Remembering your Calling
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If you have your bibles turn with me to 2 Timothy 1. Let us pray.
We are starting a new book in the series we are in the pastoral epistles God’s playbook for the church.
I have been privileged now to preach or teach through. Galatians, Obadiah, Deuteronomy, John, Philippians, Esther, and now 1 Timothy, we are working on Acts be done with that early next year.
One of my goals here as a pastor is to feed you through the preaching and teaching of Gods word.
We land here in 2 Timothy now and a little background is important for us as we dig into the book today.
This book was Written Scholars believe from Rome in Prison around the year AD 65 or 66. Many believe he wrote this after his death sentence given in Rome. It is similar to 1 Timothy in many ways but different in many ways as well. Its a letter to the Timothy, but for the church.
If you could single out a few verses to describe this book you could use.
1 I charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: 2 preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, and exhort, with complete patience and teaching.
Today I have titled the message Thankful for the Call.
Let me read to you todays text.
1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God according to the promise of the life that is in Christ Jesus,
2 To Timothy, my beloved child:
Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
3 I thank God whom I serve, as did my ancestors, with a clear conscience, as I remember you constantly in my prayers night and day. 4 As I remember your tears, I long to see you, that I may be filled with joy. 5 I am reminded of your sincere faith, a faith that dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice and now, I am sure, dwells in you as well. 6 For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands, 7 for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.
though the reading of the text what I want you to see as our main idea is this…
Remembering your calling fuels your ministry.
Remembering your calling fuels your ministry.
several sub-points under that main idea the first is this.
The Will of God fuels your calling.
The Will of God fuels your calling.
The introduction to this book is like many of Pauls letters.
You see the same greets in
1 Paul, called by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus, and our brother Sosthenes,
1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
To the church of God that is at Corinth, with all the saints who are in the whole of Achaia:
1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God,
To the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus:
1 Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy our brother,
Paul was careful to start many of his letters because he wanted those who read them to understand the kind of calling he had on his life. Paul was a pharisee before the Lord changed him, but God rich in mercy made him an apostle, gave him the gift of apostleship.
Being an apostle was something Paul could not earn rather it was something that was given to him by the will of God, and that gave Paul the power and authority to write these letters.
In his letter to the Galatians Paul starts out his letter by saying this.
1 Paul, an apostle—not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead—
God fuels your calling. But in order to fulfill that calling you have to have faith, have a connection with God. Because its God who gives you that calling through his Son Jesus Christ.
In fact Paul says The promise of life that is in Christ Jesus. Meaning It all ties to faith and fellowship with Christ. Your calling finds its very meaning through the one who called you, never forget that.
Your calling may have started at home, may have started at church, through a talk with a friend, or like me when I was 16 years old at church one Wednesday night, but no matter where it started you must remember who started that Calling and always lean into him when you are doing the work of the ministry.
Our calling involves others.
Our calling involves others.
For Timothy his calling was fueled by many people in this text we see three specifically. Paul, Lois, and Eunice.
Starting with Paul he met Timothy traveling through Lystra. Let us read this encounter.
1 Paul came also to Derbe and to Lystra. A disciple was there, named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer, but his father was a Greek. 2 He was well spoken of by the brothers at Lystra and Iconium. 3 Paul wanted Timothy to accompany him, and he took him and circumcised him because of the Jews who were in those places, for they all knew that his father was a Greek.
Timothy was a Christian prior to Paul meeting him, but he was not on the level he needed to be as a minister of the gospel until Paul came into his life.
in 1 Cor 4:14-17 we read this..
14 I do not write these things to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children. 15 For though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel. 16 I urge you, then, be imitators of me. 17 That is why I sent you Timothy, my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ, as I teach them everywhere in every church.
Paul was a father figure to many including Timothy. As we just read Paul seen Timothy as a Child as a son, and Timothy most scholars believe Father was not a believer, and he did not have that Father figure in the faith, and what Paul did was take himself and put himself as a Father figure for Timothy. He loved Timothy no other man got 2 biblical letters written to them but timothy himself.
Timothy would not the man he was spiritually without a spiritual father.
We all need people in our lives affirming the call, teaching us how to live out the call. We are not meant to do this life alone, we need others to come and help us change. We need Pauls in our lives, and I would argue we need Timothys as well.
We will touch on this more as we continue in this book, but I want to say this now do you have someone who is pouring into you spiritually and our you pouring into someone else.
I love my Dad, but he was not a spiritual father to me, I have had men like a few of my former pastors, one of my brothers in law, a man named Jeremiah who poured into me molding and shaping me to be the man I am now.
Its our responsibility as believers to be Pauls to others who need it. There are so many of us that do not have spiritual fathers be that in someone life that needs it. You don’t have to have the theological of Paul to be a mentor and a father figure to someone, so find that person, teach the word to them, encourage them, so that they may live out their calling.
I did not forget about Timothy’s Mother and Grandmother.
One scholar said this… What we do know is that these godly ladies' faith was observable to Paul. Probably before they were believers, they taught Timothy the Old Testament, but now their understanding of these Scriptures was Christ centered. Timothy and these godly mothers came to know and love the fact that the Scriptures make us wise for salvation because they point us to the Savior Himself, who is the fulfillment of the Scriptures.
The laddies who were family members of Paul faith was so noticeable that not only did Timothy pick up godly habits, but others saw that. Paul saw that very thing.
The same Scholar i just quoted would say this.. Are you teaching your kids the Scriptures? Do they see in you, mom or dad, a "sincere faith" in Christ?
One cannot overstate the importance of living out the Christian life before watching children. I want to say to my kids, "(Follow) my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love, and endurance"
I have heard from many in this room that impact their fathers and mothers have had in their lives. Paul Winslow tells me and the church all the time how thankful he was for his mother, and the impact she had shaping him as a man, as a believer in Christ. In fact I have heard many of you talk about how your mothers and grandmothers have poured into your lives setting you up with a firm foundation for the rest of your lives.
Your family is your greatest ministry. You may not have the roles of Paul, Timothy, the great missionaries in the world but God gave you your children, and your grandchildren to shape their own callings.
I want to say this as well there are many faithful saints who do well in the homes but unfortunately their kids don’t live out the faith, I would encourage you for just a moment to still be the example in the faith for them. To often many let their kids choices affect their convictions, out of love. Continue down the path of faithfulness fulfilling your all calling that you were taught by faithful saints.
I also want to encourage you once your kids leave the home to continue to be a testimony. Some of us start so strong maybe even in our parenting but they don’t see it through they get complacent in their following of Jesus Christ.
Its not just Spiritual fathers or parents or grandparents that shape your calling its others.
How many in this room have seen their calling aided by the help of other brothers and sisters in Christ?
Maybe its a friend? I have people that I can call and just talk with me help me grow in my faith in my understand of the word of God, and godliness, I hope you have that as well if not talk with me talk with my wife.
God uses others to affirm our calling, and to help us get there. Never under-estamate those whom the Lord puts in your life, because he has put them in your life so that you could help change them, but also so they can change you.
Something here you see as well is that part of the role others have is the role of prayer. Anyone in here prayed like Paul did for Timothy for someone else? Praying without ceasing remembering them night and pray.
Some of you pray for your kids, your family, your friends that they will just find and fulfill the calling that God has given them. You pray for thing like they will return to the Lord, that they will be obedient to the Lord, that they will serve him. Thats the kind of Prayer that Paul prayed for Timothy every day.
So much so that he remembering him with tears, again something relatable. Paul was crying in this situation because he was locked up in a jail cell unable to join Timothy in this ministry endeavor.
Some of us in our prayers pray for others because they are locked up in their own jail cells fighting all kinds of demons, that we just wish God will show them the way out. Many of us like Paul just want to see those we love living out the faith with our own sight. Remembering the joy that others gave to us.
Let us be others who want to help people fulfill there own callings. Whether than be through our family our relationships or our prayers.
Looking at the text I want you to see something else. Next point is this…
Feed your calling
Feed your calling
Paul here I believe goes back to timothies ordination affirming his pastoral calling, motivating him to continue in the faith. To live out what he has been called to do. The Holy Spirit gives us the calling, but we my friends have to live it out to feed it.
I am a huge fan of survivor and recently at the very end of the show when its down to the final four two of them have to go head to head in a fire making context that burns through this rope to raise a flag, and the first person to make a fire hot enough the flame big enough to cause that rope to break wins and the best ones I have seen are always one who fan the flame somehow.
I think fanning the flame is a great illustration for our own walk with Christ. Listen to the words of John Piper, “First, fire is hot. Really hot. There is hot, and then there is hot. You might say, “I’ve got a fever. I’m really hot.” Well, you’re not really hot. I can touch your forehead, and it doesn’t burn me. But if you light a bonfire, and I stick my hand in it — that’s hot. It’s white-hot. This is the way Paul talks in Romans 12:11: “Do not be slothful in zeal, boil in spirit.” Paul wants Timothy boiling. He wants him aflame. Not fever-hot, but fire-hot — white-hot. Jesus spits lukewarm ministers out of his mouth (Revelation 3:16). So I use the words “white-hot flame” to make that clear.
Second, I add the phrase “keep feeding.” Timothy, keep feeding the white-hot flame. The reason for this is that Paul’s point is not that Timothy has grown cool and needs one good hot fix. That is not the point. The present tense (verse 6, anazopurein) for the verb “fan into flame” is continuous, ongoing action.
So Timothy, keep feeding the white-hot flame. . . . Feed it. Feed it. Flames go out without continuous fuel.
Now, what is it that is supposed to be burning? What is aflame? What is to be kept burning? Verse 6 gives the answer. It’s the gift that God has given Timothy. “For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God.” Timothy, keep feeding the white-hot flame of God’s gift.
God gave a gift to Timothy. That gift includes fire. The ongoing existence of that fire is dependent on Timothy’s obedience to verse 6: Feed it, Timothy. Fan it into flame over and over again. It will go out if you don’t — even though it’s the gift of God.
And lest you think at this point that God is held hostage to Timothy’s weakness, and can’t make the gifts he gave him successful in blessing his church and reaching the lost, remember, Timothy’s fanning this gift into flame is also God’s gift. God makes the flame of his gifts dependent on our feeding, and then makes our feeding dependent on his grace.
Now for Timothy he was to keep his flame alive, by using the gift the Lord has given him.
I really like Pipers illustration here, because it applies to more than just Timothy it applies to us. So often I wonder if the Lord is not doing the work in me or you because we lack faithfulness we lack dedication to the call he has given us. I here people all the time say I don’t feel like God is working in me, and to that I say are you working for him? In the context of this sermon are you fanning the gift he has given you. I have talked about this before, but why should we expect godliness in our own lives if we we put so many things in our lives above the Lord.
Going back to survivor one year there was a showdown between Sarah and Tony, and Sarah got off to a great start here flame was touching the rope it looked like she was going to win while the other guy was far behind building a steady fire, and the flame for Sarah was just hot, but it was out of control, and in a last gasp effort she threw husk on it hoping it would get her over the top only to smother the fire, and I say that just to tell you about the importance of fanning your own flame, and not letting it burn out.
and we can do that because of this last point..
The Holy Spirit powers our calling.
The Holy Spirit powers our calling.
God gave us a Spirit not of fear. Timothy most likely had some sort of fear going on there at Ephesus. It should not be hard for us to understand that fear, because of all that he was dealing with and going through.
He no longer had his Spiritual father with me, he was dealing with outsiders coming into the church and spreading a false gospel. No doubt he was being persecuted . So Paul reminds him the Holy Spirit which lives in you, which fuels your gifts and your calling is going to see you through all this.
As you know we are studying through the book of Acts of Wednesday night and I thought it was providential that one of my commentaries listed this verse under this verse here in 2 Timothy its Acts 18:9-10
9 And the Lord said to Paul one night in a vision, “Do not be afraid, but go on speaking and do not be silent, 10 for I am with you, and no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many in this city who are my people.”
One guy said something powerful, he said, “Timothy in your fear, remember that God is with you, in you, and for you; His Spirit powers you to endure and the love you need to minister. Be disciplined Be diligent. Be brave, for God is in you.
And that quote my friends is for you as well. I love verse 7. Its one I took more to heart, and the reality is this God is the one who called you so you should be secure in that calling, because he has put others in your life to help you step into that calling, and he has called you to feed that calling by being in the word, being Obedient , fanning that flame, filling your hunger for the heavenly things and guess what he has given you the power to live out that calling.
There again is no better example of this than Jesus Christ. Who is the promise of life. Who lived out their calling like no-one else ever had. Who was full of grace dying on the cross, shedding his blood why? So he could fulfill his calling, and so that he could save his children those whom believe in him. Providing mercy to those who do not deserve it. Non of us can rightly stand before God and declare ourselves free from Sin, but thanks be to God that offers that grace through the cross, and mercy to those who believe bringing peace to those who are far from him so that we can have right standing in God.
and Jesus did all that with a clear conscience free from sin free from swerving from the call that God has put on his life. Jesus had a calling just like you and I and he lived it out perfectly. He prayed to God the Father day and night you see it in the scriptures. He wept for those who needed him, and you better believe that when he did ministry on this earth, and went to the cross despite all those who hated him despite his circumstances he had joy. John 15:11
11 These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.
Jesus had the genuine faith to live out his calling because he was God, and knew all that he said would come to pass, but even in his life he fanned the flame, never ceasing to pray never ceasing to be in communion with the Father so that everything he did was fueled by the power of God and not man. He remembered his calling now do you?
Now you have to answer that two fold? One have I answered the call for my life? Two am I living out that call.
Your calling starts with a relationship with Jesus Christ. In the text we are in today. Paul says he had a clear conscience, and Timothy has sincere faith. Those two things are important. Because in order to have a clear conscience and a sincere faith before God you have to be saved.
1 John 1:7–9 (ESV)
7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. Notice the all sin 8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 We have to admit we are sinners. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. When we come to God we can be made clean through the blood of Christ, because Christ raised from the dead ascending to heaven proving that he has the power to do that very thing
YOU MIGHT jot this down in your notes but a great way to learn to confess your sins and turn back to God is Psalm 25 for the sake of time I wont read it to you. Make that a mental note for yourself. You have to be saved to answer that call. Then you have to figure out what that call is, and for that you have to really follow the Holy Spirit and plug into the local church.
Why both those thing? First of all God living in you is the best resource you can have. Pair that with the word of God you can have a faithful fruitful Christian life baring you are obedient to God. That you are fanning the flame.
Second you have to plug into the local church. Friends the church is a place where the saints come together and use their gifts to serve the Lord and other another. Yes you can do great things for the Lord outside of the gathering of the church, but in order to really find your calling you need to be plugged into the local church.
Every single person when they are saved are giving a gift to serve the Lord and his church.
10 As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace:
In Romans 12:6-8
6 Having gifts that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them: if prophecy, in proportion to our faith; 7 if service, in our serving; the one who teaches, in his teaching; 8 the one who exhorts, in his exhortation; the one who contributes, in generosity; the one who leads, with zeal; the one who does acts of mercy, with cheerfulness.
God overtime in your faithfulness is going to reveal what those gifting are, and like Timothy when they laid hands on him the church is going to see. The church is going to be like you know what you serve children so well have you thought about serving them more? Or you are a good teacher teach this Sunday school class? Or you have a heart for the lost have you thought about being a missionary? You are really good with administration can you help with some logistics on things we need at the church.
Use your calling ultimately to glory God. Because that is the goal, and should be the desire of those who have been saved by him. Let us pray..