Family Care

Series: Gospel Shaped Church 11/8/20

Week 10: 1 Timothy 5:1-25

If there were any question as to whether we should care for those who could fall through the cracks or onto the fringes of our society, those questions are answered here in this chapter. Special circumstances or needs created by merely being in the minority number of people within a certain category of people, make them susceptible to our natural tendency to ignore or relegate those we could view in our disposable society, as outliers.

Listed as those to pay closer attention to are widows and the elderly, who, through no fault of their own, have lost their husband and have gotten, well, old. We are to actually honor those are widows in reality. Apparently some pretended to be a window in order to get the benefits set aside for actual widows, those who do need extra help.

And we are not to discard the elderly but are to treat them with the respect they’ve come to earn for the many years of living faithfully in the community of believers.

The word here is to treat all with dignity since all are created as image bearers of God.

We are not to discard and disrespect people because of a perceived lack of utilitarian value.

Widows are overwhelmingly addressed, acknowledging the unique plight they have. By extension this same call for care would apply to orphans as well which id supported by other Scripture as well (James 1:27). So let’s be on the alert to care for those, who through no fault of their own are vulnerable and may need and could use our help.