Paul was never a Pastor and never tried to be one, he was a missionary and Apostle. Jesus is God, He can do whatever He wants.
To be the Bishop of a church requires a wife and children. period.
What a load of blarmy! Missionary CHURCH PLANTERS and Apostles were in authority ABOVE pastors, roughly like bishops are today, depending on your denomination. A Church planter like Paul, by definition HAD to be a pastor, as he started the fellowships, which he oversaw...
Jesus gave us an example, in His lifestyle and teachings, and, was fully human....so the "He can do whatever He wants" because he was also God doesn't cut it as an argument. Why do you believe single adults are morally inferior to married adults?
Again, what organized Christian group, except for the "Church of wbarmy," REQUIRES married leadership (be they pastors, missionaries, or bishops)??
RE: Paul was never a Pastor and never tried to be one, he was a missionary and Apostle. Jesus is God, He can do whatever He wants.
Some observations:
1) According to the book of Acts, Paul stayed in Ephesus for 3 years, later appointing Elders to oversee the church. That to me sort of is a Pastoral role.
2) When Paul left Ephesus, he charged Timothy to be the Bishop of the Church of Ephesus (Eusebius of Caesaria mentions this in his Church History). At that time, Timothy was a Young man (1 Timothy 4:12).
Timothy is first mentioned in Acts 16:1. His mother Eunice, and his grandmother, Lois, are mentioned in 2 Tim. 1:5. All that we know of his father is that he was a Greek not a Jew (Acts 16:1).
I find it very strange then that Paul would tell Timothy in the end of his Second Epistle to greet several people in Ephesus, but does not greet Timothy’s wife ( which seems to indicate to me that he wasn’t married at that time ).
The next sentence in Timothy says he's not to be a lover of money. So much for that.