The Context of the Office 
(Part 2 of 2)
Acts 6:5-7
By Pastor Jordan Hines

To do scripture reading. Please stand as we respect the word of God. Thank you for standing today.

We'll be reading in acts six one seven. Now, in those days when the number of the disciples was multiplying, there rose a murmuring against the he, against the Hebrews and the Hellenists, because their widows were sorry about that. Their widows were neglected in the daily distribution.

There were twelve. Summoned the multitude and the disciples and said, it is not desirable that we should leave the word of God and serve tables. Therefore, brethren, seek from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom whom we may appoint over this business.

But we give ourselves continually to prayer and to the ministry of the word. And the saying pleased the whole multitude. And they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Spirit.

And Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas and Nicholas, proselyte. And from Antioch, whom they set before the apostles. And when they had prayed, they had hands on.

They laid hands on them. And the word of God spread. And the number of the disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem.

And a great many of the priests were obedient to the faith. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we just thank you so much for today that we can all come together and worship you.

I'm thankful for this body of believers who chose to come here and do that. Lord, I just pray that you would have our hearts just turn towards you and just put everything else aside and any distractions that we have and just focus on your word. I pray for Pastor Jordan as he will come and give us the word.

Help him to be clear and help us to understand what he has prepared for us. And, Lord, I just pray that you would just bless our time after and our fellowship that we have. I just pray this in Jesus holy name.

Amen. Today the message is going to be a conclusion to what we began last week. And last week we began a study on what a deacon is.

As Ted read, we're looking at acts chapter six, and you can turn in your bibles to that passage. But as we think about the song we just sang, I think that it's appropriate that it is none above him, none before him. That means that he is worthy of all of our praise and all of our honor.

I'm just connecting this now. But the idea of service, the idea of loving, the idea of caring and giving of ourselves is predicated on the notion that we are not the center of this universe. We are not the center of praise and honor.

God is none above him, none before him. That's what allows us to truly love others. It's what truly allows us to serve others.

Because we see who we are as we see who we are in Christ. We get a picture into the grace of God because we do not deserve single ounce of it. Allow me to reread verses one through seven of acts, chapter six, and then we'll pray.

Now, in those days when the number of the disciples was multiplying, there arose a complaint against the Hebrews by the Hellenists because their widows were neglected in the daily distribution. Then the twelve summoned the multitude of the disciples and said, it is not desirable that we should leave the word of God and serve tables. Therefore, brethren, seek out from among you seven men of good reputation, full of the Holy Spirit and wisdom whom we may appoint over this business.

But we will give ourselves continually to prayer, to the ministry of the word. Verse five. And the saying pleased the whole multitude.

And they chose Stephen, a man full of faith in the Holy Spirit. And Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenus, and Nicholas, a proselyte from Antioch, whom they set before the apostles. And when they prayed, they laid hands on them.

And the word of God spread. And the number of disciples multiplied greatly in Jerusalem. And a great many of the priests were obedient to the faith.

Remember last week we talked about a very basic problem from the first four verses of this text. The basic problem was that the apostles were being distracted with a good thing, a good thing of serving tables. But they were not able to devote time to prayer and to the word of God.

And the solution was set forth to bring about men full of wisdom and full of the Holy Spirit. Let's pray. God, you have truly blessed this church with wisdom.

It is not any of our own understanding, of our own tactics, of our own abilities that you grow your church, and we ask for your strength. We ask for your love in our life. We ask for your wisdom in our life.

We ask for everything, every spiritual blessing in heaven because of your son, Jesus Christ, who came to die for us. We ask that you would bless us not based on our merit, but that you would see us, you would desire to work in us, and that today we become more effective and more impactful tools in your hands. God, we thank you for this day.

We thank you that you love us and that you want us to serve you. Help us to do that today. In your son's name we pray.

Amen. So, as I mentioned last week, we left off after verse four with a sense of need and desire. And I'm sure you've read a good book or you've seen a good movie or you've seen a good series where the first part of the story is just painting a bleak, dark picture and there's no hero saving the day, yet there's no resolution to the story.

It's just a terrible situation. Well, the problem here was that the church's growth had became. Had become a problem.

It became an issue of service, of there are too many mouths to feed. And you could say it's a good problem, but it's a problem that the devil can use. Nonetheless, the problem was the Hellenistic Jews were not being cared for.

Now, the Hellenistic, as we spoke last week, was the Greek speaking or the converted Jews, the ones who were not quite seen as pure Jews as much as the Jews who were born in the land. You see, we have a solution here. And the solution that was set forth was we're going to appoint these deacons to serve tables.

And the result that we're going to see today is that as the deacons attend to the church's needs, the pastors or the apostles in this context, were able to preach the word of God, and the word of God was sent out to the world more effectively. Deacons attend to the needs of the church through their spiritual qualifications, but also through their service qualifications. Not just people who believed the word of God, who knew the word of God, but people who had compassion, who were moved to service.

Today, we're really just going to see the process of picking deacons. What did it look like, and the results, what kind of men worked so that this result could happen? So go with me first in verse five and six. And the saying pleased the whole multitude.

Pausing here. The saying that that's set forth by the apostles, it pleased them. It pleased them, in a sense that their needs were going to be met.

And we touched a little bit earlier last week about how these names were. These names are going to be names that are Greek names. These Greek names are going to reach the Greek people.

So there is a problem that they're not necessarily solving. And we traced last week that the idea of partiality permeated the early church, as people of the faith that were Jewish did not see the need for other people to become Christians. We're going to be looking at these sort of proto deacons again, these deacons who aren't quite officially called deacons, but they're doing the office or the work of deacons.

In one Timothy and Titus, we'll see the qualifications of the office of deacon but for now, we'll just see sort of the need that arose for them. So, very simply, let's first just go through the list of these seven deacons in verse five. First is Stephen.

Now we know Stephen. Stephen's the man who got stoned, right? Stephen is the man who had this long, long sermon and he was able to convinced multitudes of people to follow Christ. And he died for his faith.

And perhaps that's a part of the reason why he's mentioned here. But I believe that it's more than that. I believe that the description in this text is the real reason why he is mentioned.

He is a man full of faith and full of the Holy Spirit. He's full of faith, meaning he knows the truth, but he also trusts and depends on the truth, meaning his actions persuade people that he believes the truth and he's also full of the Holy Spirit. And we talked last week about how the Holy Spirit and wisdom are synonymous here and how if you are depending on the Holy Spirit walking in the Holy Spirit, that you will become more wise.

These men are wise. They're also filled with the Holy Spirit. It's not a coincidence that they are put together.

The only other deacon here that is mentioned of any note that we can really track their history is Philip. And we see him in acts chapter eight as he shares the gospel with an Ethiopian eunuch. And he is a part of the early church in Jerusalem.

And he is a part of the early church in general as he is sharing the gospel as a disciple. Then we have five names that we don't know a ton about. Prochorus, Nicanar, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicholas.

We know a little bit about Nicholas. He's a proselyte. He's been converted to Judaism.

He's from Antioch. He's a man of faith. And all these men are called to a very specific purpose.

They are presented by the church to the apostles, the leaders of the church, to be set as deacons, to be recognized as deacons. And then we come to sort of the interesting part of the passage where the apostles were going to do something that the world would look at and think, this is kind of weird. Why are they doing this? In verse six, it talks about how they prayed.

They prayed for these seven men, for the people that will serve for the church. They prayed for these men. But the weird part to the world is not the prayer, because people understand prayer, but it's that they laid hands on them.

This is an idea of separating someone for ministry, appointing them for ministry. This is something that is set aside. This action here happens several more times in scripture, especially in the book of acts.

You can see in acts 817, a sorcerer was saved, and the Holy Spirit came upon him. Acts 817. And they laid hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.

You can see that Saul was saved, and hands were laid on him. Acts 917. And Ananias went his way and entered the house, and laying his hands on him, he said, brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road as you came, has sent me, that you may receive your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.

You see a trend here. The Holy Spirit shows up. And then when Paul and Barnabas were sent on their missionary journeys, hands were laid on them.

Acts 13 three then, having fasted and prayed, they laid hands on them. They sent them away, and Paul carried out this action on others here. Paul laid hands on converts in Ephesus, in acts 19 six.

And when Paul had laid hands on them, the Holy Spirit came upon them, and they spoke with tongues and prophesied. This act of laying on of hands is repetitive, even happens with Timothy in one. Timothy 414.

Do not neglect the gift that is in you, which was given to you by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the eldership. And this is really key, even in today's sort of understanding of pastoral ministry. Many people understand that part of the calling to a pastoral ministry is people have to recognize you as spiritual leadership, not even just in the official ceremony, as we had a few months ago, where I was sitting up here and I, people were laying their hands on me.

It's an odd thing to actually go through from that perspective, but really what's interesting about it is that's symbolic for years and years of people who have told me, I think you should be in ministry. If there's someone who you have seen grow up in Christ and you've seen them go into ministry, you can probably see times where you spoke into their life and said, you're really good at this. You should try this.

Let's take it out of the ministry context for everyone's perspective here. If there's someone who's just really, really good at puzzles, really, really good at puzzles, so you keep buying them puzzles, and you think, I bet they would really enjoy this puzzle. And then you keep reaffirming that in their mind that you're really good at puzzles, you're really good at puzzles, and they keep working on those puzzles, and they get better and better.

And really what happens is they're being set apart as. That's the puzzle guy. In a more spiritual sense, these men are being set apart as men who are willing to serve, willing to love the flock.

And we talked about last week as well, that how the spirit of God was crucial to this. They couldn't serve in their own strength. They couldn't serve in their own abilities.

It was more about who they were. And I would submit that it's the same today that we are all able to serve in some way. We may think, well, I can't do the things that other person can do.

And to that I would say, great. You can do different things. We're the body of Christ.

We're supposed to be working together to edify one another. If we were all the same, it'd be really, really, really boring. It'd be really, really odd if we all had the same exact gift.

We're here to work with each other, to help each other. It is impactful that these men are here to serve the church. They're here to sacrifice of themselves.

An interesting note here about the widows themselves that are being cared for. Luke has more references to widows and women than any other evangelist. The word widow here occurs in Luke, 237425 712, and then three other references in the Book of Luke.

But the idea here, and also in the Book of Acts, chapter six, verse one. While there are twelve times more in the rest of the New Testament, this idea of woman or widow occurs 29 times in Matthew, 16 times in Mark, 41 times in Luke, 17 times in John, 19 times in acts. Thus 60 times in Luke and acts, and 87 times in the rest of the New Testament.

He talks about the needy, the widows, the ones who are in need of great help. And it's crucial that these needs are being met. These men were selected for a reason, and that reason was to serve these widows.

It's obviously to the church and to these men that these men were qualified for the job. But I want to ask the question, how did they know that these men were qualified? I want to do this with somewhat of a silly illustration. Follow me with this one.

So, like when you get ready to go, maybe mow your yard or trim your yard, and you start with what you're going to wear. You're going to wear really old dirty clothes or work clothes, and you're going to go out and you're going to maybe work in the hot sun, and you're going to get sweaty, and maybe you finish the job after a little while and you get thirsty. So you go to a store you get a nice cold drink, an iced tea or a water or whatever your choice is.

And the person behind you can probably tell generally what you just did. Maybe because they can see blades of grass on you. Maybe because they can see beads of sweat coming down your forehead.

Maybe because they can just tell that that person has been working. It's crazy obvious that that person was doing that very specific job and that they were qualified for it. So I think it was very clear, very obvious when you mentioned the word serve or diakonas or disciple or love or any of these qualities that are synonymous with following God, with walking in step with the spirit that these men had, that these men were it.

They understood. The church understood that these men are the ones that we want to be in this office. These Mendez were very clearly qualified to serve the church.

And it was not because they were great businessmen. There's nothing about their accolades. There's nothing about their stature in the community.

It's about how they could serve. Question for you and I is how can I be like these men? How can I live this consistent testimony that people see? I need to seek first how I can serve others, not myself. I need to be led by the spirit daily, demonstrating a heart for people and acts of service, practical things that people need.

And the cool thing is, every single person has individual needs. And you have unique abilities. So God has put all of us together so we can meet those needs together.

Because I can't meet every single one of the needs of the people in this auditorium. But there are people in this auditorium who can meet needs that I can't. So we serve one another and we encourage one another.

On a personal note, many of you know that Jenny and I have been renovating a house so that we can move into it. We have received help from many people who know a lot more about renovating a house than we do. And as we've sought counsel, we sought help.

Those people have impacted the house and impacted us personally in such a way that we could never do on our own. Those people helped us. Those people are a blessing.

It's the same way with the church. We all bring these abilities that are given by God, these blessings that are given to us by God, so that we can use these gifts and abilities for the church, for the glory of God, not for ourselves. The process of selecting and appointing these men had a direct effect on the overall health and the sustainability of the early church.

And to see this, let's look at what happened. So these men are selected. These men are picked.

They're picked for a reason. They had an impact on people's lives. They were being the church.

They were growing as a church. Let's look at the results in verse seven. This is a really exciting verse because it's not just do this, don't do this.

You might want to try this, or this is really bad. This is God is working. God is moving.

Notice that up until now it has been God calling the apostles to do something, God calling the church to do something. Now God is doing something. Then the word of God spread.

The number of disciples multiplied greatly, and a great many of the priests were obedient to the faith. Amen. Right.

The word of God spread. So the problem was solved. The apostles, which is sort of the unspoken part of the text today, were able to commit themselves to prayer and their time in the word of God.

And as they were able to do that, the word of God went out more effectively. It was spread. The number of the disciples greatly multiplied in Jerusalem.

So as the word of God spread, more people are impacted. This is compound growth. This is not just the apostles teaching.

This is that the apostles taught people. And those people that were taught the gospel were impacted by the gospel. And they went to their neighbors and said, I've been impacted by the gospel, and Jesus Christ has changed my life, and you should come and hear the apostles, and you should just hear my testimony.

And they have responded and listened to the people who have been changed by the gospel. And then those people tell other people, it's the first Timothy two two effect, where you teach men and those men teach other men, and that repeats over and over and over again where the gospel is spreading and disciples are multiplying. Now, understand, there's a distinction between the gospel spreading and disciples.

You see, you can know the word of God. The word of God can be spread in your life without being a disciple, without that continual growth. Because there's a difference between just having your eternal security secured and being safe in that and being bold enough to make disciples.

It's impossible to multiply the disciples without the disciples sharing the word. To the point even that many of the priests were obedient to the faith, even the ones whose power was being stripped away by this gospel. They were impacted by the truth because they knew the truth.

They knew that the messiah was coming and that he is coming to do miracles, to perform signs and wonders, to verify his message, and the kingdom is coming. And they knew that the prophecies, yet their hearts were blinded. Some of them were changed.

I would submit to you that the answer to all these questions of how and why is this effect happening is because spirit filled godly men served their church faithfully, and because the apostles were able to serve in prayer and serve faithfully in the word of God. And also because the church collectively took a look at these men in the church and they saw these distinct men who loved people. And I truly believe that when you set these men apart and you say these men are here to serve, you see examples of what to follow.

You see examples of how we are to do that in our own lives. People are inspiring to us at times. People impact us.

Have you ever met someone who you see a character, qualities displayed in their life and you think, I would love to be like that and maybe just apply a little piece of that in your life? Every one of us are comprised of many little pieces of people's testimonies that we've seen over the years, and we think that person was a prayer warrior. I need to pray more and more effectively, more fervently. That person really knows their Bible.

That person really knows how to serve in a practical way in people's lives. That person is really interested in people's lives. That person really knows how to come alongside someone in a time of trouble, maybe when they're being tempted, maybe when they're in a struggle with family, maybe when they're struggle emotionally or physically.

We see people like that in our lives and we think, I want to be like those people. And I don't think it's too much of a stretch to say these deacons, as they are set apart to service, are seen that way in a very specific way. I want you also to notice that the word deacon does not appear as an official title in the church.

That's not a position of power. These aren't trustees who are making executive decisions. It's not a board of men who are charge of the pastor.

These are people who are designed in their position to serve the church. That is most basically what a deacon is, is a servant. And that sounds terrible to say from a human perspective.

But a pastor is to serve. A deacon is to serve. And God has given special authority to a pastor to lead with the word of God.

And God has given the power of voting in and voting out pastors and deacons to the church. So a deacon is not to run the church. A pastor is to lead the church.

The church is to vote. The church is to run the church based on what the word of God says. That is what the Bible teaches.

This is the earliest account of the young church in Jerusalem, forming roles especially designed for service. And this is designed to complement the apostles role. This is sort of a precursor to Ephesians four when he talks about the roles of the church.

And the key word to hone in on here, if there was a key word to bring with you, to take home with you, is diakonos. It's to serve. You can see it in other context in scripture of literally just to prepare a meal or to prepare or serve a king, to be an attendant.

It is to do the will and the wishes and glorify, to put someone else above yourself. It is to put their needs above your own. The idea of deacon here is true for the three deacons that are in this church.

It is also true for each and every one of you. It's true for me. It's true that we ought to be able to serve each other.

We ought to sacrifice for each other. If it is just your pastor and your deacon serving, then the church doesn't work because we're a body, we're a living organism. It'd be like if my arm decided just not to work today and I just couldn't use it.

The whole body is affected by that one piece not working. So the process that we have seen is picking these men who are qualified spiritually and physically to serve. Deacons here attend to the needs of the church through their spiritual qualifications and their natural tendency, their propensity, if you will, towards service.

This results in a healthy, growing church because the apostles in their day and the pastors of today are able to focus on the word of God and be able to serve in very specific ways that they wouldn't be able to if they were meeting every single detail of the needs of the people. So the question for us today, as we finish, is, how do I apply this to my life? What does it look like for a child, first of all, to serve? Well, we all have different people over us, different relationships. For a child, it may be as simple as cleaning your room when you're asked to clean your room or cleaning your room, because it's the right thing to do, whichever one ends up happening first, or doing a chore, helping set the table, or just noticing that your brother or sister needs something and helping them with it.

Help your helping your parents, helping your siblings, being a friend to the people around you, being kind, showing grace. It's really getting your attention that you have been putting on yourself, on other people. For teenagers, it takes different forms.

It may take different forms as you gain more independence and gain more freedom to do whatever you want to do. Maybe you use that independence, as Paul did, not to gain something selfishly, but to give to others. You may think, well, I could go do this fun thing, or this person really needs me to bring them something, so I'm going to go to the store and bring them something, or I'm going to rake their yard.

I'm going to sacrifice three, four, 5 hours and I'm going to do this for them because I love them. Maybe this is also just sitting down and listening to an older person, serving them, by listening to them, by respecting the wisdom that they have to give. I would submit that it's also an application here to be brave enough to try different ministries.

When you are a teenager, a young adult in this sort of age group, this is when you really are able to start developing and growing into the habits that form your life for many decades. And it's okay to try different things. It's okay to be pushed past what you think is possible.

It's okay to be challenged. It's okay to be uncomfortable. As adults, I think we can find what God has qualified us to do through those teenage years, through those young adult years, and as God has showed us what we are qualified to do, what God has blessed us with the ability to do, we can really invest a lot of our time in using our abilities for the glory of God, for the service of others.

Maybe you are on the flip side, where you are helping a younger person. Every one of you is able to be a disciple maker and be discipled. And even for those of you who are a little bit older, do what your body and mind will allow you to do as long as possible for the glory of God.

Because I guarantee you with 100% certainty, God did not give you retirement to spend it on yourself. It's not to relax or to enjoy everything for your own pleasure. It is to glorify God with every breath.

It's not just when you stop working at a nine to five job. And I would say collectively as a church that we ought to select good godly deacons, that we ought to hold deacons accountable to the high standard of God's service, and that we ought to not be afraid to meet the level of service that they are already serving at. Don't feel like because someone else is already doing it, I can't step in and try to be of help.

And lastly, pray for your deacons. Pray that God would equip them spiritually and physically to perform the tasks unique to the position of a deacon at Northridge Baptist Church and pray that God would equip you with that same spirit. The study of what a deacon is is really going to bleed into what a Christian is much like what a pastor is.

So let's pray that God would equip us to serve in whatever way God is calling us to do. God, you have truly challenged us from the word of we are confronted today with the fact that we are to do everything in service, that deacons are here an example of loving others sacrificially of loving others appointed being appointed by the church especially to serve the people whereas not every single person in this church will be appointed as a deacon. But we do ask that you would help each and every one of us to serve.

Help us to see the needs of other people, have compassion on them as Jesus did and to desire to change as a result. Desire to help other people as a result. Pray these things in your son's name.