Sermon Tone Analysis

This passage summarizes the entire book.

It’s a wrap-up with several themes repeated.

This is the final message on 1 Timothy.

My prayer has been that you will be strengthened and better able to deal with the time of transition we are facing.

God does not want us to be disloyal to him and loyal to people.

He wants us to put Jesus first, the well-being of the body of Christ second, and our own individual choices in a distant third.

Paul tells Timothy to follow, fight, to fortify, to fine-tune, and to forego certain things for the good of the church and the glory of God.

As we look at this church and how God wants us to conduct ourselves, look no further than Paul’s charge to Timothy.

Follow

First, we are to follow.

He tells us to flee certain things.

But when we run away from one thing, we will run to another.

This is the problem deer have in the woods.

Smart deer will lay down and not move when someone is near.

But if they get up and run away from one hunter, they expose themselves to another hunter in the woods.

What are we to flee?

The love of money, the wasted conversations, the false teachings, the sin that is in this world.

We are to run from these things.

Where do we go when we flee these things?

What are we to follow?

Make it you plan to pursue righteousness.

This is how people in the church act when they are following God.

Make it your plan to be godly.

In other words, take seriously the teachings of Jesus and the apostles and live out what you read and understand.

Make it your plan to have faith.

If you see that the Bible contradicts what you believe, trust Jesus.

We are all in a process of change, but we won’t change if we don’t trust.

It’s hard to give up life-long beliefs.

If we are going to be what God wants us to be, we need to have faith in Jesus.

Make it your plan to love.

Walk into this building to love God.

Walk into this building to be a help to other people.

Be patient, kind, not rude or boastful.

If you see a need, meet it.

Make it your plan to love.

Make it your plan to be steadfast.

This church is going through changes right now.

Godly people are steadfast.

They don’t walk out the door when things are difficult.

Their love for God and for people causes them to stick with Jesus and stick with the church so that they can be part of the solution, not part of the problem.

Make it your plan to be gentle.

Timothy could unload on the false teachers.

He could be highly critical of all that was going on in Ephesus.

Godly people don’t run roughshod over others.

They are gentle in their approach.

Paul later says to Timothy in 2nd Timothy,

Do you see the love in these verses?

Instead of quarreling, the Lord’s servant is kind, hoping that through gentle correction that people will be led to change.

If we follow these guidelines and flee from sin, we will be people who make this church a stronger church for the glory of God.

Fight

Second, we are to fight the good fight.

The fight is over issues of faith.

“The faith” deals with the teachings of Jesus.

These fights are worthwhile.

No matter what people say, you cannot get whatever you want out of the Bible without horribly twisting what it says.

We live in a day when many will tell you that the Bible is not reliable, it is not the word of God, that it contains false teachings and that we are so much more enlightened in our day than Jesus, Peter, John or Paul were in their day.

The times have changed and we need to change with it.

The church needs to fight this fight.

The Bible, the teachings of Jesus, are a rock.

If we build our lives on Jesus, when the winds blow and the water rises, we will be secure.

Our world lives on fads.

Something is important today and tomorrow they move on to something else.

Those involved in teaching know that emphases and theories about teaching change all the time.

Each one was better than the one before and will help solve problems.

When they don’t a new theory comes.

If you want something that you can stand on, stand on the word of God.

Take hold of the life to which Jesus has called you.

That life deals with eternal issues, has an eternal perspective, and will not change every time the world changes.

Fight the fight of faith.

It is a battle worth fighting.

Fortify Yourself

Third, fortify yourself.

We fortify ourselves when we realize that everything we do is in the presence of God and of Jesus Christ.

We fortify ourselves when we keep the commandment unstained and free from reproach.

We fortify ourselves when we will of the appearing of our Lore Jesus Christ.

We fortify ourselves when we meditate on the blessedness of God, the Sovereitnty of God, the one who is king of kings and Lord of Lords, the one who dispenses immortality, who dwells in an unapproachable light, who is invisible.

We fortify ourselves when we give him honor and when we lit him have eternal control!

Amen!

Fine tune

Fourth, encourage others to fine-tune their lives.

There is no sin in being rich.

The rich have their own set of temptations.

Riches can make a person arrogant or can set their hopes that their riches will give them what they want in life.

We fine-tune our lives when we realize that God is the one who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.

We fine-tune our lives when we use our riches to do good, rich in good works, generous and ready to share.

We fine-tune our lives when we realize the benefits of living this kind of life.

We store up a treasure for ourselves a good foundation for the future.

What do we find in the future?

We find that in our generosity, we have taken hold of that which is truly life.

Forego

Fifth, we are to forego.

Don’t get involved with things that are a waste of time.

Irreverent babble and contradictions of what is falsely called “knowledge.”

These have been discussed earlier.

The end result of a focus on these things is we swerve from the faith.

We are distracted drivers.

We focus on what we think is important, but what we think is important is not the focus God wants us to have.

We need to guard the deposit, the word of God, that has been entrusted to us.

Forego focusing on other things.

The church is best served when it focuses on the things of the spirit of God.