Thankful for Life Change

Please find 2 Timothy chapter 2. The title of today’s sermon is Thankful for Life Change. We have spent the last couple of weeks going through what we can identify as our core values. The first is that we value the unwavering truth of scripture. Last week we said that we value growing relationships. And today, we will see that we value life change.

2 Timothy 2:20–26 ESV

20 Now in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver but also of wood and clay, some for honorable use, some for dishonorable. 21 Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work. 22 So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. 23 Have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies; you know that they breed quarrels. 24 And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil, 25 correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, 26 and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will.

A true Christian can really identify with a changed life. We have been brought from death to life. We, as a church, are celebrating that this morning. Corbin Sikes is telling the world that he has changed. But more than just him changing but that God has changed him through belief in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We live in a celebrity culture. When celebrities do or say things, we tend to pay attention. There was one recently who made a huge statement. Her name Kat Von D. She got famous for being a tattoo artist on the show “LA Ink”. She was very involved in the occult and was practicing witchcraft. She began searching for truth. Beginning in 2020, people noticed that she was getting rid of all of her books on witchcraft and the occult. Her body was nearly covered in tattoos and she started blacking most of her tattoos out saying that they meant nothing to her now and that they were just landmarks of the dark times in her life. And just this year, she has professed Jesus as her Lord and savior and has been baptized into a small local church in Indiana, much like this one you are in today.

Many times, we see celebrities do something like this and get all caught up with it and then they go back to their worldly ways. I would encourage us that when we hear of anyone, celebrity or not, to pray for them that the profession is real and will bear fruit. Today as we go through our passage, I want us to see that this deals as much with the believer and the change that should continue to happen in their life as it does the unbeliever converting to Christianity.

Because, and I try to make this point as often as I can, life change is tested through time. Yes, we celebrate when someone makes a profession that Jesus is Lord. But do they continue down this path? And, do we help them down this path in growing in godliness and righteousness? Do we think that someone is truly a Christian when they have made a profession, been baptized, yet leave the church altogether and never grow? I think these are all important questions that can all be wrapped up into one great important question.

What should life change look like in the life of a believer?

1. A Changed Life is Cleansed

2 Timothy 2:20–21 ESV

20 Now in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and silver but also of wood and clay, some for honorable use, some for dishonorable. 21 Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, he will be a vessel for honorable use, set apart as holy, useful to the master of the house, ready for every good work.

I think I need to start off by reminding us that this book is a letter that was written to a young pastor. So a lot of what Paul is telling Timothy is dealing with him as a pastor. But also, I want to remind you that Pastors are not held to a higher standard as a Christian. We are all called to the same godliness and holiness.

We believe what it says in 2 Corinthians 5:17 “17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” We are called to be new people. The issue that the world has with most Christians and that I completely understand is that a lot of Christians do no care if people get saved or not, as long as they act right. And this is not what a church should believe or act like. The church should not be focused on producing good people, the church should be focused on producing Godly people, people who have been changed by the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We should want to see people come to faith in Jesus by believing in the gospel and then see their life changed. (gospel presentation)

Paul goes into detail here about different vessels. Some that are made of gold and silver, and others that are made of wood and clay. The ones that are made of gold and silver are for honorable use, and the ones of wood and clay are for dishonorable use.

We know by reading this that we can be one of the two. But Paul gives us direction in this as well. He says that if anyone cleanses himself from what is dishonorable, then he will be a vessel for honorable use. And this is something good to hear, but how do we do that. How do we make sure that we are being cleansed from what is unrighteous and that we are being vessels for honorable use?

For us as Christians to be cleansing ourselves, we must be in tune with God. We must pursue the things of Christ like holiness and godliness. And we do this together with different things.

scripture reading

prayer

fighting sin (2 Cor. 10:5 take every thought captive)

share our faith - grow ourselves in what we believe and make us look at our own lives

These are all different ways that we can cleanse ourselves from unrighteousness. And we do this why? Paul tells Timothy to do this so that he will be set apart as holy, useful to the master, and ready for every good work. I want to quickly look at each of these that Paul lists out.

Set apart as Holy - For all those who are saved by the grace of God, we are already holy. So is this different than that? Paul is taking this further that our justification that we receive at salvation. Paul is telling Timothy to watch himself here, even though he is a Christian. So that he doesn’t turn into someone who is worldly.

Useful to the Master - First off, who is the Master that he is speaking of. Well that is God. Timothy, being a pastor, needed to model what it means to be a Christian to those around him. The same way today, in our context that we are in where Christianity is viewed by many to just be Moralistic Therapeutic Deism (if I am good then I will get to heaven), we as every day believers need to paint of a picture that being a Christian is very different and we live our lives differently than the world says we should.

Ready for every good work - We need to be prepared. We don’t need to be reluctant in our work for God and his kingdom. I saw this very thing this past Sunday when 11 of us from here got out of our comfort zone and went around the neighborhood and talked to people and passed out pies for Thanksgiving. I think this is not only opening up doors in our community but opening up the hearts of us to those in our community and seeing that we need to be ready for every good work.

But we cannot effectively do any of this unless we are first cleansed. Just like the vessels for the house that Paul is telling Timothy about, we are vessels in the house of God. And we need to have a changed life. And a changed life is cleansed.

2. A Changed life is Changed

2 Timothy 2:22–24 ESV

22 So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart. 23 Have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies; you know that they breed quarrels. 24 And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil,

Paul tells some really good advice for us here. Flee from youthful passions. When someone is young, they just want everything. If their friend has it, they want it. If the neighbor has it, they want it. If other kids are doing something, they want to do it. But this doesn’t always stop when we become adults. So Paul tells Timothy to flee from these things, even as an adult. Satan is still trying to tempt the Christian to do evil. We must fight against this.

And Paul tells us that we must pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace. These are attributes of a mature Christian. And even though he is telling these thing to Timothy who is a pastor, they are still a standard for a Christian to be mature. We need to pursue these things.

He goes on to says to not have anything to do with ignorant controversies because it breeds quarrels. Who here has seen a church just be ripped apart because of some type of controversy? It isn’t hard for that to divide a group of immature believers. A sign of maturity is when these controversies come up, we help to lead it to a place of peace for everyone.

And then he addresses Timothy personally as a pastor and tells him to not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach and patiently enduring evil. The life of a pastor is very hard. And it is a rollercoaster. Just the other day, I got an extremely nasty message from someone complaining about something, and 15 minutes later, I check my mailbox and have a card in there encouraging me.

Pastoring is extremely hard and it isn’t getting any easier. around 10 years ago, the average tenure of a pastor was 5-7 years. Today, it is 2-3 years. Why is that? I think it comes back to spiritual maturity. People who are immature are hard to deal with. And this is why we, as a church, believe in life change. We truly believe that a changed life is changed. That they are fleeing from youthful passions and pursuing the things of God. That they are driven to become more mature believers.

We are supposed to be different than the culture that is around us. All of those things that Paul is telling Timothy to flee from, is the things that the world is telling us are okay to do and to be. And many people profess Christ as Lord and savior but fall right back into this. There is this since of perseverance in what Paul is telling Timothy when he tells him to patiently endure evil. Becoming a Christian does not make things easier. In fact, in many ways it gets more difficult.

You are now part of what is a much smaller family. Your old family will possibly alienate you and pressure you to give up the godly life you pursue. Brothers and sisters, we must make a stand in our faith. If we truly believe that a changed life is changed, then we must be different. We must shun many of the things that we once loved. No longer participate in the things we once did, no longer practice the same things we once did, no longer have the same close friends that we once did. We truly believe that a life is changed.

But we cannot expect you to do all of this on your own. This is why we all need the local church. And not just a local church but a church that is going to disciple us and to help us grow in our faith. So that we do not fall into the things that we once did. Paul tells us to flee from our youthful passions. This indicates a change in a person. We die to ourselves and we live for Jesus Christ.

Galatians 2:20 ESV

20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

A changed life is changed. But even more than this, we effect others with our lives and that is why...

3. A Changed Life Changes Other Lives

2 Timothy 2:25–26 ESV

25 correcting his opponents with gentleness. God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of the truth, 26 and they may come to their senses and escape from the snare of the devil, after being captured by him to do his will.

Sometimes, people need to be corrected. But this doesn’t mean that they need to be yelled and screamed at and sent nasty text messages. Sometimes the most effective results we get as parents is when we take our kids and sit them down and have a hard conversation with them. We tell them what they did wrong and we show them how to not do it again. Paul tells Timothy to do it with gentleness. Isn’t this a lesson that we all can learn from. One thing that we spend a lot of time talking about at home with our daughter is thinking before we speak and act. When we do this, we are more probable in doing it with gentleness.

So that God may perhaps grant them repentance. We correct people so that we can see them restored. And yes it is good to see them restored to us, but it is a much better thing to see them restored to God. That they are led to a knowledge of truth. The truth of the gospel. That Jesus died for the sins of man on the cross at Calvary.

And come to their senses and escape the snare of the devil. To be able to see someone go from death to life. I mentioned earlier about Kat Von D. To see someone who was in the occult and practicing witchcraft to be radically changed by Jesus Christ. But not only that, to see someone who is speaking out about the evils of the old life and pointing people to the truth of Jesus. This is what a changed life does.

We need to be open to correction, but also, we need to be able to approach our opponents about some correction with gentleness. When I hear what Paul is describing here, my mind goes to a ministry that is called Love Life. This is something that I believe our church will begin to be more involved with over the next year. The abortion clinic on Latrobe Drive in Charlotte is that busiest abortion clinic in the southeast US. There is a ministry that is located right next door to them called Love Life. They assist expectant mothers who decide not to abort their babies. They also do what they call prayer walks on a weekly basis where they walk around the block and pray for specific things. While they are doing this, they are encountered by the most demonic opposition that I have ever encountered. People just yelling and screaming at the people who are there to stand for the unborn.

Love Life, in a way, is doing what Paul is describing here. They are gently correcting their opponents. The people who are praying never engage that ones who are screaming at them, they only continue to pray and to give their expectant mothers an opportunity to chose life.

A changed life changes other lives. How does this happen practically. Paul is talking about opposition but we believe that we change each others lives too even when we aren’t opposed to one another. So how does that happen.

building relationships

gathering to pray

gathering to open God’s word (outside of the building)

being open with one another

We truly believe that a changed life changes other lives.

Conclusion

I started us off with a question.

What should life change look like in the life of a believer?

I think that this answer has a very broad answer but at the same time, very simple answer. Broad in the sense that we could spend hours upon hours describing this life. But simple in the fact that we just need to point to Jesus. That is what a changed life should look like. At Immanuel, we believe this is wrapped up into 3 traits.

Someone who knows

Someone who grows

Someone who go’s

We want to see people know Jesus. We does this through belief in the gospel.

We turn from our sin and turn to Christ. We are celebrating here in just a couple of minutes someone who is declaring that they have done this.

We want to see people grow in their relationship with Christ. This is seen through their personal time that they spend with God. Through prayer and bible intake, we grow. We also grow when we get together in small groups and sharpen one another.

We want to see people go. We are all missionaries for Christ. We are called to go into this dark world and be a light. We do this by sharing the gospel to others.

Maybe you have never truly placed your faith in Jesus Christ. I want to give you an opportunity to do this right now. I am not going to lead you in a prayer or ask you to come down. But I want you to bow your head. I am going to explain the gospel one more time.

(gospel presentation)

If you are here today and have never truly done that, but today, you believe for the first time that Jesus did that for you and now you are going to lay down your life to follow him completely, raise your hand.

If you have raised your hand, I don’t want you to run out of the doors as soon as the service ends. I want to talk to you. I ask that you at least fill out the card on the edge of your bulletin so that I can get in touch with you.