Able to Teach
When Paul writes that “an overseer, therefore, must be… able to teach” (1 Timothy 3:2), what does he mean?
There are lots of different answers out there, but the most convincing one I’ve found is from Jonathan Leeman.
Here is his answer:
Able to teach means that an elder is someone who rightly teaches the Bible.
Able to teach doesn’t necessary mean preaching from the pulpit or teaching from the front.
It does however mean being “able to open the Bible and reliably explain what it says so that people rightly understand” when being asked a question or caring for members of the church.
“An able teacher is someone who holds fast to sound doctrine and can faithfully communicate that doctrine to others.”
(Jonathan Leeman)
To prove his point, he surveys the Pastoral Epistle:
An elder must not teach different doctrines, especially those that promote empty speculation (1 Timothy 1:3-4).
An elder must have as the goal of their teaching love, a good conscience, and sincere faith (1 Timothy 1:5).
An elder’s teaching must match his life (1 Timothy 4:16).
An elder must teach doctrines that agree with the sound teaching of Christ (1 Timothy 6:3-4).
An elder must hold onto the pattern of sound teaching that is found in the Scriptures (2 Timothy 1:13).
An elder must correctly handle the word of truth (2 Timothy 2:15).
An elder will avoid empty speech which departs from the truth (2 Timothy 2:16, 18).
An elder will patiently and gentle instruct the truth to those who disagree (2 Timothy 2:24-25).
An elder’s teaching should lead to repentance and a knowledge of the truth (2 Timothy 2:25).
An elder will teach God’s Word not their wisdom (2 Timothy 4:2).
An elder will hold firmly to the word of God and instruct with sound doctrine those who contradict it (Titus 1:9).
An elder will not teach what is empty or deceptive in order to make a profit (Titus 1:10-11).
An elder will be sound in the faith and doesn’t get involved in myths and false teaching (Titus 1:13-14).
An elder’s teaching will be sound and recognised by others as being so (Titus 2:1, 7, 8).
Leeman does not deny the need for a man to be competent in his communication, but his first concern, as the survey of the Pastorals show, is that the content they teach needs to be faithful and consistent with what Scripture teaches.
Able to teach = Being able to faithfully communicate sound doctrine.
“Able to teach” is mainly about doctrinal integrity, not rhetorical ability - but it is a little bit about rhetorical ability. After all, you have to communicate sound doctrine to teach it.”
(Sam Emadi)
Field Notes
A reminder that every Saturday I send out a Substack with 10 links from around the web worth checking out and the latest resources I’ve produced at Blog of Dan (my online Notion page).