Timothy's Thoughts

W e’ve often heard the phrase “let no man despise thy you” but I Timothy 4:12-16 says more than that. The opposite of letting people despise his youth that Paul gives Timothy is to be an example. We often pull this verse out when we want to tell young people that they can have a place of service too, but I think it may be telling us more than that. It would be wrong to assume that people would despise Timothy’s youth simply because he was young. It may be instead that they would despise his youth because he was immature. I look at some of the teenagers I know and some of them are very immature. That is to be expected, since they are teenagers, but some of them grow up into their twenties and even thirties with no indication that they are ever going to take on the responsibilities of life. I look at other teenagers and you can already see that they have it together. They aren’t waiting until they are officially crowned adults before they take responsibility for their own lives and be...

P aul warns Timothy in I Timothy 4:1-11 that some would leave the faith and listen to spirits and devils instead. There are a lot of people who put a great deal of emphasis on what they feel the Holy Spirit is leading them to do. While that sounds spiritual and close to God, the problem is that many of these people can’t tell the difference between what the Holy Spirit is telling them to do and what some other spirit is telling them to do. The Holy Spirit isn’t the only spirit that can influence people and some spirits have lead people astray. Notice what Paul says some of these spirits are leading people to do, “forbidding to marry and commanding to abstain from meats which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving.” There are some denominations that will not allow the leaders of their churches to marry. That doctrine is of Satan and not of God. As for eating various kinds of meats, Paul says that it’s all good if we’ve been saved. Paul tells Timothy to put the brethren i...

C hapter 3 of I Timothy ( I Timothy 3 ) deals with the qualifications of pastors and deacons. Just prior to this, Paul wrote about some differences between men and women, so in context it is safe to assume that when he begins with the statement, “This is a true saying: If a man desire the office of bishop, he desireth a good work,” Paul is still using the word man to refer to the male gender, not to refer to any human. In looking at the preceding chapters, we have already seen that Paul is calling for men to lead in the church, so we need not discuss that women are not to be preachers more than that. Aside from the differences between the qualifications of a pastor and that of a deacon, such as pastors aren’t to drink wine while deacons can drink in moderation, we can summarize these two lists by saying that when considering a man for either of those positions we should examine his personal life. If he doesn’t rule his own house well, we shouldn’t be surprised when he can’t lead the...

A lot of people don’t like I Timothy 2:12-15 because it begins, “But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.” Of course, there’s a lot of discussion about whether this passage is referring to a woman teaching any man or just her husband. And we might also ask whether a woman should be teaching at all. Based on other passages, we know that this isn’t talking about women not teaching at all. In Titus 2, Paul instructs the older women to teach the younger women, so it is clear that women are to teach. The issue people find the most sticky has to do with who women aren’t to teach and just what we mean by teaching. At the very least, women aren’t to teach or usurp authority over their husbands, but does that mean that she can’t tell her husband anything for fear she might teach him something? That would be silly. Given the context, I think this passage has more to do with authoritative teaching within the church. It has a similar context...

I n I Timothy 1:18-I Timothy 2:11 Paul writes concerning not getting away from holding faith and a good conscience. He warns Timothy of the potential of becoming shipwrecked in that way and give the example of Hymenaeus and Alexander. But rather than allowing himself to become shipwrecked also, Paul tells Timothy how to avoid it. His first instruction is prayer be made for all men. He mentions supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks. These are all types of what we would call prayer. Paul makes special mention of government leaders. When we pray it doesn’t always seem like we’re doing that much, but prayer should be a priority. It should come first. Prayer for all men will help us to have a quiet and peaceable life, but it is clearly something God wants us to do. Paul points out that God wants all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. If for no other reason, we should be praying for other people because God wants them to be saved. I don’t th...

A s Paul continues his first letter to Timothy ( I Timothy 1:12-17 ) he marvels at how the Lord put him in the ministry. We don’t think about that enough. We’re all in the same boat. It’s easy for us to think that we’re something special because we’re actually doing the work that God has called us to do while other people aren’t doing what they should. But we read what Paul is saying here and he is amazed that God would count him faithful and put him in the ministry. Think about this. If you owned a business and you found out that one of your employees was taking money from the cash register, would you trust that employee to carry your money to the bank? Would you even let that employee do anything other than maybe stock shelves? It isn’t likely. And yet, God has take those of us who have sinned against him and are worthy of punishment, and he has put us in the ministry. Look at what happened with the angels. Those who sinned were thrown out of heaven. God could have used the faithfu...

P aul begins his first letter to Timothy ( I Timothy 1:1-11 ) with a reminder of why he left Timothy at Ephesus. Paul had gone off to do other things, but he wanted someone to stay behind to teach the Christians at Ephesus sound doctrine. Paul is asking Timothy to continue to do what Paul had asked him to do. In much of the rest of the letter, we learn what Paul believes is sound doctrine. Paul encourages Timothy to avoid fables and endless genealogies that promote questions. So often, people come up with some of the strangest things. They’ll tell stories about something they saw or something they heard and then try to make some kind of doctrinal sense out of it. Someone will think they’ve seen an angel or they’ll have heard someone talking about the end of the world on television or who knows what and then they have to bring it up and ask questions about. It is easy to get drawn into trying understand whatever it is and then trying to answer the questions, but in the end it does lit...