Paul's Favorite Guy
Tom Shrader begins a series on 2 Timothy by examining Paul's opening words to his beloved protege Timothy, written from prison as Paul faces death. He emphasizes the importance of mentoring relationships and God's promises of grace, mercy, and peace. Shrader challenges men to be courageous leaders in their families and churches, noting the conspicuous absence of Timothy's father and grandfather from Paul's account of his spiritual heritage.
“God saved you for a reason, He's uniquely gifted you, He's allowed even that yucky stuff in your life so that you can be an instrument that He uses to take this gospel message to a lost and dying world.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: CBCC August 2008
Recorded: 2008 at Cannon Beach Conference Center
Duration: 51 min
Themes: mentorship, courage, leadership, family, grace, mercy, peace, legacy, mentor, father, young pastor, church leader, spiritual son, imprisoned believer, absent father, grandfather
Scripture: 2 Timothy 1:1-6, 2 Timothy 4:6, 2 Timothy 3:12, John 14:27, 1 Timothy 3:9, Philippians 3, 1 Corinthians 11, 1 Kings 2:1, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians
Theological Themes: pastoral epistles, discipleship, spiritual formation, biblical mentoring, grace theology, prison epistles, apostolic succession, covenant promises
Full Transcript
I grew up a Seventh-day Adventist and every... That is really good, isn't it? I mean I'm just sitting here going a little rainy, kind of foggy day, a little quiet music like that, and I don't know, I wouldn't want to listen to what comes next if I was you, so it's pretty inspirational. Mila, the stuff for which we don't have words, is that stuff that you wrote, is that original stuff? Okay, that stuff is really good, and I'm not trying to, I guess I am trying to promote it, is that on a CD or something? Is that on CD and do you guys have stuff to sell? No? Not yet? Well it needs to get on CD, that is really good stuff, I really appreciate that, that was wonderful.
Can you guys close with Everlasting God? Can you wire that up? And I don't know how to do the PowerPoint, obviously, so you all figure it out. Yeah, we're glad you're here. Those of you who are guests this morning, a special welcome to you, it's great to have you here on a Sunday morning.
We are actually starting today what will be our first of six sessions in looking at the book of 2nd Timothy, so if you have Bibles and you'd like to turn to that, what we're going to do is a bit of a flyover. We've had a great day, it's, Suze and I are up, for those of you again who are new, just to remind you maybe a little bit, we're up from Arizona, so we love weather like this, people keep saying, oh I wish we had the sun, and I'm saying, I don't need, I got plenty of sun, I don't need any sun, this is ideal for us, and had kind of a lazy start to the to the morning.
A Family Update and Football Talk
I mentioned to you last night, we're coming upon the greatest time of the year, which is college football. My daughter Haley, growing up was a cheerleader, but never really into sports, and she married a guy who came to ASU to play baseball, and his whole life was baseball and sports, so she's become a bit of a sports fan, although she has a great perspective on it.
We were talking this morning to Haley, and then we have four now, four grandchildren, and the oldest is two and a half, and so his name is Brayden, so you can hear Brayden this morning. I said to Haley, what are you doing? Now get this, this is how you know you have a real woman, this is a woman you want. Haley, what are you doing? She said, we are watching the 1990 Iowa-Ohio State football game. That's a woman, that's what you want right there.
So I said, Brayden, what are you doing? He said, well, I'm watching football, Papa, we're watching football. What Haley doesn't understand, because we're real Iowa fans, in fact, Sarah and Haley and I are going back on the 27th of September, back to an Iowa football game, they've never been to the stadium for a football game, it'll be great. What she doesn't understand is in this 1990 Iowa-Ohio State game, Iowa leads the whole way until two seconds left when Ohio State scores to win the game, so it's vintage Iowa football, so she's got disappointment ahead of her, but it'll be a great day.
Brayden, the other day, Brayden is right at that point where it is time for potty training, and so, you know, it's kind of fun to watch this. I don't remember how, I don't remember how we did it, and I guess it's probably because I didn't do it, but now they have books. So Haley's taking him through this book the other day, and here's this, this, and this, and this is what big boys do, this is absolutely perfect, this is Brayden, by the way, it's perfect for him. She said, all done, and said, now, Brayden, do you want to be a big boy? And he said, maybe tomorrow, Mom, and I thought, that's perfect, that's what I want to do, I want to be a big boy, and maybe tomorrow, Mom, but not now. So, it's a source of joy, especially for Susan, I love watching it as well.
Approaching 2nd Timothy: A Verse-by-Verse Study
2nd Timothy is a letter written, and I love it, we're going to look at five verses is all. It's a bit, I said we're going to study it verse by verse, we're not going to get through all the verses, I hope I whet your appetite. I assume that many of you attend churches who are involved in studies that are kind of verse by verse study, that's my preference. I have no problem with topical studies, I do quite a few of those during the week, but I think, here's what I've noticed on topical studies, we tend to select studies that allow us to avoid the hard passages.
So when you're working through a book, you just have to deal with some of these things. Over the years, we've dealt with a lot of things that we would have never chosen to deal with, but they're in the passage, you have to deal with them. If you are here, and you're kind of going, I've never been around this verse by verse study, I hope that I do two things today, and in the course of these sessions. One, whet your appetite for this, so that you look around and say, I need this. Two, I want you to see, you can do a lot of this on your own.
What I want you to notice over these sessions, is how all I'm going to do is just take stuff that is just sitting right there, and just pick this fruit off, and you can open your eyes, and do this study as well.
Reading Our Text
So let's read these verses. "Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus, by the will of God, according to the promise of life in Christ Jesus, to Timothy, my beloved son, grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father, and Christ Jesus our Lord. I thank God, whom I serve with a clear conscience, the way my forefathers did, as I constantly remember you in my prayers night and day, longing to see you even as I recall your tears, so that I may be filled with joy. For I am mindful of the sincere faith within you, which first dwelt in your grandmother Lois, and your mother Eunice, and I am sure that it is in you as well."
Now that's as far as we're going to go, but let me just finish these next two verses. "And for this reason I remind you to kindle afresh the gift of God which is in you through the laying on of hands, for God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but power and love and discipline."
Paul writes this letter from prison. It is the second time he's been imprisoned. If you were to take an opportunity and read through Philippians, Paul writes that from prison, but it's the first time he's there. In the midst of that letter, he's optimistic. He says, "I'm looking forward to being with you again. I can't wait to get out of here, not exactly sure how this is going to happen, and to spend time with you again."
That is not what's going on in this book. In fact, if you flip to the very end of 2nd Timothy, verse 6 of chapter 4, he says, "I'm already being poured out as a drink offering, the time for my departure has come." The optimism is gone in the sense of perhaps release, and he understands this is the end of his life. This is, in fact, the last written communication we have from the Apostle.
The Backdrop of Persecution
I love this backdrop. Nero is on the throne looking for scapegoats, the Christians are the scapegoats, and he is blaming all of Rome's problems on them. Persecution has broken out against the church. They are martyring Christians. It's a wholesale slaughter. They say as many as 25,000 Christians were killed in a year in Rome.
What's interesting about that is if you look to 2007, estimates are that about 10 times that, or 250,000 Christians, were slaughtered worldwide. I read stories all the time from the persecuted church of men and women who are leading Bible studies, and they will come in and they may arrest them, they may imprison them, they may kill them. We were reading some stories the other day, I think it was Indonesia, but this guy was leading a study, they asked him to stop, he wouldn't, and they merely cut off his hands.
So persecution is all about the church. In fact, again, against this backdrop, we'll get there in a couple of sessions, in chapter 3, verse 12, Paul says, "Indeed, all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will be persecuted." That's a promise.
When Life Gets Serious
So that's the backdrop. Paul is dying, and he knows it, and I personally love that, because all the kind of trivialness of life is melting away. If you can imagine that scene, you sitting down with someone who you love and you care for—I would argue this is the person that Paul loves more than anyone else in the whole world. Paul's writing him this communication, so he's not writing and saying, "How do you think the Seahawks are gonna play?"
He just shoots straight. We had a guy years ago who went to the church, and I told him at the church, I said, "Look, if you're in the hospital, and I come and visit you, you're gonna die, because I don't go to the hospital. I mean, I just can't get to all these things. So if I come to visit, if your doctor just left and said, 'You're gonna be fine,' but I show up, he's lying to you. You're gonna die. That's the only reason I would be there."
So this guy from the church was having heart surgery, and back in those days, I was a little more available than now, and so I went to see him. In fact, they had done the heart surgery, didn't go right, they cracked him the next day and did it again, and they cracked him the third day, and he had three of these surgeries in three days. When I could finally speak to him, it was a very interesting conversation, because he didn't ask, "How about the Diamondbacks? What do you think about the Suns?" There was a seriousness to life.
So I love that richness. That is part of what I do like about hospital visits, when people are really sick. What are those important things in life? We can get so distracted.
The Problem of Distraction
Susan was watching this guy on TV. Tim Downs is this guy's name, and I don't remember a time she ever did this, but he writes novels, and I guess some nonfiction stuff as well, but somehow, whatever happened in this interview intrigued her enough to buy a book, so she gave it to me, and so I'm working my way through it. It's a suspense thriller, but in the middle of this, there's a character, and he's challenging this guy about life. He writes this: "Life is too busy to have to think about life."
Ironic, isn't it? You know, Pascal once said that the distinguishing characteristic of mankind is distraction. We don't like what we see when we slow down long enough to look at our lives, so we keep ourselves distracted. We fill our lives with all sorts of trivial stuff and nonsense. That way, we never have to confront our emptiness or longing. We simply don't have time for it. How very convenient.
I thought about that against the backdrop here of 2nd Timothy. Tony Campolo wrote a book years ago called "Who Switched the Price Tags?" In there, there's one little paragraph, and from that paragraph, I actually did a study. He had an informal survey with 50 people who were at least 95 years of age, and he asked them, "If you could live your life over again, what would you do differently?"
Three Things the Elderly Would Change
They said there were three things. Number one, they said we would risk more. Now, I live in a foolhardy way, but we wouldn't play it so close to the vest. We would have faith. That would be the context that we would use. I know not many of you were here for that movie, but that book of Angelina that Jeff mentioned, I got a copy of it a couple of years ago and read it. It's such a wonderful, simple story of just faith. It's like Corrie ten Boom and the Tramp.
for the Lord, and we don't read those books anymore. We're reading all these things and thinking books. Let me tell you what we're doing in Christianity. We're doing way too much thinking. We're thinking and thinking and thinking and thinking and thinking rather than just living by faith, and I'm not advocating stupidity. But I am saying there is this matter of faith, and when you hear the story of Cannon Beach or you listen to the story of Corrie ten Boom, you just see this simple faith. They would risk more. They would say, God will take care of that.
Here's the second thing. They said they would think more. They'd contemplate. We do not value that. We don't value that as a culture. I'll prove that to you. When you go back to work, go to your cubicle, sit down, and just start thinking. And pretty soon somebody's going to come by and say, what are you doing? And you're going to say, thinking.
And before you know it, it's going to spread through the office. There's somebody down there thinking. They're down there thinking. We have a maverick down here. He's thinking. And pretty soon they're going to come up and they're going to say to you, you okay? And you'll say, yeah, what are you doing? I'm just thinking. And then one of the guys, usually a boss, usually the guy that knows every little bit of the policy manual, is going to come by your cube and say, what's going on here? I'm thinking. What's he going to say? We don't pay you to think, which means you could work for one of the airlines, based on what I've seen lately. So you don't have to think.
Here's the third thing. We do things that would last beyond our lifetime. What's going to last beyond your lifetime? What's your legacy? Well, really, God ultimately cares about so many things, but ultimately it's people in His Word, people who know Him, people who don't know Him, human beings. So it's very simple. And they said, this is what we would do.
Paul's Opening Greeting
Well, Paul begins to communicate this. I called this the book of 2nd Timothy. It's actually a letter. And it's a letter that is really convenient for us up front, because it tells us who's writing it and who's receiving it.
I received, not long ago, a seven-page, single-spaced letter. Now, when you get a letter like this, here's what you do. The very first thing you do, you get it out of the envelope. And it's always marked personal and confidential. So you get it out of the envelope, you hold it in your hands, and the first thing you do is what? You look to the very end to see who needs to get a life, who doesn't have time, and they write you this letter. And that's not true. If somebody writes a letter at that length, I'll always respond to it.
But right up front, we don't have to guess. Paul, Paul an apostle of Christ Jesus. How? By the will of God, according to the promise of life.
Paul's Identity as Apostle
Paul identifies himself here as an apostle. Other places, he identifies himself as a bondservant, a slave. He's a slave to Christ. God has freed us from the bondage of sin and the consequence of sin, so that we can now enslave ourselves, not to darkness and sin, but to holiness, to Christ Himself.
But he identifies himself here, not again as a bondservant, but as an apostle. I thought early on, when I became a Christian, that'd be kind of a cool title to have. And then as I studied it, I realized, you and I have never seen one of these apostles. It means literally a messenger.
Eugene Peterson, in his paraphrase, The Message, are you familiar with The Message? Listen to how Eugene Peterson identifies this. I love it. I, Paul, am on special assignment for Christ. That's all of us, by the way. There's a sense in which we're all sent, or apostles, in that way. That's not who Paul is. Paul is an apostle, one of those original 12, 13, who God selected, who saw the risen Christ, who had this special assignment.
Called by God's Will
How do you get that job? Well, he's there by the sovereign will of God. God placed him, chose him. Now, I want to make this point to you. We'll talk about it more. God's done the same thing in your life.
I mentioned it last night, and I come back, it just seems like everywhere I go, I'd come back to this again and again and again. God has reconciled us to Himself through Christ, and then He gave us a ministry of reconciliation. I said it last night, if all God wanted to do was get you to heaven, He would have taken you there at the moment you believed in Him. But He's got something way bigger for you.
He saved you for a reason. He's uniquely gifted you. He's allowed even that yucky stuff in your life, He's allowed those unique things to happen in your life, so that you can be an instrument that He uses to take this gospel message to a lost and dying world. Just as Paul was selected, you have been selected. A different role, to be sure. You're not an apostle, but you are chosen by Him and sent by Him into a dark world. We'll talk more about it in a little bit.
The Promise of Life
You're chosen by the will of God according to the promise, I love that, of life. That word promise is a great word. Here's what I've learned about a promise. A promise is only as good as the one who makes it.
I can promise you something, but if I don't have the ability to pull it off, it really doesn't matter, does it? Or I can promise you something, and I might even have the ability to pull it off, but if somehow I just don't carry through.
I mentioned last night Larry Wright, he's my mentor, my hero. He and I used to do a study on Thursday morning, and I'm in there one day, and a guy walks in, and Larry said, you know him? And I said, no I don't. He said, oh my gosh, it's been really interesting. He's had a long sojourn, and he's getting married this week. And this guy had asked Larry to do the wedding. Larry said, I won't do the wedding. The guy said, but will you come and just speak and pray? And Larry said, fine. So the guy walks in, and Larry said, do
I said, no. And he goes, hey man, now Sunday's the wedding, right? Sunday. Sunday's that wedding. Don't you forget it. You're gonna be there now, aren't you? I said, yeah, yeah, yeah. Study's over. Larry said, all right, now Sunday. I'm gonna see you Sunday. Four o'clock. Four o'clock Sunday, right? Yeah.
Sunday, Larry goes to church and does His thing, and comes home, and the Cowboys are on, and he watches the Cowboys, and as the day's winding down, he said, well, I'll get my calendar and take a look and see what I have to do for the rest of the week. And all of a sudden, he opens up His book, and he realizes he's missed the wedding. And he called the guy the next day and apologized, and he said the guy was a little bit offended by it, which seems trivial to me. Obviously, he wouldn't do it intentionally.
But here's what I want you to see. Larry had every intention of being there, but a promise is only as good as the one who makes it. You can have Ginsu knives with a lifetime warranty and an 800 number, but if Joe Ginsu isn't answering them, it ain't gonna do you any good, whatever warranty you have, right?
The Reliability of God's Promises
I saw something the other day. I love infomercials. I watch a lot of infomercials. I love them. I just love to watch them. I watched one the other day. This is my new, this is the new favorite term they use. I love this. A limited lifetime warranty. I don't know what that means other than whatever breaks isn't covered, is all I can figure out in that whole deal.
It's the promise of life. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. Whoever believes in Him will not perish, but will have eternal life in Christ Jesus. So when we talk about somebody and we say we know that they're in heaven, how do we know that? Well, based on the promise that Christ gave and their belief in that, we know that it's true.
And that's, by the way, and we have to come back to this over and over again, is not a universal promise. I will hear this all the time. So-and-so's in a better place. And I'm thinking, there's no way. This guy didn't know Christ, didn't care about Christ, didn't care about the things of God. He's not in a better place. He's in hell. But we don't seem to have the courage. I go to more funerals for these pagan guys, and it seems the worse you are, the faster they get you to heaven.
It's the promise of life to those of us who believe Jesus is who He said He was. It's the promise of life. As good as the one who makes the promise.
God's Immutable Nature
When we talk about the attributes of God, I bet if we did this, let's talk about the attributes of God. And I said, all right, you start and you talk about, He's holy, and He's merciful, and He's all-knowing. You talk about all of these attributes. Here's the attribute of God that gets overlooked, that to me is really the most important of them. He's immutable, meaning He doesn't change.
He made this promise, and a timeless God does not produce dated material. He's not in heaven going, man, 2008. I'm going to have to rethink this thing about adultery. He's an immutable God. He doesn't change. Those are His promises. And this book is filled with promises. And it's promises from God who can keep them, not the world.
The world always has a knockoff. So if you go to John 14:27, Jesus said, my peace I give you, my peace I leave you. Then He says this, not as the world gives. So the world says, here's a peace for you, snort this, sleep with this, buy this, rent this, possess this, and you'll have peace. God says, no, no, no, that's not peace.
True Peace Versus Worldly Peace
The world says peace is the absence of turmoil. God says, no, peace is not the absence of turmoil. It's the presence of God in the midst of our turmoil. God has not exempted us from the difficult aspects of life. He merely says that in the midst of these, I'm going to climb right in there with you. And there will be a peace that passes all human understanding.
People are going to look at you and say, I don't know how you can endure that. And you have the pleasure and the joy and the privilege of saying, I can't. It's God in me who did this. The wonderful truth. Don't be cynical. Here are the promises of God.
The Paul and Timothy Relationship
And then he lays them out. To Timothy, my beloved son, in 1st Timothy, Paul addresses the letter this way, to Timothy, my true child in the faith. There's a special relationship here. You need in your life a Timothy and a Paul. I opened a book the other day that Larry had given me, and he had written in the front, to my beloved Tomothy. And there's a special relationship.
Now, I'm going to make a real appeal here. This is really important. In your life, you need to have a mentor, and you need to have a protege. And you have them both simultaneously. I had a great illustration this one day. I was in the middle of something. I can't remember what the issue was. I just remember at the time, I thought, how am I going to get through it?
And so I called Larry. I was at home. I pushed line one. I called Larry. I said, Larry. Yep. And I said, hey, I got some issues. I need some help. I need to think this through. And he started, what is it? I started, and line two rang. He said, why don't you get it? And I said, forget it. Whatever they are, they can figure it out later. And I said, I got to deal with this. He said, no, go ahead and get it.
I picked up line two. Here's what it said. Tom? Yep. Have you got a second? I need some help. On line one, I'm a protege. On line two, I'm a mentor. So you have to have that in your life. God saved you and allowed you these experiences, so you begin to dump them into others.
Embracing Your Average Place
Think about this. Let's say you are just stone-cold average. A hundred people. You're just smack average. By the way, that is most of you. I'm sick of this trying to be the greatest. You're just never going to get there, man. Have you looked in the mirror? Do you understand you're average?
I don't understand this. Way too many people are trying to burn a bunch of energy to be the absolute
We're average and rather enjoy it. Let's say you're solid 50 out of 100. Do you understand that 1 through 49 desperately need you to pour your life into them? You need those in your life. You need those relationships desperately. Do you have them?
Age is not a barrier. I did a funeral for a lady and her husband got up to speak. He was 71 or 72. And he said, "I want to thank my mentor, Luke." Luke is a guy on our staff who's 28. You need this. You are not meant to live this Christian life in isolation.
I will tell you from a lot of experience, there are a ton of older people who have a ton to offer. You've got to go and seek them out and ask them. They are filled with a wealth of wisdom. Here's what we're finding at church a lot: the older people have wisdom, but the younger people really have the biblical experience. There's this great relationship taking place where the younger people are pulling along the older people spiritually, and the older people are saying, "Let me tell you about life." It's just a great way to live.
Paul's Heart for Timothy
Paul, Timothy, this relationship. He said, "to my beloved son Timothy." Then he has, in essence, a wish for him.
If you were to have a wish for your kids, what would it be? "Oh, that they get a good education. Oh, that they find something." I remember when the girls were small, we always had these little old ladies around church, and they would say, "We started praying that God would bring a husband along for your girls." And I'd always say, "Whatever, thank you very much." But I always thought, what if God doesn't want them married?
We think like, "Oh boy, here's the promise: an education." Even an education. We don't want an education so they learn anything. We have 64,000 students at ASU. Not one of them there is to learn anything. If you say, "Why are you here?" they'll all say the same thing. What? "Get a job." That's the only reason you want to get an education. Get a job. Get a spouse. Get a house.
Grace, Mercy, and Peace
Here's what Paul says. Here's my wish. Do you see it? Grace, mercy, and peace. Where do I find those? From God and from Christ Jesus our Lord.
In the book of Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, the introduction is grace and peace. For whatever reason here, and in 1st Timothy, Paul adds the idea of mercy. But let's spend a second on this. Grace, mercy, and peace to you.
You will always see them in that order. Grace and peace. It's like the crucifixion and the resurrection, and they're coupled together. Until I experience the grace of God, I cannot experience the peace of God. Grace, He said, "Here's some stuff I'm going to give you." Mercy, "Here's some stuff I'm not going to give you that you deserve."
The Uniqueness of Grace
There is a singular word that I am falling in love with. It's the word that separates biblical Christianity from everything else, and it's that word grace. Grace is absolutely unique to the Christian faith.
What I've discovered in my life: I happen to be pretty conservative theologically. So I would embrace the historic doctrines of grace. I don't know if that term means anything to you. Let me put it in a term that degenerates all sorts of... I'm a Calvinist. "Really? He looks too happy to be a Calvinist." Well, it's the doctrines of grace.
Here's the problem with guys like me, and there's a lot of problems with guys like me, but here's a big problem with guys like me. We're big on grace up unto salvation, and we don't have any of it with how you live it. We talk about grace as it relates to salvation, but we live according to God's grace. God is a gracious God to His people.
Living in God's Grace
I'm going to recommend two books to you. They're going to rock your world, my friend. One of them is called Scandalous Freedom, and the other is called What Was I Thinking? Both are written by Steve Brown. Wonderful books.
I love, again, on Sunday, I know we get more high school and college students than we do in the other session, so I got a couple of things special for you, but one of them is that book. Our college students and our 20-somethings have been working through Scandalous Freedom, and it's just rocking their world. Some of it I go, "I don't know," but here's what he gets us to live in. He gets us to live in God's grace.
I talked through the book of Philippians, I don't know how long ago, and in the middle of it, Paul's doing this. He says, "I was really religious, right? Philippians chapter 3. I was really religious. I had this and this and this, and I was circumcised on the eighth day, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." But he says, "I count all of that, King James, as but dung, compared to the surpassing value and knowledge of knowing Christ Jesus."
So here's what he says: "I was in religion, but I got out of it. And now I'm in relationship." Here's my observation, especially among good Orthodox churches. We go from religion to relationship, and then we turn it right back into religion again.
Where Is the Grace?
So we start talking. "How's God work in your life?" "Well, I just read this book." I don't care what you read. It doesn't matter what you read. I'm sick of what you read. What are you doing? What has God done in your life? Where's the grace and the mercy?
That's the story that you missed this morning, of how this whole place came to being. And all they did was simply trust God. God's wonderful grace. It's not a license to sin, but it's an understanding of who He is. God's grace and God's mercy and peace in the midst of a really tumultuous world. And you need all of these.
I don't care. Hey, if things are really good or things are really bad, my message is the same to both of you. This too shall pass. This too shall pass. It's going really bad. And I don't mean this in some sort of a trite way, but remember this. No matter...
No matter how bad it gets, what? It can only last a lifetime. No matter how bad it gets, it can only last another 20 or 30 years. And then I've got all of eternity. And if you're cruising along going, I don't know why they keep talking about pain and suffering. I don't have any. Let me just tell you, that will change.
Paul's Clear Conscience
Now, here's what I want you to see. You could have taken those first two verses and you could have pulled all of that out of there if you'd have given a little time. You've got to work on this a little bit. In this letter, as Paul writes when he's dying, you would think he might talk a lot about the past. He really doesn't, except for this little section in here of verses three and four and five.
He said this, "I thank God who I constantly serve with a clear conscience." Paul said, my mind is freed. I'm comfortable in understanding that, though I'm not perfect, I can stand before God with a conscience that's clear. He talks about in First Timothy 3:9, he said, "holding to the mystery of faith," and I do it "with a clear conscience."
At our church, we take communion every Sunday. It's a little bit unusual among a lot of Protestant churches, we take communion every Sunday. And one of the things that I try to do, it's a wonderful time for evangelism, because we point out this is not for everyone. I did not do communion for a couple weeks, and we got a bunch of young guys in our pastoral staff, and we're putting in this position, and apparently for a couple weeks in a row, our guys neglected the warning.
So as you would expect, that would demand emails. So I got this email saying, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, we ought to be warning these unbelievers that are there, yada, yada, yada. I thought, all right, I'll do communion next week. So I did it, and I read the email, and I pointed it out.
The warning in Scripture is not to the unbeliever, but to the believer. We add this warning saying, it would make no sense to you, not to judge you, but if you came into our church, you said, "I don't know Christ, I don't believe what you believe, I don't even know what you're talking about," it makes no sense for you to participate in communion.
But what Paul says in First Corinthians 11 is, to those of us who say we're Christians, we need the warning that we are to come to communion with consciences that are clear. It's a wonderful time for us at least once a week to stop and to take an inventory of our lives. And Paul says, as I look at my life, I know I'm not perfect, but I will tell you, I can stand before God with a conscience that is clear, sin that's confessed, relationships that as far as they depend upon me, I'm living at peace with other people.
Paul's Longing for Timothy
He says, "I long to see you, even as I recall your tears, so that I may be filled with joy." Again, Paul's looking back at a time that's recorded for us in the book of Acts, where Paul's saying goodbye to Timothy and to some of these other elders at the church at Ephesus. Paul's saying goodbye to them, and it was a time of tears and brokenness.
I love this because it so humanizes the apostle. We sometimes think of Paul as this stoic guy who's almost robotic, who's void of emotion. And Paul said, no, there's this time I remember, I long to see you.
Look at verse 3. It almost appears redundant. He said, "I constantly remember you in my prayers, night and day." With actually two different ideas here. "Constantly" has the idea of 24-7. "Night and day" has with it the idea of this is an ongoing process. Paul says, I'm consciously aware of you, and it's not just a day, it's night and day. It's forever. Timothy, I want to see you again. That's my desire. I want to be filled with joy. I remember when we parted. And that moment's never going to come, by the way.
The Missing Father Figure
"For I am mindful of the sincere faith within you, which first dwelled in your grandmother Lois, and your mother Eunice, and I am sure it was in you as well." Now, I want to stop. I don't think I need to break that apart. You see a little bit of a godly heritage there, but there is a glaring omission to me in verse 5. When you read verse 5, there is a question that ought to jump off that page at you. What's the question? Where's dad? Where's grandpa?
So I want to take just a bit of time, if I could, and talk to the men. I was in a Christian bookstore. This is exactly how this came down. I'm standing there looking at these books, minding my own business. And a lady came up to me and said, "Are you Tom Schrader?" Nothing good happens after a question like that. And I said, yes. Now, I've never seen this lady in my life. I don't think I've ever seen her again. I saw her this one moment in my life.
"Are you Tom Schrader?" Yes. "You know what's wrong with men today?" That's what she said to me. Now, I looked down and saw a wedding ring, and I thought, well, I know one guy's problem, but that's a different issue. She said, "You know what's wrong with men today?" And I said, no, I don't know what's wrong with men today. And she said, "They're wimps." And she turned and walked away.
Now, here's the deal. She's exactly right.
David's Charge to Solomon
There's a wonderful scene. You don't have to turn there, but I'll make a note of it, men. In First Kings chapter 2, verse 1, "As David's time to die drew near, he charged Solomon, his son, saying," So you get it? Another one of these death moments. David dying. Solomon's there. Here's what he says. "I'm going away of all the earth." So what's he saying there? I'm going to die. All going to die. "I'm going away of all the earth."
Here's what Dad says to his son. "Be strong, therefore, and show yourself a man." Be a man. I am absolutely convinced, with everything in me, that the country and the world we live in today is all jacked up. It's all screwed up. It's an absolute mess. And the reason is, men, godly men, haven't been men. They haven't led. They haven't
Leading as Men in Today's Culture
They haven't led in the home. They haven't led in the church. They aren't leading in the culture. I'm going to take advantage, although this is not part of it. I'm going to call this a God thing. I don't know if that's true or not, but I have some notes in here. I'm looking around, seeing a lot of younger faces.
So boys, young men, especially to you, I have some notes. We do a summer camp every year. We take about 500 junior high and high school kids over to San Diego. And we do one session where we split the boys and the girls. I like to go with the girls. I have girls. I have a girl wife. We had a girl dog. I like the girls. So this year they gave me the boys. Go talk to the boys.
I don't want to talk to the boys. I want to talk to the girls. Go talk to the boys. So here's what I said. So boys, maybe a little bit of this rubs off on you.
What It Means to Be a Man
Guys, be a man. What does that mean? Again, I know some of you are a little bit older and you've got a spouse and all this, but there's a bunch of you here who are young. Let me give you some real insights.
When it comes to girls, guys, it's really important how you act toward these girls. Here's what I observe: there's way too much hugging going on. Way too much, "Oh, how are you? Fine, how are you?" Every girl that you talk to, every girl that you date, every girl that you spend time with should be better off having spent time with you, not used and thrown away.
Now, girls, don't you let him take advantage of you. Girls, if you've got some guy saying, "Listen, I really love you, you're really special, and because I love you and you're special, we should be involved physically," let me tell you something, girls: he doesn't love you. If he loved you and you were special, he wouldn't ask you to do anything. He'd love you for who you are. He'd care for you for who you are.
A Lesson at the Mall
I took my daughters one day to the mall. They were like 14 and 12. "What are we doing, Dad?" I said, "We're going to learn something today, girls." And we're standing at the mall, and we're standing there. I said, "I want you to watch those guys." There were like three guys. I said, "Just watch them."
"This is stupid." I said, "Well, it's not stupid. We're going to do this." And here's what would happen: like two or three girls would walk by, and you could see these guys hustle, work on them, and then as they walked by, you could see the guys. You could watch them. You could watch the way they were working, what they were saying. You could imagine what they were saying to each other.
I said, "Girls, that's how a guy is. Guys are absolute scum to be avoided at all costs. They are helpful only at the time you want to breed and not until then." Girls, watch out. Guys, don't act like that. That's not a man. That's a punk.
Controlling Your Mind and Emotions
Let me tell you something too, boys: you need to get control of your mind. Our old buddy Paul says that Timothy, "Flee youthful immorality." Here's a great illustration of that: Joseph. Here's old Joseph. Here's Potiphar's wife. Here's Joseph, where Potiphar's wife's coming on to him again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again. And Joseph finally runs away.
"Oh, he was weak." No, he was smart. He couldn't take it anymore. I am so grateful that when I was a young man, there was no such thing as the Internet. Because now you got that stuff in front of you, and it's available, and it's anonymous, and it's affordable. It'll suck you in, and once you get that junk on your hard drive, guys, you can't get it off. It is so hard to deal with.
Be a man. Control your mind. Control your eyes. Here you go: control your emotions. Control it as you begin to deal with girls.
Step Up and Be Responsible
And guys, step up and be a man. I'm talking to a gal the other day that's on our 20-somethings ministry, and she's really cool, really pretty, really smart, really savvy, loves God, and no boyfriend. And I said, "You know, this just blows me away." And she said, "I'm to the point where if I could just find a guy who's not living with his mom and not selling yogurt, he's in."
Guys, look it. Suck it up and be a man. Get a job. Go to work. And work hard.
Every time we get young staff—we got a lot of young staff—there's two things we know we got to deal with. Because every young man has the same problem. One, you're really cocky. You think you know it all, and you barely know anything. Two, you have no concept of work. Work. Be a man.
Leading in the Church
Step up and lead. Step up and lead within the church. If God's got you in a high school group or a college group, you lead in that group. What does that mean? That means you look for those people who are hurting, and you go and you minister to them. It means you serve. You do the things that need to get done. God's placed you there for a reason.
Now, if I can fast forward. Men. Those of you that are men. Can I tell you we desperately need you in the church? Now I'm going to tell you where we need you. You're not going to like this. Here's where we need you, but guys, in children's ministry.
What does a third grader think when every time they come in, all they see in the room is a bunch of women? Here's what they think: Christianity's all for women. In our church, one of the strengths we have is that we have men serving all through children's ministry.
Men Making a Difference
We have a guy who is the starting right tackle on the USC football team. He's as big as this screen. And he's huge. And he works with third graders. Or three year olds. When you go in the three year old room, I'm not kidding you, there's like twelve of these boys hanging on him. And he's slamming them into this bean bag and mows them around.
Guys, lead. Christianity is not about women. It's about men. That's what that is. Do you see that? That church? Men. And you don't need a bunch of them. Men who are willing to take a stand for Christ. Take a stand for Christ at church. Take a stand for Christ at home. By the way, that does not mean me, Tarzan, you, Jane. It means
The Heart of Fatherly Love
in a loving, nurturing way. As Christ loved the church, you love your wife. You love your kids. I honestly believe this. Most parents don't love their kids. I say that. Nobody wants to argue about it. I don't know how you can argue about it. All you've got to do is look at the way you respond.
If you're out and you're going, "Why are you working so hard? I'm working so hard for my kids." I don't believe that for a second. "I'm going to give them what we never had." They don't want what you never had. They want you.
I don't care if you take them to Disneyland or Disney World. I don't care if you take them on some rafting trip. "Once a year we raft for a week." Who gives a rip? They don't need you for a week. They need you for 52. They need you to tuck them in at night. They need you to read them stories. They need you to answer questions. They need you to be at the soccer games.
The Wrong Questions
Years ago, when I was starting in business, a guy said, "You need to find somebody who's where you'd like to be and go and interview them, talk to them." So I went through this exercise and I asked the wrong questions. Go to that guy who's where you want to be in business and ask him this: How many of your kids' plays did you see last year? How many of your kids' soccer games did you see last year?
Lessons from the Basketball Court
I coached fourth and fifth grade girls basketball when my daughter Sarah was playing. So it was really an interesting experience. Our very first game, so we're getting ready. It's Friday night. We're playing the next day. So I said, "All right, girls, here we go. Tomorrow's the game, man. All right, you ready?" "Yeah, we're ready." "So we got to get out there. We got to be ready. We got to be sharp."
So I'm all jacked up. I'm ready to go. And a girl goes, "Mr. Schroeder, can I ask you a question?" "Yes." "Are we going to wear blue scrunchies or white scrunchies tomorrow?" I don't know, sweetie.
So we're about the fourth game of the year. We only lost one game in two years, by the way. And it was a game I was gone. So we're getting ready. "All right, girls. We're ready. We're going to practice a couple of times this week. We'll be ready. We're playing the orange team next week."
It's exactly what happened in the huddle. One girl said, "Which one's the orange team?" And the other girl said, "That's the team where none of the parents come to the game." You don't think they're watching?
They're Dying for Your Presence
I know, especially if you haven't been around much and it's tough. You get these high schoolers sometimes and they give you the illusion they don't want you around. They're dying for you to be in their life. They're dying for you to be at that game. They're dying for you to spend time with them.
Be a man. That's what it means to be a man. Step up and lead. Take charge. Let Him see what it means to be a follower of Christ. Not just something, not just some words, but to be engaged in their life on an ongoing basis. To let Him see you cry, to hear Him say you're sorry. To let Him see the humanity of this. To let God teach the world around you through you.
A Call to Authentic Manhood
Men, be men. We are in a jacked up, screwed up world and I can't fix that. But we're in jacked up, screwed up churches. Because men aren't... Men, get rid of the yellows and the pinks. I'm kidding about that. But just be a man, okay?
Paul says to Timothy, "Hey man, I know you got some incredible heritage. Your mom and your grandma." And then He says, "I want to kindle afresh, keep alive afresh, that gift that is in you. I want you to be strong, okay?" That's what we're going to pick up tonight when we come back.
Closing Prayer and Worship
Let me pray. I want you to stand. We're going to stand. And you are going to sing this song and just understand the God that we worship. This powerful God. He is a God who loves you and cares for you. Who saved you. Who's given you grace and mercy. So let's pray.
Father, thank you that you are an everlasting God. Thank you that you are a God who loves us. Who cares for us. Thank you for grace and mercy that brought us into right relationship with you. And then allows us to continue to be the men and women you've called us to be.
God, I especially pray for the guys in the room. That we would be strong and be men. We would be courageous in the most gentle way. I pray for these young men here, the high school students, the college students. Before they get all screwed up with the world. You would set their minds and hearts on a course that pursues you. That pleasing you and loving you would be paramount in their life. More important than a job and a house and a security is to find security in you.
And God, here's the promise we have. You'll take care of that other stuff. Not an excuse to be lazy. But an excuse to be a man. God, we thank you for that. And we praise you in Jesus' name. Amen.