What do deacons do?

Introduction

The office of a deacon has suffered a lot of confusion over the past hundred or so years. I don’t think most churches fully understand, let alone most pastors fully understand what a deacon is. Part of this is because the bible actually doesn’t say a whole lot about deacons. Because of this, there is some element of liberty as to how the diaconate should function and there should be some humility when evaluating how churches differ on this issue. The scarcity of information though should push us to focus even more on what the bible does say about the office.

Many churches have drifted into one of two errors in the way that they view the deacons. Often the ay deacons function is based more on tradition than it is on the bible and so it helps us to reevaluate the priorities of diaconate. The two errors that churches creep into is either viewing the deacons as just another committee or a grounds crew or elevating them to the status of an elder. The first error crept in probably as a reaction to second. During the era of Henry Ford, churches began to adopt business models similar to Ford motor company where everything was broken down into committees. Deacon’s have sometimes fallen into just menial labor heads. There was also a trend within churches away from elders and so deacons began to fill that role within the church. They became under-shepherds providing leadership within the church. A proper understanding of the authority structure in the church is that the church is congregational ruled, elder led and deacon served.

Because of these two shifts in thinking about deacons, the church has lost something. Just as a pastor who is occupied with serving tables cannot fully be what he needs to be; so a deacon who is occupied with oversight in the church cannot fulfill his function fully. My desire is to bring us back to a place where elders are elders and deacons are deacons because I am zealously desirous to see both offices fully fulfilled in the church.

The office of a deacon is an essential function within the church and without them things fall through the cracks that shouldn’t because a pastor can’t do it all on his own. The deacons were so important historically that Nazi Germany even tried to outlaw the diaconate in the Netherlands during WWII. Pastor Matt Smethurst tells the story of how the deacons in the Dutch Reformed Church were providing aid, distributing food and giving shelter to the oppressed during the war. Well, Germany didn’t like that because they were the one’s doing the oppressing. So in 1940, the Nazis issued a decree outlawing the diaconate. In response, the Dutch church convened a synod in which they gave this response:

“Whoever interferes and touches the diaconate touches the task of the church. Whoever lays hands on the deacon lays hands on worship.”

In the end the Nazis backed down. But from this story, we see the value of deacons in the life of the church was so much that the Nazis were threatened by it. So to help us understand the special purpose of the deacons in the church, we need to take another look at what scripture actually says. We are going to primarily be looking tonight at Acts 6. Some have debated whether these are actually the first deacons, but at the very least they set the model for what would become deacons.

Protecting the unity of the church

Acts 6:1 “And in those days, when the number of the disciples was multiplied, there arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews, because their widows were neglected in the daily ministration.”

To understand the purpose of the deacons, it is important to understand the circumstances that demanded their founding. Prior to this point the church had apostles and elders, but there is no mention of deacons existing. So what happened?

In Acts 6, as the church grew (in fact the text says they began to multiply) conflicts began to arise between the different groups in the church. The word in our bibles Grecians is literally the Hellenists, a term that was applied to Greek-speaking Jews. These were Jewish people who grew up most likely outside of Israel. They had slightly different cultural practices having been surrounded by the Gentiles and they spoke a different langauge. Clearly, by this point they had moved back to Jerusalem possibly because of Pentecost and never left.

The Hebrews are those Jews who were raised in Israel and spoke Aramaic. They might have been a little more observant Jews. But these two groups began to class because the church had a system in place to take care of the windows. Notice their was a daily ministration- The word ministration comes from the Greek word διακονια (diakonia) from which we get the word deacon. The meaning is the activity of helping especially as it relates to a persons sustenance. Conflict arose in the church because of a lack of organized effort. A group of widows were falling through the cracks.

So part of the function of the deacon’s is to protecting the unity of the church. But what does this look like? They are like the white blood cells in your body that rush to fight off infection.

When there is conflict they seek to arbitrate reconciliation

They themselves must be unified if they are going to bring unity

They seek to connect people within the body

This implies that they cannot be a constantly contentious person- Some people think of themselves as the devils advocate just for the sake of making people think. Such an attitude does not promote unity. It is alright to honestly disagree and discuss issues, but an overly contentious person can never promote unity in the church.

Freeing up the Elders to focus on the Word

Acts 6:2 “Then the twelve called the multitude of the disciples unto them, and said, It is not reason that we should leave the word of God, and serve tables.”

A second function of the deacons, and I am just going in chronological order here, is to free the elders up to minister the word of God. We need to make sure we understand that the apostles didn’t create deacons because this issue was unimportant. They were not just passing the buck to someone else. They came up with this solution because the issue was too important for them to only give half of their attention to it. This problem threatened the life of the church. Many of the books of the NT deal with at some point division especially around cultural and ethnic lines within the church. That shows us that God places a high priority on these issues.

In spite of all of this, the apostles say it is not reason- the word reason here means pleasing, desirable, worthy of accepting. The idea here isn’t that they just didn’t want to do this, but it is not in the best interests of the church, if the pastor is having to peal away all the time to deal with these issues. Clearly, the apostles are overseeing the solution because they call the disciples together to choose the first deacons, but a pastor only has so much time and when other things take him away something suffers.

Acts 6:4 “But we will give ourselves continually to prayer, and to the ministry of the word.”

The apostles felt a strong need to give themselves to prayer and the word. While the life of the church is threatened by conflict and the needs of the church; the life of the church is non-existent without the preaching of the word. It comes down to who is going to prioritize which needs.

Now this does not excuse a pastor to only study and preach and have no interactions with the people. Ministry is service. You must relate to people to serve them the word truly. This was not the example of Paul and it flys in the face of the requirement that a pastor be given to hospitality. So what does this look like?

this may involve visiting families in the church

this may involve menial tasks that take time

this may involve financial matters and building plans

this may involve administrative functions

Just to throw this out there if the pastor has to go behind the deacons or be present for everything the deacons do, then it has not truly freed up the pastor to focus on word ministry in the church.

Serving tables

Acts 6:2–4 “Then the twelve called the multitude of the disciples unto them, and said, It is not reason that we should leave the word of God, and serve tables. Wherefore, brethren, look ye out among you seven men of honest report, full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this business. But we will give ourselves continually to prayer, and to the ministry of the word.”

The most obvious function, though sometimes the most forgotten function of the deacons is service. There are menial things that people in the church need taken care of. In this case it was the ministration to the widows. Giving out the money set aside for true widows as we read in 1 Tim 5, but also serving them. This ministry according to the text was daily. Being a deacon costs time. It is a sacrifice, but to truly fulfill the function of a deacon there has to be a willingness to make that sacrifice. Time management is a lost art in our society and deacons as disciplined men have to master time. This does tend to make it a little easier for retired men, but that’s not really the men I see in the text.

Two of the men chosen as deacons: Stephen and Philip were both preachers in their own right. So they had a pretty busy schedule. Luckily Philip got to get transported from place to place JK.

these might be tasks like fixing things around the church

lawn care

fixing a church members car, roof, or whatever skills we have to use to help

bringing benevolence offerings to those in need

Conclusion

In the early church, the deacons were also involved in baptisms, church membership and tending to the sick. These functions are important in the church, but when the diaconate is not functioning healthily; those things get half done by the elders of the church. The last thing I want to do tonight is point us to vs 3. Let me ask you a question, “Who chose the deacons?” The answer is the church. Back in vs 2 the apostles had called the multitude of the disciples. The entire congregation. So after the church nominated the deacons, the apostles prayed over them and in a sense ordained them to that ministry vs 6. So the leadership of the church does still have a say as we recognize the choice.

I have been praying about two men that I would like to see become deacons in the church, but I believe this is supposed to be the jurisdiction of the church to choose. So here is what we are going to do tonight. I am going to hand out a sheet of paper which I would like you to write down anyone that you think should be a deacon in the church and is qualified for the office. Next week, we will be going over the requirements and after the evening service, we will bring to a vote those who are nominated and have been vetted by the deacons. My prayer is that those I recognize as potential deacons will be the ones God places on your hearts to select. During the vote, there will be a list of the requirements that we will ask you to consider when placing your vote.

One last word: Acts 6:7 “And the word of God increased; and the number of the disciples multiplied in Jerusalem greatly; and a great company of the priests were obedient to the faith.” says that as a direct result of the deacons being established the preaching of God’s word increased and the number of believers multiplied greatly. Even to the extent that some of the priests got saved. God began to do an amazing and seeminly impossible work in the church when the deacons were set up and functioning in their God-given role.