Thoughts on I Timothy 5: Practical advice for the Church

In chapter 5, Paul gives Timothy a lot of tips for handling situations in the church.  Today I will just focus on the handling of widows.

Perhaps contrary to what a lot of people might think today, Paul did not call for the universal helping of the poor.  He believed it was the responsibility of the church to help those who truly needed it.  In his day, the primary case was widows.  Paul instructed Timothy to only help widows who did not have family to care for them.  If someone refused to care for their elderly family members, they were to be shunned. (Boy, do we have a different mentality today in the US...) 

If the widow was young enough to remarry she should, so that she could be taken care of and the church could focus on those "truly in need".  I think the modern corollary is that people who are young enough to still work should be expected to do so and not be taken care of by the church.  This is something the church in the US used to do well.  If someone could work, the church would help them find work, even if that meant cleaning up the church and doing yard work for elderly parishioners.  With the advent of the welfare state, there is both less expectation of the church to help and greater expectation that when the church does help, that it does so without regard to the capabilities of the recipient.  Both mentalities are wrong, but it is very hard, given today's circumstances, to escape either one.