1 Timothy – PT1 – The Aim of our Charge

Over the last year or so with Threshingfloor, spending much of my time investing in and training up leaders, shepherding small communities of believers, and doing my best to follow Jesus’ lead I have come to love Paul’s letters to Timothy. In the past few months I’ve read its 6 short chapters through well over a dozen times and received much help in shepherding the Threshingfloor family. A couple weeks ago I decided I would begin a deeper study of 1 Timothy in order to get beyond just reading the text. For me that means writing about it. For the next few months I will be posting the thoughts inspired by my studies for those in the Threshingfloor family and whoever else wants to listen in to benefit from. My prayer is that it will help us live better as people who are growing in our understanding of Gospel Content, living in Gospel Community, and living out Gospel Cause.

1 Timothy was written to a young leader of a young body of believers, something that I certainly identify with. Paul sent Timothy to oversee the church in Ephesus in order to ensure they remained faithful to the Gospel which had been preached to them. As the Expositor’s Bible Commentary notes, 1 Timothy is “primarily practical rather than theological,” therefore we will delve with Paul into many of the ins and outs of overseeing the Christian body, a work that constant.

Paul opens his letter with a direct command to the young leader;

As I urged you when I was going to Macedonia, remain at Ephesus so that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine, nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies, which promote speculations rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith. The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. Certain persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain discussion, desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions. (1 Timothy 1:1-7 ESV)

Apparently there had risen up in this young church in Ephesus men and women who were distracting the believers from the primary truths of the Gospel with “different doctrine…myths and endless genealogies.” We don’t know exactly what kind of heresy was being taught there in Ephesus, but it’s clear that the church was being drawn away from essentials and into speculation rather than stewardship. There are huge implications in this text for those of us here in the 21st century.

While we in the western world generally don’t get caught up in arguing about people’s lineage, we’ve had over two thousand years to develop a wide array theological systems and doctrines that there’s an infinite amount of disagreement over. In our communities where the majority of people have grown up in church and feel like they have a grasp on the “gospel basics” I’ve noticed a powerful tendency to get caught up in “deeper” things. We turn from gospel essentials to debating things like predestination, spiritual gifts, eschatology, and others that seem to have depth because of the difficulty of fully understanding them.

That kind of fruitless debate is exactly what Paul insists that Timothy prevent.  Things which “promote speculation rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith” are things that need to be pushed out from the community’s discussions for the sake of focusing on the core truths of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Satan can use a passion for “deep” theology to prevent us from truly following Jesus. For those who are leading the family of the Lord it is essential that we keep the main thing the main thing. Jesus is to be the center of what we do, not calvinism or creationism or whether marijuana should be legalized or if prophesy still takes place. We have been given a stewardship from God and must steward it well.

Community leader, watch out for people who are constantly making “confident assertions” but don’t live up to their talk. The mark of a true follower of Christ isn’t the ability to converse about theological systems. It’s their lives are increasing conformity to Jesus in action. As Edwards says in The Religious Affections, “Godliness in the heart has as direct a relation to practice as a fountain has to a stream.” Talk is of little worth if there is no action to prove it.

As Paul tells Timothy, “the aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.” Our goal in Threshingfloor is to create communities where people are growing in their love of God and love of others. Love is what will motivate people to live as Christ has commanded, therefore it is the aim of our charge. We should constantly be asking ourselves whether or not what we are demonstrating and leading our community in is fostering love in our community. If love is not present and growing in your community, Paul gives three things to watch for when he says that “love issues from a pure heart…a good conscience, and a sincere faith.”

Where love isn’t present it is because one or more of those things are missing. If there is a person in your community who is constantly drawing others into “vain discussions,” it is probably because they have impure motives, have a conscience stained with sin, or are putting their faith in something other than Jesus at that moment. As their brothers and sisters in Christ it is our job to help shepherd them into the restoration of those broken places. We must lead them to Jesus and remind them of his all-sufficiency. He’s the center of what we’re doing in Threshingfloor Communities. Our passion is to see His fame spread all throughout the nearly 70,000 young adults here in the FM area, and we must not let anything – even good things – distract us from that. So like Paul did for Timothy, I urge you who are leaders of communities and you who are a part of a community, do not wander away into myths and vain discussion. Instead, let the aim of your charge be love that flows from a heart purified by the blood of our beautiful savior. Then, and only then, will your community be a place where people from all walks of life can come together to experience the grace and power of our God. And that, my friends, is very good.