Passing Along What You Have
2 Timothy 2:1-7
Rev. Brian Bill
July 8-9, 2023
We had a blast being with our family for a few days last weekend. Here’s a picture of our seven grandchildren ages seven and under. I appreciated Pastor Ed preaching but wasn’t happy with him singing at the end because that puts the pressure on me to do the same. Not going to happen.
As part of our time together, we made a trip up to Wisconsin to see my dad and my sisters. When my sister Mary arrived, she came bearing two gallons of A&W root beer. I was immediately transported back to the little A&W stand in our neighborhood and the countless treks I would make to pick up gallons of root beer for our family.
When she poured me a glass of the foamy drink the aroma took me back to the days I used to work at the restaurant when I would mix up the beverage in the basement (you don’t want to know how much sugar we added). Incredibly, it tasted exactly as I remembered it, which sparked off another memory of my boss making me dress up as the A&W Root Beer Bear (AKA “Rooty”) and hand out root beer barrels and coupons to patrons in the parking lot.
As embarrassing at it is to admit, part of my identity as a teenager was wrapped up in being “Rooty the Root Beer Bear.”
The topic of identity is a huge issue in our culture today. Many suggest we can find our identity by looking inward. Others proclaim identity is wrapped up in what we do or what we have. Still others equate identity with gender or sexuality.
Identity is quite powerful because it relates to who we are and why we’re here. It is how we define ourselves, and it clarifies our purpose in life. Contrary to our culture’s confusion, identity is not self-declared or self-developed; it is given to us by our Maker and Redeemer. As one author put it, “Christian identity is received, not achieved, taking enormous pressure off us to perform and merit our affirmation.”
In short, YOU ARE WHO GOD SAYS YOU ARE. You have been made in the image of God and therefore have dignity, value, and worth because of WHO you are, or more accurately, WHOSE you are as stated in Genesis 1:27: “So God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.” You matter because you have been made by the Maker.
We’ll be addressing the topic of identity in greater detail this fall in a series we’re calling, “Unshaken and Unashamed.”
As Paul neared the end of his life, he painted some identity pictures for timid Timothy to help him see who he is and what he is called to do. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, Paul used six portraits to show what it means to be a faithful follower of Jesus Christ.
Let’s give our attention to 2 Timothy 2:1-7: “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 entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also. Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops. Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything.”
We could summarize it like this: Before passing on, pass it on by leaving a legacy of faithfulness.
1. A fearless child. The first identity image is found in 2 Timothy 2:1: “You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus.” If you are born again, you are a child of God, a son or daughter of the King. The phrase, “you then” is emphatic and “my child” is personal and tender. Paul had the joy of leading Timothy to faith in Jesus as we see in 1 Timothy 1:2: “My true child in the faith.” In 2 Timothy 1:2, Paul refers to him as, “my beloved child.”
One of my favorite parts of our baptism services is to hear how people come to faith in Christ. I can’t wait to hear more on Sunday, August 13. Speaking of this, I enjoyed reading a recent letter Ray Pritchard received from a woman who is reading “Anchor for the Soul.” She describes how God got her attention in a very unusual and unforgettable way.
“While I was taking my walk during lunch, an individual threw your book at me (hit me right in the face) and said, ‘Maybe this will be useful to you,’ then walked off very angry. I’m currently still at work and just finished the first chapter. I am spiritual, not religious, and I do want a relationship with God. After reading just the first chapter I felt like a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders and I heard ‘I have always been here, just let me in.’ I think this book is the beginning of a new path for me, and I wanted to reach out and say thank you so much and I can’t wait to read more!”
I love Ray’s response, “God has many ways of reaching people. Sometimes we won’t get the message until it hits us in the face!” How is God getting your attention? Is He clobbering you with something right now? If you’ve not done so yet, it’s time to become His child through the new birth.
To “be strengthened” means, “to be empowered or to make strong.” One commentator has counted 25 times in his two letters to Timothy that Paul encouraged him to be strong. Notice timid Timothy is not told to be strong in himself, but to be strengthened by the “grace that is in Christ Jesus.” The source of strength comes from outside of us as stated in Ephesians 6:10: “Finally, be strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might.” The NEB translates it this way: “Take strength from the grace of God which is ours in Christ Jesus.” God’s grace saves us, sanctifies us, and strengthens us.
2. A faithful steward. After reminding Timothy that he is a fearless child, the next picture Paul paints is that of a faithful steward in verse 2: “And what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses entrust to faithful men, who will be able to teach others also.” Timothy had been given the gospel to guard and then give out to others who will pass it on to others. We could call this the ministry of multiplication. The word “entrust” means, “to deposit something valuable for safekeeping.”
The key is to find faithful men and women who will faithfully pass the baton of faith along to other faithful people as we see in 1 Corinthians 4:2: “Moreover, it is required of stewards that they be found faithful.” According to Psalm 101:6, God looks “with favor on the faithful in the land.” This faith transfer must first take place within families as grandparents and parents pass along the gospel to the next generation.
Here‘s a question to ponder. Would it be better to disciple 10 people a year for 30 years or one person every two years, but that person would in turn disciple someone else and that person would disciple another individual? Option one would yield 300 disciples over a lifetime but option two would produce 32,768 disciples.
I think of how Pastor Brown was used mightily at Edgewood for 44 years of faithful and fruitful ministry following this multiplication model. He not only poured into faithful servants like Pastor Ed and Pastor Tim, but he trained many other pastors, multiple lay leaders, and entrusted ministry to multiple missionary interns who are serving Christ around the globe today. I also think of how Justin Rumley grew up at Edgewood under Pastor Brown’s leadership. Justin was ordained a couple years ago by Edgewood and has been serving as a part-time pastor in Kewanee. Sunday, after a unanimous church vote, Justin will be installed as the full-time pastor of First Congregational Church SBC!
Before passing on, pass it on by leaving a legacy of faithfulness.
3. A focused soldier. The next identity image is found in verses 3-4 and shows how God wants each of us to be totally surrendered even in the midst of suffering: “Share in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier gets entangled in civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him.” The phrase, “share in suffering” is a command and means, “to suffer together.” The theme of suffering permeates 2 Timothy, as it is found at least once in every chapter.
• 1:8: “…share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God.”
• 2:3: “Share in suffering…”
• 3:12: “Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.”
• 4:5: “As for you, always be sober-minded, endure suffering…”
Brothers and sisters, we’ve said it before, but it bears repeating – Jesus did not propagate the prosperity gospel, He preached the persecution gospel. John 15:20 is just one example: “If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also.” I see one of my roles is to equip us to share in suffering and to be prepared for persecution. If we’re not ready, we may end up questioning God’s goodness when it comes. If we’re not willing to endure hardship, we won’t accomplish much for Christ and will complain, capitulate, or cave on our faith when hard times come.
Related to that, we must never lose sight of our brothers and sisters being persecuted around the globe as we embrace Hebrews 13:3: “Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.” We’re called to stand with fellow suffering servants.
In the Second World War, people often quoted a catchphrase as a way to justify austerity and self-denial: “Don’t you know there’s a war on?” If you’ve been saved, you are a soldier and there’s a war on with your flesh, with the world, and with the devil.
According to a helpful resource called, “Manners and Customs of the Bible,” the discipline of the Roman army was severe.
Every soldier was compelled to “endure hardship.” The weapons were heavy, and in addition to them, the ordinary foot soldier was compelled to carry a saw, a basket, a pickax, an ax, a thong of leather, and a hook, together with three days of rations. The Roman soldier was expected to keep one thing in his sights, and only one: the service of his commander. He was not allowed to marry, nor could he engage in agriculture, trade, or manufacturing. He was a soldier and could not be anything else.
In Joshua 5:14, Jesus appeared as the “commander of the army of the LORD.” As soldiers, our number one aim must be to please our Commander, Jesus Christ. Because we’ve been enlisted by the Almighty, we must make sure we do not become entangled with anything that would take us off mission. Hebrews 12:1 challenges us to “lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely.”
1 Timothy 1:18 calls us to “wage the good warfare” and 1 Timothy 6:12 implores us to “fight the good fight of faith.” Unfortunately, too many today have either gone AWOL or have become entangled in things that are tripping them up.
Since I have never served in the military, I asked a few vets to describe some expectations of being a soldier.
• Maintain a single-minded focus.
• Practice rigorous daily discipline.
• Expect opposition from the enemy.
• Exhibit unquestioning obedience and loyalty to the commanding officer.
• Work as a team with fellow soldiers.
• Be willing to restrict your freedoms.
• Be constantly vigilant.
• Train every day so tasks become second nature and automatic.
• Know your enemy, but also know your allies.
• You will fail some tests. Learn what you did wrong and move on.
Speaking of being ready, I am so impressed with Sheila Kuriscak and her team of servants as they equip children to “stand strong in today’s battle for truth” during Super Summer Slam July 20-23. They could use some more servants and let’s make sure we’re inviting family, friends, and neighbors. We’ve invited four of our neighborhood kids and we’re hoping they all come.
4. A fit athlete. In verse 5, Paul switches metaphors again by putting the image of an Olympic athlete in our minds: “An athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules.” The word for “athlete” means to “strive together” and “crowned” refers to an evergreen wreath given to the winner but only if he kept the rules of the contest. “No rules, no wreath” was the order of the day.
Paul often drew spiritual lessons from sports like wrestling (Ephesians 6:12), track, and boxing as we see in 1 Corinthians 9:25-27: “Every athlete exercises self-control in all things. They do it to receive a perishable wreath, but we an imperishable. So I do not run aimlessly; I do not box as one beating the air. But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.”
In order for an athlete to compete in the Greek games, they had to be a trueborn Greek, and swear that they had trained diligently for 10 months. I thought of some ways sports can teach spiritual lessons.
• Follow the coach.
• Must be disciplined.
• Training and conditioning are required.
• Practice self-denial.
• Be willing to work hard.
• Have a strategy to win.
• Know the rules and follow them.
Every sport has its own rules and regulations. When rules are broken, consequences can be severe like they were for four NFL players who were recently suspended for betting on games. Or for runner Senbere Teferi, who was mere seconds away from defending her Peachtree Road Race title in Georgia but took a wrong turn at the end of the race, knocking her out of first place, costing her thousands in prize money.
As you may know, the John Deere Classic is taking place right now. I’ve only attended once and had a great time. I asked my son-in-law Brad about some of golf’s rules, and he sent me one I wasn’t expecting called the Clubhouse Rule: “If a shot ends up in the clubhouse and the clubhouse is not out of bounds, you can open a door/window and play the next shot without penalty.” He also sent me a news story about an Illinois golfer who disqualified himself from qualifying for the U.S. Open after realizing he committed a rule violation while he was playing. Rick Widdell told me the 2023 US Golf Association rule book is 244 pages long!
Team Edgewood, God is calling us to play by His rules. We can’t make it up as we go or think we know better than He does. I cringe when I hear Christians say something like this, “I know what I’m doing is a sin, but God understands my situation. I know He just wants me to be happy.” Not.
Before passing on, pass it on by leaving a legacy of faithfulness.
5. A fruitful farmer. The next motif is found in verse 6: “It is the hard-working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops.” The word “hard-working” means, “to toil to the point of exhaustion, to give great effort.” While I didn’t grow up on a farm, I spent a lot of my summers with my uncle who farmed. Here are some things I remembered.
• A farmer has to work.
• The work is hard, dirty, and never-ending.
• There’s always something to fix.
• The tasks are often mundane and monotonous.
• Weeds and pests are a constant threat.
• Patience must be practiced.
• The weather is unpredictable.
• Farmers hope not in the present, but in a future harvest.
Paul wants us to know that while salvation is free, there is a cost to our discipleship. It’s not meant to be easy. I heard about a church that wanted to reach people living in a post-Christian context. After wrestling with their mission, they got out a whiteboard and wrote down these phrases:
Really hard work.
For a really long time.
In a really hard place.
We know Paul did not hesitate to call out those who flamed out in their faith, but he also celebrated those who stepped up and stood out. Listen to Romans 16:6, 12: “Greet Mary, who has worked hard for you…greet the beloved Persis, who has worked hard in the Lord.” In 1 Corinthians 15:10, Paul said this about himself: “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.”
6. A fervent student. After painting these pictures, Paul wanted to make sure Timothy spent enough time thinking about them in verse 7: “Think over what I say, for the Lord will give you understanding in everything.” The phrase “think over” is a command which means, “Consider carefully, meditate, chew on this, let this sink in.” The word “understanding” means to “reason out and run together.” The idea is to slow down and study so it can all come together.
Paul said something similar in 1 Timothy 4:15: “Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress.” In Philippians 4:8, Paul said, “…think about these things.” Psalm 64:9 says, “Ponder what He has done.” Psalm 119:27 adds: “I will meditate on all your wondrous works.”
Unfortunately, many of us don’t spend much time mulling things over and meditating because we’re inundated with media and messaging all the time. A couple months ago I met a pastor named Bob Allen who just moved to Missouri. He recently wrote an article that rocked my boat called “Pay Careful Attention to Your Attention.” I thought I’d share my pain with you.
A captivating torrent inundates the senses of the teens and preteens I work with every morning. Their gaze fixates on the…screen in their hands. The scene flashes and the next clip seizes their focus, demanding their attention for a few more seconds as a stream of fights, dances, jokes, pranks, rants, and filtered faces kindles something in them. Watching them, it is the disinterest of their posture toward the material they consume which strikes me.
The body language of these developing young men and women presents a marked contrast to their rapt attention. These minds hold no quarter for anything but their own amusement, but this isn’t amusement; it’s anesthetic.
Bored. They are bored.
And in their boredom, they barely blink their way into a glassy-eyed, joyless trance of watch-swipe-watch-swipe-watch-swipe. Rather than engage in relationship, conversation, play, work, community, or anything really, they endlessly scroll through an endlessly repetitive series of endlessly desperate posts made by endless individuals seeking to fill the endlessly deep hole at the center of every soul. It is frightening.
I want this to be a generational problem. I want to blame parents for giving their wards access to smartphones. I would love to slap the technology right out of the hands of these impressionable minds…but who am I to do so?
I am the same person. I impulsively snatch up my phone every time it buzzes, dings, chirps, lights up, and otherwise makes itself noticeable. But the issue lies not just in smartphones, apps, or social media but also in the uncountable phenomena flitting through our day-to-day lives, vying for our attention.
I fear we immerse ourselves in these diversions, pastimes, and avocations haphazardly, paying little heed to what they cost us—how much they ask and take of us. We end up inadvertently ensnared by our own interests which have the potential to delight and distract us from the One for whom our hearts were designed to worship.
How are you doing at meditating on what really matters? Do you take time to embrace that which is eternal? Do you immerse yourself in God’s inspired Word? Do you think about theology?
About a week ago, our Mainspring Young Adults ministry spent time taking the State of Theology survey (the entire church will take this survey in a few weeks). The results were stunning as they aced this test with flying colors! Their understanding and embrace of biblical theology, along with their Christian worldview, is a testament to how God is using Pastor Kyle, Pastor Chris, and AJ, along with all the servant leaders for our Student Ministry and Mainspring. It is humbling and encouraging to see them getting their doctrine and duty right. They understand the message of the Bible and they live on mission, taking the gospel to their neighbors and the nations. We will hear from one of these young adults at the end of the service.
While I’m not sure I should have told you I was “Rooty the Root Beer Bear,” I am certain we must get back to the root of who we are so we can pass along what we’ve been given.
If you know Christ through the new birth, you are…
1. A fearless child.
2. A faithful steward.
3. A focused soldier.
4. A fit athlete.
5. A fruitful farmer.
6. A fervent student.
This week, I saw a guy wearing a hat with a bold message on it. Seeing this as an invitation to initiate a conversation, I told him I liked what it said and asked him what it meant to him. He looked like a deer in headlights, as if he had no idea what I was talking about (I’m used to that). I smiled, pointed to his hat, and read the message out loud: “I’m a Jesus people person.”
He shrugged his shoulders, took off his cap, looked at the words and simply said, “Oh, I just picked this up in some store in LeClaire.” Seeing this as a gospel opportunity, I identified myself as a Christ follower and asked if he was interested in following Christ. Immediately, he put the brakes on the conversation and made it clear he was done talking. I thought about accusing him of false advertising, but thought better of it. Since I didn’t have an Anchor for the Soul to throw at him, I mumbled something about the importance of being a “Jesus people person” and excused myself.
This guy had obviously not thought deeply about what he believed. Have you given much thought to what you believe? Have you owned your faith? How would you respond if someone were to ask if you’re a Christ-follower? Would you shrug your shoulders, or would you boldly identify yourself as a fearless child, a faithful steward, a focused soldier, a fit athlete, a fruitful farmer, and a fervent student?
Let’s spend some time right now pondering these pictures. Since we don’t have much silent time in our world today, let’s quietly consider these identity images. As you do, ask God to give you understanding and to show you which one you need to grow in.
Before passing on, pass it on by leaving a legacy of faithfulness.
