The Good Servant of Jesus Christ

February 2, 2020 Pastor's Service Order Call to Worship Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord, O my soul! I will praise the Lord as long as I live; I will sing praises to my God while I have my being. Hymn #559 Ten Thousand Reasons Hymn #693 Amazing Grace My Chains are Gone Call to Confession If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Let us pray. Prayer of Confession Lord God, You require us to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly before You. We confess that we have not loved You or our neighbor in this way. We repent of this. Grant that Your Holy Spirit drives us to seek these things through Christ. Amen. Words of Assurance Righteousness will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification. Hear this good news and be free to live in peace. Amen. Greeting Because of the work of Jesus Christ for us we have been given the gift of repentance and the forgiveness of sins We are a forgiven people. Let us now greet one another as brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ. Children's Choir Hymn of Preparation #762 Ancient Words Children's Message Prayer for Illumination As we come to God's Holy Word this morning we trust that through the Word and Spirit he is working in us to make us holy. We come before him this morning and ask that he would illumine our minds and open our hearts as we read it. Let us pray. Triune God, grant us a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Christ, so that the eyes of our hearts might be enlightened. Help us to know the hope to which you have called us, the riches of the glorious inheritance of the saints, and the immeasurable greatness of your power at work in us. Through Christ, our Lord. Amen. Old Testament Lesson: Deuteronomy 6:1-9 Responsive Psalm: Psalm 71:14-19 P: But I will hope continually and will praise you yet more and more. C: My mouth will tell of your righteous acts, of your deeds of salvation all the day, for their number is past my knowledge. P: With the mighty deeds of the Lord God I will come; I will remind them of your righteousness, yours alone. C: O God, from my youth you have taught me, and I still proclaim your wondrous deeds. P: So even to old age and gray hairs, O God, do not forsake me, until I proclaim your might to another generation, your power to all those to come. C: Your righteousness, O God, reaches the high heavens. P: You who have done great things, O God, who is like you? New Testament Lesson: 1 Timothy 4:6-16 Hear ends the reading of God's Inspired and Inerrant Word. The grass withers and the flower fades but the word of the Lord remains forever. Amen. Standing Strong in the Faith When we read the New Testament, we see over and over calls for believers to stand firm in the faith. They are called to not only stand strong against the pressures in the world that might cause their faith to weaken but we see that they are also called to stand firm against what comes up against them in the church. As we have seen in our journeys through several short New Testament books over the last year the problems that we saw the Apostle Paul addressing were not just pressures from the world. It was false doctrine within the church. In Colossians we saw that people were teaching that sure you need Jesus to forgive your sins but they were saying that that wasn't enough after your sins had been forgiven. After that you needed some spiritual experience to increase in faith. Whether a religious ritual or some other experience. This wasn't the world coming at them, it was false teachers within the church who were questioning the sufficiency of Christ. Just recently we saw in the book of Titus that people in the church were teaching false doctrine and Titus was to stand strong and proclaim the truth. And today for youth Sunday we have another passage that has the Apostle Paul telling someone in the church to stand strong in the faith. Timothy is a young man and this is why we have landed in this passage for today. Now, we focus today on our young people but what Paul instructs Timothy in what we have read today is vital and important for each and every believer who trusts in the Lord Jesus Christ. In this passage we have three distinct things that we are going to take away this morning. The first is that training in godliness is of infinite value. We know that what we learn about sound doctrine and what we do for the sake of the gospel is something that lasts. It not only endures through the trials and hardships of this life but it is also of eternal value. Secondly, we see that these are the things that we are to proclaim and live. After letting Timothy know the value of what he has been taught he makes sure that he understands that he doesn't keep this to himself. He also lets him know that it starts with how he lives. There is not to be a disconnect between how we live and what we do. Lastly, we see that we must be certain to stand strong in these things. Paul says that we are to persist and to stand fast. There is no fast track or easy path to living the Christian life. We must persevere and be deliberate to take a look at how we live as we make sure that what we say we believe lines up with how our lives are lived. And so with that framework laid out for us we land in the fourth chapter of First Timothy and see our first point very clearly: training in godliness is of infinite value.​ 1 Timothy 4:6-10 ESV If you put these things before the brothers, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, being trained in the words of the faith and of the good doctrine that you have followed. Have nothing to do with irreverent, silly myths. Rather train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come. The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance. For to this end we toil and strive, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe. As this passage starts out we find that Paul is referring things that Timothy is to put before his fellow brothers. Just prior to this part of First Timothy we see Paul letting his young friend know that in later times some people will depart from the faith. They will devote themselves to deceitful spirits and the teaching of demons. They will make rules out of things for their own gain and will use strange teachings to control people and lead them away. And so, what we see this morning is what he is supposed to do in order to show those around him how they are to live the Christian life. Timothy has been trained in the faith and now he is to live it out in order to show people the contrast between false teachers and those who cling to the faith once for all delivered to the saints. The first thing he tells his young friend to avoid is irreverent, silly myths. We are not 100% certain what he was talking about but in this time there were superstitious stories from non-Biblical Jewish writings that people were trying to mix in with the Christian faith. While we may not have the same things we are still vulnerable to this. We all look for some affirmation that what we believe is true and this can get us to latch on to superstitions or anecdotal evidence and we put more trust in our experience or a story from someone else than we do in the inspired and inerrant Word of almighty God. With the risk of embarrassing myself I'm going to tell a story of when I did this very thing. I was in high school when the first Gulf War was going on and I heard a story second hand about how someone I knew from the church in Sioux Falls I went to youth group at had a sister who was going to school at SDSU in Brookings. I was told that she picked up someone who needed help on the side of the road for some reason and this person started talking about Saddam Hussein and he said that the end was near. He gave some other details of what was going to happen in the near future. I don't remember what they are because this has all become very foggy over the last 30 years but I do remember the last part of this story. This person sitting in the passenger seat of her car disappeared into thin air while she was going down the road at 70 or 75 miles per hour. As silly as it seems now as a young person concerned about a pretty serious conflict in the Middle East I put a lot of faith in that story. It confirmed to me that what I believed about God was in fact true. As a 15 or 16 year old I put more trust in a second hand silly myth than I did in the inerrant, inspired, and revealed Word of Almighty God. Like I said I'm embarrassed to admit it but at the same time that has shaped and formed me in an important way. I want to now know the word of God and I came to understand I don't need stories but that the revealed Word of God is not only true but it is sufficient. I don't need add-ons to the Bible to know it has authority and will grow me in holiness. The revealed, inspired, and inerrant Word of God is enough. And that is what is important. To trust the revealed Word of God. That is what we are to be trained in. Not myths. Not sentimental ideas. Not even what someone is telling us that God supposedly told them. Paul says we are to be trained in godliness and we do that by knowing the Word of God. And Paul uses a good little illustration for us to help us understand this, doesn't he? He refers to the idea of training our body. He says it is of some value but godliness is valuable in every way. It not only prepares you for the life to come but it also prepares you for this life. Godliness will help you to live in peace with your neighbors. It will equip you to live in the real world and care for others. Paul is pretty deliberate about this idea. He says that this is trustworthy and deserves full acceptance. In other words, this is important Timothy. This is important Christians. Train yourself in godliness. It needs to be a priority and he tells us why this is a priority. We have put our hope in the living God who is our Savior and so we want to grow in that trust. We want to desire the godliness and holiness that he blesses us with through the Holy Spirit. That is to be our striving and longing. At the end of this passage we are looking at for our first point, we have some language that might confuse us there in verse 10. It says that Jesus is the Savior of all people. This might sound a little bit like universalism to us. That is the idea that everyone is saved regardless of whether or not they have faith and trust in Jesus Christ. We know that the Bible is very clear that this is not the case and so what is being said here? When Paul speaks of all people, he is talking about people groups. He is contrasting the Old Covenant paradigm that salvation came only to the Jewish people. This isn't teaching universalism but is saying that the salvation Jesus won in his life, death, and resurrection isn't just for people of one ethnicity, but is for all people and it is applied specifically to the individual who has faith and trust in Jesus alone for their salvation. And so, in this first part of today's passage we have seen that our training in godliness is of infinite value and that we are to make this spiritual training, this discipline, a priority for our lives. As we move on to our next block of text in this passage we see that those things that we are to value are not to be kept to ourselves but instead they are to be proclaimed so that people may hear that these things are the commands of God.​ 1 Timothy 4:11-15 ESV Command and teach these things. Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity. Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching. Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophecy when the council of elders laid their hands on you. Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress. We see this truth very clearly here. Command and teach these things. This idea that we as believers are to focus on our spiritual training is not a suggestion. This is not to be something that we add to the mix when we can find the time. Paul tells Timothy to command these things because it is that important. Our spiritual development is not a suggestion that is to fall in behind our exercise routines or professional development. Those kinds of things are important, but they are temporary and we are to focus on that which will truly last. That is why he uses the word command here. He isn't supposed to just float this out there as one of the buffet options for how we are to fill our lives. For believers, this is the main course. It isn't a side dish or something we have a little sample of. It is to be our nourishment. But Paul is obviously concerned that Timothy will be silent or that he will allow his teaching to be ignored because Timothy might be looked down upon because he is younger. Now, we are having youth Sunday here today and this is the reason we have this passage, but it is unlikely that Timothy was in his teenage years. In their culture, you were considered a youth until you were forty. An idea that I'm sure some of us really appreciate. Regardless, the idea of what Paul is saying holds true for our young people. This isn't Paul saying that just because you are young and have a different perspective you should tell others how it is done. What is his focus here? To proclaim that which he has been given. He's not saying Timothy should throw out his own ideas just because he's young. Timothy is to proclaim the things that scripture tells us, not his own ideas. That is an important thing for our young people to understand. Get to know scripture. Focus on what God has to say and that is how you can challenge not only the people in your age group but even those who are older than you. Now young and even the older are thinking. That's great, I can get on board with that, but people will look down on me. Maybe because I'm young or maybe because the world just doesn't have much time for God's Word. This is why Timothy is told to set an example for believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, and in purity. To sum it up, Paul says to carry yourself in such a way that people will know that you actually believe what you're saying. You aren't saying ideas that you don't personally take to heart. If you have clean and honoring speech. If you show yourself to love and have good conduct and you are pure, people are going to notice. I can guarantee it because you will stand out. The other morning, I woke up really early not feeling so well and so I sat down in our recliner, pulled out my laptop, and started working on this very sermon because I knew I wasn't going to be able to get back to sleep. After working for a while, I wanted to have something else going on in the room and so I decided to see what was on TV. I came across a golf tournament on the Golf Channel and it was a European Tour event being played in Saudi Arabia. That was exactly the kind of thing I was looking for. I turned the sound down and it worked well as something in the background to make me feel a little less like I was all alone at 4:45 in the morning. Anyway, I looked up at one point and they had the traditional blimp view of this course. They started with a zoom in of a specific green and fairway area but then they pulled out to a broader view. The greens and fairways were lustrous and green but everything else was brown and sandy. Even the homes surrounding the golf course were all brown and earth tones. The golf course couldn't be missed. Everything else tended to blend together but the golf course stood out as a green, lush oasis in a plain, brown world. If we as Christians, set an example in speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity we will stand out in a dark world. Speaking specifically to our young people, you will stand out in this world if you stand up for Christ and his gospel. Do you want to be different.? Do you want to stand out? Living a life of purity in your world will stand out and give you an opportunity to share the gospel. Living a life of truly caring about others, not just talking about it, will stand out in your world. Having clean speech will make other see that you actually believe what you say you believe. And while I have diverted for a moment to the youth among us this is true for every one of us. We are called to have our lives stand in contrast to the world that we might have a powerful and effective witness in the world. We are called to live this way and be equipped in the faith, trained in godliness. And before we move on to our final point we see a few things that Timothy is called to devote himself. The first is the public reading of scripture. He is to put the word out there to be heard. This makes sense right? If we actually believe that God uses the Word and the Holy Spirit to build us up in faith and godliness then we want plenty of scripture to be heard and so Paul charges Timothy to read scripture to the believers when they gather together. He also calls on him to exhort others in teaching. Exhort is not a word we use very often. It means to encourage and urge others on to believe and live in a godly way. And we see that this is probably what Timothy was gifted with by God. The elders laid their hands on him and made a proclamation. The word used here is prophecy but that word doesn't always mean a telling of the future. It means a proclamation of the truth and to charge someone to do something with the authority of God's Word. It seems from this that the elders saw Timothy's gift of proclaiming and exhorting the Word of God and so Paul is telling him to develop that gift. He is to practice it and make progress. And this brings us to the final verse of our passage today and our final point. We first saw today that we are to train in godliness and to grow in it. Then the charge on us was to not only proclaim God's truth but to live a life consistent with it. Now in this final verse for us today we are to stand strong and firm in these things.​ 1 Timothy 4:16 ESV Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers. Timothy is to keep a close watch on himself. Paul wants Timothy to make sure that what he is doing and teaching is on track. He doesn't want Timothy being creative in coming up with new teachings on his own. He wants him to be certain that what he is teaching is in line with what he has been taught. As we saw a few weeks back when we went through the book of Titus we hold fast to the truth of scripture and the gospel because we want to be sure to get it right. We do this not because we want to win arguments or because we like being right. We make sure we get it right because it is true. It's true that we are all sinners who need to be rescued. It is true that God the Son took on human flesh and lived among us. It is true that even though Jesus was without sin he took on the wrath of God for our sin in his death on the cross. It is true that our crucified Lord defeated sin, death, and hell when he rose victorious over the grave. It is true that you and I are saved not by the works that we do but instead by faith in what Jesus has done for us. All of that is as true as the fact that you are sitting here in this building this morning. And it is that very message that God the Holy Spirit uses to create faith in our hearts and to build us in faith. If all that's true, and it is, then we keep close watch on what we believe and teach. We keep close watch on how we live. It says here that by persisting in doing this he saves himself and his hearers. Remember, scripture is very clear that we do not save ourselves by our own works and so Paul isn't telling Timothy to get to work on doing all this because he is responsible for getting others saved. He is saying that this stuff is true and so when you hold fast to it you keep yourself in the faith and others are brought to faith. It isn't a points system that Timothy can use to get folks saved. It is a statement on the importance of proclaiming the truth of the gospel. And with that we have come to the end of our 10 verses for this morning in 1 Timothy 4 we have seen the three clear points from the text but how can we take it from here and use it in our world. There are two things that we can apply to our lives this week in this text. The first is be deliberate to train yourself in godliness this week. We have seen just how important this is and that it is of eternal value. There are several things that this could be for you. Maybe it is picking up your Bible this week. Maybe it is taking a minute or 2 before you start your school day or your work day in prayer. Maybe it is grabbing hold of a verse or two and committing it to memory this week. I was convicted on this from an unusual source this past week. Perhaps you are familiar with the Christian satire news site the Babylon Bee. If you aren't, it is a website that writes satire news articles to make a point and often their articles are rather convicting. I saw a headline early yesterday morning that said this "Local Christian Man has more Napoleon Dynamite quotes memorized than Bible verses". The idea was that we often care more about quoting random movies than quoting scripture. That's a bit of a gut punch on its own, but then this satire article quoted this fictitious movie quoting man as saying "I like to store up lines from Napoleon Dynamite in my heart, so I always have a good one for any situation that might come my way." This is piercing satire isn't it. It convicts us that we need to be more deliberate to train ourselves in godliness. Immersing ourselves in scripture is how we do this. And so, find something this week whether prayer, Bible reading, or memorizing some scripture and be deliberate with it. Whether scripture memory, prayer, Bible reading, or family worship. Throw yourself into it this week and trust that God the Holy Spirit will work in you and bless it. Secondly, think about the world around you and how you can stand out for Christ. Timothy was called to stand out in speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity. Those are a call on our lives to and in some way, I'm sure we stand out as believers but this week I want to challenge you to pick one and focus on how you can stand out for Christ in that area this week. I'm not meaning to be lax in other areas but instead to think about how that specific area of your life can be used for God's glory and as an opportunity to proclaim the gospel where you are at. As we depart from here this week may you be blessed as you are a Good Servant of Jesus Christ. The gospel we proclaim is true and so may we be diligent to find ways that we can proclaim it. Just as Paul called Timothy to persist in this may you be strengthened by the Word and Spirit to persist in serving your gracious savior. Amen. The Apostles Creed I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried; he descended to hell. The third day he rose again from the dead. He ascended to heaven and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty. From there he will come to judge the living and the dead. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the holy catholic church, the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, and the life everlasting. Amen. Prayer for Blessing and Congregational Prayer Almighty God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirt, We bring our prayers before you with a certain trust that you hear us. We know this truth not because of anything in us but because Jesus died for us and the Holy Spirit is at work in us. God the Father, you are beyond our comprehension. You are great and mighty, good and loving, holy and just. We praise you because of who you are and that you are God who is not only powerful but that you are a God of love who deeply cares for your creation. We praise you for the gift of your church and we pray that in your church the gospel of Christ and Him crucified would be faithfully proclaimed. We pray especially for our brothers and sisters who are being persecuted around the world. Give them safety and strengthen them with boldness to proclaim the gospel. We praise you, God the Son, for the love that you have shown to us in your saving work for us. Grant that we would trust in your work alone to save and that we would cast aside any sin that clings so tightly that we may be faithful to you. May we trust in your perfect work for us and may we be mindful of this good news as we live our lives in gratitude for what you have done for us. God the Holy Spirit, we bring our praises and prayers for you have blessed us with the gift of faith. You are our great comforter and we pray that as we hear the word of the gospel we would be given peace and confidence in Christ alone. God of all comfort, we lift up those with needs on this Lord's Day. We pray for those who suffer, for those who endure poverty, for the crippled, the sick, and the troubled and tormented. We ask that you fill them with your sustaining and healing power. We also ask that you would continue to sustain and support our members who are not able to gather with us each week. We humbly pray for our covenant children. We ask that you would help us to be faithful to baptismal promises that we have made to them. We pray for the mothers to be among us and we pray for the safety of the children in their wombs. We also ask for your sanctifying and sustaining presence for the missionaries that our church supports in our country and throughout the world. You are Lord of the harvest and as you send out the laborers we pray for a plentiful harvest by the power of the Holy Spirit. Today we especially remember the ministry of Mission E4 in Haiti. Give them wisdom and strength to persevere in your great work and prepare the hearts of those to whom they will be proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ. We offer these prayers in the name of Jesus Christ, our great God and king, who taught us to pray......... The Lord's Prayer Church and World Announcements Super Bowl Sliders Offering We continue to worship God through the giving of our offerings. Doxology Offertory Prayer Blessed are you, O Lord our God, maker of all things. Through your goodness you have blessed us with these gifts. With them we offer ourselves to your service and dedicate our lives to the care and redemption of all that you have made, for the sake of him who gave himself for us- Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen. Closing Song #770 In Christ Alone Benediction The LORD bless you and keep you; the LORD make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you; the LORD lift up his countenance upon you and give you peace. Amen.