When I look in the NASB, KJV, or ESV the term is not found consistently and in most cases noted as an added word and not in the original. For example Deu 17:9 and 19:17 have “in office in those days”. The “in office” is added as it is simply “in those days” or “yôm”. There is a subtlety in that there is a difference between those with the designated role, and the implied those performing the role. This will take more thought and review.
What I suggest is that the implied “office” term would be correct when used to indicate a role to be performed, but the connotation is an authority being bestowed, which I contend it does not give.
Especially when applied to the overseer what I have seen is a sense of authority granted to those elected to hold that title. When our Creator commands us to teach but not to take the title of teacher, perhaps the same is true with the role to oversee, but not the title or implied authority.
What has taken my focus is the root of the word, especially as a verb, is to visit, and I see it as to visit people and issues. But even more when the Lord visits, which we can see with the same word in places like Isa 29:6 “you will be visited (episkopē) by the LORD of hosts”. What holds my heart is James 1:27 “to visit orphans and widows”. I have purposely and joyfully done the latter but avoid the former as in a way my own kids are orphans.
There is also the pondering of “traditions”, or handing down from one to another, especially over the generations. There is the clear command for the dad hand the commands of the Lord to his kids in Deuteronomy 6, but there is also the traditions of men which are a bit more than frowned upon in places like Mark 7:7 based on Isaiah 29:13. This can get complicated.
The Kozlowski Family ● An Attempt at Restoration ● Family.Kozlowski
1Co 4:10 We are fools for Christ's sake, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are held in honor, but we in disrepute. To the present hour we hunger and thirst, we are poorly dressed and buffeted and homeless, and we labor, working with our own hands. When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we entreat. We have become, and are still, like the scum of the world, the refuse of all things.
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