Rev. Lubbers is a minister emeritus in the Protestant Reformed Churches.

Honor widows that are widows indeed. But if any widows have children or nephews, let them learn to show piety (godliness) at home, and to requite their parents: for that is good and acceptable before God. Now she that is a widow indeed, and desolate, trusteth (hopeth) in God, and continueth in supplications and prayers day and night. But she that liveth in pleasure is dead while she liveth. And these things give in charge, that they may be blameless. 

I Timothy 5:3-7

We should observe carefully that we are dealing with three matters. Briefly stated they are as follows:

1. That the church of God is bound by the Lord Himself to “honor” in a special way those widows who are really widows. According to verses 5 and 6 this honor accorded to widows must be discretional. The real widows must not be confused with those who are not real widows. To this matter we must give our attention in this lesson.

2. Paul also teaches the members of the church that God would have the children and grandchildren to “learn to shew piety at home” (v. 4).

3. The spiritual motivation for shewing such “godliness at home” is that such a conduct is according to the good, acceptable, and perfect will of God (Rom. 12:1,2; I Tim. 1:5). And that such conduct is “good and acceptable before God” is the end of all contradiction. Such is the new obedience of God, which is in “newness of spirit,” not according to the “oldness of the letter” (Rom. 7:4, 5).

It ought to be stated that the name “widow” is a very honorable one. In the Hebrew language the term is almanah, that is, “a silent one.” She lives “alone.” Basically she is and remains a very lonely child of God. The reason is that her husband had died. God had severed that sacred tie with her husband. It is the only honorable way to be separated from a beloved husband. .All other separation is the outgrowth of that which God hates. (Read Malachi 2:14-16.) God, who took away the widow’s husband, has a special care for such widows in the church. He says to the church of the living God, honor the widow who is a widow indeed by my gracious removal of her husband from supporting her. That husband was to her even as Christ is to the church. She is a very lonely, yet very honorable, child of God. (Cf. Psalm 68:5; Psalm 146:9.) To honor such widows is the privileged duty of the people of God.

This honor is not to be accorded by the church through its diaconate to those who have been divorced on the ground of fornication and adultery. Such are not “widows indeed.” These are divorced because of the hardness of their hearts (Matt. 19:3-12).

Paul teaches Timothy to charge the children and the nephews that such honorable care is the duty of those who are in the very home in which they are born and reared. So strong is this charge that, if any does not provide for his widowed mother or grandmother, such a one is, in this lack of concern, a very denier of the faith; yes, he is worse than an avowed infidel. At least the infidel shows concern for his neighbor. (Read the parable of Jesus in Luke 10:25-37.) If a Samaritan will do for a Jew what the priest and the Levite refused to do, should not a son who fails to provide for his own mother be branded as worse than an infidel, who at least shows the milk of human kindness?

The obligation to care for a needy, widowed mother is a spiritual lesson which must be learned by members of the family. (Read, concerning this “learning,” Hebrews 5:8 and Luke 2:49-52.) Here the eldest brother in God’s family combines His learning obedience in the temple in Jerusalem with the day-to-day obedience in the home of Joseph and Mary. His learning was the suffering all his lifelong and finally on the cross. Our learning to care for an honorable widowed mother is the abc’s, the first principle, of godliness and practical piety. (Read Exodus 20:12; Leviticus 19:2.) In this latter passage we read, “Ye shall be holy: for I the LORD your God am holy. Ye shall fear every man his mother, and his father, and keep my sabbaths: I am the Lord your God.” The Gentile churches must learn how to conduct themselves in the house of God. The first commandment with promise is: If you obey your parents ye shall live long in the land of my sabbaths, and finally in the eternal Sabbath which remaineth for the people of God (Heb. 4:9).

The children in the Christian family ought to “requite their parents”!

In the Greek text, the verb translated “to requite” is “to make return for, repay, to make return for a benefit or service received.” The Holland translation is wedervergelden. The service which children receive from mother is a mother-love which no son or daughter can ever really repay fully. All that they can do is shew such kindness and love which is a spiritual token of their undying gratitude. Why? Because their parents were such perfect fathers and mother? Not at all. All their lifelong these godly parents confessed on bended knee to their heavenly Father their weaknesses and shortcomings. Yet, God would use them, as just such weak vessels, that the glory of His faithfulness might be revealed in the generations who keep His covenant. Such is good and acceptable to God, who says, “Ye shall fear every man his mother, and his father, and keep my sabbaths: I am the LORD your God.”

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God distinguishes between two different kinds of widows. There are those who are lonely, yet who continually “trust (hope) in God,” continuing in prayers and supplications night and day. On the other hand, there are widows who live delicately (in carnal pleasure). They never quite understood their calling as mothers in Israel toward their husbands and children. Soon such widows defiantly cast off the “loneliness” inherent in Christian widowhood. She is indeed not the kind of widow whose only hope is that she be kept in the power of God through faith and hope. When she did receive children she was not like the converted Eve, who believed that she was saved in childbearing. She did not “continue in faith, love, and sobriety.” She never received her children as a true mother in Israel, whose calling was, under her husband, to admonish her children in the fear and nurture of the Lord. She was dead “while she lived” with her husband, and she remained spiritually dead. She never uttered prayers and supplications for her children. So she was spiritually dead while her husband lived and also after he died. If her husband was chiefly concerned with the salvation of their children, she never really shared his enthusiasm. Now that he died, she will make the best of it and eke what pleasure she can out of her life of widowhood. Such widows the saints will not honor as widows indeed. She does not deserve the name and the honor of a godly widow.

There were “many widows in Israel” during the time of Elijah. But there was a pious widow who dwelt in Sarepta, a city of Sidon. Yes, the Bible knows how to distinguish “widows indeed” from those who are not such. Here is room for self-examination on the part of every widow in the church of God.

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In verses 9-15 we read: “Let not a widow be taken into the number under threescore years old, having been the wife of one man, well reported of for good works; if she have brought up children, if she have lodged strangers, if she have washed the saints” feet, if she have relieved the afflicted, if she have diligently followed every good work.”

We would have it noticed by all that there was evidently a kind of service rendered in the churches of Paul’s day which was of such a nature that it required women of exceptionally “good report” in all the churches. We think here of the women who received special mention by Paul in Romans 16:1-5. Who does not think also of Acts 9:36, 39? The good works prove that such a widow is not a novice in working for the benefit of the needy in the church. And that she is a widow who is past sixty implies that she has always given her all, and intends to follow these works. She will be one who is very proficient and will give full measure. She never shrinks before arduous and difficult tasks. She gives herself. She has much love to the needy saints, doing good to all!

A young widow must not even be considered to be placed on the list of those who are called for such arduous work, which require so much self denial. Young widows under sixty years of age must be told categorically that they area “class” of widows who are not yet ready for this arduous assignment in the church. Paul writes to Timothy that there is a potential problem to consider. It is that your widows will fall into Satan’s temptation to desert the ranks of these doers of their assignments. The KJV writes, “for when they have begun to wax wanton against Christ, they will marry.” This marriage is a manifestation of a certain sinful wantonness against Christ. In this “wantonness” there is an unruly power of sin. It is the strong lustful desire to have a “man” at any cost. Their only “will” is to marry. It is the strong cry of the blood in their veins, which will vanish when they reach the age of sixty years, the time when the overpowering “burning” has ceased, of whichI Corinthians 7:9 speaks: “for it is better to marry than to bum.” This is counterbalanced in I Corinthians 7:39: “The wife is bound by the law as long as her husband liveth; but if her husband be dead, she is at liberty to be married to whom she will; only in the Lord.”

In view of this we must hold that it is not sinful for a “young widow” to will to marry. Blazoned in Scripture is the true word: “Marriage is honorable in all, and the bed undefiled, but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge” (Heb. 13:4). What does this teach us? Is it not that although marriage is right, there are times when it is not convenient? (Cf. I Cor. 6:12.) Now to avoid placing such moral hardships upon the young widows, the Holy Spirit here gives a very wise and kind rule, that widows under sixty be not considered to be placed on the role. It prevents confusion and disorder in the churches, while at the same time it allows the young widows to remarry in the Lord. Thus they will not be deemed to be sinfully wanton, driven by pent-up, burning sexual desire. However, it must be the desire to bear children in the church; the desire to be saved in childbearing; a sobriety which is governed by faith, love, and holiness (I Tim. 2:15).

Thus the holy avenues of assisting in the care for the “widows indeed” remain open for the real widows who are past the age of sixty and are the true objects of the Lord’s care in the church.

We might repeat here the words of Leviticus 19:3: “Ye shall fear every man his mother and his father and keep my sabbaths”! Thus says the LORD. I am your God. Let every man or woman walk in this commandment, not in the oldness of the letter, but in newness of spirit. For the end of the commandment is love out of a pure heart, a good conscience and faith unfeigned (I Tim. 1:5).

Some Questions and Suggestions to consider:

Do the Scriptures leave us wholly in the dark concerning the identity and nature of the official status of the “widows” in the churches?

This is a good question which is often raised by those studying these passages. In I Timothy 5:9, the Greek text reads katalegesthai. Literally, “to be put on the list.” This terminology suggests that this was simply a list of willing volunteers. It was not to be placed in an instituted special “office” of deaconess at all. Thus some suggest. They then proceed to read in I Timothy 3:11an office akin to the office of a deacon, as spoken of inActs 6:1ff. We believe that this is done to no avail. We suggest the following considerations:

1.Is it not entirely unnatural to have an “office” of deaconesses in which only “widows” may serve? and that, too, only after they have come to the age of no less than sixty years? In I Timothy 3:11 the list of qualifications to be eligible for the “placement on the list” hardly fits into the spiritual qualifications of the wives of deacons, that is, their conjugal companions. The qualifications for the “list of women” are identical with the attained life of sanctification of all the saints in Christ.

2. Rather it is far more natural to think of volunteers to perform the good works of mercy which included a walking in all good works (I Tim. 5:10).