Bible-saturated pastors

2 TIMOTHY 3:14 - 4:8

In 2 Timothy 2:17 Paul made the strong assertion that the teaching of church leaders who are not true to the once and for all given apostolic message, will spread like gangrene. I saw an extraordinary film once which depicted the real-life events of men who survived a plane crash in a South American jungle. One of them broke his leg. The leg was amateurishly bandaged as they waited for rescue. What was going on beneath the bandage was indescribable. The bone had peirced the flesh and the wound had become infected and was becoming gangrenous. But the man was saved because of some flies. The flies laid their larvae under the badage, they become maggots and the maggots fed on the infect flesh and kept it clean, and his life was saved as well as his leg.

Obnoxious stuff that gangrene! Men who spread false teaching in the life of the Body of Christ, the church, are spreading gangrene. That gangrene is described in all its pathalogical detail in the first 9 verses of chapter 3, as the world infects the life of the church, and the life of the Spirit is driven from the people of God. The church putrifies into death and is eventually amputated by the head of the church, the Lord Jesus.

As we’ve been seeing, the anitdote to this terrible development is what Paul calls in 2 Timothy 2:2 - faithful men. These are men who can be described as sons of the apostle. Every true Gospel evangelist and pastor down the centuries is part of this band of brothers. In the words of chapter 3:10 they understood and followed Paul’s passion for truth, his glory-of-God driven lifestyle, his other-centred care of people, his willingness to accept every kind of personal discomfort in order to secure the well being of God’s chosen people. Men who love the Bible, are motivated by a passion for God’s glory, and are willing to suffer, are the men who will build spiritually healthy churches.

We finish the little series with an overview of the actual methodology the Spirit of God employs in this process.

1. MEN WHO ARE TOTALLY SATURATED IN AN ALL-SUFFICIENT SCRIPTURE (verses 14-17)

I am often found at 39 Moor Lane with a wok in my hand. If it takes me longer than 20 minutes to produce a meal I feel a failure. From setting the basmati to cook, to chucking finely chopped vegetables and spices and small pieces of chicken into the wok, I like to race against the clock. I shall be grateful for a long time to the Chinese people for giving us the wok. I have little patience for a process called marinating. You get some recipies which call for the meat to be placed in some exotic liquid for several hours, in some cases overnight. That frustrates the apron off me. But, for some dishes it’s the only way. The meat is soaked in such a way that all of it, inside and out, is flavoured by the power of the liquid environment.

There’s something of that in the verses before us. Paul’s vision in verse 17 is the faithful man, the man of God, thoroughly equipped for every good work. A man ready for the ministry. A man ready to be a son of the apostle in the life of the churches. How do you produce such men through whom God will purge gangrene from his body and promote healthy spiritual life? You do it by saturating them through and through in Scripture.

Only Scripture can produce such men because of its intrinsic nature. All Scripture is breathed out by God. Scripture may have come through men, but it came from God. Every word and phrase, came from God. God’s breath, the Holy Spirit, came upon certain men and worked in and through their minds so that when they spoke or wrote or dreamed, what was formed in them was exactly what God wanted to say to His people. To despise or neglect Scripture is to despise or neglect God himself, because God’s Word is God himself expressed. That’s why at the end of the process the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Scripture is full of Christ, and Christ fills the Scripture.

To try to produce church leaders by any other means is ignorance and folly. Only the mind of God can produce men after God’s own heart. You try cooking up such men without this marinade and you’re doomed to failure. The moment the colleges begin to stray from a commitment to the infallibility of Scripture is the moment they begin to fail to produce missionaries and pastors and women’s workers who will build the church. The health of the church, it’s ligaments and muscles, its nerves and blood vessels, depend on teaching ministries that are full of the nutrients of the Bible. Only that will equip the saints for the work of ministry to upbuilding of the body of Christ. That’s Scripture’s origin and nature.

But, think for a moment about Scripture’s sufficiency. Why is the Scripture alone able to do this? Why not Scripture plus the philosophy of religion? Why not the Bible plus the seven habits of the effective manager? Because Scripture is sufficient to thoroughly equip the man of God for every good work. Does a man need to be taught the truth of God, the whole truth and nothing but the truth? then the Bible alone can do that thoroughly. Does the man need to have his sin rebuked and be brought into the full light of the holiness of God? the Bible alone can do that. Does he need to be corrected, or put right as God views rightness? The Scripture alone can do that job. Does he need to be trained in the development of a righteous, God-centred character? That’s the Bible’s job accompanied by the Spirit of God.

I hear that a new ministry has developed quietly at the heart of the church. It’s the wedding planner. Our very own Fronk. The great day arrives, nothing’s been forgotten, everything is in place. The wedding day is thoroughly furnished. Nothing’s left out that needs to be in, everything’s been swept aside that might spoil the day.

If you want to supply the churches with men who are being purified of every disqualifying trait, who are growing in likeness to Jesus, you have to thoroughly marinate them in Scripture. Because of what the Scripture is and what it’s sufficient for. The Scripture is the Wrod of God, and the word of God always accomplishes that for which it’s sent. God speaks, “Let there be light” and .... there IS light.

And ... you can begin to do this with a child. Timothy was first trained to be a man of God through the diligent ministry of a godly grandmother and mother. They’re mentioned in chapter 1, and in chapter 3 we discover that the apostle’s son knew the OT Scriptures from childhood. From a baby is what the Greek literally says. From when you were an infant. John and Charles Wesley were taught the Scriptures by a godly mother from the time they were born. On their fifth birthday they had to learn the alphabet, and on day two they began to read the Bible in the kitchen of the manse at Epworth in Lincolnshire. And unwittingly, Mrs Susanna Wesley prepared two Scripture-saturated boys for the minstry. That ministry may be in the pulpit, it may be in the board room, it may be in the nursery, wherever, God will use it for his glory.

Men who are totally saturated in the all-sufficient Scripture.

2. MEN WHO ARE CONSCIENTIOUSLY COMMITTED TO THE EXPOSITION OF SCRIPTURE (4:1-8)

What a man leaves behind tells you a lot about the man. Jesus told a parable about a land-owner who left behind full barns and an expanding business. The Lord’s comment was, You fool. Everything he’d lived and worked for was going to be scattered to the four winds of human spending power. He left nothing of value, and therefore he carried nothing of value into the day of judgement. You fool.

Paul’s about to die as he writes this letter to Timothy. He says as much in the moving picture of the ship slipping its moorings and heading out of the harbour; as well as the picture of the sacrificial cup in the temple being poured out and the last drop about to fall from the lip of the cup (verse 6). I’m leaving for a better world. But I’m conscious of having fought the good fight, of having run the race, and having kept the faith. I was in it for the long haul. I didn’t try to join the race in my 50s having neglected Christ for decades. I didn’t try to jog, drop out, re-join, drop out again. I fought every round, I ran every lap, I preserved every drop of truth.

And what I’m leaving behind, Timothy, is YOU.

You must continue to be what I modelled before you. Be a man who is committed to the exposition of Scripture.Preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season; correct, rebuke and encourage—with great patience and careful instruction. Be marinaded in Scripture in your heart and mind, and then let that flow out in ministry to the people of God. As you are corrected, rebuked and encouraged by the sufficient Word of God, express that in all your ministry. Do it when it’s summer and the skies are blue and the harvest is growing and the church seems to be enjoying a season of growth and abundance. But do it when it’s winter, and the skies are like lead, and the ground is dry and there are no grapes on the vine. Don’t swallow the lie that there’s an easier or better way to build the church than with the faithful explanation of what God says in His Word.

You’ll need great patience and perseverance because members of the congregation, may be in large numbers, will leave you to go off to more exciting and more contemporary ministers. And, you’ll be tempted to copy the new methods, the more successful approaches be they centred in the world of business, or entertainment, or spirituality.

Timothy, I’m about to die, and what I want to leave behind is a man who is saturated in Scripture and committed to Bible saturated preaching. A commitment born not of habit, or tradition, but born of a commitment that this method alone is pleasing to God. I adjure you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge, PREACH THE WORD. This is a conscientious commitment. It’s a commitment based on those eternal realities. It’s a man committed to Bible-centred ministry in the face of all that God is in His nature and all that Christ is in his person and work. This isn’t a proven technique, this is a divine imperative seared upon a man’s conscious.

Woe to me if I preach not the Gospel. Imperative.

Paul wanted to leave behind after his departue a man who would be conscientiously committed to the exposition of Scripture. Not a lecture based exposition. Not an “I’ve unfolded the text” exposition. But one which rebukes, corrects and encourages by its impact on the congregation. When they asked Whitfield if they could print his sermons he responded, “Yes. If you can include the thunder and lightening”.

Mothers, you can be a Eunice. Grandmothers you can be a Lois. Church officers you can be like the elders at Lystra who said to Paul, please take this young bloke, Timothy, and train him for ministry and we’ll cover his expenses. Church members you can be like the Christian assembliles in Lystra and Iconium who prayer for and financially supported the apostolic band. We can be like the church at Antioch that had the vision to send away Paul and Barnabas on that first mission trip through which the Gospel came to Timothy.

And we’ll help secure the future health of the church of our Lord Jesus, who died on the Cross to bring the church into being. Who ascended on high in order to prepare a place for the church in his father’s house, and who sent the Spirit to bring the church into being in all the nations of the world. May God grant us a part in the work of raising up men who are saturated in Scripture and conscientiously committed to its exposition.

What a great thing to leave behind.