Agapeton said "So could this just be that the deacons are US? Could it possibly be that the role of Stephen in Acts 6 is what we should all be aspired to be since he was chosen to deacon/serve tables (Acts 6:2)?"
Here I go, raising an old thread. If for nothing else, then to say careful dude, you'll start thinking like me soon >:-). Wait, there is more.
How if I said that people go to some pastoring school to learn skills to answer a particular widespread need? A need that may be born of local inability of eldership, or maybe local inability to see that we do well to strive toward being able to oversee, or some such? Preaching doesn't need to be a part of that, but the Apostles, Paul, even Jesus did it.
What Agapeton said about 1 Timothy 3:8-13 is well-thought through, and in isolation, bulletproof (well, I thought so). All the same, context is our friend. God has given us direction in the parts that male and female play in headship (eg, 1 Corinthians 11:3, Colossians 1:18), and in headship's implied servanthood (eg, John 13:12-17). We can't take from a passage what it doesn't say. In this case, of course women can still be diakonon of one kind or another. Yet Man (male humans - not Mankind this time) should also be moving toward fulfilling his role as Woman's head in Christ, that is also, as her servant.
