2 Timothy

This is the word of the living god. We're going to read 2 Timothy 2 versus 1 to 10. You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus. And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses in trust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others. Join with me in suffering like a good soldier of Christ Jesus.

No 1 serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs, but rather tries to please his commanding officer. Similarly, Anyone who competes as an athlete does not receive the Victor's crown, except by competing according to the rules. The hardworking farmer should be the first to receive a share of the crops. Reflect on what I am saying for the lord will give you insight into all this. Remember Jesus Christ raised from the dead descended from David.

This is my gospel for which I am suffering even to the point of being chained like a criminal, but god's word is not chained. Therefore, I endure everything for the sake of the elect that they 2 may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you that it is, a word that you're living. We pray that your Holy Spirit will take it, put it in our hearts and minds, help us to be focused on it this morning.

As we've looked over the last couple of weeks and we finished this morning as we look at this subject of fanning into flame the gift of god. Lord, help us to want that in our lives. That we will take in and reflect as it says in that verse on what you are saying to us. And help us be changed because of it. In Jesus' name, our men.

Now what impact does being a Christian have on your life? Just think about it for a minute. How much of your day to day life your week is taken up with your relationship with God with Jesus with his bride, the church. Does it even come anywhere near the top of your list of priorities. Your things that you're going to do this week.

Is it high up? Never mind characterise your whole life? For example, if we looked at the time we spent reading, whether it's books or magazines or newspapers or perhaps nowadays. It's your Twitter feed or, you know, you're scrolling through Facebook. What percentage of all that reading that you do would be god's word?

I mean, it wouldn't be a high percentage, would it? I mean, I was thinking about earlier that I don't mean he's here, but if you read PIM's Facebook stuff on Brexit, I mean, it'd be a tiny percentage God's word. I mean, luckily none of us do, but it would be a very small percentage of what we read. And I think most of us would say the amount of time we spend reading would be dwarfed by the amount of time we spend watching TV. The reality is you see a lot of us put our Christianity under the section of our lives that we might call leisure.

You know, we have work. We have other stuff that we do. We have families. We have elderly parents. We have kids to bring up.

And then we have our spare time or our leisure time. And that is sport and TV and going out places and socializing and and I guess Sundays. Being a Christian has to fit For us into that little bit of thing called spare time into that leisure box, we treat it, don't we? Like, it's just an accessory to our lives. And so we feel pleased with that if we manage to fit that accessory in on a Sunday morning and a Wednesday evening each week or fairly regularly.

Now I guess if you're like me, you can rationalize other things in your in your mind. You can say, well, you know, if I have people around on Friday night or or Saturday night, and they often tend to be from church. And so we call that, ministry or serving in our heads. But in the end, is it really any different from seeing some other mates or having people around that you met at NCT class or at the school gates or from work. It is not, I guess, for most of us, a very different looking evening.

Might be cheaper on alcohol. That's about it, isn't it? We taught football, movies, TV, life, with all of those groups. Now we've spent the last 2 weeks and again this morning at looking how we might fan into flame the gift of god, how we're going to be courageous in the way we speak out the gospel, and how if we're obedient in doing that, we may very well suffer for it. We're looking at 1 of the so called partial letters.

There's Paul, the apostles writing to Timothy Paul's in prison. Timothy is a colleague and a friend and a son in the faith. We looked to this last week. He stayed in ephesus to pastor the people of the church and Paul is urging Timothy to be faithful. He's urging him to stick at it But the previous chapter ended, if you'd just look up at the verse 16 of chapter 1, the previous chapter ended with Paul talking about many people deserting him verse 15, you know that everyone in the province of Asia has deserted me, but he singles out on Aciferous in verse 16 as having stuck with him.

Look at verse 16 near the end. Because he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains. Not being ashamed has been a key theme of this letter as we've looked at it, the first chapter and a bit over the last couple of weeks. He's urging Timothy not to be ashamed of the gospel. Not to be ashamed of Paul being in prison.

And he carries on this theme as we begin chapter 2. He's saying to Timothy, look, don't be ashamed, fan into flame, be courageous, speak out. That's what he's saying to Timothy. And the idea that our faith and and our commitment to Jesus Christ will fall into any sort of compartment. Never mind, the 1 called leisure would be unthinkable to the apostle, wouldn't it?

Paul urges Timothy in this second chapter to keep going. But he also, and that's what we're going to look at this morning, highlights some areas that he wants Timothy to be aware of. Highlights some areas that he needs to think about as a Christian leader, but we also have much to learn from that. Because even if we're not leaders, leaders are supposed to be our role models. We're supposed to be like them.

And so as we look at these few verses at the beginning of chapter 2, what we're going to see is what a mature, strong Christian looks like a Christian whose flame burns brightly, and that's what we should want to be, isn't it? We want to be like that. Well, Paul is saying to Timothy, not only be like that, but he's actually saying as we'll see, find other people and train them to be like that. But before we get into these 4 little pictures, that were just read to us at the beginning of chapter 2, it starts with a very strong exhortation. In verse 1, he's just commended on a syphorus remembering the previous chapter, and he says verse 1 You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.

He's saying to Timothy in effect, be like him, be like honoriferous, be strong, but specifically be strong in the grace. Now what does that mean? So we know, don't we? It can't mean that we need more of anything. It can't mean that we need more grace because god has given us all we need, not just for salvation, but for life.

No. Paul is urging Timothy to use what he's already been given, to draw on the resources that the Holy Spirit gives us, But interestingly, the Greek word for strong here at the beginning be strong in the grace is actually a passive word for strength So, actually, Paul is very much not saying to to Timothy, pull yourself together. Be strong yourself. You know, that gather your strengths. That's not what he's saying.

What he's saying is use the strength that Christ gives you. Use the strength that the Holy Spirit has put in you. We don't need to ask for more. We don't need to call down the Spirit. What we need is to use what we've been given.

That is the opening to this chapter. Fan the flame that god has given you so you'll be courageous for the gospel. So you'll be willing to suffer and so you'll stand firm strong in the grace that you've received. And Paul then goes on to give us 4 examples of people. When I look at them, Each in turn for people who will show us or model to us elements of a strong spiritual life.

In other words, people who are using that god given strength that the spirit is put in them. And we'll see as we look at each in turn that in looking at that different examples of a mature strong Christian will see what a grace filled follower of Jesus looks like. Now a word of warning just before we dive in, we are going to look at them individually, but they're written as a whole. It's a whole picture. So don't get too caught up necessarily in each individual picture.

Read them as a whole as it was read to us by Dean. That's what we have to do here. The Catholic church as an example for this gets the 1, talking about a soldier, very wrong versus 3, join with me in suffering like a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No 1 serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs. The Catholic Church have often used that as say, okay, the soldier is the priest entanglement as marriage.

So, priests don't marry. It's not right. It's not what it's saying. Look at the whole picture. And although we look at them individually now, keep in mind what he's saying overall.

So without warning, the first person we're going to look at verse 2 is the teacher. Let's read verse 2. And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses and trust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others. Paul is saying here, look, if you're fanning the flame in your life, then you will seek to pass the gospel onto the next generation. Onto reliable people who are going to teach other people.

So he's saying it's quite straightforward. Remember, Timothy is facing opposition in Ephasis particularly from false teachers inside and outside the church. And so if you're a strategist, you have to think about that and you say, okay, what are we going to do about false teachers? They're hidden sometimes. You can't always see them.

Well, 1 very effective strategy to deal with false teachers is to train and deploy sound teachers in all aspects of church life, whether it's the Sunday school, youth home groups, wherever it is, if you've got sound teachers doing them, that combats the false teachers. Well, there are several aspects of this little verse that apply to us. Firstly, the word in trust is an interesting word. It's a command here. It has the concept in it of depositing something valuable with someone else for safekeeping.

That's why if you're fanning the flame, you'll be looking to do that. You'll be looking to teach the next generation Paul saying, look, don't go through life constantly nave or gazing, constantly thinking about yourself self absorbed, wondering about your own position with god or your own growth, you will grow You will fan the flame as you share and teach others. Now that might be as a Sunday school teacher, that might be as a youth leader. It might just be when you have coffee with a friend and you build each other up and you help them or you do a 1 to 1. The point is it's a command and it's written in the continuous tense, so it's something we're supposed to do with people all of the time.

As they cross our path. So think about that. Where are you doing that in your life? You know, why did you say no? I don't know if you did, but why did you say no if you said no to Sunday school last time Rory asked you?

Why don't you do 1 to 1 with anyone? It is a continuous expectation or command for us to do it. I remember quite a few years ago, We had quite a tricky situation actually in this church, and there was a couple very unhappy with the leadership, being so outward focused always talking about evangelism. And I remember they said to us, that they were prepared to talk to someone else about Jesus when all of their own issues and anxieties had been dealt with. That was the argument.

This year's not how it works, is it? Spacked actually to where we were last week, why are we expecting easy stress free lives? Did Paul have everything buttoned down in his life before we started writing to churches and preaching? Now he's in prison here. Did Timothy know he's got massive opposition.

See, we don't need to be courageous as we're being urged to be We don't need to be courageous. We don't need to be bold. We don't need to be prepared to suffer for the gospel if we have no intention of talking to anyone. Not it, you can't say I'm going to wait till my whole life is sorted out and it's an even keel and then I'll look outwards. The second thing to notice about this phrase is he uses an audio phrase and the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses then entrust them to reliable people, etcetera.

Now what Paul is saying there is, look, I want you to to others, everything you've heard me say, in other words, my teaching, it's wider than the gospel. He doesn't just use the phrase which he would otherwise, the truth or the gospel of Christ Jesus. He doesn't use that phrase because he's talking about something much bigger here and all encompassing truth. If you like, it's almost a systematic training course that he wants Timothy to do. It's a discipleship program.

That's what he's talking about. So fight club and sisters act and all those sort of things are exactly the sort of thing he's getting at. He's saying if you're going to be a Christian who burns brightly, and certainly if you're going to be a teacher like Timothy, then disciple others. Disciple others. But, and this is quite controversial, his bit, but he does put conditions on that discipling.

Did you see it? You see he says we're to be selective in how we exercise this ministry, we need to focus, he says, on people with good character. On people who are reliable. That's what it means. Reliable people who in due course, we will hope we'll be able to teach as well.

See, the emphasis is all on their character, not on their ability. He doesn't say pick the guy or the girl who looks like a superstar who looks like they could be fantastic at this. It's not what he says. Just pick the person whose character is reliable. It's a absolutely key point we can share the gospel and we should share the gospel with anyone and everyone, and we must do that.

But if you're going to spend time and energy really discipling people, really helping someone grow, then you need to be a bit more ruthless about it. What does that look like? Well, I've used the face sometimes you grow the people who wanna grow. Now, see, what it's getting at here is there are people who don't want to grow and they actually make it quite obvious. There's no heart for the church, no heart for other people, There's largely self absorbed.

They're regularly sending apologies, not turning up. You know, they you agree a 1 to 1 and they it gets cancelled all the time. You give them, you have a great time having coffee with them on a Tuesday and then Sunday comes and yet again they're not here. And Paul is saying that's no good because you've got to seek out reliable men, reliable women who you can entrust the whole truth with and who you have a reasonable expectation may in the future be able to teach others. Now that is pretty strong stuff when you think about it.

Do you have you thought like that before? Or are you plodding along with the same people year and year? No evidence of growth in them, constantly messing you around? Well, I think it's saying move on, disciple somebody who's hungry. Somebody who wants to burn brightly.

But understand also there's a cost to discipling people. See, it takes effort and it takes commitment. Think about just how Jesus discipled the 12. Spent hours, days, weeks, months, years with them. I was really struck at you when I was I was thinking about this in the week, even Jesus' alone time, which some of you seem to want.

Even his alone time was often with them. Loop 9 verse 18 says this, once when Jesus was praying in private, and his disciples were with him. But it wasn't, was it? Decypling is sharing your life. Are you ready to commit to this sort of teaching?

Second illustration is a soldier. Look at verses 3 and 4. Join with me in suffering like a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No 1 serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs, but rather tries to please his commanding officer. Now the main meaning is obvious.

It's clear that if being a Christian is like being a soldier, it is not a leisure activity. You know, the soldier is focused. He's not trying to do 2 things at once. He's not getting mixed up in civilian affairs, it says. He's expecting to fight.

He's expecting to fight and for us that means expecting to fight for the gospel. And as as Paul says at the beginning of verse 3, he may have to suffer for it, even possibly give his life. So that's quite a long way, I guess, from what we're expecting for us next week in Southwest London. Possibly having to give your life. Being a soldier is dangerous, being a Christian in Kingston, not so much.

See, we have to be aware, don't we live in today's world, no 1 cares if you work at a Christian tar charity or a Christian at university or you're a Christian in the office. The only thing they object to is when you try and tell them about it. When you try and speak out the gospel, then you'll get opposition. Well, that is active soldiering, isn't it? But the word I really want to pick up on here is the word good.

It's an interesting word. Join with me in suffering like a good soldier. Now what is a good soldier? Well, I guess it's somebody who doesn't just do the bare minimum, trying to get away with as little as possible, but you know, stay in the army. It's not a lazy soldier, it's not an undisciplined soldier.

It's somebody that hasn't signed up for a 9 to 5 job because that's not soldiering. It's not a compartmentalized life. Well neither is being a follower of Jesus Christ. See, a good soldier isn't even a soldier who puts in 60 or 70 working hours a week. It's somebody who gives everything.

He's a soldier 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, particularly on active duty. And he knows, doesn't he, that even when he's on holiday or has time off, he can be subject to recall at any moment. Does that describe you? Are you a soldier for the gospel of Jesus 24 hours a day, or is this part of your life that you put away until you get it out on a Sunday morning? I remember asking Loray, most of you know Loray, who's an ex soldier, South African, Wine Earth was he in the British Army, fighting for us when when he was South African.

And and it was kind of an interesting answer. She's very, very honest answer. He said because if you're joining the army, you want to fight. And the British are always fighting. But that's right, isn't it?

We don't become soldiers because you know, we like camping or because you look good in car key. I mean, that's That's not why you become a soldier, isn't it? Being a soldier is not fun, and neither should be joining the church. Well, the other thing to note, same example, verse 4, no 1 serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs. Now I was trying to think what's the equivalent of us of getting involved in civilian affairs?

I mean, the stuff we have to do. We have to bring up the children. We have sort out their schooling, we have to pay the mortgage or the rent. We have to do our jobs, don't we? Well, yes, and we can glorify god in those things.

But the key word here is entangled. We mustn't get entangled in the sense of being trapped by them. You know, so into them that we don't wanna solve you anymore. Can even argue that if you get so entangled in civilian affairs, the army would call that desertion. See, all sorts of things can trap us, good works, charity type stuff, running, events, even outreach things that we can put on, not really thinking about the end result, we spend hours putting something on, but then never bring anyone.

But also, notice in this verse, who is it that the soldier is trying to please. It's not himself, it's not his mum, it's not his friends, it's not his spouse. It's actually not even the other soldiers. It's the commanding officer in other translations. It's the person who'd enlisted him.

It's the person who got him into the armies. The person who's in charge of him. For us, that's Jesus Christ. Do you think your soldiering at the moment would impress your commanding officer? The third example is very similar in some ways, verse 5, which actually says similarly.

Similarly, anyone who competes as an athlete does not receive the Victor's crown, except by competing according to the rules we're looking at the athlete. Well, again, being an athlete doesn't fit into leisure, does it? They don't go for an occasional jog. They have to train, and they have to train hard. They have to watch what they eat and drink and they have to watch when they go to bed and all that sort of stuff.

Now actually it probably wouldn't do some of us any harm to think about those things But that isn't the key point here. It's the little phrase at the end of the verse which says you don't win except by competing according to the rules. Now, for Natalie, we all understand that. If you're running around a track, you can't just cut across the middle. You can't start before everyone else, can you?

But what does it mean for us as Christians? What does it mean we have to compete according to the rules? How do we apply that? There aren't any rules, are there? It's all grace.

It's what we're told? Well, firstly, let's clear up 1 thing we're not running a race against each other. This is not a race to some sort of only a few of us get to heaven, only a certain number. It's not a question of trying to come higher up in that league table. The competition we face is from Our past often, the flesh, the world, the devil, that phrase.

It's the old self is knit with temptations and lust That's who we're in training to beat. We looked at it last week about self discipline. It's the same thing. An athlete's life is a disciplined life. But it's interesting.

The original verb, again, Atleo, which we get the word athlete from means to contend to struggle to wrestle It's a strong word, and that's what it that's what we have to do. We have to contend and struggle and wrestle against the old life. Against the flesh, against the devil. See, what happens to the athlete who cheats, who uses steroids? They're disqualified.

Don't be like that says Paul. Don't be like that. Compete according to the rules. Now what's our equivalent of of cheating? Quite hard.

I mean, it could be avoiding suffering. Suppose the athlete does that if he cuts across the middle. Could be diluting the gospel. It could be not speaking out the whole message, making it more palatable, you think. Where it says here, you don't get the crown.

Well, if the crown is eternal life and god gives us the crown, then what are the rules that we have to refer to or that we have to think about for that? Well, it must just be that we need to be in Jesus, isn't it? That's the rule We have to be in Christ. We have to be born again. We have to be walking in step with the spirit.

We have to be relying on god. We have to be obedient and faithful. In essence is what we said at the beginning, we must stand in the strength of grace. But it's interesting when you do think about athletes and you think about them running their race, it isn't always you must have noticed this in the Olympics it isn't always the 1 with the greatest stability. The greatest talent, the fastest, actually, that comes first, sometimes it is.

But it isn't always. It can be the runner who is perhaps not as quick but has the greater determination on the day. The greater will to get there and win. Just turn with me to 1 Corinthians and chapter 9. If you're using the church by it's on page 11 51.

1 Quintin's chapter 9. And we're going to look at versus 24 percent to 27 percent 24 percent 26 percent because Paul here gives us the same illustration basically in a little more depth. 1 Quintin's Chapter 9 verse 24. Do you not know that in a race, all the runners run, but only 1 gets the prize Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training.

They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore, I do not run like someone running aimlessly. I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. Please clear what the crown is. We're running to be in heaven.

What are the rules to get to heaven? You've got to be in Jesus. The fourth and final example Paul gives us of what an on fire Christian looks like is the farmer. So look at verse 6 with me of 2 Timothy chapter 2. The hardworking farmer should be the first to receive a share of the crops.

Now I don't know about you, but you've probably seen athletes run on TV, just watch the Olympics or 1 of those other events. You've probably watched some documentary on athletes training or something. We may know teachers, I guess, as many in this congregation. We know soldiers of at least an ex soldier in the formal array. We talked about ready.

But I think far fewer of us know much about arable farming here in London. I certainly don't. I had to look up quite a lot of this. But let's think about that. What is the characteristics of being a farmer?

Because if we understand it, then hopefully we'll understand what Paul's saying us. Well, firstly, the farmer sows the seed and he looks for growth, but he doesn't stand there, does he and expect to see it immediately? Takes time. You have to plow the field. It takes time to plant, takes time to water the crop, takes time to fertilize, and eventually there's a harvest.

And interestingly of course, during that wait, anything can happen. And the farmer more than anyone is well aware that he is at the mercy of someone far greater than him, who makes the rainfall, who makes the sunshine, who can bring free stall famine. Secondly, the farmer uses, sorry, usually spends a vast amount of time, many hours working entirely alone. That was something that struck me when I was looking to it. So he's not like the soldiers in the army, is he?

He's not like the teacher who's in the school or the staff room. He's not like the athlete who's in the team or the squad. He toils alone most of the time. And similarly, we may often have to be alone when we're a follower of Jesus in the office or at the school gates or with our neighbors, you don't have the church family around you then. You're on your own and you've still gotta be courageous.

You've still gotta speak up for Jesus. When you're not in a little gang, Thirdly, the farmer's up early, working. I don't want to do this, overdo this illustration because I mentioned it already. But, you know, when you look back at Christians have been used mightily by god, I don't think they were getting up at lunchtime on Saturday because they've been watching a box set on Friday night. That's not what they're like.

We need to think about what we're doing for Jesus, how we're living. But the great thing about this first is it says, look, if you faithfully, if you are a hardworking farmer, if you toil away, then you get the first of the crop. It is a real tangible reward. So how does that apply to us? You wanna work hard as a Christian?

How are you gonna get the first part of the crop. Well, I was thinking about 1 example linking with what we were saying earlier is if if you share the word with others, If you do a 1 to 1, if you're in a coffee shop talking to someone, if you're leading a home group in the next few weeks or co leading, if you're teaching Sunday school, or the youth. If you're preaching, then, of course, it's very obvious. You do get the first fruits of your labor because as we prepare, as we study the word, god by his spirit speaks to us in that preparation. So the first person to be convicted by this passage this morning was me in the week.

That's the first fruits, isn't it? So joy as you prepare for Sunday school or whatever it is, and god speaks to you. That's the joy being the farmer. But as I said at the beginning, we mustn't look at these examples only individually. You've got to look at them overall.

What is Paul saying? And 1 thing that came across clearly, I think when you read these, particularly with the athlete and the farmer is the idea that being a Christian who fans the flame, being a Christian who's on fire being a Christian who's courageous is all terrific, but it involves waiting. You have to train hard as the athlete. You have to work hard as the farmer, but you both have to wait. The athlete doesn't get the medal before he starts.

He gets the medal when he finishes the race. The farmer doesn't get the crop until the harvest comes. You see, Paul is saying I think to to Timothy and to us, you're in the thick of battle now. You're in the thick of battle now because you're training and you're teaching and you're girding yourself up to speak out the gospel. And you're talking to a largely hostile world or at least a world that isn't interested.

And you're trying to grow the church and you're trying to grow the kingdom of god. And he's saying persevere, be patient. Don't listen to the false teachers who will say you can have everything now because you can't, instead be faithful. Keep going. That's what he's saying.

That's what the 4 examples are showing us, faithfulness. And if we pay attention to those, then we can be like on a Ciphorus, we can be strong in the grace. Look at verse 7. We're going to finish here. Reflect on what I am saying for the lord will give you insight into all this.

So let's finish by asking yourself the question, has he given you insight? Has he spoken to you over the last 3 weeks, as we've been thinking about fanning the flame of god in our lives, as we've been thinking about being courageous for God as we've been thinking about faithfulness and speaking out the gospel as we thought last week about love, power and self discipline that the Holy Spirit puts in you. Has god been speaking to you? You see, if so, then verse 7 is coming true for you, isn't it? The spirit is giving you insight insight into your spiritual life insight into how you need to change insight into what god wants from you.

Well, don't let that fade. Don't let that fade. Resolve now while it's still fresh in your mind to obey to listen to the insight you've been given by god and to walk in step with the spirit. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for your word.

We thank you that it has, give us an insight into what it means to be a Christian, strong in the faith, strong in Christries, a strong in the grace, lord help us to be, aware of, areas of our life that need to change, whether we're looking at different aspects of what you've shown us this morning being a soldier, being fully committed 24 hours a day being a teacher, thinking about the next generation, looking for character, spending time with people to grow them. Lord help us whichever it is. Whichever of those examples spoke specifically to us, law changes by using your word. Help us to be thoughtful, reflectful that we might be change people as we leave here, this morning. Changed by your word and the insight you've given us.