|
This is a text reader for the article below:
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Sunday 12/15/24
Title: A Good Soldier of Christ Jesus
Click for Message Video
Message Audio Player:
Podcast: Download (Duration: 1:06:33 — 125.9MB)
A Good Soldier of Christ Jesus
Even though it will not likely seem like it, our continuation in our topic is at heart perfectly in line with the theme of the birth of our Messiah.
Jesus came to destroy the power of sin and death, liberating all who will believe to enter into eternal union with God. The process of which is what we have been learning since easter. The focus of the work of the Spirit of God in the believer of conforming us to the image of Christ and the resulting testimony being empowered for the furtherance of the kingdom of God in the world.
It is the Good News proclaimed to the shepherds in the field, albeit not understood by them of course.
We’ve been saved to a person, not a place! The Gospel represents true and intimate relationship with God.
We have many expressions to our relationship with and to God.
- Creator / Almighty God – to created
- Master/ Lord – to servant
- Father – to child
- Friend – to friend
- Husband – to wife
All of these relationships carry with them certain responsibilities and expressions giving the gospel message a richness, a dynamic and a vitality which often blend these relationships in unexpected ways, some of which might not seem all that natural.
For example – we are told that if we love Him we will obey His commands. The love in that statement is a friendship love, which typically one would not expect to be validated through obedience to commands. That is not normally the language of friendship. That is because the One with Whom we are friends, is also our Lord and God.
So in the work of the kingdom we are in fact His servants and will have to give an account, as Jesus’ parable of the talent or minas demonstrates. However, our motivation and devotion to the work of the kingdom is not solely that of a servant/steward, but due to our love for Him. So even in the relationship of kingdom work we have the inescapable reality and motivation of our devotional love for Him. We don’t have to be “TOLD” to do the work, we want to if we truly love Him.
As such, when we are truly committed to God our lives preach the gospel without ever referencing chapter and verse. It literally preaches itself in the lives we live.
So when we read in Timothy encouragements to hold fast to the truth of the gospel BECAUSE you know from whom you learned these truths. That they were lived out before your eyes in those you knew and trusted – we get a picture of the gospel that is organic, natural and intensely rooted in relationships.
Now building upon all we learned in chapter 1, let’s dive right into chapter 2 where Timothy is encouraged to be strong in the influence of our living Savior Jesus Himself…
2 Timothy 2:1-26,
“(1) You therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.”
It is an irony that a near exact encouragement was given from Paul to the church in Ephesus where Timothy was ministering a mere six or seven years prior. I like the Amplified version of it which reads like this…
Ephesians 6:10,
“In conclusion, be strong in the Lord [be empowered through your union with Him]; draw your strength from Him [that strength which His boundless might provides].”
“(2) And the things that you have heard from me among many witnesses, commit these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also.”
And therein is the classical biblical example of being mentored which yields a call to be a mentor. It is not unlike the idea of semi modern pyramid schemes.
- Paul mentors Timothy and Titus.
- Timothy and Titus both mentor at least two people.
- Those two people in turn mentor at least two more people.
And so the kingdom is spread and grows in heart real estate One mentored disciple at a time. Each possessing the solid foundation for their faith of knowing the one from whom they learned these truths. And having seen them lived out before their eyes.
That is the living out the stewardship of the minas and talents.
But as I’ve said before, mentoring is living. There must be a living example which by the spirit empowers the testimony to influence another disciple for Christ. Thus Paul’s next words are those directed at being the kind of example faithful men could follow.
“(3) YOU therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.”
This is where your reverential fear, your love and devotion to and your acknowledging of God in all your ways become a visible lesson of ardor and passion to those around you.
The enemy is not unique. He comes up with no quantifiably new tactics in warfare. What he does is copy the Servants of God. He takes their actions and twists them into a life lesson for his followers, the children of darkness or the children of this world.
Jesus told some of the leaders of Israel that they were of their father the devil and the desires of their father they wanted to do. This is essentially what Paul is calling Timothy to do with God, in response to the opposition that comes his way. For the opposition that is coming to him is referred to as hardship.
This is a compound Greek word from kakós (G2556), evil, and páthos (G3806), passion. To suffer evil passions.
Have you ever wondered why the world can’t simply “Live and Let Live” regardless of their touted philosophy?
They are vehemently stirred from within to attack all that is unwaveringly Godly. They hate it from the depths of their core. They cannot react passively because as Jesus said to the spiritual leaders of Israel 2000 years ago they are children of the devil and the desires of their father they want to do. They are twisted and passionate for evil.
And the enemy is an evil father. He places it in their heart and stirs up desire to attack the righteous. Then he turns to the righteous and suggests to them that his children are the enemy. But as Paul said by the Holy Spirit we are not ignorant of his devices. Meaning we know his motives and his ways of operating. We are told that we do not in fact wrestle against the devil’s children. Our enemies are not flesh and blood but are spiritual. and we pull down and cripple the inroads of their attacks not by attacking the devil’s children or even the devil Himself but by maintaining our attention unwaveringly on our Lord. We submit to Him, resist the temptations and influence of the devil and God causes satan to flee from us with this tail tucked between his legs like the defeated dog that he is.
This is one of the reasons why Paul says what he is about to say. For one of the ways that we get entangled in the affairs of this life is by placing our attention on the distractions of the enemy.
“(4) No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please Him Who enlisted him as a soldier. (5) And also if anyone competes in athletics, he is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules.
(6) The hardworking farmer must be first to partake of the crops.
(7) Consider what I say, and may the Lord give you understanding in all things.
(8) Remember that Jesus Christ, of the seed of David, was raised from the dead according to my gospel, (9) for which I suffer trouble as an evildoer, even to the point of chains; but the word of God is not chained.
(10) Therefore I endure all things for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. ”
Now there are many commentators who will say this reference to the elect is referring to the Gentiles to whom Paul was sent, but I take exception with this for three reasons. However, let me say before I explain why, that in the end the intended lesson Paul is seeking to convey remains the same regardless.
Every reference to the elect throughout all of scripture has always pointed to those who were in relationship with God. This included Jesus Who was by very nature – literally as well as to ANYONE who ultimately belongs to God through the New Birth. This even extends backwards to any Jews and Non–Jews who were submitted to the Old Covenant and faith in the promised Messiah.
However, we have it on very good record that though Paul was faithful to his call to the Gentiles, he maintained a tremendous ardor for his brethren according to the flesh – even to the point of one time claiming in his letter to the Romans…
“(1) I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, (2) that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. (3) For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh,”– Romans 9:1-3
That having been said, it was anything but beyond Paul to mention his passion for his fellow Jew.
So what makes me think this is a reference to the Jews as opposed to the Gentiles.
Well like I said we know this reference to the elect CAN refer to the Jews and arguably does so more in scripture than it does for Gentiles.
Secondly because Paul longed for their submission and inclusion in Christ but most of all because of what he says about them in this passage we are reading in Timothy. Paul says his reason for suffering for the elect is that “that they also may obtain the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.” This seems like such common sense to me that it is almost painful to read commentators about this. The Gentiles of Ephesus to which Timothy was left to minister were already saved so this would exclude them from this reference as it would all Gentile churches he had established. However, the persecution he endured was largely, though not exclusively, from the Jews before whom he unashamedly preached the gospel of Christ to the Gentiles, claiming their Messiah had turned to the Gentiles due to His rejection by the Jews.
Now as to the greater question – who are the elect?
Well due to time we will have to look into that when we continue in 2 Timothy.
Blessings!
