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1 Timothy 5:3 Give proper recognition to those widows who are really in need. 4 But if a widow has children or grandchildren, these should learn first of all to put their religion into practice by caring for their own family and so repaying their parents and grandparents, for this is pleasing to God. 5 The widow who is really in need and left all alone puts her hope in God and continues night and day to pray and to ask God for help. 6 But the widow who lives for pleasure is dead even while she lives. 7 Give the people these instructions, so that no one may be open to blame. 8 Anyone who does not provide for their relatives, and especially for their own household, has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.
Look at Acts 6:1 This is the issue Paul is instructing Timothy to deal with.
In those days when the number of disciples was increasing, the Hellenistic Jews[a] among them complained against the Hebraic Jews because their widows were being overlooked in the daily distribution of food.
Remember the story of when Mary and Joseph took the baby Jesus to the Temple and they met Anna? Anna was one of those widows who lived at the church. Anna is a good example of the widow Paul is talking about in Verse 5.
Luke 2:36 There was also a prophet, Anna, the daughter of Penuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was very old; she had lived with her husband seven years after her marriage, 37 and then was a widow until she was eighty-four.[e] She never left the temple but worshiped night and day, fasting and praying. 38 Coming up to them at that very moment, she gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were looking forward to the redemption of Jerusalem.
According to one commentary, widows were sent to the church to work and live in the office.
" There was in those times an office in the church in which widows were employed, and that was to tend the sick and the aged, to look to them by the direction of the deacons."
This stems from a long tradition in the Jewish faith.
Jeremiah 49:11 ‘Leave your fatherless children; I will keep them alive. Your widows too can depend
The church wasn't the place for all widows, though. After all, not every widow would want to be an Anna. So Paul told Timothy how to deal with them.
