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    I have read all your answers to the divorce and marriage questions you have posted on the sight.  My question is what areas can divorced people serve in?  Can they teach a Sunday School class, be a missionary, (which I feel is the same as pastoring), or a deacon.  I know three men who are married to divorced women, one is a pastor, the other just finished a Bible Inst. and is waiting and praying for Gods direction and the other, a deacon, has surrendered to the mission field.  Also, at what extent does the church tolerate fornication (couples living together) should the Pastor Baptise, dedicate babies (not baptism) Lords Supper etc... At what extent do you allow them, I know you want to love them but also need to show them the error of their ways I appreciate your boldness in the word and taking a stand for it.

  The Bible specifically forbids a man who has been divorced and remarried from being a pastor or deacon. I Timothy 3:1,2 says, "This is a true saying, If a man desire the office of a BISHOP, he desireth a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the HUSBAND OF ONE WIFE..." The word bishop (which means an overseer) is used here in describing a pastor. I Timothy 3:12 says, "Let the DEACONS be the HUSBANDS OF ONE WIFE..." A missionary is the same as a pastor, only is in a foreign country (although there are also home missionaries). There is no excuse for saying that missionaries can be divorced and remarried, but we are living in a sad day when that is what is being preached.

As to using divorced and remarried people as Sunday School teachers (or any other position in the church), that is up to the local church to prayerfully decide.

Your second question: "at what extent does the church tolerate fornication (couples living together)..."

I Corinthians 5:9-13 says, "I wrote unto you in an epistle not to company with fornicators: Yet not altogether with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous, or extortioners, or with idolaters; for then must ye needs go out of the world. But now I have written unto you not to keep company, if any man that is called a brother be a fornicator, or covetous, or an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner; with such an one no not to eat. For what have I to do to judge them also that are without? do not ye judge them that are within? But them that are without God judgeth. Therefore put away from among yourselves that wicked person." The church is not to tolerate it, but to put them out of the membership.

If they then repent, they can be received back in again. II Corinthians 2:6-11 says, "Sufficient to such a man is this punishment, which was inflicted of many. So that contrariwise ye ought rather to forgive him, and comfort him, lest perhaps such a one should be swallowed up with overmuch sorrow. Wherefore I beseech you that ye would confirm your love toward him. For to this end also did I write, that I might know the proof of you, whether ye be obedient in all things. To whom ye forgive any thing, I forgive also: for if I forgave any thing, to whom I forgave it, for your sakes forgave I it in the person of Christ; Lest Satan should get an advantage of us: for we are not ignorant of his devices."

As to trying to police the Lord's Supper, we are not called upon to do that. We are told to give the warning, and God will do the judging, if it is necessary. I Corinthians 11:27-32 says, "Wherefore whosoever shall eat this bread, and drink this cup of the Lord, unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But LET A MAN EXAMINE HIMSELF, and so let him eat of that bread, and drink of that cup. For HE THAT EATETH AND DRINKETH UNWORTHILY, EATETH AND DRINKETH DAMNATION TO HIMSELF, not discerning the Lord's body. For this cause many are weak and sickly among you, and many sleep. For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But WHEN WE ARE JUDGED, WE ARE CHASTENED OF THE LORD, that we should not be condemned with the world."

Notice that it is not the pastor or deacons that are told to judge the people as to their fitness or unfitness to partake of the Lord's Supper. Each person is told to judge himself or herself. Therefore, the person that eats or drinks unworthily, brings upon himself or herself judgment from the Lord. The problem with the pastor or deacons (or anyone else) trying to decide who is worthy and who is not, is that we do not know the hearts of the people assembled, nor do we know what they might be secretly doing. The Lord says that He will do the judging, if they are unwilling to judge themselves and their sin.

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