2 Timothy 1:5 – Five Heart Preparations for Finding and Affirming Faith in Others
1 Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, according to the promise of life which is in Christ Jesus,
2 To Timothy, a beloved son:
Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
3 I thank God, whom I serve with a pure conscience, as my forefathers did, as without ceasing I remember you in my prayers night and day, 4 greatly desiring to see you, being mindful of your tears, that I may be filled with joy, 5 when I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you…
"My guilt," realizes Tim Keller in retrospect in Songs of Jesus as he meditates in print on Psalm 130, "was like low-level chronic pain. When it was removed," he says of his personal epiphany, "I realized it had drained my life of joy and confidence."
Having lived into adulthood and mistaken zeal in ministry with something like the low-level chronic pain of guilt that Tim Keller describes, the apostle Paul seems determined to exercise the possibility of the imprinting stain from Timothy. Opening ourselves to the possibility that Timothy's tears represented entirely, or almost entirely, godly sorrow in themselves, I believe it will be helpful for us to consider the counterweight also.
Let's consider that Timothy may have been one of those among the church leadership at Ephesus in Acts 21:1-14 whose tears implored Paul not to follow his faith-filled convictions and go to Jerusalem.
How does, by Christ's grace, Paul develop the perspective to look past Timothy's faltering and fearful tears at one point in time and deliberately, according to the progression in 2 Timothy 1:5, call to mind his faith? For all of us, in the relationships we have and the hopes we aspire to in those we care about, a going to be keenly aware of such moments.
(1) Develop realistic expectations of ministry.
Beginning his letter, Paul identifies himself as an apostle. Not only does this grant the letter the imprimatur to be read in the churches, it is relevant to his state of mind as the fifth verse progresses. Apostles in the broader sense outside of the Bible's covers were those who brought the culture of the conquering empire to new territory.
Even in human government, apostles would expect resistance, confusion, and uneven adoption. Apostles were ground breakers and frontiersmen. Paul was no different and would not have dwelt unduly on Timothy's weaker moments.
(2) Remember Whose is the power and the purpose.
We recall that Paul's determination to seek Timothy in Timothy's church as Christ's to sanctify was evident in the letter's introduction. He hasn't forgotten that the pastor's and the church's missteps are Christ's to correct in Christ's time. Christ's is the will and the promise that put Paul in this position of influence.
It is Christ's to give life and flourishing to the faith of the new believers in Ephesus. Likewise, remembering that we are not faith's source as it may flicker from time to time in the lives of those we love can restore a healthy perspective.
(3) Keep your own lamp clean.
The admonition is from the pastor in Richard Llewellyn's How Green Was My Valley. His charge well understood in that coal powered age that light sources which were not cleaned regularly became smudged and gave a poor view. Just so, it is important if Paul is to view the church at Ephesus and his disciple Timothy as the Lord does that Paul's own conscience not interfere. Thus, he stayed in step with the Lord to the extent that he can declare his conscience clean and look to the ward who has made it so to work in lives through him.
(4) Take the long view, the REALLY long view.
As we noted, then Paul look backward through the generations. As soon as he could see that Christ includes his own conscience, he thought Christ's work in the meanderings of his own heritage. Seeing history as Christ sees it through centuries makes it easier for him to be graciously paternal in the progress over months and years in Timothy's life.
(5) Before you go to men about God, go to God about men.
In the appropriately named Power Through Prayer, E.M. Bounds remind us of one of Paul's crucial checkpoints in finding and affirming Timothy's faith on the other side of his peers. Bounds connects, "Talking to men for God is a great thing, but talking to God for men is greater still. He will never talk well and with real success to men for God who has not learned well how to talk to God for men.”
Paul doesn't make a guess as to this essential element. He says he has prayed without ceasing for Timothy. This surely shapes what he sees in his young apprentice, in his insistence that even Timothy's tears be viewed in perspective. Should we skip this step, we tend to recall intense emotions out of perspective, especially if they represented a disappointment to us. Persisting in prayer before any momentous encounter, however, the Holy Spirit Who first opened the eyes of faith can open our eyes TO faith in Christ still alive and well in others.
2 To Timothy, a beloved son:
Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
3 I thank God, whom I serve with a pure conscience, as my forefathers did, as without ceasing I remember you in my prayers night and day, 4 greatly desiring to see you, being mindful of your tears, that I may be filled with joy, 5 when I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you…
"My guilt," realizes Tim Keller in retrospect in Songs of Jesus as he meditates in print on Psalm 130, "was like low-level chronic pain. When it was removed," he says of his personal epiphany, "I realized it had drained my life of joy and confidence."
Having lived into adulthood and mistaken zeal in ministry with something like the low-level chronic pain of guilt that Tim Keller describes, the apostle Paul seems determined to exercise the possibility of the imprinting stain from Timothy. Opening ourselves to the possibility that Timothy's tears represented entirely, or almost entirely, godly sorrow in themselves, I believe it will be helpful for us to consider the counterweight also.
Let's consider that Timothy may have been one of those among the church leadership at Ephesus in Acts 21:1-14 whose tears implored Paul not to follow his faith-filled convictions and go to Jerusalem.
How does, by Christ's grace, Paul develop the perspective to look past Timothy's faltering and fearful tears at one point in time and deliberately, according to the progression in 2 Timothy 1:5, call to mind his faith? For all of us, in the relationships we have and the hopes we aspire to in those we care about, a going to be keenly aware of such moments.
(1) Develop realistic expectations of ministry.
Beginning his letter, Paul identifies himself as an apostle. Not only does this grant the letter the imprimatur to be read in the churches, it is relevant to his state of mind as the fifth verse progresses. Apostles in the broader sense outside of the Bible's covers were those who brought the culture of the conquering empire to new territory.
Even in human government, apostles would expect resistance, confusion, and uneven adoption. Apostles were ground breakers and frontiersmen. Paul was no different and would not have dwelt unduly on Timothy's weaker moments.
(2) Remember Whose is the power and the purpose.
We recall that Paul's determination to seek Timothy in Timothy's church as Christ's to sanctify was evident in the letter's introduction. He hasn't forgotten that the pastor's and the church's missteps are Christ's to correct in Christ's time. Christ's is the will and the promise that put Paul in this position of influence.
It is Christ's to give life and flourishing to the faith of the new believers in Ephesus. Likewise, remembering that we are not faith's source as it may flicker from time to time in the lives of those we love can restore a healthy perspective.
(3) Keep your own lamp clean.
The admonition is from the pastor in Richard Llewellyn's How Green Was My Valley. His charge well understood in that coal powered age that light sources which were not cleaned regularly became smudged and gave a poor view. Just so, it is important if Paul is to view the church at Ephesus and his disciple Timothy as the Lord does that Paul's own conscience not interfere. Thus, he stayed in step with the Lord to the extent that he can declare his conscience clean and look to the ward who has made it so to work in lives through him.
(4) Take the long view, the REALLY long view.
As we noted, then Paul look backward through the generations. As soon as he could see that Christ includes his own conscience, he thought Christ's work in the meanderings of his own heritage. Seeing history as Christ sees it through centuries makes it easier for him to be graciously paternal in the progress over months and years in Timothy's life.
(5) Before you go to men about God, go to God about men.
In the appropriately named Power Through Prayer, E.M. Bounds remind us of one of Paul's crucial checkpoints in finding and affirming Timothy's faith on the other side of his peers. Bounds connects, "Talking to men for God is a great thing, but talking to God for men is greater still. He will never talk well and with real success to men for God who has not learned well how to talk to God for men.”
Paul doesn't make a guess as to this essential element. He says he has prayed without ceasing for Timothy. This surely shapes what he sees in his young apprentice, in his insistence that even Timothy's tears be viewed in perspective. Should we skip this step, we tend to recall intense emotions out of perspective, especially if they represented a disappointment to us. Persisting in prayer before any momentous encounter, however, the Holy Spirit Who first opened the eyes of faith can open our eyes TO faith in Christ still alive and well in others.
Comments
Post a Comment