Make Disciples
Review
Timothy, Timotheus (Person). Paul’s convert and companion, whose name means “one who honors God.” His name is often spelled Timotheus in the KJV.
Timothy first appears in Acts 16:1–3 as Paul’s disciple whose mother “was a believer; but his father was a Greek” (v 1). He was a third-generation Christian after his mother Eunice and grandmother Lois (2 Tm 1:5). The apostle Paul, undoubtedly Timothy’s spiritual father, refers to him as “my true child in the faith” (1 Tm 1:2); he perhaps converted Timothy on his first or second missionary journey. The son of a Greek (or gentile) father, Timothy was yet uncircumcised; however, when Paul decided to take Timothy with him on the second journey, he had him circumcised, so as not to hinder their missionary endeavors among the Jews.
Timothy, who was “well spoken of by the brethren at Lystra and Iconium” (Acts 16:2), became Paul’s companion and assistant on his second missionary journey at Lystra.
He traveled with Paul into Europe following the Macedonian vision. When Paul decided to go to Athens, he left Silas and Timothy at Beroea to better establish the church there (Acts 17:14). Timothy and Silas eventually joined Paul in Corinth (18:5). He next appears with Paul in Ephesus on his third journey (19:22), from where Paul sends Erastus and him into Macedonia ahead of himself. In the last mention of Timothy in Acts 20:4, he was included in the list of goodwill ambassadors who were to accompany Paul to Jerusalem with the offering for the Christian Jews.
Timothy is often mentioned in the Pauline letters. His name is included in the introductory salutations of 2 Corinthians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, and Philemon. Timothy’s presence with Paul when he wrote these letters confirms the accuracy of the references to him in Acts. He was in Corinth on the second journey when Paul wrote 1 and 2 Thessalonians, at Ephesus on the third journey when Paul wrote 2 Corinthians, and in Rome during Paul’s first Roman imprisonment, when he wrote Philippians, Colossians, and Philemon. He is mentioned in the introductions of 1 and 2 Timothy as the recipient of those two pastoral letters.
In the closing salutations of Romans 16:21, Timothy is listed along with others who send their good wishes to the believers in Rome. In 1 Corinthians 4:17 and 16:10, Paul speaks words of praise for Timothy as he sends him with a message to Corinth (see also Phil 2:19–23; 1 Thes 3:2–6). In 2 Corinthians 1:19 Timothy is named along with Paul and Silas as men who were telling about Jesus Christ.
In Hebrews 13:23 the author (Pauline authorship uncertain) tells his readers that Timothy has been released from prison, and hopes to come with Timothy to visit the readers of that letter.
Paul put Timothy in charge of the church at Ephesus and wrote him two pastoral letters addressed with his name to help him perform that responsible task.
A. The Need for Reconciliation—Why?
Because of sin God and man are in a relationship of hostility and enmity. Though this is not mentioned in 2 Corinthians 5, it is clear in Romans 5. We were enemies of God (v. 10). Does this refer to mankind’s enmity toward God or to God’s enmity toward man? The latter seems to be the sense; that is, God reckoned us to be His enemies. This is the sense of the same word in Romans 11:28, where God is said to reckon the people of Israel His enemies. Paul’s mention of God’s wrath in 5:9 supports the interpretation that the enemies were the object of His wrath. Our state of estrangement could not have been more serious, nor the need for a change, a reconciliation, more urgent.
B. The Cause of Reconciliation—How?
Clearly the testimony of the New Testament is that reconciliation comes about through the death of the Lord Jesus (Rom. 5:10). God made Him to be sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. The death of Christ completely changed man’s former state of enmity into one of righteousness and complete harmony with a righteous God.
Leon Morris, who also holds that both man and God are reconciled, carefully notes that
When we say that God can be thought of as reconciled to man, that does not mean that, with various imperfections, He alters completely His attitude to man. Rather it is our groping way of expressing our conviction that He reacts in the strongest possible way against sin in every shape and form, and that man comes under His condemnation accordingly; but that when reconciliation is effected, when peace is made between man and God, then that condemnation is removed and God looks on man no longer as the object of His holy and righteous wrath, but as the object of His love and His blessing.