that - many Christians have likewise become so freedom focused that by ignoring God's law they have themselves been taken captive and placed in bondage.

The message in scripture is that if you want to walk in freedom, you must have the Law of the Lord. I would like you to turn to the one-hundred-nineteenth Psalm and join me at Verse 45. (Psalm 119:45). Please, for contexts sake would you read with me Psalm 119:41-48.

We cannot afford to miss the context of freedom which is spelled out in this passage and clarified everywhere else in Scripture: Freedom comes not from a lack of mastery but by being willfully submitted to the law of the Lord!

This nation will not remain free if it will not submit itself to the law of the Lord. Many nations - even great world powers have risen and those who lived in their time would say, "They can never go away for they are too great and powerful a nation!" But these same dynasties and nations have fallen and come to nothing with none but archaeologists having any capacity to find them again. Where is Babylon, Assyria, Medo-Persia and the Roman Empire? Where are the Pharaohs of Egypt? They exist only in archaeological extrapolation. There may even be nations standing in the same place with the same names but they are merely shadows of another time. Strike down a nation and another will rise up to take it's place - but it will not be the same nation. Grandeur and power do not make insurance which guarantees continuity.

The only guarantor is God alone and he will not be trivialized and abandoned without recompense!

In the early church, at least around the time of Chrysostom who lived around (C 350AD) they recognized at least two stages in a Christian's early life. First you became a catechumen which meant you were being instructed in the ways of Christ and were likely to have received Christ. But first it was required for a time that the catechumen would learn the principles of the faith and prove by evidence of life the sincerity of their fledgling faith. When that catechumen underwent baptism he was called a Neophyte which literally means seedling or "new growth¹." It was longer still before that neophyte would be considered a mature Christian. In the context of 1 Timothy 3, it is imperative that an overseer be mature and be seen as holy lest he fall prey to the Devil's schemes. In these two verses we have the two final requirements for an overseer and three results of them being broken.

It all begins with ensuring that the overseer had time to Grow.

Time To Grow

Paul continues the passage saying that the candidate for overseer must not be a new convert. If you've ever heard the word Neophyte² than you've go the idea of what Paul means by new convert here. The imagery is of a seedling which has only just germinated and burst from its seed. In computer terms we talk about someone like this as a NOOB which means you know very little about computers and are generally at a loss. Paul's use is set somewhat in juxtaposition against the concept of being an "elder" which by definition demands maturity.

When it comes to maturity - nothing takes the place of time. Time in and of itself does not mean maturity as is evidenced in Hebrews 5, but maturity doesn't happen overnight. It's true enough that it takes only a few months to raise a large zucchini; but an oak tree can take decades. But which one would you rather build your house with?

What happens at home stays at home! Well, not exactly. One of the key issues during President Clinton's term in office was the divide created during the Monica Lewinsky scandal. A great deal of ink was spilt arguing both for and against the point that the quality of a person's private life weighed significantly upon their capacity for effective public service. From the perspective of scripture it becomes clear, however, that the home life is far from unrelated to the public life it is at essence a microcosm which exposes the real person.

I want to rephrase that another way because, much like a surgeon's scalpel serves to provide an opening so that he may repair what is broken inside - I want to peel back for you the layers so that you can see the areas of your own life which is most in need of surrendering to God. Do not take this as an opportunity to think to yourselves, "Ah this is a sermon that (so and so) needs to hear!" Rather this is a personal message for you.

It is relatively easy to "put on the plastic Jesus" when you get out of the car on Sunday morning and pretend that everything is alright. But your performance in front of other people really isn't all that impressive to God. Because your performance really isn't an insight into your heart. But something happens when you live in close proximity to other people; we tend to let our guard down and in many ways expose who we really are to those in our own households when the doors are closed and the curtains are drawn.

When that happens who are you?

Have you ever had the experience of meeting someone and finding them to be disagreeable in a variety of ways? Maybe they have a bad attitude or they have habits that make them out to just be the kind of person you don't want to hang around with. Now, imagine meeting that person and then after you've formed all your opinions you find out that they are a Christian or worse yet, a pastor. The effects can be catastrophic.

From the positive requirements of what the elder or pastor should be, Paul moves now to what we must not be.

How many of you have been to the Grand Canyon? Did you take pictures of the whole canyon? It really doesn't matter how big your camera is you simply cannot take one complete picture of the Grand Canyon. If you want a picture of the Grand canyon you're going to have to take hundreds of photographs and stitch them all together into one massive photo.

When you look into the qualifications to be an overseer or pastor what you're really getting is one snapshot of maturity in Christ. It's not a complete picture but it is a good picture. As much as that picture describes what Pastor's should be, it also describes what every believer should be growing to be. As such it is best understood as a series of Character traits which manifest or display themselves in daily life.

"it is necessary therefore for the overseer (watcher of souls) to be above reproach, a one woman kind of man {idiom: faithful to his wife}, sober (self-controlled with alcohol with a broader reference to his serious handling of his life), self-controlled (in general), orderly, hospitable, skillful in teaching, ..."

I want to get us back into the mode of studying First Timothy and Church 101 so a very brief review is necessary. In the first chapter Paul touches on Pastoral Leadership, the Foundation of the Gospel as the core of the church and the fullness of God's grace. It seems that in the church people were missing the point. There were teachers who were teaching the law wrongly. They had forgotten that the Law's singular purpose is the convict sinners and direct them to Jesus. Paul himself serves as the primary example of the chief of all sinners. If God can save Paul the blasphemer, the persecutor and the violent agressor than God can certainly save you. Amen? (I expect at least a few amens!)

The second chapter launches us into ministry. As children of God we are first commanded to pray. We must pray at all times for all people with every kind of prayer, intercession, requests, conversational, and above all prayers of thanks. The fruit of our prayers may well be the salvation of many souls.

The men are specifically commanded to pray without anger and dissension. The Women are specifically required to dress appropriately and to be devoted learners of God's word . Elsewhere we learn that women must teach other women but here we discover they must neither teach men nor exercise authority over men.

Now considering the context of what has gone before - specifically in terms of Paul's statements concerning women in leadership it is only natural that he begin to explain the requirements for leadership in the church but also to a certain extent to defend leadership.

This is why he begins the third chapter with "It is a trustworthy statement, if any man aspires to the office of overseer, it is a fine work he desires to do." In this statement Paul demonstrates a few principles for us to adhere to when it comes to church leadership.

I want to get us back into the mode of studying First Timothy and Church 101 so a little bit of review is necessary.

Pastoral Leadership

In the first chapter Paul begins with the leadership of the church: Pastoral authority which is grounded in the supremacy of Jesus Christ. Key to the functioning of the church is a pastor who will stay the course long enough to effectively correct error and teach truth.

Paul's letter to the church in Ephesus is a letter about being holy even if you live in a society that is not. God's passage for is taken from the sixth chapter. And now hear the word of the Lord. (Ephesians 6:10-11)

There are twenty seven specific commands in this letter. Each command has been based upon the lesson of holiness from the first two chapters. The letter begins with a reminder that God has selected us before hand so that we would be holy and blameless by living within the magnificent grace of God.

Everyone who has accepted Jesus as their savior is dwelling in grace and has received complete forgiveness for every sin - and you have been redeemed. This means that holiness has been given to you in Christ.

Since God has given you the holiness of Christ, what kind of people should you be? If God has made you holy than you also must become holy in your daily life. Throughout the Ephesian letter lesson after lesson is given to instruct us in holiness. One of the final commands given to us that we might act out the holiness that God has given us is the command to be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his might.

There are struggles and trials on every side. Some are inside of us and others are outside. From struggling against sin to striving to obey God. Each of us have been and will continue to be tested and tried.

If everyone will be tested and tried – where will you get the strength to endure them? But where will this strength come from? How do we “get” strong in the Lord in order to BE strong in the LORD?

Most of the time we try to be strong in our own flesh. Since most of you have endured many obstacles in life you might be tempted to be strong in your own strength. It goes by many names; everything from self-sufficiency to stubbornness to arrogant pride. But it's really the same thing: Being strong in your own strength.

But our own strength fails us. We are inadequate for the task of holiness. Every one of us can testify to failing in our prayer life even though we tried. We can all sympathize with the Alcoholic who really tries to stop drinking but his insatiable thirst drives them back for just one small drink (which cascades into another death spiral.) Every one of us has had the experience of “trying to be good” but failing miserably. We need the strength of God.

So how do we get strong in God's power?