Well, welcome if you're visiting here.
My name is Brad Matthews and I'm an
associate professor here and it is my
honor to open up God's word. We're going
to be looking at First Timothy 6. 1
Timothy 6 starting in verse 11. Uh, and
for those who don't know, this semester
we are working on and we're going
through a sermon series. on ministering
God's word. A part of our mission
statement here at Covenant Seminary,
we're looking at the pastoral epistles
as we do that to do that focus. Now, two
weeks ago, President Gibbs brought a uh
word from 2 Timothy 4 where Paul gives a
charge to Timothy to preach the word.
And then last week, Dr. Drake uh looked
at 1 Timothy 1 where Paul entrusts the
charge that he had received from Jesus
to minister the gospel and he entrusts
that charge to Timothy.
As you look through the pastoral
epistles, you can find there are a lot
of charges that are going on in there.
So in addition to those two in 1 Timothy
1 3 and 5 Timothy is called to charge
people not to teach a different gospel.
In 1 Timothy 1:5 he goes on to say that
the aim of that charge is love from a
pure heart, a good conscience and a
sincere faith.
In 1 Timothy 5, Paul charges Timothy to
observe the rules that he has set within
the church without partiality. In 1
Timothy 6, Timothy is called to charge
the rich, not to be hotty. In 2 Timothy
2, we see that we are to charge servants
in the church, not to be quarrelome. In
1 Timothy 5 and Titus 1, we recognize
that charges can be made against the
elders. A slightly different reality.
The simple thing is is that the pastoral
epistles are very charged. There's a lot
of charging.
Well, today there's one I skipped over
and that's the one we're looking at
today. 1 Timothy 6 and verse 11. This is
the last charge that Paul gives to
Timothy in this letter. So, let's read
it together. There in verse 11, Paul
says, "But as for you, oh man of God,
flee these things. Pursue righteousness,
godliness, faith, love, steadfastness,
gentleness.
Fight the good fight of the faith.
Take hold of the eternal life to which
you were called and about which you made
the good confession in the presence of
many witnesses.
I charge you in the presence of God who
gives life to all things and of Jesus
Christ who is is in his testimony before
Pontius Pilate made the good confession
to keep the commandment unstained and
free from reproach
until the appearing of our Lord Jesus
Christ which he will display at the
proper time. He who is the blessed and
only sovereign, the king of kings and
lord of lords, who alone has
immortality, who dwells in
unapproachable light, whom no one has
ever seen or can see. To him be glor
honor and eternal dominion.
Amen. Let's pray together.
Lord Jesus, we pray that as we turn our
attention to your word and what your
servant Paul said to your servant
Timothy, we pray that you would teach us
more about what it means to be ministers
of your word in this place and this time
for the sake of your glory and the honor
of your kingdom. We pray in your name.
Amen.
Well, I want to speak for a moment about
the nature of cancel culture. That's a
term that's pretty familiar to us now.
It's been around for a while. It was
extremely prevalent a few years ago.
It's a little less common, but it still
goes on a lot. So, I just wanted to kind
of orient us by doing, you know, what
what theologians and scholars do. We got
to give a definition, then we got to
critique that definition. So, definition
of cancel culture. Cancel culture is a
form of public shaming in which groups
or individuals swiftly denounce and
campaign against a target often using
social media. It is a social environment
in which publicly boycotting or
withdrawing support for people,
organizations, etc. regarded as
promoting socially unacceptable beliefs
is widespread practice. That's an idea
of cancel
culture. Now, usually we we know the
drill. Usually, this goes on with
celebrities or other people in socially
or vocationally or politically elite
circumstances.
And that person or that organization
commits some sort of act that is clearly
immoral or socially unacceptable
and that's it.
They're done.
They don't get to make any more movies
or shows. They don't get to write any
more books. they are taken off of our
social media friend groups. Right? That
is the way in which we express in this
current culture the recognition that
they have done something wrong.
Uh Dr. Derek Rish Maui who just this
past weekend came and spoke at our FSI
conference remind us reminded us that in
that circumstance in this kind of
culture the most privileged position is
to be that of a victim. the person that
has actually had those circumstances
done to you. Why? Because then you are
beyond critique. You're no longer able
to be considered corrupt. And if you're
not a victim, then the very next thing
that you want to be is either an ally,
an advocate, because then at least
you're aligned with those who are beyond
critique.
What you definitely don't want to be is
a perpetrator, right? You don't want to
be that because you will be cancelled.
Now that doesn't happen just amongst the
socially elite and celebrities.
It can happen within friend groups. It
can happen within families.
It can even happen within churches and
seminaries. Right
now, you may think that I'm bringing all
this up to just simply critique it and
condemn it entirely. And my response is,
well,
not entirely.
Not entirely.
There are certainly problems with it. It
is self- congratulatory as though I
could never do such a thing. Right?
That's part of the problem. It's
misguided in thinking that the best
solution to these circumstances is just
to eliminate someone from our lives
rather than to look for repentance and
uh forgiveness and reconciliation. There
are many things that are problematic,
but there is one reality that it does
actually pick up on.
It recognizes that our conduct,
the way that we act in this world, has
impact
on the way that another person will
receive us. Whether or not they're
willing to listen to our message, to
listen to our opinions, to follow our
leadership. It recognizes that when we
fail, that has impact.
Now, I bet I'm willing to bet that many
of us, maybe even all of us in this
room, though I see a few small children,
so hopefully they are exempt,
can think of at least one person
that we would say, "I will never trust
that person again."
Now, I'm not talking about someone
random in the world, someone out there.
I'm talking about someone that you knew
and you interacted with.
So, and I also am willing to bet that
you didn't just wake up one day and say,
"Man, I'm just not going to trust that
person." Have no absolute reason why.
I'm just that's it. They're out. My
guess is is that the reason why is
because
they betrayed you or they hurt you or
someone that you loved or there was
something about their conduct that was
suspicious and concerning.
We live in a world where people fail.
And that has impact. Just one small
problem.
One small problem. I don't know about
you, but I can fail too.
I can fail too. And Paul is speaking to
that reality. The reality that we all
have within us, the capacity to fail.
And that means what he's trying to say.
Your ministry,
whatever it may be,
involves communicating God's world
within the reality of the capacity to
fail. Now, some of you will do that more
directly through things like preaching
and teaching and context like this or
the church. Some of you will do the
ministry of God's word and far more
indirect and implicit realities through
things like counseling and
administration.
But all of us
are actually engaged in the ministry of
God's word as his servants. And you know
how I know this is because Paul gives
this charge to Timothy. It was written
to him.
But one of the things that the
scriptures reminds us is while it was
written to him, it was also written for
us. It speaks to all of us. We as the
church get to read this exhortation that
Paul gave to Timothy.
And here how we need to learn from it.
All of scripture is profitable for
teaching, reprove, correction, and
training in righteousness. That means
that this text speaks to you and to me
regardless of what your ministry is and
will be.
That's a reality that we need to know
because as we come here, one of the
easiest mistakes that we can make in a
place like this of higher education is
to think that ministering God's word is
just about knowledge and technique. If I
just know the right theology, if I just
know the right biblical interpretation
and if I have correct homalytical
practices or correct modalities in the
counseling room or the correct lesson
plan, if I just have that, then I will
be a faithful minister. But the text
continuously pushes us to recognize that
there's also spiritual, emotional, and
relational and physical realities to
ministering the whole word. Why? Because
we are whole people.
And that means even our conduct is fair
game. Simply put, Paul is saying our
moral life impacts our witness.
Ministering God's word is a moral act
just as much as anything else. How we
live our lives, the dispositions of our
heart is all fair game.
So what do we do with that? We need to
see from this text things that Paul
calls us to. And there's two things in
particular that he calls us to do.
There's things that we must flee and
there's things we must pursue. So let's
look at things we must flee first. He
says that at the very beginning he says,
"But as for you, oh man of God, flee
these things." And we're thinking,
"Well, what things are you referring
to?" And most scholars agree it's to the
passage that just came before starting
back in verse three when Paul says, "If
anyone teaches a different doctrine and
does not that does not agree with sound
words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the
teaching that accords with godliness,
he is puffed up with conceit and
understands nothing. He has an unhealthy
craving for controversies and for
quarrels about words which produce envy,
dissension, slander, and evil suspicions
and constant friction amongst people who
are depraved in mind and deprived of the
truth. Imagining godliness is a means
for gain. But godliness with contentment
is great gain. For we were brought into
the world and we cannot into the world
without Sorry, let's try that one again.
For we brought nothing into the world,
and we cannot take anything out of the
world. But if we have food and clothing,
with these things we will be content.
For those who desire to be rich fall
into temptation, into a snare, into many
senseless and harmful desires that
plunge people into ruin and destruction.
For the love of money is a root of all
kinds of evil. It is through this
craving that some have wandered away
from the faith and pierced themselves
with many pangs. That's what Paul is
saying. We need to flee. And as we look
at it, there's really two major
components. The first one is we need to
flee the reality of greed. And it is
easy
in this place to say, come on,
no one who works here
can be accused of pursuing a high
salary, right?
No one who's a student here can be
accused of pursuing a vocation that's
going to have some high payoff. Stop
talking to me about greed. Right? Come
on. It may seem like an irrelevant
discussion,
but many of us know, we know people,
right, who started off just concerned
about finances, significantly concerned.
Of course, let me be clear. Of course,
we have to be right and good stewards of
our financial resources. But we know
people who start off as overly concerned
and eventually that evolves into an
attitude of I have a right to a certain
kind of spa uh salary or certain kinds
of special privileges that then evolves
into unwillingness to make any type of
financial sacrifice no matter what. That
inevitably sets them on a trajectory
away from fidelity with Christ. That's
why Paul says the money is a root of all
evil. But interestingly, we want to be
very careful not to just focus in on
greed of money. Because Paul says
godliness with contentment.
There are other things that you and I
can be greedy for. There are things that
we can be discontent about within our
life that can pursue that will focus our
pursuits elsewhere. Maybe it's fame and
popularity. Maybe it's influence. Maybe
it's a certain kind of relationship.
Maybe it's a certain place or
demographic that you want to go. Paul
warns us that discontent, that greed is
a problem.
But even worse,
we have to go back to that statement.
Did you notice godliness with
contentment is great gain? But did you
see the description that came before all
of that discussion of greed? He says,
"There are some people who imagine that
godliness," and please everyone see
those air quotes. Godliness
is a means of gain.
But he's referring to the person that he
just described. And let me just kind of
unpack for a moment what he said about
this godly person. They are conceited,
ignorant. They crave controversy. They
quarrel about words. They produce envy,
dissension, slander, suspicion, and
constant friction.
I don't know about you, but that doesn't
describe a godly person in my life or to
me. I that doesn't fit. And what I think
Paul is doing is actually he's hitting
home closer to something more true about
you and I. This is the person that Paul
is talking about that has figured out
how to put on the facade
of godliness.
who somehow manage to navigate through
the world and do things like contention
and controversy and yet somehow make it
look like they're actually a servant of
Jesus Christ. Right? Paul says that
there are those who seem godly, but then
we find out afterwards or in the midst
of it actually they produce something
else.
Now, many of you might have a person in
your mind right now.
I know I know someone like that, right?
That it's it's those people, the people,
the types that have podcasts make about
them, right?
But many of us know what it's like to
have dis difficult seasons in our life,
wounds in our past
and concern for others that actually can
lead us to the same place of putting on
a facade.
And that's a warning to us. Uh I
remember about a year ago I got a text
message from a friend and this is what
he said. I'm listening to a sermon, a
recorded sermon from a broken, sad,
couragegiving dude.
He was referring to me.
Now, he was talking about a sermon that
I gave during a season of life where I
had been walking down a steady decline
into a valley that was very dark and
going into a hard season in life. And I
can tell you as you know much as I tried
to keep up a stiff upper lip and be
courageous that eventually as I walked
through that dark valley that courage
gave way to a lowlevel
cynicism
that just sounded something like within
my head. life is just going to be hard
and disappointing forever
and then eventually I'll die and
hopefully it will be better in glory.
Right? That's it's that I'm just trying
to be honest here. You know, the the
reality is that all of us have
circumstances in life eventually that
can lead us to a place where things
start to take root and are hard. And as
we try as best we can and even as I
tried as best I can to communicate hope,
the reality is that there was that
tarnish of that cynicism. I know there
are people that could sense it, that
that affected the way that my ministry
of the word went forward. And I grieve
that and I repent of that.
How do you deal with that? Well,
thankfully for me, the Lord has, you
know, brought me up out of the valley
and has continued to expose, you know,
places where I need to root out
cynicism. But I wonder,
are there places in your heart like in
mine where there are still things
lurking?
Are there cynicism or bitterness,
contempt,
a critical spirit, superiority,
divisiveness, quarrelomeness?
When we let these things burrow into our
hearts, they damage oursel and they
damage others.
Paul says, "Flee
from those things."
Now, thankfully, he doesn't just call us
to live a life of negation. He also
calls us to something that we must
pursue. So, we need to look in the text
because that's where he actually gives
us the list of things pursue. He says in
three different commands, pursue, fight,
and take hold. So pursue righteousness,
godliness, faith, love, steadfastness,
and gentleness.
Fight the good fight of faith. Take hold
of the eternal life to which you were
called. There's three different
commands. And one of the things that we
need to know is each of these commands
are actually really aggressive.
Uh the verb do for pursue righteousness
is also you could translate that as
persecute like chase after that thing.
Hunt it down and get it. That's one of
the ways that the the verb for uh fight
could also be translated as to labor or
to toil. Uh it's an etmological fallacy
would be call it to agonize over this
work that you are called to. to fight
the good fight of faith. And then to
take hold is also used in terms of
arresting,
to seize someone. That's what they did
to Jesus in the garden. They seized him.
There is an intensity
to what Paul has called us to. And
within that, there is all these
questions that we have. Well, why are
these particular virtues put in there?
Righteousness, godliness, faith, love,
steadfastness, and greatness. and
scholars have tried to identify what is
what is the coherence of this list? Why
did he choose these various different uh
issues and that's a normal question to
ask but I think that we fail sometimes
to recognize that when we see these
types of lists Paul is trying to point
to a greater whole. In other words, Paul
has these vice and virtues lists all
throughout his letters and every single
time they are not comprehensive and yet
we can try and treat them like
checklists. We can say, "Well, check. I
don't think I'm greedy.
Check. I don't think I've been given
over to quarreles, so I think I'm good."
Right? But the the vice list is trying
to point at the reality of someone who's
in rebellion against God. Whereas these
virtues list, just like the fruit of the
spirit, just like any other virtue list,
is pointing to this reality
of the life that God has called us to,
what he made us for, and what he is
redeeming us to in Christ.
So what our faith teaches us, why we
fight, why we agonize, the good fight of
faith is because our faith is reminding
us that person, that is the one that God
has made you to be. Fight for that and
rigorously pursue all of those virtues
so that you might grasp the life that
God has earned for you.
It's rigorous. It's intense.
Um, tomorrow is my daughter's seventh
birthday,
right? Yes. All right. We got there. Uh,
and just it just so happened that as we
were talking to her about the upcoming
birthday that we started to look at
pictures. So, pictures of, you know, the
the day that she was born. Uh, and I
started remembering the intensity.
I was So, it was 36 hours of labor that
ended in a C-section. I was tired. And I
know I'm not supposed to say that,
right?
Cuz Katherine worked intensely
for a long time. Why? Because she wanted
life.
That's the idea behind what Paul is
saying when he gets to this final
charge. Keep the commandment unstained
and free from reproach. Why? Because
everything that was just spoken of, this
reality of this life that God has called
us to can be summarized up as when you
and I go out to minister the word, we're
trying to embody that life so that we
don't bring a stain
upon the message. When we embody the
life that is actually in keeping with
God intended, there's no reproach.
People cannot critique the message by
critiquing us. We can't be cancelled.
Now, can I just name something
that's exhausting?
So, one of the pictures on the day of
the delivery after 36 hours of induced
labor followed by a C-section is do is
Katherine holding Doie sleeping because
she was tired. I don't know about you,
but this could be tiring to try and
pursue things like that. It can be
overwhelming
because it sounds like as is it I mean
you know welcome visitors I'm just
communicating a message of it's no big
deal just be perfect all the time
right and it could lead us to despair
to think this is impossible or even
worse to push our struggles underground
and hide them so that no one sees just
how desperately
we are struggling.
Well, how do we deal with that? The
answer is it cannot be that in order to
minister God's word that you have to be
perfect because if that's so, I should
have never stood up here and no one ever
should stand up here. I need to go sit
down. We just need to wait until Jesus
shows up to talk to us, right? So, it
can't be perfect. And there's something
that I didn't tell you. So, there's
things we must flee from and there's
things we must pursue after. But there's
also this reality in the text that there
is a person we must trust.
Did you see it? It was in between. The
charge to keep the commandment actually
takes place in between an exposition of
Jesus's salvific work. So let me read
again verse 13. I charge you in the
presence of God who gives life to all
things and of Jesus Christ who in his
testimony before Pontius Pilate made the
good confession.
In other words, that's looking to the
reality of Jesus's death that he was
faithful to as he spoke the word of God
even in the reality of temptation.
But then it comes after the keep the
commandment unstaining free from
reproach until the appearing of our Lord
Jesus Christ.
So it's bracketing you're keeping the
commandment within this the salvific
work of Jesus going to the cross for you
and me and coming back one day to
finally bring us into glory. This is the
point where I would walk to the you know
Lord's supper you know in a church set
because we say as often as you eat this
bread and drink this cup you proclaim
the Lord's death until he comes again.
This is literally an inclusio. you are
literarily in Christ.
In this text,
Paul is wanting us to see that you and I
are actually enabled to keep the
commandment because of what he has done
on our behalf. And therefore, we can
actually recognize that this charge that
Paul gives to us is done within the
context of active present tense
commands. He's not saying to Timothy,
"Because you have fleeed and because you
have pursued righteousness, now you can
actually minister the word of God." No,
this is an ongoing reality that you and
I are constantly
having to do and it's done within a
status. Did you see what Paul called
Timothy,
oh man of God?
Now notice
Paul calls him that. doesn't say, "Well,
I hope that you someday will be a man of
God."
He says, "You are." And that's how he
addresses us too because of the person
of God and the work of Christ that has
be done. That is true for you and for
me. Oh man of God, oh woman of God,
you have received an unmmerited status.
And that actually leads us to a life of
doxology. Did you see how Paul moves? so
smoothly
into the reality that one day Jesus is
going to appear on our behalf. And it is
he, did you see? Who is the blessed one?
He is the only sovereign. He is the king
of kings, the lord of lords. He alone
has immortality. He dwells in
unapproachable light. To him be honor
and eternal dominion. Amen.
>> Amen.
>> He is the worthy one.
He is the worthy one. and he has made
you worthy by his life and death and
resurrection.
Oh man of God, oh woman of God, flee
from sin
and pursue righteousness
because he is the one that is at work in
you. Let's pray together. Lord Jesus, we
thank you that you have done a work on
our behalf so that we can say all of our
labors, all of our efforts to minister
your word to this broken and hurting
world can be done because it is you that
is at work within us. We pray now that
we can glorify you and be faithful to
you through your spirit. Amen.