Video Transcript: The Special Role of Deacons

Transcript: The Special Role of Deacons

Introduction

Bruce:
Welcome back. We’re talking about deacons and the importance of the role of deacons in the church. And in the last session—just a reminder—we saw that we are all called to be deacons.

Now in this session, we’re going to look at the fact that there is a special role—some people who have this special designation as deacons. And you know, that came about in the church in a rather surprising way. And so we’re going to talk about that a little bit as we look at some of the Scriptures and the setting in which this all happened.

So, first of all, let’s look at the founding passage for deacons, the servants of the church.

Acts 6: The First Deacons

Bruce:
This is Acts chapter six, and it’s the passage where we have some people now who were part of the church, but now they are set apart. That’s—that’s the word. What the word ordination means. It means simply to be set apart for a particular role.

These people are set apart.

“In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Hellenistic Jews among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food.”

Several things to notice there: there are Hellenistic Jews. Now, remember that the church came out of a Jewish background, and so the fact that there are Hellenists—or Greeks—as part of this church was a new thing, a huge cultural deal.

Abigail:
Yeah, and we’re gonna see how big it was in just a moment.

Bruce:
“So the Twelve gathered all the disciples together”—so you got all the Jews and the Hellenists and the Greeks together—“and said, it wouldn’t be right for us to neglect the ministry of the Word of God in order to wait on tables. Brothers and sisters, choose seven men from among you who are known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom. We will turn this responsibility over to them, and we will give our attention to prayer and the ministry of the word.”

“This proposal pleased the whole group. They chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit; also Philip, Procorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas from Antioch, a convert to Judaism. They presented these men to the apostles, who prayed and laid their hands on them.”

“So the word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith.”

Explosive Growth

Bruce:
Now let’s look at some of those. Notice: these were heady days. Three thousand people come to believe on Pentecost. Two thousand later. Five thousand people within a matter of days or weeks.

Have you ever been part of a church that grew by over zero? I have not either.

The church I served in California went through a growth spurt at the end of the 1980s where we were scrambling, scrambling, scrambling, trying to cover bases, trying to keep up with that growth, right? And then you think of five thousand in a matter of weeks. Yeah—so these are heady, heady days.

And as a result, it looks like the disciples had this idea that Jesus gave them: that we’ve got to serve people. And James, who is the brother of Jesus—who wrote the book of James later—talks about the fact that what’s pure religion? Well, it’s caring for widows and orphans, right?

I mean, they didn’t have—they didn’t have those safety nets like we have now. At least in our country, if you are a widow, if you’ve got sickness, if you’re poor, there are safety nets that will make sure you’re fed, make sure you’re clothed, make sure you’re cared for. That didn’t exist back then.

So—hefty days. Yeah.

Abigail:
Ministry expansion. You know, I just love what’s even being addressed there in that whole passage, where it’s like—they know this need is super important, but they also know that they have a job to really teach and preach the Word of God, and they can’t spend the time caring for the widows, right?

Bruce:
Yeah. And so they decided to create an organizational change.

But notice the context of it. That last one—the King James Version puts it: “the people were murmuring.”

That’s a lovely word—murmuring.

Abigail:
Yeah, when you hear that word, you just think—

Bruce:
The unity is threatened. And yeah—so there.

Now, you know, I have led churches where there was murmuring. And in fact, I think—you know—the deacons have a very important role. Able to address that, and we’ll get to that later. But this was a scary time.

Division and Spiritual Warfare

Bruce:
In another course I teach for Christian Leaders Institute—Spiritual Warfare—I started and developed that course because I experienced it in my life and in my ministry. And that—as soon as the body of Christ, the mission of the church, is being fulfilled, the enemy sets in.

And one of his primary, primary tactics is division. And so right away, at the beginning of the church—right? It’s just after Pentecost (that’s Acts 2). We’re in Acts 6. The enemy has come in now: “How can we create division among them? Where can we question?” And here’s the difference between Jews and Greeks. And the church says, “There’s a place I can hit.”

Here’s something I forgot to say when we were looking at Acts 6. It’s very fascinating that the whole church gathered, and they chose these men. They were all Greek names.

And so the Jewish church said: “Yeah, there’s a problem. And we recognize that you people who are new—brand new—they’ve got no basis, they are not part of the children of Abraham—they’re new. We’re going to make sure that your needs are addressed in a way that you can trust.”

That, for me, is a powerful statement.

Abigail:
It’s not something—you can read that and totally miss that, and it is a powerful—

Bruce:
Right. And so, okay, there’s unity threatened. Now, who’s going to step up? Well, these men get the job.

Now, back then it was men. In the church I serve now, women are freely welcome to be deacons. We understand that from the flow of church history. And we’ll talk about that later too. But from the flow of church history, there’s a time where that fit culturally. Now, having women—and Phoebe is a well-known deaconess acknowledged by Paul in the church.

So unity threatened, we’ve got to do something about it. And what do we do? Make sure the needs are addressed.

Apostolic Focus

Bruce:
So there’s also, as Abby mentioned, that clarifying of the focus of the apostles. What are we responsible for here?

And it’s interesting—the results striking to me.

The results are—did you catch that? The first thing is that priests came to believe.

I mean, the purpose of the priests in the Old Testament was to be the kind of go-between between God and the people. So, you know, the people who bring their sacrifices for their sins to the priests, who bring that sacrifice to God, and then give assurance of forgiveness.

And now these priests who were experiencing deacon work by the deacons began to believe more in the message of Jesus on the cross.

That’s striking. But then the church began to grow.

Abigail:
Right. The numbers of disciples increased rapidly.

Bruce:
This happened directly after this—the laying on of hands occurred.

Yeah, and there’s the verse: “The Word of God spread. The number of disciples in Jerusalem increased rapidly, and a large number of priests became obedient to the faith.”

The Triumph of Christianity

Bruce:
Now there’s a book—thank you—The Triumph of Christianity. Historians. Rodney Stark is a historian. Historians look at the growth of Christianity and marvel at it, because in a matter of three centuries, they basically took over the then-known civilized world.

And how did that happen? How did it happen that the message of Jesus Christ became so incredibly powerful that people received it?

Well, Rodney Stark talks about that in The Triumph of Christianity. And this is one of the things he points to.

First of all, he said: In the Roman Empire back then, Romans feared death. And the religion of Rome—there was no certainty about afterlife. You would come to the river, and you’d pay the river man your payment to go across, which would be buried with you, and there, and you’d enter the afterlife. And so they were afraid of death.

That’s encouraging to me when I think of the ministry of the church. But I wonder how many people are afraid of death. And I think there are many. And sometimes that fear can get pushed off because we’re just so busy—

Abigail:
Get so busy that you can—right?

Modern Illustrations of Fear and Faith

Bruce:
I remember when I was in college, a friend and I used to go to a hospital in the city where the college was. And we volunteered on Saturday mornings. And we started, you know, shaving people who couldn’t shave, and making beds, and that sort of thing.

And then they found out we could sing. And so we ended up—we’d come and we’d work for a while, and then we’d sing. Pretty soon, we ended up just going from nurse station to nurse station, singing. And we’d take requests from people.

But we got to know a guy who was there until he was going to die. I mean, he had so many illnesses, so many cancers. He had both legs amputated, and I forget how many—but a multitude of operations. And you know, visiting him was always an upper. I’d come out of there with my faith built.

But then right next door to him was a man who was crying out for help the whole time. Just crying, screaming: “Help me. Help me. Help me.”

And it turns out—we inquired and tried to visit him—and he was dying, and had been told he was dying, and his fear was so palpable that he could do nothing but cry out. And unfortunately, he wouldn’t listen to anybody in the process.

So Romans feared death. And people probably do too, where you are. I mean, death is a fearful thing. It’s an unknown. And how do you get the assurance that there’s no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus? That only comes with faith in Jesus Christ.

Mercy in the Roman Empire

Bruce:
So the setting in the Roman Empire was—they feared death. And Romans tended to denigrate mercy and pity. In other words, they—that was a value they looked down on. It was empty.

And then you put those two things together—fear of death and denigrating mercy and pity—and a plague hits the Empire.

You know, we’ve all been through COVID in the most recent past. This was a plague that’s taking life. What’s going to happen?

Here’s just a statement about that that I found: 5,000—

Abigail:
People a day. Yeah.

Bruce:
You’ll notice the Greek physician given described it as a long, cruel disease that involved fever, diarrhea, and inflammation of the throat, as well as pustules on the skin.

So—what? Fear would—

Abigail:
Be really high.

Bruce:
In that moment, right? Now you may have seen the fear during COVID. You know, there were some people who were just terrified to go out anywhere, terrified to be anywhere. And, you know, all of us know people who died during COVID.

And so you’ve got that kind of situation going on—that kind of death. But within the Roman Empire, now spreading through the Roman Empire, there were Christians who had a different value system.

Take note of that. Christians don’t fear death. You know, we know we have eternal life. We have that assurance in Jesus Christ.

Abigail:
And then again, that model—that Jesus comes and he’s so radically different from the culture, and is calling us as Christians to really show mercy to everybody. I mean, that is a complete flip of what everyone has seen constantly.

Witness Through Suffering

Bruce:
Yeah, you know, it is powerful for me when I think of people that I have—friends that I’ve known—that have died.

And one in particular, a young man—when he had melanoma cancer, went through the treatment. It was successful. At the five-year point, he had a big celebration for all his family and friends, saying: “Cured of cancer.”

And a year later, it came back. And they tried a bunch of experimental stuff, but nothing worked. And so it became obvious he was going to die. He was going down, down, down, down.

And we used to play racquetball together on Friday. So I visited him every Friday.

At his funeral, which I was privileged—privileged to do—afterwards, two families from his immediate neighborhood came to me and said that they became Christians because of how he died.

Now, I find that interesting. I think, “Did they become Christians because he was healed? The power of Jesus?” But no—they saw faith in him.

Once he was diagnosed and knew he was going to die, he said: “It’s going to work out for me.” He was concerned about his family, his children. But he said also: “I’ve not been a consistent witness in this community.” So he went door to door in his neighborhood and just shared: “I’ve got to tell you.”

Abigail:
What an impact. I mean, just think about how many of us kind of live in that—where you just don’t, yeah, you don’t have that boldness to do that. And for him to, like, take that boldness, and then to have two people there that—

Bruce:
Right? Yeah.

So that’s the situation back in Rome. There’s a plague. People are dying—5,000 a day in the city of Rome. And people are afraid. And so what happened was—the Romans, if they had a place to get out of the city, got out of there. They fled.

And it was the Christians who stayed. It was the Christians who cared for the people. It was the Christians who would take sick people into their homes and care for them.

And as a result, what happens? The church began to grow.

Abigail:
Well, I mean, imagine you’re being basically left for dead, and then someone graciously takes you in, cares for you. I mean, what an impact that would have on your heart. And you go: “Why are they this way? Why are they—you know—that would stir in you the desire to maybe learn more about Jesus.” And to think about how that just rapidly spread Christianity.

Again, it’s amazing, because that was such a risk that they took on their lives.

Deacons and the Church Today

Bruce:
Right. So—so this is, this is how it works. How it worked in ancient Rome. This is how I think it’s supposed to work in your world and in my world: that the church—the church is known not for judgmentalism or hypocrisy, but is known for being servants who are looking for needs and who are finding ways to fill needs.

And in the name of Jesus, are reaching out to those who are dying and those who are not—those who have tried to find fulfillment in a bunch of different other things and haven’t found it. And then they find a place where people are willing to serve them, who are exhibiting a different lifestyle and a different set of values.

And I told you the fact that in the church in California, we restructured the role of deacons in the church. And it was a fascinating thing. They went from—I’ll tell you later, some of the stuff that they were involved with—but they went to: “What can we do in this community? What can we do for people in this community? Where are there holes in the safety net for people?”

And they were so fun. In the end of the 1980s, we were having new members classes of 50 and 60 people, four times a year. And it was one of those times where people would come in—“Well, we received help this way from the deacons here. And wow, we’re just so impressed that you’re willing to take on our problem.”

And—yikes.

And I was visiting a church yesterday—now, visiting is when I attend quite regularly, but when I’m not involved in a church. But yesterday, at our mission emphasis, I talked to a man in this community who heads up a ministry of mercy. It’s Love in the Name of Christ. Or Love in Action, is what it is now.

And they provide housing for people with disabilities. They provide food in a variety of ways. They provide furnishings for people. They provide—anyway, I got talking to the guy who I know a little bit, who heads that up. This is the church.

This happens to be a ministry I pray for every day. This is the church. This is the church in this community. It’s being a beacon.

Abigail:
Yeah, and I think it’s just so important that, you know, even as we looked at this passage at the beginning, it’s like setting this example of appointing deacons so that that example is seen throughout the whole church. Because once again

Abigail:
Yeah, and I think it’s just so important that, you know, even as we looked at this passage at the beginning, it’s like setting this example of appointing deacons so that that example is seen throughout the whole church. Because once again, we are all called to be the servant and be these hands and feet. And I think a church putting the importance on “this is what our deacons need to be doing” I think is so critical for every single person attending and seeing that.

Bruce:
And by the middle of the fourth century, Christianity was declared the official religion of the Empire. And—but it started here. So, join us as we continue exploring this office of deacon in the next section.