2 Timothy 1
2 Timothy 1:1
2 Timothy 1:7
2 Timothy 1:8
2 Timothy 1:12
2 Timothy 2
2 Timothy 2:1-4
2 Timothy 2:2
2 Timothy 2:4
2 Timothy 2:4ff
2 Timothy 2:11-13
2 Timothy 2:15
2 Timothy 2:20
2 Timothy 3
2 Timothy 3:1ff
2 Timothy 3:1-4
2 Timothy 3:15
2 Timothy 3:16
2 Timothy 3:16-17
2 Timothy 3:17
2 Timothy 4:1-4
2 Timothy 4:3
2 Timothy 4:5
2 Timothy 4:7
2 Timothy 4:9-21
1 Timothy 5:20
Topic : 2 Timothy
General
Be …
1. Be Stirred in God’s Gift (1:6)
2. Be Strong in God’s Grace (2:1)
3. Be Stable in God’s Guidance (3:1,17)
4. Be Steadfast in God’s Gospel (4:1-2)
2 Timothy 1
Three Exhortations
1. Don’t Allow Your Ministry to Become Cold (1:6-7)
2. Don’t Allow Your Motives to Become Confused (1:8-12)
3. Don’t Allow Your Message to Become Corrupted (1:13-14)
2 Timothy 1:1
Grace Is for the Worthless
1. Grace is for the worthless Grace is for the worthless. It is God giving me what I don’t deserve.
2. Mercy is for the helpless. God withholding from me what I do deserve.
3. Peace is for the restless. The assurance that whatever happens to me will work out for God’s glory.
2 Timothy 1:7
Resource
- “Evangelical Preaching,” Charles Simeon, p. 135
2 Timothy 1:8
Jackie Robinson
Jackie Robinson was the first black to play major league baseball. Breaking baseball’s color barrier, he faced jeering crowds in every stadium. While playing one day in his home stadium in Brooklyn, he committed an error. The fans began to ridicule him. He stood at second base, humiliated, while the fans jeered. Then, shortstop Pee Wee Reese came over and stood next to him. He put his arm around Jackie Robinson and faced the crowd. The fans grew quiet.
Robinson later said that arm around his shoulder saved his career.
2 Timothy 1:12
Resource
- Ask Him Anything, L.J. Ogilvie, Word, 1981, pp. 115ff
2 Timothy 2
Metaphors
1. Discipling Teacher (2:2)
2. Dedicated Soldier (2:3-4)
3. Disciplined Athlete (2:5)
4. Diligent Farmer (2:6)
5. Correct Workman (2:14-19)
6. Clean Vessel (2:20-23)
7. Consistent Servants (2:24-6)
Majoy Ballou
We have all seen John Wayne movies that made combat look like a romantic romp in the park. Men who have been through it tell a different story. The most graphic descriptions of battle I’ve read came from Bruce Catton’s excellent books on the American Civil War, including The Army of the Potomac. They provide a striking understanding of the toughness of both Yankee and Rebel soldiers. Their lives were filled with deprivation and danger that is hardly imaginable today. It was not unusual for the troops to make a two-week forced march during which commanders would threaten the stragglers at sword-point.
The men were often thrown into the heat of a terrible battle just moments after reaching the front. They would engage in exhausting combat for days, interspersed by sleepless nights on the ground—sometimes in freezing rain or snow. During the battle itself, they ate a dry, hard biscuit called hardtack, and very little else. In less combative times, they could add a little salt pork and coffee to their diet. That was it! As might be expected, their intestinal tracks were regularly shredded by diarrhea, dysentery and related diseases that decimated their ranks. The Union Army reported upwards of 200,000 casualties from disease, often disabling up to 50 percent of the soldiers. The Confederates suffered a similar fate.
Combat experience itself was unbelievably violent in those days. Thousands of men stood toe to toe and slaughtered one another like flies. After one particularly bloody battle in 1862, 5,000 men lay dead in an area of two square miles. Twenty thousand more were wounded. One witness said it was possible to walk on dead bodies for 100 yards without once stepping on the ground. Many of the wounded remained where they fell among dead men and horses for 12 or 14 hours, with their groans and cries echoing through the countryside.
While their willingness to endure these physical deprivations is almost incomprehensible, one has to admire the emotional toughness of the troops. They believed in their cause, whether Union or Confederate, and they committed their lives to it. Most believed that they would not survive the war, but that was of little consequence.
Please understand that I do not see unmitigated virtue in the heroic visions of that day. Indeed, men were all too willing to put their lives on the line for a war they poorly understood. But their dedication and personal sacrifice remain today as memorials to their time.
There is, perhaps, no better illustration of this commitment to principle and honor than is seen in a letter written by major Sullivan Ballou of the Union Army. He penned it to his wife, Sarah, a week before the battle of Bull Run, July 14, 1861. They had been married only six years. These powerful words still tough my soul:
My Very Dear Sarah:
The indications are very strong that we shall move in a few days—perhaps tomorrow. Lest I should not be able to write again, I feel impelled to write a few lines that may fall under your eye when I shall be no more .
I have no misgivings about or lack of confidence in the cause in which I am engaged, and my courage does not halt or falter. I know how strongly American civilization now leans on the triumph of the Government, and how great a debt we owe to those who went before us through the blood and suffering of the Revolution. And I am willing, perfectly willing, to lay down all my joys in this life to help maintain this Government and to pay that debt.
Sarah, my love for you is deathless: it seems to bind me with mighty cables that nothing but Omnipotence could break, and yet my love for country comes over me like a strong wind and bears me irresistibly on, with all these chains to the battle-field.
The memories of all the blissful moments I have spent with you come creeping over me, and I feel most deeply grateful to God, and you, that I have enjoyed them so long. And how hard it is for me to give them up and burn to ashes the hopes of future years, when, God willing, we might still have lived and loved together and seen our sons grown up to honorable manhood around us.
If I do not (return), my dear Sarah, never forget how much I love you, and when my last breath escapes me on the battle-field, it will whisper your name. Forgive my many faults and the many pains I have caused you. How thoughtless, how foolish I have often-times been.
O Sarah, if the dead can come back to this earth and flit unseen around those they loved, I shall always be near you in the gladdest day and in the darkest night, amidst your happiest scenes and gloomiest hours—always, always: and if there be a soft breeze upon your cheek, it shall by my breath, or the cool air cools your throbbing temple, it shall be my spirit passing by.
Sarah, do not mourn me dead: think I am gone, and wait for me, for we shall meet again.
Sullivan
Major Ballou was killed one week later in the first battle of Bull Run. I wonder, don’t you, if he did indeed utter Sarah’s name as he lay dying on the battlefield. She undoubtedly suffered the greater pain in the aftermath of that terrible war.
2 Timothy 2:1-4
Audie Murphy
Audie Murphy was an unlikely hero. Weighing in at only 112 pounds and with the face of a child, Audie was 18 years old when he went overseas during World War II. Nothing about him suggested a hero in the making. Yet when called upon by his commanding officers to do the duty of a soldier, Murphy held nothing back.
By war’s end, the quiet boy from Texas had fought with extraordinary bravery and saved the lives of countless fellow soldiers. He returned home to an adoring public, was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, and received at least 36 other medals—more than anyone else in U.S. history, all because nothing meant more to him as a soldier than the will of his commanding officer.
2 Timothy 2:2
It All Started With a Sunday School Teacher
1. A Sunday School teacher, a Mr. Kimball, in 1858 led a Boston shoe clerk to give his life to Christ.
2. The clerk, Dwight L. Moody, became an evangelist. In England in 1879 he awakened evangelistic zeal in the heart of Frederick B. Meyer, pastor of a small church.
3. F. B. Meyer, preaching to an American college campus, brought to Christ a student named J. Wilbur Chapman.
4. Chapman, engaged in YMCA work employed a former baseball player, Billy Sunday, to do evangelistic work.
5. Billy Sunday held a revival in Charlotte, N. C. A group of local men were so enthusiastic afterward that they planned another evangelistic campaign, bringing Mordecai Hamm to town to preach.
6. During Hamm’s revival, a young man named Billy Graham heard the Gospel and yielded his life to Christ.
It may be that you are one of the tens of thousands who has been led to Christ through the ministry of Graham. Who are your converts? Are you discipling them in Sunday School? Only eternity will reveal the tremendous impact of that one Sunday School Teacher who invested his life in the lives of others.
Audie Murphy
One of the greatest was heroes in U.S. history was a young man named Audie Murphy. Murphy was a diminutive man who weighed only 112 pounds and had the face of a child (He was 18 when he went overseas during World War II). Nothing about him suggested a hero in the making. Yet when called by his commanding officers to do the duty of a soldier, Murphy held nothing back.
By war’s end, the quiet boy from Texas had fought with extraordinary bravery while saving the lives of countless fellow soldiers. He returned home to an adoring public, was awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, and received at least 36 other medals—more than anyone else in U.S. history. All because nothing meant more to him as a soldier than the will of his commanding officer.
2 Timothy 2:4
Your In the Navy
Shortly after joining the Navy, the new recruit asked his officer for a pass so he could attend a wedding. The officer gave him the pass, but informed the young man he would have to be back by 7 p.m. Sunday. “You don’t understand, sir,” said the recruit. “I’m in the wedding.” “No, you don’t understand,” the officer shot back. “You’re in the Navy!”
No Safe Battles
For the Christian soldier the price of commitment to the cause of Christ is too high only when he wants less than victory. There are no safe battles—but there are no safe compromises either.
Elizabeth Elliot
Elizabeth Howard was a student at Wheaton College. She had scrutinized the boys on campus and decided that there was really only one who at all interested her: Jim Elliot. He displayed a maturity and godliness that was very attractive. When the school yearbooks were handed out, Elizabeth asked Jim to sign hers, hoping that if there was any interest in her, he might indicate so in signing her yearbook. When he returned it, she rushed to her room, found his signature and read beneath it, “2 Timothy 2:4.”
Natural Leader
Napoleon’s genius had been attributed to many things, but, above all, he was a superb natural leader of men. Like any wise leader he was aware that his own success would have been nothing had his men not been willing, even eager, to follow him. Obviously he could not know and personally inspire every man in his vast army, therefore he devised a simple technique for circumventing this difficulty.
Before visiting a regiment he would call the colonel aside and ask for the name of a soldier who had served well in previous campaigns, but who had not been given the credit he deserved. The colonel would indicate such a man. Napoleon would then learn everything about him, where he was born, the names of his family, his exploits in battle, etc. Later, upon passing this man while reviewing the troops, and at a signal from the colonel, Napoleon would stop, single out the man, greet him warmly, ask about his family, compliment him on his bravery and loyalty, reminisce about old campaigns, then pin a medal on the grateful soldier.
The gesture worked. After the review, the other soldiers would remark, “You see, he knows us—he remembers. He knows our families. He knows we have served.”
2 Timothy 2:4ff
Most Lamentable Thing
It is a most lamentable thing to see how most people spend their time and their energy for trifles, while God is cast aside. He who is all seems to them as nothing, and that which is nothing seems to them as good as all. It is lamentable indeed, knowing that God has set mankind in such a race where heaven or hell is their certain end, that they should sit down and loiter, or run after the childish toys of the world, forgetting the prize they should run for. Were it but possible for one of us to see this business as the all-seeing God does, and see what most men and women in the world are interested in and what they are doing every day, it would be the saddest sight imaginable. Oh, how we should marvel at their madness and lament their self-delusion!
If God had never told them what they were sent into the world to do, or what was before them in another world, then there would have been some excuse. But it is His sealed word, and they profess to believe it.
2 Timothy 2:11-13
Resources
- Charles C. Ryrie, So Great Salvation, (USA: Victor Books, a Division of Scripture Press, 1989), pp. 140ff
- Difficult Passages in the Epistles, R. Stein, Baker, 1988, p. 60, “Does God remain faithful with we are faithless?”
2 Timothy 2:15
Were You But Willing …
Remember the wise words of Richard Baxter to the people of Kidderminster:
“Were you but as willing to get the knowledge of God and heavenly things as you are to know how to work in your trade, you would have set yourself to it before this day, and you would have spared no cost or pains till you had got it. But you account seven years little enough to learn your trade and will not bestow one day in seven in diligent learning the matters of your salvation.’
Resource
- Rightly Dividing - J. R. Stott, Between Two Worlds, p. 136. (to cut straight, i.e., A ploughman making a furrow or a road builder.)
Requirements of Beneficial Study
The most beneficial study of God’s Word requires diligence and perseverance, but the results are worth the effort. A.B. Simpson said, “God has hidden every precious thing in such a way that it is a reward to the diligent, a prize to the earnest, but a disappointment to the slothful soul. All nature is arrayed against the lounger and the idler. The nut is hidden in its thorny case; the pearl is buried beneath the ocean waves; the gold is imprisoned in the rocky bosom of the mountains; the gem is found only after you crush the rock which encloses it; the very soil gives its harvest as a reward to the laboring farmer. So truth and God must be earnestly sought.”
2 Timothy 2:20
Which Would You Choose'
What if you went to a friend’s house one day and wanted a glass of water. You go into the kitchen and see all across the counter numerous glasses. As you look closer, you see that every one is dirty—lipstick, old cocoa, mold, food, etc. But behind the sink you notice a peanut butter jar that is sparkling clean. What would you use to drink out of? God is no dumber than we.
The Heart of Man
I know you will apply hard to German, but do not forget the culture of the inner man—I mean of the heart. How diligently the cavalry officer keeps his sabre clean and sharp; every stain he rubs off with the greatest care. Remember you are God’s sword, His instrument—I trust, a chosen vessel unto Him to bear His name. In great measure, according to the purity and perfection of the instrument, will be the success. It is not great talents God blesses so much as likeness to Jesus. A holy minister is an awful weapon in the hand of God.
Contrast
Contrast between paper plates and fine china. Paper plates are used once, and thrown away. Fine china is used and washed and reused.
2 Timothy 3
Part I - Understanding the Ways of the World (1-9) so that
Part II - We may undertake a witness to the world (10-17)
2 Timothy 3:1ff
Anarchy, Apostasy and Apathy
Vance Havner says that our day is one of anarchy in the world, of apostasy in the church and of apathy in the individual believer (Eph. 5:16).
2 Timothy 3:1-4
Resource
- Charles Swindoll, Make up Your Mind, p. 84, two kids who contracted a hit man to kill father.
2 Timothy 3:15
Permission to Backslide
As a teenager, J. Stephen Conn sensed God calling him to be a preacher. But he felt a certain disadvantage. Because he had been saved when he was 7 years old, he would never be able to hold an audience spellbound with stories of a wicked past. So he asked God for permission to backslide—just long enough to get some experience in a life of sin to “enhance” his preaching later on. Deep within he knew that God would not answer such a request, so he decided just to preach the Bible without a dramatic testimony.
Some time later Conn wrote, “For the past 11 years I’ve been pastoring a church. I realize now what a great testimony I really have. God not only has the power to deliver from sin, He has the even greater power to keep from sin. God not only saved my soul—He saved my entire life!”
2 Timothy 3:16
The Word
1. Doctrine—Keeps us from Error
2. Reproof—Keeps us from Sin
3. Correction—Keeps us from Failure
4. Training in Righteousness—Keeps us from Foolishness
2 Timothy 3:16-17
Resource
- “Evangelical Preaching,” Charles Simeon, p. 203
Transformation
The Scriptures were not given for our information, but for our transformation.
2 Timothy 3:17
Adequate, Equipped
- Example of painter going to job without tools, paint, ladder, etc.
- Example of putting together bicycle, swingset, etc. and lacking some parts.
2 Timothy 4:1-4
This Is What We Want
In April, 1985, I visited in a couple’s home who told me how they had been fans of Dr. Gene Scott from Southern California, and what a great preacher he was. They hadn’t been at church for a while, so I went to visit them. When I arrived, Dr. Scott was on TV—they’d purchased a satellite dish in order to stay current with his teaching. After some chit-chat, the husband turned to me and said, “You’re probably wondering why you haven’t seen us at church lately. Right then, Dr. Scott held up a book about the lost city of Atlantis and the pyramids, and the husband looked at me and said, “This is what we want in Bible teaching, and we haven’t ever heard this taught in any of the churches we’ve been in!”
2 Timothy 4:3
Ear-Tickling Messages
Unfortunately, preachers with ear-tickling messages are all too abundantly available. “In periods of unsettled faith, skepticism, and mere curious speculation in matters of religion, teachers of all kinds swarm like the flies in Egypt. The demand creates the supply. The hearers invite and shape their own preachers. If the people desire a calf to worship, a ministerial calf-maker is readily found.”
2 Timothy 4:5
Not Satisfied
Sometimes we are not satisfied with the responsibilities God has given us, thinking we are fitted for a larger ministry. Looking enviously at the size or scope of a fellow believer’s calling, we think less of our own work and begin to neglect it. In his book Be Faithful, Warren W. Wiersbe illustrated how one Christian leader handled that problem. “A young preacher once complained to C. H. Spurgeon, the famous Baptist preacher, that he did not have as big a church as he deserved. ‘How many do you preach to?’ Spurgeon asked. ‘Oh, about a hundred,’ the man replied. Solemnly, Spurgeon said, ‘That will be enough to give account for on the day of judgment.’”
The truth of Spurgeon’s Statement is borne out in Paul’s reminder to “make full proof of thy ministry,” which means, “fulfill your ministry.” The apostle was telling his young friend in the faith to do all that God has called him to do. But this did not mean that Timothy was required to do the same things Paul was called to do. Nor did it mean that he would accomplish as much as the apostle would. Rather, it meant that whether Timothy’s task was large or small, in the limelight or behind the scenes, he was to fulfill his ministry in a diligent and commendable manner.
The same is true of us. Whether we are teaching three unruly boys in a Sunday school class, directing a girls club of hundreds, or preaching to thousands, we’re to do the job faithfully. That’s what God expects. And as we do, we will be fulfilling our ministry. -D.C.E.
If…
1. If to be a Christian is worthwhile, then the most ordinary interest in those with whom we come in contact would prompt us to speak to them of Christ.
2. If the New Testament be true—and we know that it is—who has given us the right to place the responsibility for soul-winning on other shoulders than our own'
3. If they who reject Christ are in danger, is it not strange that we, who are so sympathetic when the difficulties are physical or temporal, should apparently be so devoid of interest as to allow our friends and neighbors and kindred to come into our lives and pass out again without a word of invitation to accept Christ, to say nothing of sounding a note of warning because of their peril'
4. If today is the day of salvation, if tomorrow may never come and if life is equally uncertain, how can we eat, drink and be merry when those who live with us, work with us, walk with us and love us are unprepared for eternity because they are unprepared for time'
5. If Jesus called his disciples to be fishers of men, who gave us the right to be satisfied with making fishing tackle or pointing the way to the fishing banks instead of going ourselves to cast out the net until it be filled'
6. If Jesus himself went seeking the lost, if Paul the Apostle was in agony because his kinsmen, according to the flesh, knew not Christ, why should we not consider it worthwhile to go out after the lost until they are found'
7. If I am to stand at the judgment seat of Christ to render an account for the deeds done in the Body, what shall I say to him if my children are missing, if my friends are not saved or if my employer or employee should miss the way because I have been faithless'
8. If I wish to be approved at the last, then let me remember that no intellectual superiority, no eloquence in preaching, no absorption in business, no shrinking temperament or no spirit of timidity can take the place of or be an excuse for my not making an honest, sincere, prayerful effort to win others to Christ.
2 Timothy 4:7
Stand Against Hitler
At the height of WWII, Protestant theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer was imprisoned for taking a stand against Hitler. Yet he continued to urge fellow believers to resist Nazi tyranny. A group of Christians, believing that Hitler was the Antichrist, asked Bonhoeffer, “Why do you expose yourself to all this danger? Jesus will return any day, and all your work and suffering will be for nothing.” Bonhoeffer replied, “If Jesus returns tomorrow, then tomorrow I’ll rest from my labor. But today I have work to do. I must continue the struggle until it’s finished.”
Tour De France
One of the most grueling of all bicycle races is the Tour De France. A contestant in that event, Gilbert Duclos-Lassalle, describes it in a National Geographic article titled, “An Annual Madness.” The race covers about 2000 miles, including some of France’s most difficult, mountainous terrain. Eating and drinking is done on the run. And there are extremes of heat and cold. To train for the event, Lassalle rides his bicycle 22,000 miles a year. What kind of prize makes people endure so much hardship and pain! $10,000? $100,000? No. It’s just a special winner’s jersey. What then motivates the contestants? Lassalle sums it up: “Why, to sweep through the Arc de Triomphe on the last day. To be able to say you finished the Tour de France.”
2 Timothy 4:9-21
Stephen Foster
One cold January morning in 1864 a man was found lying in a heap in the seedy Bowery section of New York, bleeding from a slashed throat. He had staggered to a wash basin, which fell and shattered. A doctor at the scene used black sewing thread somebody found to suture the wound. The man—an almost penniless drunkard—was admitted to Bellevue Hospital, where he languished unknown for three days before dying.
Later, someone seeking him was directed to the local morgue. The friend knew that the man he sought was much more than a derelict. He was a genius whose songs captured the hearts of generations of Americans: “Swanee River,” “Camptown Races,” “Oh, Susanna,” “Beautiful Dreamer,” and two hundred more. His name? Stephen Foster.
1 Timothy 5:20
Public Rebuke a Necessity
A man on staff with Chuck Swindoll got sexually involved with his secretary. The church chose not to handle it in public, but rather deal with this privately. The next year, 17 marriages of senior leadership people in the church broke up! Paul is clear that when a leader sins, he/she needs to be publicly rebuked so that others will be warned away from the same sin.
