1 Timothy 1
1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus according to the commandment of God our Savior, and of Christ Jesus, {who is} our hope,
An apostle is one who is sent by God to communicate the gospel to people who haven’t heard it before. Paul didn’t become an apostle of his own accord, but by the commandment of God. If you want to build God’s kingdom, you can’t decide to do it yourself. You have to go by the commandment of God, and minister at the time and place of God’s choosing. Otherwise your efforts will be in vain.
What does Paul mean when he says that Jesus is our hope?
To hope for something means to eagerly await that something. So then, what is Paul hoping for, and what does Jesus have to do with what Paul is hoping for?
Paul is hoping for the new resurrection body that he will get when Jesus returns. He is eager to get it because right now, he has a flesh through which he is tempted, and to overcome that temptation he has to suffer – that is, he has to endure mental anguish. But when he gets that new body he will not be tempted anymore, and therefore will not have to endure mental anguish to be pleasing to God. That is what Paul is eagerly waiting for.
2 To Timothy, {my} true child in {the} faith: Grace, mercy {and} peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
Grace is help from God to overcome sin and accomplish spiritual goals (like building His kingdom). Peace with God is a state where God is on your side and not opposing you. Mercy is not getting the punishment you deserve. You can’t do anything for God if He hasn’t shown you mercy and forgiven you your sins, or if He is opposing you instead of being on your side, or if He is not actively helping you to get things done. Paul realized how important it is to have mercy, peace and grace from God, and that is why the first thing he wishes Timothy is that he (Timothy) have mercy, peace and grace from God.
Given that Paul wished grace, mercy and peace for the people he wrote to, don’t you think that Paul himself always ensured that he was in a position to receive grace, mercy and peace from God? Shouldn’t you too?
Timothy was Paul’s true child in the faith in that whatever Paul asked Timothy to believe, Timothy saw the truth in it and believed it. It is rare to find such people, and Paul knew that, and therefore he valued Timothy a lot. If we find such people, we should value them too – not people who merely pretend to agree with us, but people who actually see what we believe to be true.
3 As I urged you upon my departure for Macedonia, remain on at Ephesus so that you may instruct certain men not to teach strange doctrines,
4 nor to pay attention to myths and endless genealogies, which give rise to mere speculation rather than {furthering} the administration of God which is by faith.
When it concerns where to go and what to do, notice how Paul didn’t command Timothy but urged him, even though Paul was in charge. There is a gentleness that a good leader displays. That is one difference between a dictator and a leader. A dictator needs to command so that people will obey, but because a leader leads, he doesn’t need to command – people believe in him sufficiently that they respond to an urge from him. In our homes and churches, when dealing with adults, we should strive to be leaders rather than dictators.
In churches today, just like in churches in Paul’s times, there are people who teach strange doctrines – doctrines not founded on Scripture, but on myth. The myth may have originated from Scripture – most are – but while they appear to be backed by Scripture, they really aren’t, if you examine them closely. If you are not careful, you will be fooled. See, I have warned you about this.
Another thing to watch out for is speculation. Speculation is going beyond what Scripture says and adding your own thoughts about what it leads to. It is different from insight in that insight enables you to read in between the lines and glean truth, whereas speculation results in gleaning falsehood. Truth is supported by other Scripture whereas falsehood is contradicted by other Scripture.
Genealogies refer to a long line of implications. Someone will come to you and say, “The Bible says this and this, and that implies this, and this implies that,” and so on, until they finally end up with a ridiculous conclusion.
For example, someone once tried to convince me that there were two Jesus’. One was the man ‘Christ Jesus’, and the other was the man ‘Jesus Christ’. He pointed me to Ac 24:24 and several places in Romans and Corinthians and Galatians to show me ‘Christ Jesus’. Then he pointed me to other places in Acts and Romans (like Rom 1:6 and Ac 20:21) to show me ‘Jesus Christ’. This, he concluded, implies that there were two separate people, just like how “James Smith” and “Smith James” are two different people.
We further the administration of God when we get ourselves and other people to more closely do what God wants us to do. The way to do that is by getting them to believe the truth about God and about man. While it is good to use logic to convince people about the truth, we should realize that ‘logic’ can also be used (very easily, I might add) to convince people to believe what is false.
For example, if you start with a false assumption, you can prove anything. Someone once showed me that if you assume one equals two, you can prove that I am the Pope. Here’s how…
The Pope and I are two. But two equals one. Therefore, the Pope and I are one. Therefore, I am the Pope!
We need to realize that not everyone who teaches Scripture, even if they have gone to seminary, is anointed by the Holy Spirit. There is a lot of falsehood in Christianity today, and one needs a lot of discernment to distinguish between true and false teaching.
Paul’s purpose in writing this letter to Timothy was to stop people from teaching what is false. That is the theme of this letter, and everything he writes in this letter is tied to that theme.
5 But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.
This is a good verse to remember, and to use to determine how effective our instruction is. If you are a teacher or pastor, and people receiving your instruction are not increasing in love from a pure heart then your instruction is not very effective.
A lot of people express love. When you say or show someone that you love them is it with a pure motive, or is it because you want something from them? Love from a pure heart doesn’t expect anything in return. When you talk sweetly or give a gift to your spouse or relative or coworker or friend, is it because you want something from that person?
A good conscience is one that doesn’t convict us of sin. We sin all the time, often even without knowing it, especially if we are not walking carefully. Until that sin is forgiven, our conscience will convict us of it. For this reason, even after we are believers, when we sin, we need to repent and ask God to forgive us (remember the content of the Lord’s Prayer?). If we need to make restitution or apologize, we need to do that too. That’s how we maintain a good conscience. However, if church leadership doesn’t talk about these things from the pulpit, the members of the church will never learn to do this – and yet this is the goal of our instruction!
A sincere faith is one where our actions match our statement of belief. When a person says that he believes God, and then doesn’t act like he believes God, he has an insincere faith. For example, if you say that God is not a liar, but you take your own revenge, then your actions don’t match your belief because, in the Bible, God says that that you shouldn’t take your own revenge because that is His job and He will do it.
So then, examine yourself and see if you love from a pure heart and have a good conscience and a sincere faith. And if you don’t then you need to work on fixing it so that you do!
6 For some men, straying from these things, have turned aside to fruitless discussion,
7 wanting to be teachers of the Law, even though they do not understand either what they are saying or the matters about which they make confident assertions.
If a person is in church leadership, and he or she doesn’t have love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith then he or she will end up teaching what is false. This is a very serious thing because in 2 Pet 3:15-16 Peter tells us that the end of such people is destruction.
Yet there are many people who are like that. I’ve found many people in various churches who make confident assertions about things they don’t understand. This is just like how it was in Paul’s times – people there were teaching the Law but they didn’t realize that the law is not made for a righteous person. They memorized the nitty gritty details of the Law, but they didn’t get the big picture. They understood the ‘what’ but they didn’t understand the ‘why’. Just as it says in Ps 103:7, God showed Moses His ways, but the sons of Israel only saw God’s acts, and that is why they constantly opposed Moses.
Paul tells Timothy to stop these people from teaching the things of God. We too, if we are godly and in leadership in a church, need to stop such people from teaching in the church.
8 But we know that the Law is good, if one uses it lawfully,
9 realizing the fact that law is not made for a righteous person, but for those who are lawless and rebellious, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers
10 and immoral men and homosexuals and kidnappers and liars and perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound teaching,
11 according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, with which I have been entrusted.
The Law is not meant for the righteous, but for the unrighteous. People who are doing the right thing with the right motive shouldn’t let the Law hinder them from doing that. If you are such a person, let your goodness abound unrestrained. But make sure that, in God’s sight, and not merely your sight, you are indeed a righteous person doing things with the right motive.
12 I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who has strengthened me, because He considered me faithful, putting me into service,
13 even though I was formerly a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent aggressor. Yet I was shown mercy because I acted ignorantly in unbelief;
The worst thing is doing the wrong thing with the wrong motive. The next worst thing is doing the right thing with the wrong motive.
The best thing is doing the right thing with the right motive.
Paul had the right motive, but he was doing the wrong thing – only because he really didn’t know better. This is the second-best thing. God is lenient with such people because they act ignorantly. God helped Paul realize where he was wrong and that humbled Paul. Never would he think too highly of himself no matter how greatly God used him afterwards.
God had to make Jacob limp before he called him Israel. God let Peter deny Jesus before he made him a great apostle. If God has allowed you to fall miserably, take heart and repent, and let it humble you so that you never again think too highly of yourself.
If you haven’t yet fallen miserably, don’t wait to fall miserably, but adjust your definition of falling miserably so that the depth of your current fall is considered a miserable fall – and let that humble you, so that you don’t have to fall further to have a humble and contrite spirit.
14 and the grace of our Lord was more than abundant, with the faith and love which are {found} in Christ Jesus.
When God is helping you, you will sincerely believe the teachings of Christ. Also, when God is helping you, you will love from a pure heart. This is what Paul experienced. His initial theology was wrong, but when he was shown the truth, he humbled himself and acknowledged that he was wrong, and received mercy, peace and grace from God in abundance.
We may all start out with wrong theology. However, if we learn humility and practice it continually, we too can receive an abundance of mercy, peace and grace to strengthen us and help us come to a place where we have a sincere faith, a good conscience and love from a pure heart.
15 It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost {of all.}
Paul never forgot his past wrongs. He didn’t let them condemn him but he let them humble him. It humbled him so much that he considered himself as the worst sinner in existence. This is a very good attitude to take. God allows us to fall so that we can adopt such an attitude.
Paul didn’t start out like this. At one point, the considered himself as good as the best of apostles (2 Cor 11:5). But as he examined his life and the things God put him through he slowly realized his lowly human state.
16 Yet for this reason I found mercy, so that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might demonstrate His perfect patience as an example for those who would believe in Him for eternal life.
17 Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, {be} honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.
Just as God was so patient with Paul, He is also so patient with you and me. So then, don’t let your past condemn you, but let it humble you and make you grateful to God for the greatness of His love towards you. Your gratefulness will let you serve Him without grumbling and complaining whatever your lot may be. The end result is that you will want honor and glory only for God, and not for you.
This is the path every person who has taught false doctrine in the past should take. Paul was a blasphemer, but he was able to turn around. So can you and I, if we follow the path of humility and love for the truth that Paul took. It is with this humble attitude that we must stop others from teaching false doctrine.
18 This command I entrust to you, Timothy, {my} son, in accordance with the prophecies previously made concerning you, that by them you fight the good fight,
19 keeping faith and a good conscience, which some have rejected and suffered shipwreck in regard to their faith.
20 Among these are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I have handed over to Satan, so that they will be taught not to blaspheme.
To blaspheme is to say wrong things about God. When the Pharisees said that Jesus was doing miracles by the power of the devil when He was actually doing miracles by the power of the Holy Spirit, they were essentially calling the Holy Spirit an evil spirit, and Jesus called in blasphemy (Lk 12:10).
People like Hymenaeus and Alexander taught the wrong things about God. Paul observed that this ‘shipwreck in regard to their faith’ was because they didn’t keep a good conscience. It is interesting that what you believe is related to how you live. That is why Paul asks Timothy to keep a good conscience. We must keep a good conscience too, so that we will teach what is right. This is what ‘fighting the good fight’ is all about.
Paul commanded Timothy to stop the false teachers in Ephesus from teaching strange doctrines. When it comes to protecting the church, Paul didn’t urge Timothy, but he commanded him. We should note the distinction.
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