Suffer to Preserve the Gospel

Well, good evening. It is indeed a delight to be here with you again. I am here with my wife, who does not want me to single her out right now, so I'll have her stand so you can say hello to missus Bridget. And we are here this week to find accommodation for our family. We return home on Tuesday, hopefully having acquired a Lusaka address, and then we come back with the whole team at the end of August to make this our new home. So please pray for us as we go through all that that entails. If you have your Bibles with you tonight, open them to Siwo Timothy. And as you open to Second Timothy. If you know your Bible, you know that Two Timothy is one of the pastoral epistles. And oftentimes when we think about the pastoral epistles, we think in this way. We think of the pastoral epistles that's for people in ministry. Sermons from the pastoral epist epistles are sermons for people in ministry. And oftentimes we think of ourselves as as the sort of the sort of end user. The church exists for two different groups of people. One is a group of people who are in the ministry who are called of God, and they see the church one way, and and they serve the church one way. But the other is the the end user, uh, the Christian in the pew, who, if not careful, gets the idea that the Church exists for me. The Church exists so that I can have my needs met. The Church exists so that I can be satisfied. The Church exists so that I can be taken care of. And so there are those people whom God calls to serve me, feed me, minister to me, take care of me. And then there are the people like me whose job is to make sure that they serve us properly, and that they feed us properly, and that they care for us properly. If we're not careful, this is the way we divide the body of Christ. And so we think that certain things in the pastoral epistles then become irrelevant to us. And I would argue that thinking like that makes us irrelevant to the church. It makes us useless to the kingdom because we have missed the entire goal, missed the very reason for which Christ laid down his life. Jesus did not die so that some people could give their lives to him in service of the advancement of his kingdom, and others could sit and soak it up. If you can't say amen, yours a arch this is not the fullness of the reward for which Christ died. No Christians should ever see him or herself as the end user. No Christians should ever see him or herself as the served. No Christian should ever view the Church as something that exists so that we can merely have our desires and needs met. But instead we must all realize, recognize, and understand that God is still about the business of expanding his kingdom, and that every member of this kingdom has a role to play in that expansion. When we think this way, we don't view the pastoral epistles the same. We don't listen to messages from the pastoral epistles that talk about elders and pastors and preaching and so on and so forth and say, oh, I can check out because this one has nothing to do with me. We recognize that this is equipping us to understand why it is that we are who we are, and whose we are and where we are as followers of Christ. And so as we look here at two Timothy, I want to do a couple of things. I want first to give you a sense of this letter, and then upon giving you a sense of this letter, will look at our our key verses here, which is really just there's just one key verse here that well, that we'll look at and expound upon in light of the nature of the entire book, and in expounding upon that, give us a field and a view of what it is that God is doing in and through his kingdom. What it is that we have the privilege of being a part of the verse that we'll look at is really chapter one, verse eight, or Paul says to Timothy, Therefore, do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the Gospel by the power of God. Amen. In order to understand this, we need to understand this particular letter. This is one of the last letters that Paul would write. He writes it at the end of his ministry, and at the end of his life. He is in prison in Rome. He is in prison again. He is what you call a repeat offender, okay, but he knows that this time will likely be his last. How do we know that well, at the end of the letter, if you'll turn over to chapter four, there is this famous passage here in chapter four, beginning of their verse six, for I am already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time of my departure has come. There is no doubt in Paul's mind that he is at the end of his life. But go down a few more verses and look at verse nine. We often miss this one. Do your best to come to me soon. So he's writing to his young protege, and he's saying to his young protegee, I am at the end of my life, and do your best to come to me soon. He gives further instructions, and will look at those instructions momentarily, but for now understand that this is what Paul is doing. He's writing towards the end of his life to a young man whom he has mentored and discipled in the faith, to a young man whom he is calling to continue on in the faith. There are two main themes in this letter, and they are interrelated. They are sort of one and one A thing. Number one is preserve and proclaim the Gospel as it was presented. Preserve and proclaim the Gospel as it was presented in every chapter. We see an allusion to this in verse eight. Therefore, do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner. Look down in verse thirteen. Follow the pattern of sound words that you have heard from me in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus verse fourteen. By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you. Look with me. In Chapter two, You, then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus, and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, in trust of faithful men who will be able to teach others. Also in chapter three, verse fourteen. But as for you, continue and what you have learned and have firmly believe, knowing from whom you learned it, and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. All scriptures breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, reproof for correction, for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete equipped for every good work, and write on in the chapter four, verse one, I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ, Jesus was to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom, preach the word. Be ready in season out of season, reprove, rebuke, exhort with complete patience and teaching. In every chapter of this letter, there is this urgency that Paul has that Timothy would preserve and proclaim the Gospel. But why this urgency. Understand that there is no new Testament at this timestand that the apostles are the bearers of this message, and that they are being killed off one by one. Understand that Paul knows that his life is going to come to an end. And it has been said and rightly so, that Christianity is always within one generation of extinction in any culture. If you don't believe me, just take a trip through Europe and look at the great cathedrals that used to be packed with faithful Christians listening to the Word of God thundered by some of the greatest preachers in history, that now have been turned into museums where your voice will echo off of empty walls. Were on the Lord's dead. In many European cultures, less than five percent of the population goes to church, and most of the churches that they go to are absolutely apostate, while mosques are filled to the brim with faithful worshipers. And that's with the New Testament. Imagine what Paul and his fellow apostles would have feared as they came to the end of their lives, knowing already the problems that existed. I always laugh when people say, you know what we really need to do, is we really need to go back and be like New Testament churches, really like corinth Amen, that was a New Testament church saints. So before we get on nostalgic about New Testament churches, as though somehow they were so much better than we are, go back and read some of the things that had to be said to some first century churches. It was already apostasy and heresy. And now as the apostles are coming toward the end of their lives, they must have feared the worst. So as he came to the end of his life, he writes to his young protege, urging him, pleading with him to preserve and to proclaim this gospel and to find other men, faithful men who would also preserve and proclaim the thoughtful. This is his message. But there is another part to his message. There's something else that you find in every chapter in two Timothy as well. Look with me if you will, at the second half of verse eight. But share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God verse twelve, which is why I suffer as I do two verse three. Share in suffering as a good soldier in Christ Jesus. Chapter three, you're getting of verse ten. You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness, my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, at Listra, which persecutions I endured. Yet from them all the Lord rescued me. Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. You know, it's amazing how often Christians asked the question that has just been answered. Pastor, I just don't understand what don't you understand. I just don't understand why as a faithful Christian I can have to endure something like this. But the people out there who are perverting the Gospel and not even standing in the truth that they're just going they're just I'll finished the sentence for you proceeding from bad to worst? Are you really asking me that? Because if you're asking me that question, you asked me, pastor, why why are things happening just like the Apostles said they would happen? Maybe because they wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Amen. The next time somebody asks me why the Apostate churches have all the TV channels covered, I point right here to this verse. Why would God allow to Don't ask your pastor that anymore. It's been answered. Amen. Look at the next part of this. Go down to chapter four, Chapter four, verse five. Ask for you always be sober minded, endure suffering, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. So the first thing we see in every chapter is this emphasis on preserving and proclaiming the truth of the Gospel as it has been presented by the Apostles, And the second thing that goes it is endure the suffering that will follow as an inevitable result of doing the first. This answers a question that I've often had about this epistle. I've often wondered, why is it you know, if I'm in the first century, and I'm an apostle, and i know what's been happening with the other apostles, and Paul was in touch with the other apostles, he went up if you regulations won, and you regulations too. He went up on a number of occasions to the rest of the apostles in order to communicate to them the gospel that he had been preaching, so that he knew from them that he was running faithfully. By the way, there's something to be said for that, this idea of preserving and proclaiming the gospel. There are so many individuals who want to go preserve and proclaim the Gospel as they understand it, without being under anyone else's authority. When the apostle, Paul himself went to the other apostles to make sure that they checked him to see that he was preaching rightly. But you don't need authority, God help us. We all need to be checked, amen. We all need to be checked. And so if I'm in connection with the other apostles, and i know what God has been doing, and I'm in prison and I believe I'm about to die, I also write a letter just like Paul. But my letter goes something like this. Paul called to be an apostle. Da da da da da dah. You know the rest, do this one thing for me. You remember when Peter was in jail and there was a prayer meeting and the angel came and got him out. Go get those brothers, get them together again, and tell them to pray that same prayer. So that I that's my letter, but that's not the letter Paul wrote. But why if you are a father, If you're a father, you'll get this if you're a father, and and I know this is this is this is different from in some parts of the world. But as a father, oftentimes we have little disagreements with our wives over how firm we need to be with our sons. And oftentimes our wives want to say, but he's just a little boy, and we want to say to them, but he won't always be. And there are times and I'm not saying, oh, you're a man, and men don't bribe. I'll cry before any man in this room. Mike Robert Forum finished a third of that. That's not horrible, but there are times when as farms we had to teach our sons not to fall apart, and especially as they grow up, every once in a while we have to look at them and say, son, there is going to come a day when you will be the head of a family and everyone will be looking to you, and difficulty will come, and in that moment you need to hold your head up and not crumble. Today is when you start practicing that. You see, what good would it have done for Paul to say to young Timody, who, according to Chapter one, struggled with being timid and fearful. What good would it have done for Paul to say, they are about to kill me for preaching the gospel. And what I want you to do after they kill me for preaching the gospel is preach the gospel that they're killing me for. But you need to know, I'm so scared. No, he couldn't do that, not when his intention was to strengthen the hand of this young pastor who struggled with fear. Already he had to face death, and that's exactly what he does in this epistle, and he does not flinch once. Essentially, he says, they are about to kill me. I know they are about to kill me, and I know why they're gonna kill me, because I'm preaching the Gospel. And when they do, I want you to preach the gospel and don't stop preaching the gospel. And I want you to prepare other men to preach the gospel so that when they kill you for preaching the gospel, someone else will be alive to preach the gospel. And you teach them to teach others to preach the gospel so that when they get killed for preaching the gospel, someone else will be alive to preach the gospel. Because the Gospel is far more important than your life. In fact, the Gospel is your life, and the proclamation and propagation of this Gospel is your life. And not just if you're called to preach, but if you have been redeemed by Jesus Christ. The Gospel is your life, and the propagation and preservation of the Gospel is your life. Why Because if Christ is your all in all, your greatest desire is for Christ to have the fullness of the reward for which he died. Not just that you will be comfortable, but it is your great passion and desire that the Gospel go forth in power, and that it go forth in truth. But how do you do that? Look at verse eight. Therefore, do not be ashamed of the testimony about the Lord there's the gospel message, nor of me his prisoner. But share in suffering. How do you do this? How do you do this? Share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, In suffering for the Gospel by the power of God. I've often said to young ministers, and oftentimes you hear people who are going into ministry and interget. They'll say, and I have a passion for people. I have a heart for people, and I want to serve people. And it's because I love people. Or you want to go to this place because you love these people. You even go to that place because you love those people. And always, always, at that point, I have a caution, do not go into ministry because of people, because you won't stay Amen, somebody, We don't go into the ministry proclaim the gospel because we love people. We do it because we love the gospel. Why is this important. Interestingly enough, as you read this letter, in almost every chapter there is a point at which Paul makes it clear that he is enduring pain and heartache and suffering because of people, and not just because of people out there, because of people in here. The worst pain a gospel minister ever has to endure is from the people whom he serves. Rarely is the greatest pain that a minister of the gospel experiences. Rarely is his greatest pain inflicted upon him by unbelievers. Usually, the greatest pain he experiences and endures is from the people whom he serves. And Paul was no different. Look at chapter one and verse sixteen. You are aware that all who are in Asia turned away from me. You think that might have hurt maybe among whom are for jealous and Homogenes turned with me? To chapter three, or let's just go forward to chapter four. Dear best to come to me soon, for Demus, in love with this present world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonaika. Crescence has gone to Galicia, Titus to Dalmatia. Luke alone is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is very useful for me in ministry. By the way, he had a falling out with Mark. In case you don't remember, tichikis I have sent to Ephesus. When you come, bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas, also the books and above all the parchments. Alexander the copper Smith did me great harm. The Lord will repay him according to his deeds. Beware of him yourself, for he strongly opposed our message. At my first defense, no one came to stand with me, but all deserted me. What is this? What is this? This is a man who put his life on the line for the sake of the Gospel, who was abandoned, mistreated, and abused by the very ones on whose behalf he was laying down his life. If he's in the ministry for the people, he's gone. But because he's in the ministry for the Gospel, he can remain. Why Because his greatest desire is not to please people. But his greatest desire is that Christ might have the fullness of the reward for which he died. His greatest desire is that Christ would be formed in his people. His greatest desire is that the Gospel would bear fruit in the lives of people, and so he endures for the sake of the gospel. This is why it's the gospel. Oh, I've been mistreated, but really they mistreated you. What do you think they need? I don't know. I don't know. I think they need to be mistreated like they mistreated me. No, what they need is the Gospel. I've been abandoned. What do you think they need? You should probably beat them up. Know, what they need is the Gospel. What they need is the Gospel. If we are in this for the people, we don't stay. We're in this for the Gospel. Now, if you flip that to its other side, then here's what you need to hear. You're not a preacher. You're not a proclaimer of the Gospel. If I am looking to a pastor to get from that pastor the idea that I am the center of his universe, I am misunderstanding the purpose of that pastor. And when that pastor is not coddling me and patting me on my head, but instead pressing the truth of the Gospel until it hurts, and maybe a little bit even beyond that, because he desires for Christ to be formed in me. I do not look at him as an enemy. But I say, faithful, are the wounds of a friend. But if I believe he's just there to serve me, he's just there to please me, and that the goal is me, and that I'm at the center instead of the Gospel being at the center. Now, all of a sudden, I'm one of those people who's leaving the church because my feelings were hurt because I was sick and you didn't come visit me. Really, how was I supposed to know? And tell me? Pastors, don't raise your hand if you've heard that one before. You see, we must understand what is central here, and what is central here is the Kingdom of God advancing through the proclamation of the Gospel. That's what matters here. So we endure suffering for the Gospel, and then look by the power of God. That is the only way that we endure the suffering that comes our way, by the power of God. There is no other way to endure the suffering associated with the proclamation of the Gospel other than the power of God. Some of you know this because you have family members who don't believe the gospel. You have family members who hate the gospel, or worse yet, you have family members who claim to have been converted and yet don't know the Gospel, and get offended because you preach the gospel to them, because it's obvious that they don't know the gospel. How do you endure that by the power of God. There is no other way to endure this but by the power of God, for the sake of the Gospel. By the power of God. This is why, and this is how we endure for the sake of the Gospel. Why because it has to be preserved and proclaimed. There is nothing more central and nothing more important, And there is nothing you need more than you need the Gospel by the power of God. Why because we wrestle not against flesh and blood, and you do not endure battles like the ones in which we are engaged, apart from a power that is greater than your own. Look at the rest of what he says. By the power of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works, but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the Agis began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ. Jesus who abolished death and brought life and immortality alight through the Gospel for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher. Which is why I suffer as I do. I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me. This is why, and this is how, because Christ is the one who brought life and immortality to light. What does that mean? Christ has caused us to realize that this is not our home, that this is not the be all to end all, that this is not as good as it gets, This is not the end of the line. There is something above and beyond this, and it is that to which He has come to call us. And it is that that he has given us to proclaim before others. And it is that that has endued us with power to endure to the end. And we believe, and we know that the God who raised Christ from the dead, he's able, faithful, and he will see it through. Therefore we proclaim the Gospel because it's our only hope, and therefore we endure the suffering that will come inevitably as a result of doing so. Why, because it is why we are who we are. It is why the Church exists, not so that people might be coddled, mollified, satisfied, entertained, but that Christ might be formed in you, and that the Kingdom might expand, and that Christ might be glorified. This is why. This is how preserve the Gospel, Saints, proclaim the Gospel. And as you preserve and proclaim the Gospel, always be ready and willing to endure by the power of God, whatever you are called upon to suffer for the cause of the Gospel, because in the end, it's all we have, and it is the very reason why we are who we are, where we are, when we are. Let's pray our God and our Father, we thank you. Thank you for evenings like this, when the Family of God can gather together and close out our Lord's day. Be reminded of your goodness, your mercy, your majesty, your power. Be reminded of who we are, of why we're here, of what matters and the end for which we serve. Grant by your grace that your people might be enriched and emboldened as a result of the Word that we've heard tonight, and that Christ indeed might have the fullness of the reward for which he died. This is our prayer and the earnest desire of our very souls. We ask it in Christ's name and for his sake. Amen.