Fight the Good Fight

Well, good morning. I hope that everybody got their exercise walking in the snow. Whether or not you did or didn't, I don't know. I exercise, I don't do it militantly, but I do it reasonably disciplined. Most of the time I run. I try not to do that in the wintertime outside for various reasons, like don't wanna grow an icicle farm in my lungs that's one of them. There's probably many others. For those of you who do like to run outside during the winter, then we have counseling available. Whatever else you feel you need. But I typically run in the wintertime on a treadmill. We finally got rid of our old treadmill and got a newer one and I'd like to do that 'cause I put a lot of miles on my body. It's these kind of old athlete knees and hips and back and all that stuff, and it's just a little easier on the treadmill sometimes to run than it is beating pavement, and I've pounded a lot of pavement in my life. And so we cashed in our old one and got a newer one. We had one for, I don't know 16, 17 years, whatever it was, maybe 18. And then we finally got another one. And so I can run in the wintertime in my basement, it's great. This one came with a little screen, my other one it was just like, it didn't have anything at all, it was just like a go button. And then you got on it and that was it. This one has a little screen on it, which is cool. And there's people on there and they talk to you like trainers and stuff. And it came with a one year membership to iFit. So it's awesome, because you can go, hey I wanna run in the grand canyon and you can plot to in and you can go, like I wanna run in the grand canyon. And then five minutes later, you're like, I don't wanna run in the grand canyon, I wanna run down it ,I don't wanna run up it, so get me out of here. But there's trainers that are on this and they give you a ton of information. They talk to you about your mechanics, how you're running all of that stuff. And then they give you some inspiration as well. And they tell you... And they give you perspiration also that's another side note, but they give you inspiration as well to kind of tell you things to kind of pump you up when you're struggling, which is most times, right. When you're running and those kinds of things. And it's interesting because when the trainers were saying all that they're saying, I've run with a bunch of different trainers on this particular program. And well, whether male or female, I hear some of the same themes that are coming out of them. In fact, there's some of the same themes that I heard that were coming out of athletes that I was listening to, whether it's summer Olympics or winter Olympics. I hear often some of the same themes about when they're asked, how do you keep going? How do you keep fighting? How do you keep pressing through? Well, these trainers are saying, hey, I know it's getting hard right now, we're on mile 36, just kidding I don't do that. Hey, I know know it's getting hard right now, we're on mile... We're not even on a mile, you've been running for three seconds, but I know it's getting hard right now, but how do we keep pressing on? How do we keep fighting? How do we keep pressing through? And here's what they'll continually say, you gotta know what your why is, you gotta know what your why is. And of course, for some, it depends if they're an Olympic athlete, then they may have a why that is for winning for their country or achieving a gold medal for their country. Or maybe if it's just a regular person like me or you, I'm not saying you're all regular people, but a regular person like me if you're out running or whatever, you've gotta have a why, maybe it's to just get fit or maybe you're running on somebody's behalf or maybe you're... I don't know what it is, but if you don't have one, it's really hard to kind of persevere when things get tough, if you don't really have a why. And so the same thing is true in our spiritual lives. If we don't really have a why behind what we're doing when we go through hard times, it becomes much more difficult for us. Paul was writing to Timothy as we're concluding him writing this letter called Timothy, where he is writing to Timothy in Ephesus. And when he is doing that he's actually concluding by helping Tim to understand some of the why behind what he's doing right now. See, Timothy was in a hard spot. You and I have to realize that what Timothy was trying to do in Ephesus was difficult. Paul had already outlined in chapter one, that there was a bunch of faults teaching and that it was wreaking havoc in the church. And Paul had sent Tim into Ephesus to help kind of mitigate all of that. He gave him instructions, he gave Timothy instructions about how to bring unity and order into the context of the local church. We see that in chapter two in chapter three, and he's really saying to Timothy, I'm giving you these instructions so that you know how people ought to conduct themselves in the household of God. He's not just talking about when people are in a building worshiping together. He's saying this family of God, this household of God, this is how people actually ought to conduct themselves when they exist in the household of God. But then he reminds him when we go into chapter four, he reminds Timothy hey, there are spiritual forces at work in this false teaching that want to lead people away from the truth and want to lead people away from God and the beauty of the gospel. And so I need you to stand up in opposition to that, but I want you to do so as filled with the spirit that we embrace the leadership of the holy spirit, not spirits that are at work, that we can't see, 'cause there's often more than we can see going on in the realm of the spiritual. And then we're told, hey, this is how you care for one another. This is how you show honor to one another as brothers and sisters, as family members. Pastor Jonathan, really great message last week, talking about that. And here's how we care for the vulnerable that are among us as well. This is what we have as a culture of honor, where we honor each other as brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers and all of those things, right? And then we get to chapter six and what Paul is teaching Timothy in chapter six is how to know what his why is for going through all of this hardship. Really going through what was really hell for Timothy to have to deal with that Paul knew he was going to deal with because Paul had had a revelation by the spirit that these things were actually going to transpire and take place. And so he doesn't give Timothy the why of just kind of appealing to Paul as apostle, right? You might could think Paul could just say to Timothy, hey look, I'm the apostle Paul, like thee apostle Paul. So you should be honored that I sent you into Ephesus to deal with all of this garbage that's going on in the church. And your why is just because the apostle Paul sent you. Now, that might even be viable, I might even go, hey, the apostle Paul sent me, I would be like, I'm honored. He sent me, he's seen the resurrected Jesus. I'm gonna listen to what he says, he's been commissioned by Jesus, I'm just gonna do whatever he says. And that would help me endure it to some degree. But Paul doesn't appeal to that when he talks to Timothy about out his whys for how he can endure in the midst of suffering, how he can endure in the midst of persecution, how he can endure in the midst of hardship, he doesn't appeal to that. He goes bigger, he gives him much, much grander of view of what the whys are. Now, what I'm gonna do for us is I'm gonna look in 1 Timothy six, and hopefully all of you have a Bible with you, either a hard copy or a digital copy. I want you to look in that because we're gonna continue to reference it. And you hear me say this over and over again and sometimes you even believe me that I want you to do this. I want you to do this, it's a good habit to either have a hard copy of a Bible or a digital copy so that you can look when I'm talking. Not everything I say is going to appear magically on a screen. I want you to have it in front of you because we're gonna land and we're gonna talk and we're gonna work out of this passage in 1 Timothy chapter number six. And what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna highlight three why's for us, three why's. Because what Paul's doing is he's encouraging and exhorting Timothy at the end of this letter as to how he needs to go through this hardship and how he deals with living in kind of a hard time and listen carefully, I think that every one of us, even though Paul's writing to Timothy specifically, every one of us should be exhorted to embrace the same things because we're all walking, either walking through hardship or going to walk through hardship. And we need to understand our why when we're doing it, because if we don't, we can get really, really disoriented. So Paul's going to appeal to those ideas. And I'm gonna give us three that really I'll summarize as one, but I'm gonna give us three and I'm gonna start with this one. Why Number one is the call of God. If you wanna understand what it means to walk with perseverance in difficult or hard times, you've gotta understand your first why and that is the call of God. Look at what 1 Timothy 6:11 says, "But you, man of God, flee from all this and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, and gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses." Now, the first thing that I notice about this call that is being extended to Timothy is that it's a personal call. So of all the ways that we could view this, you could say, this is a personal call. What do I mean by that? Well, you've got your copy of the word right in front of you, right? Here's what he says, he begins this way, "But you man of God." now this is a very interesting designation that Paul gives to Timothy. He says, "But you man of God," now this is a very Old Testament phrase, man of God. It's used of Kings and prophets in the Old Testament. In fact, Moses was called man of God. David, King David was called man of God. The prophet Elijah was called man of God and his kind of mentee Elijah the prophet was also called man of God. You've got four of these designations that are in the Old Testament that denote man of God and Paul chooses to use that to help Timothy understand you have been specially called for a particular task and I am referencing you in the same way that the Old Testament references some of these kings and priests and prophets that were used of God. And I'm referencing you that way because you have been called by God to do a very particular personal task, you are a man of God. But there's a secondary reason that I think he calls him man of God. You know what Timothy was? Young, he was young. This is an interesting thing for Paul to do because what he's doing in calling Timothy a man of God is he's calling him up, he's calling him up. This is so, I think this is brilliantly relevant for our day and age because too oftentimes we have young men who, they're actually living in extended adolescence. Instead of growing into godly manhood they're boys with beards. They know how to sigh our children, they just don't know how to be a father. We have women that are also in just prolonged adolescence. But there's a time where the boy and the girl need to sit down and the man and the woman of God need to stand up. Paul says, "But you man of God," Paul tells him in a different place. Don't let anyone look down on you because you're young, but set an example for the believers in life in love and faith and impurity, right? Just because you are younger in age, doesn't mean that you are condemned to stay in relative immaturity for your entire life. He's calling Timothy up and we should be calling one another up into being men and women of God, not just boys with beards. Hmm, you're welcome. It's a reminder for us all and then what he says, he says, "Man of God I want you to flee from all this." Well, what's the all this that he's supposed to flee from? Well, it tells us a few verses earlier. Look with me just a little bit up in 1 Timothy 6:3. Paul says, "If anyone teaches otherwise and does not agree to the sound instruction of our Lord Jesus Christ and to godly teaching, they are conceded and understand nothing. They have an unhealthy interest in controversies and quarrels about words that result in envy, strife, malicious talk, evil suspicions, and constant friction between people of corrupt mind who have been robbed of the truth and who think that godliness is a means to financial gain." Now here, he's talking about the problem of the false teachers that are in Ephesus that are continually dealing in speculative controversies. And as a result are causing all kinds of heartache and pain to people around them, including themselves. And they think that somehow this form of teaching and this form of godliness can be a means for them to make a whole lot of money, like that's not relevant in our day and age. There's some people that put on heirs of godliness they come on television, that are there to soak people dry. They just, just saw your seed, saw your seed, you give us a thousand dollars God's probably gonna give you a hundred thousand dollars and it just doesn't work like that. It's just not how it works. You give them a thousand dollars it means you don't a thousand dollars, he does have a thousand dollars and he's got a private jet. 'Cause he needs that. It's really important, Jesus said he really needs that. It's ridiculous. It's stupid. It's gross. It's an abomination. And what Paul is saying here is he's saying to Timothy, I want you to flee and he really, you could categorize these things he said to flee from. You could categorize them into three things. I want you to flee from heresy. In other words, I want you to flee from all of this speculative nonsense that when you press it up next to the gospel it's not that, I want you to flee from divisiveness where we're creating all of these factions and fractions in the body of Christ he said, "I want you to flee from that. And I want you to flee from greed." You don't need to be one of those people who think that godliness is a means to be able to be financially wealthy, like that you're leveraging that just to make money. He says, "You are to flee from those things," but he doesn't just tell Timothy to flee from something. He tells him to flee from something so he can pursue something, right? He says, "I want you to flee from those things so that," you've got your text with you right there, right? It's right there in front of you. You're seeing it just like I'm seeing it verse number 11. He said, "You flee from all of these things, from divisiveness and heresy and greed and you pursue righteousness," that can also be translated, justice, godliness in other words a behavior that comports with the life of God, faith because without faith we can't please him, love, that's really the fountain head of the fruit of the spirit, right. The fruit of the spirit is love and from that comes everything. Endurance, why should you pursue endurance? Because you're in the middle of a hard time and you're gonna have to persevere in the midst of this. And he says, "You are to pursue gentleness," why? Because in the correction of enemies, in the correction of those who are in opposition to the gospel, you've got to demonstrate clarity of mind and gentleness. You're not to be harsh with older men or older women as we learned in chapter five, you're to exemplify gentleness and this is also a fruit of the spirit. So he says run after these things and that formula flee these things, pursue these things, flee these things, pursue these things, Paul uses that formula often. In fact, if you look at the second letter that he wrote to Timothy after this one, he uses the exact same formula in 2 Timothy 2:22 says this, "Flee the evil desires of youth," right Timothy is young, "And pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace along with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart." Flee something, pursue something. Listen folks, some people have kind of drilled down and said the irreducible minimum of Christian life is running from everything that's bad. That's what we think this whole thing's about, flee from everything that's bad. If that's all we're doing, that feels like a really empty kind of way to live. We're not just fleeing things that are bad, we are, but we are running to something, we're running to someone. We are fleeing that which is an opposition to God and we are pursuing the very nature of who God is himself and he supplies us with all of these wonderful characteristics that are gonna bus to endure. And then he says, "Fight the good fight of the faith,," did you catch that? Fight the good fight of the faith. He didn't just say fight the good fight. People use that phrase all the time. Sometimes they just misappropriate the phrase, right? It could just be anybody, anywhere, they're doing something, right. I don't really like my boss and somebody just says, keep fighting the good fight. Okay, that's not what we're talking about. Not what this passage is talking about, right? Or we might say fight the good fight of faith. That's also not exactly what's being talked about here. Fight the good fight of the faith. In other words, what he's saying to Timothy is contend for the faith that has been handed down once for all to the saints, contend for the beauty of the gospel in the face of all of this false teaching and that word fight that's used there is in the present tense in the Greek and it means we're gonna keep on doing it. We wish it was just one knockout blow, right? It's not, the fight is ongoing, it's an ongoing struggle. So he's appealing to this call and it's a personal call for Timothy, but it's not a personal call, but we also see eternal life's call that is in this as well. And we'll see it when we look in the second part of verse number 12, it says this "Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses." It's an interesting thing here that Paul uses both the divine and the human element when he's talking about the call that's been placed on Timothy's life. When he says, "Take hold of the eternal life, to which you were called," that word call is in the divine passive. Here's what that means, it means God is the agent of the calling. God is the one who is doing the calling, but not only is he saying, God is the agent of the calling, but he's also telling Timothy to take hold of the eternal life to which he was called. So there's both a divine and a human element that is all boiled into this statement. Paul has used this idea of taking hold of that which Jesus has called us to, he's used that statement elsewhere. If you remember his letter to the church at Philippi, here's what he said in Philippians chapter three. "Not that I've already obtained all this or have already arrived at my goal, but I press on to take hold of that which Christ Jesus took hold of me. Brothers and sisters I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus." So we're reminded that God is the initiator and the author of salvation and the author of eternal life, but that we have to press in, take hold and appropriate that which he has graciously provided to us. Then he talks about Timothy's good confession. He says, "You made this call that was placed on you when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses." What's he talking about out there? Well, I think that probably he's talking about Timothy's baptism. It's possible he's talking about Timothy's commissioning or his ordination. Those could have actually happened at the same time by the way. So we're not a hundred percent sure, but the likelihood is when he is talking about in the presence of many witnesses, that he very well may be talking about Timothy's baptism. And so what happened at Timothy's baptism, he made a confession. We'll talk about it in just a second in our, kind of the next portion here. But he made a confession, he was confessing that which he believed. And you know what Paul's doing right now? Paul's saying, hey I know you're walking through a hard time, but I wanna remind you of the call, the call that you have to live in light of eternity, the call to eternal life. Eternal life doesn't start when we die people, starts when we meet Jesus, he is eternal life. So I'm living the eternal kind of life right now. And I will experience an eternal kind of life when I die. Eternal life is not just about... Listen to this, eternal life is not just about duration, it's about quality. It's a kind of life that we lead and Jesus himself is life, Jesus himself is eternal life. We live an eternal kind of life when we put our faith in him, we were already experiencing eternal life that will just simply transcend the grave and will last forever. That's a beautiful picture and a reminder and it's all because of Jesus. But he says this life that he has called you to, when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses. Paul is saying hey Timothy, do you remember what you confessed to saying you believed about Jesus, live like that, live like that. Sometimes we just need to be reminded, don't we? Sometimes we just need to be reminded of what it is that we say we believe because too often we don't, we just don't live like it. That's why we need brothers and sisters in our lives who can actually share the gospel with us. We need to preach the gospel to ourselves, we need to speak the gospel to our brothers and sisters, we need to have the gospel spoken to us. Why? Because we need it. Basically, the Bible is a ministry of reminding. We're always being remind of the truth that we say that we believe, but sometimes we're not living into the truth that we say we believe and Paul is saying to Timothy, you remember all those things that you confessed about who Jesus is? You remember all those things that you confessed about who God is? You better lean into that now, because this is the call that's been placed on your life. And things are hard, life is difficult, this is really challenging, you need to believe what you say you believe. Brothers and sisters that's what we need to do too. Because when we got in a baptistry, like we saw earlier today with this precious middle school girl who wrote out her testimony, that was beautiful and brilliant and deep, the middle school girl, let's go. That was awesome. That wasn't a girl, that was a young woman who was talking about her life of faith in Jesus Christ, that was brilliant. And I'm listening to that and I'm thinking to myself, you know what, there's gonna come a time in her life, just like there's a time in my life. There's gonna come times in all of our lives when somebody's gonna have to say, hey do you remember what you confessed to believing about Jesus? Do you remember what you confessed to believing about who he is and what he's done?" You need to live into that because when we go through stuff, when we go through a hardship, we need to be able to live in to that which we have been called to believe. Why number one is the call of God. Why two, Why number two is the gospel of God. I'm gonna show you that as we progress through this text, but I want you to look in verse 13 through the beginning part of verse 15. Paul writes to Timothy, "In the side of God who gives life to everything and of Christ Jesus who while testifying before Pontius Pilate made the good confession, there it is again, isn't that interesting? I charge you to keep this command without spot or blame until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which God will bring about in his own time. You see, what we see here is that first of all, he charges Paul in the sight of God and of Christ Jesus. Let me just say this to all of us brothers and sisters please listen to me. Everything that we do, everything is in the sight of God, everything, everything we think, everything we do, every decision we make, it's all in the sight of God. Paul adds like a little... Kind of a little dash of seriousness here in this charge to Timothy when he says everything is in the sight of God. And I'm charging you with this charge, this exertation because I want you to understand that everything you do Timothy, God sees. Now, you know what? Some of you think about that and you go, that's kind of scary, maybe a little bit, it can be sobering for us, right? That God sees, but you know what else it is? Incredibly comforting 'cause you're going through hardship, you're standing in defense of the gospel, you're walking with Jesus and walking out the truth, but people are all over you about it. People are getting all sideways about everything in their world, they're getting so political, they've lost side of the gospel, they're making decisions around people that are influencing their lives, that are talking heads on TV more than the word of God. They make decisions that they defend by talking, talking points about their favorite person on the right or the left, but can't defend what they're doing in the word of God. And all this is happening to you, I want you to know something. I see you. I see you. I know what you're doing. I see you. I know it's hard. I see you. I know you're having a difficult time where you are, I see you. It's a comfort as well. It's both a seriousness and a sobriety and a comfort that nothing is hidden in the sight of God. But then he talks about Jesus good confession. That's kind of sub-point A, if you wanted to put it down, Jesus good confession, right? He says it right here, he says, "In the side of God who gives life to everything and of Christ Jesus who while testifying before Pontius Pilate made the good confession," he made the good confession. Now what was this all about? He did this before Pontius Pilate. He's talking about Jesus made the good confession. What is he talking about? Well, we'd have to go back into the gospels to see Jesus talking to Pontius Pilate, right? In John 18, let's pick up on that conversation. "Pilate went back inside the palace and he summoned Jesus and he asked him, 'Are you the king of the Jews? Is that your own idea,' Jesus asked, 'Or did others talk to you about me?' 'Am I a Jew?' Pilot replied, 'Your own people and chief priest handed you over to me. What is it you have done?' Jesus said, 'My kingdom is not of this world. If it were my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jewish leaders. But now my kingdom is from another place.' 'You are a king then', said Palate. Jesus answered 'You say that I'm a king. In fact the reason I was born and came into the world is to testify to the truth. Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.'" You see, within this conversation that Jesus had with Pilate, Jesus made a confession. And do you know what his confession was? I'm the king, I have a kingdom, I am the Messiah that the Jews have been looking for. I am Lord. I am the truth. Jesus highlighted all of these things in his confession. I'm the king. I'm the Messiah. I'm the Lord. I'm the truth. And now we are told here Paul says to Timothy, just like Jesus made his confession remember your confession or maybe we could call it our good confession if you wanted to write that down, our good confession. Because back up in chapter 12, I'm sorry verse number 12 he says, Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses." Then he talks about Jesus making the good confession in front of Pilate. Jesus made the good confession. I am the king. I am Lord. I am Messiah. I am the truth. And so what was Timothy doing when he at his baptism, what was he confessing? That Jesus is the king and Caesar is not. Jesus is Lord, Caesar is not. Jesus is the Messiah that all Israel has been hoping for. And Jesus is truth when all the rest of the world is chaos, this is what Timothy was confessing likely at his baptism. Sometimes we need to be reminded of those truths because if we just believe those things, it would enable us to be able to endure. All of a sudden, we have a different way of looking at the life that we're leading and what we're doing, we just forget sometimes that Jesus is king. We forget that he's Lord. We forget that he's over everything, like he's over everything. We forget sometimes that he's the truth. We're so spun up, right? What's the truth? I'm getting all of this and getting this and getting this, go to Jesus he's the truth. He is the truth he said, "I am the way the truth and the life." He is the truth not a truth, not one way to the truth, He is truth, period. That's what we need to be able to embrace and come back to, that's the confession that Timothy was making likely at his baptism. That's what we need to be reminded about. Sometimes we need to go to somebody and say, hey, do you remember when you got baptized? This is what you confessed. And you need to live into that unless of course you've not been baptized. And if you haven't been baptized, is it because you don't have anything to confess? Because the early church I'm being honest, the early church didn't know anything about unbaptized believers. This is how they walked into the church, this is how they made their public commitment in the church. They were baptized, not because it's a religious ritual because Jesus commanded it. Go into all the world, preach the gospel, baptize them in the name of the father, son and holy spirit, teach them to observe everything that I've commanded them. Why did Jesus give us that? Because we are to identify with his death, his burial and his resurrection. So this is a command of Jesus, this isn't just some religious ritual of the church. Some of you may need to be baptized if you have a confession of faith, right? If you can genuinely confess your faith in Jesus Christ, but some have maybe held off on being baptized because they really don't have anything to confess. Right now it's just about coming to church and taking it in and you're a good friend to it. Like you're a good neighbor to it. No, you're really receptive to it, but you're not sure if you really wanna confess that Jesus is king, Jesus is Lord, Jesus is Messiah, Jesus is the truth because that makes a claim on your life. And you're gonna testify to that in front of everybody, just like this middle school girl. This middle school girl who confessed this in front of their entire church. If you need to be baptized because you can make a confession of that faith, you should. Jesus said so, you're welcome. The truth is that confession of truth, confession of the gospel, confession of Jesus as who he is, this is just routine in the New Testament. Do you remember when Philip ended up coming up on the Ethiopian eunuch and the Ethiopia eunuch is reading out of the scroll of Isaiah and Philip says, hey, do you know what this means? And he's like, I don't, unless somebody really explains it to me and Philip went, I'm your guy. It's not really in the text, but that's kind of what he said, I'm your guy. And so he takes that passage and says, this is actually talking about Jesus. And he unpacks Isaiah for him so that he understands who Jesus is. And then he realizes that Jesus has taught that we must be baptized to identify with him and identify with his people. And then here's how the conversation went. "Philip said, 'If you believe with all your heart, you can be baptized.' And the eunuch answered, 'I believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God." You know what that was? A good confession. That's his good confession. Do you know when Paul was writing to the church at Rome, Rome like where the emperor lives, right? Where the emperor hangs out and lives, where when you say that the emperor isn't divine and the emperor isn't God and the emperor isn't Lord, because it's inscribed on their coins. Caesar the son of God is inscribed on their coins. And for you to make a confession that Caesar's not Lord but Jesus is, this is serious, but this is also how we are saved because of our belief. Listen to what Paul wrote to the Roman church. He said, "If you declare with your mouth Jesus is Lord" not Caesar "And believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead you will be saved." What is that? It's a good confession. That's what it is, a good confession. And it's not just in our head. See, we look at that and we go, okay, I'll say that because you don't think there's any real ramifications. If they confess this and they are baptized, they can get their heads chopped off. This was Rome. This isn't just about saying something as some kind of religious exercise this is the submission of our life to the truth of who Jesus is. He is Lord. He is king. He is truth. And I confess that whatever the cost may be, that's what this is talking about. Paul's reminding Timothy of that confession, He's reminding him of the gospel, the good news, because Paul is telling Timothy to fight the good fight of the faith without he says, "Without spot or blame until the appearing of our Lord, Jesus Christ." Some of you are going okay, so I'm supposed to endure and fight this good fight for the faith until Jesus returns. Can you help me out? When is Jesus going to return? Yes, I can help you out. Paul said it very emphatically in the text, "In God's own time." There it is. You don't need a map for that. You don't need a compass, it's in God's own time. Yeah, but can you tell me something more specific? Yes, God will do this in his own time. That's as specific as I wanna get. That's how specific Paul got, are there things that are gonna lead up to that, that we read about in the New Testament, absolutely. But this is ultimately going to be in God's perfect timing Jesus is going to come. And so listen, when we live in light of that, when we live in light of the return of Jesus, that should actually allow us to endure in hardship, to keep fighting the good fight of the faith. The gospel actually gives us that kind of raw material to be able to do it because God saw that our entire world was helpless and lost. Everyone has sinned and come short of the glory of God. But God in his grace sent his son who was born of a Virgin who lived a sinless life. And the sinless one went to a cross on behalf of the sinful ones like me and you to absorb the wrath of God against sin, which God in his holiness and in his justice must do. And Jesus took our place on that cross absorbing the wrath of God, standing in a our place. And then he rose from the grave on the third day, demonstrating that his sacrifice was sufficient an offering to God because only a sinless substitute could accomplish what has been accomplished on our behalf. And only Jesus fits that bill. And now by faith in him, we can be reconciled to God, our sins can be forgiven because of what Jesus has paid for on the cross, through his death and his resurrection. And now Jesus didn't just resurrect and hang out. He ascended back to the father where he is at the right hand of God ever interceding for you. Do you know that Jesus is praying for you, Jesus wants to use you, Jesus wants to fill your life so that you can be used by him in the world. And Jesus has also promised that he is going to return when? in God's own time but until that time, because of all that Jesus has accomplished, which the gospel of God communicates to us, we should be motivated to enjoy Jesus and to join God on his mission in the world of seeing every man, every woman, every child come and be reconciled to God through Jesus Christ. Listen, if you need more motivation than that, I don't know what to tell you. I don't know what to give you. If you need more motivation than that, I don't know what else to tell you. The interesting thing is though Paul is encouraging and pumping Tim with encouragement here. He actually gives him one more why. Not only the call of God and the gospel of God, but it's actually, he talks about the nature of God. This is another motivation, another reason. Look in verses, kind of second part of verse 15 and 16, he says, "God, the blessed and only ruler, the king of Kings and the Lord of Lord." Do you see what he's doing here? He's talking about... What this is right here. Just leave this up for a second. Do you know what this is? Paul's just exploding into a doxology. You know what a doxology is? It's a short hymn of worship. He does this from time to time in his writing. He just like he's writing along and then he just explodes. Boom, I just gotta talk, I just gotta magnify God. I've just got to magnify God. And then he starts talking about the nature of God, God the blessed and only ruler. Do you know what that means? The blessed and only ruler? It means that He, God is the Supreme authority over this universe and every universe that exists in all the universe, he is the supreme authority and sovereign over all of it. Then to clarify that a little bit more. He said, he's also the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. That designation is given to God the father and is given to the son as well. And that means that regardless of how many people there are, that are leading in different countries and different places who have authority and power as Kings or prime ministers or presidents or whatever. Jesus is the king over all of them. He's the president over all of them. He's the prime minister over all of them. He's the Lord over all of them. There will never be another figure anywhere in the entire universe that will not be subject to King Jesus. And he says he alone is immortal. Do you know what that means? That means that God is the only self existent being in the entire cosmos. And he is not subject to the permanency of death. He is immortal in and of himself because he is self existent. No other being is self existent. Every other being is dependent, God is self existent and immortal. The permanency of death cannot touch him and he lives an unapproachable light. The glory of God is so radiant that it is meta physically impossible for a human being to come into that radiance. It is not only meta physically impossible to approach that radiance. It is morally impossible to approach that glorified radiance, thank God for Jesus.

- [Man] Amen.

- Because all of us would have burned up like staring in the sun at the holiness of God in our own filth and grim. But Jesus, God the son, the perfect sinless one has now given us the opportunity to enter into the throne room of the one who in our own merit is unapproachable, but that we can approach only in and through the beauty and the glory of Jesus. And then it says, "Whom no one has seen or can see. To him be honor." In other words, he is the only being in the cosmos. God, God the father, God the son, God the holy spirit that is worthy of our worship, worthy of our very lives. He says, "To him be honor and might forever." Might forever means that he is sovereignly powerful enough to obviously do anything that he wants to do. He will thwart the power of evil, but his plan will never be thwarted and he will accomplish that which he has promised to do. This is the glory of what he's talking about here. These are the whys, the call of God, the gospel of God, the nature of God. Imagine being Timothy and being pumped up with encouragement to fight the good fight of the faith. Because we can be encouraged by this as well. Ultimately, you know what Paul's saying to Timothy, if I summarized it in one statement, it would be this, God is your why. Timothy, God is your why. But if you wanted to break that out a little bit, based on the text that we've been talking about, say it this way, "You can keep fighting the good fight of the faith," you. Timothy yes and you, "You can keep fighting the good fight of the faith." Here's why, "Because God called you, because Jesus is king and because God is sovereign," that's what we just unpacked in this text. You can keep fighting the good fight of the faith because God called you, Jesus is king and God is sovereign. So let me break that down for you before you walk out. Whatever you're facing, God is your why, whatever it is, God is your why. I mean, I was looking over in the first worship gathering over here with a lady who is completely bald going through chemo. Who's just has her hands up worshiping God and trusting and trying to live into what she believes because she's in a really hard place. Her family who's having to take care of a daughter and a granddaughter who's sitting in this room right now in a difficult place. I look all across the room and I see all kinds of difficult places and difficult stories all over the place. Maybe the place that you're living in right now is lonely, maybe it's just hard, maybe it has to do with work, maybe it has to do with family. Here's what I need you to remember. God called you to eternal life, so take hold of that life. Take hold of that. Stop living like this is all there is, stop living like your present circumstance defines everything about you. Our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us a glory that we can't imagine. Paul said this in Romans, Paul said this, I consider that our presence sufferings are not worth comparing to the glory that will be revealed in us. You see my brothers and sisters beloved of God, we sometimes live so focus on only the temporary and the here and now that we don't think about living life in light of eternity. When we live in light of eternity, we steward our lives differently, we steward our resources differently, we steward our relationships differently, we steward our priorities differently because we're living in light of eternity, not just in the temporary. Maybe you're... By the way, when we live in light of eternity, what have we to fear? Why are we so freaked out all the time? You do know that that's exactly how politicians raise money. They raise money on anger and fear. That's how they do it, it's in the playbook. That's what they do, I know these things, I've talked to them. They appeal to your anger and your fear. Listen my brothers and sisters, we're not made to live by fear. That's not how we're made to live. We're made to live by faith. Life can be hard, life can be scary, life can be shaking at times, but we're not meant to just live in a constant fear and terror, that's not who we are. That's not who Jesus made us to be. That's not how we are to live as people of faith. Well, what do you have to fear? Right? We don't, guess what? We're all going to die. I don't know when, I hope it's not soon, but we're all going to, and then what if I know Jesus, I'm with him. what am I whining about? Jesus has made us to have the ability to live now the immortality that only he can give, he's done that for us. Death no longer has the last word in our lives. So make the life that we lead now one that demonstrates that we're living in light of eternity and not just for now. 'Cause so many times we're just spun up about everything that's going on in the world. Ahh! When Jesus was talking to his disciples in Matthew chapter 24, and they're like, could you tell us about the end of the age and the signs of the end of the age? And you could just hear it, they're spinning out. Ahh! I'm gonna translate this for you, here's what Jesus says. Stop freaking out, stop freaking out. There's gonna be some things that are gonna happen just know them, but stop freaking out. It's really unbecoming for the people of Jesus, because it signifies that we don't trust the king who has an unshakable kingdom who sovereign over all of this. Maybe you're upset at the events in the world. Maybe you're upset with world leaders or national leaders. Remember this, Jesus is king.

- [Man] Amen.

- Jesus is the truth. Leaders will come and leaders will go and Jesus remains. So you can keep fighting the good fight of the faith because you're never going to be embarrassed by Jesus. You're never gonna go, why did I vote for him? You'll never do that with Jesus, never. He has an unshakable kingdom. Maybe your health is in a bad spot. Maybe you've been hurt or you've been abused and you feel like the people who did it got away with it. Maybe you're concerned and scared about the world that your kids and your grandkids are inheriting. I want you to remember something. God is sovereign, nothing gets by him, no evil even if they thought they got away with it, I promise you, they didn't, nothing escapes the sight of God. Nothing will thwart his plan, He will thwart evil, but nothing will thwart his plan. And in God's own time, Jesus will appear. And with him, he will bring judgment against evil and he will bring in vindication for his church and he will usher in new creation. So until that time, keep reminding yourself of the why, God is your why in the midst of hardship and difficulty. So live like that. Let's bow our heads together. Dismissing you in just a moment. Thank you for your kindness of listening. If you're here and you've never before received Jesus, you've never confessed that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father. You've never been born from above, you've never been transformed by his spirit. Then there's not a bigger issue for you than that. And I pray the spirit of God would draw you to himself. What I'd ask you to do if that's going on in your heart, that when we dismiss in just a moment, you'll come right across the atrium if you're here in this room or in the east worship center, just come right across the atrium. There's some folks in there in the fireside room who'd love to take just a moment and talk to you about what new life in Jesus looks like, to pray for you, to send you home with something that's gonna help you in your journey of faith. I'm not trying to cajole you into this or manipulate you into this. If I can talk you into it, somebody else could talk you out of it. But if God is doing this in your heart, don't harden your heart to him, respond, seek his forgiveness, seek to know him personally. We would love to see you there. If you're watching online, of course you can go to the chapel.com/knowingjesus and we'd love to connect you, connect with you in that way. Father, you've said so much to us over the course of these weeks and even here in this last message in this series, 1 Timothy, you've said so much by your spirit. And I pray today that we would remember the why of everything that we do in good times and in hardship. Everything is about you. Our lives are to simply be centered on you, submitted to you for your purposes. And I pray Father in the name of Jesus that you would do your good purposes in every single one of our hearts and in every single one of our lives so that we might bring you glory. And so that every man, woman, and child around us might hear and see the beauty of the gospel of Jesus Christ. You are our why, help us to live like that by the power of your spirit, I ask in Jesus name. Amen.