A Selfless Servant: Timothy

Today, I want us to look at Timothy’s example as a selfless servant in the Gospel, and how we can emulate that example in our own lives toward one another.

So Paul says that he’s going to send Timothy to them. Likely, Timothy will be tasked with helping the Philippians sort through some of their issues that they’re facing, but his main goal will be to get a report to bring back to Paul on how they’re all doing. He’ll likely receive some encouragement and missionary support himself.

But again, the primary reason for Timothy’s coming is to care for the Philippians, do some pastoral work among them, and then to return to Paul with news of their wellbeing.

One of the major reasons Paul chooses Timothy is specifically because of Timothy’s genuine pastoral concern for people:

Have Genuine Concern

Philippians 2:20 (ESV)

For I have no one like him, who will be genuinely concerned for your welfare.

We knew, already, of course, how much Paul cares for the Philippians. Now Paul shows the Philippians that Timothy cares for them, as well.

Not only does Timothy care for them… Paul makes a pretty big statement on the level of concern Timothy has… “I have no one like him.” Paul is likely speaking of co-laborers in Rome. Remember a few passages ago, we talked about folks who were teaching the Gospel out of rivalry with Paul. People who were trying to discourage him while he was in prison. The outlook in Rome was not all that much of a pretty picture of a unified church body. More on that in a moment.

For now, notice that Timothy’s disposition toward the Philippians is one of care and genuine concern.

This is a model of Christ toward his church… This is the mark and model of a true pastor. One who cares for the health and wellbeing of the flock of Christ under his care. Paul’s not going to send a hired hand to care for these people. He’s not going to send someone with selfish ambitions.

Right now there’s a podcast that’s gained a lot of listeners over the past few weeks called, “The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill.” It documents the story of a pastor named, Mark Driscoll, who utilized his church to gain a national following for himself and to stroke his own ego. He regularly demeaned and manipulated and verbally abused his church members and fellow leaders on staff.

But people turned a blind eye to all this stuff because he was a gifted preacher. No one wanted to believe that he was a jerk behind closed doors because he got all kinds of book deals and spoke at all the big conferences. And listen, Mark was one of us. This wasn’t some other group of Christians’ deal. He was popular among evangelicals. He preached a Gospel of repentance by faith in Christ. But yet, his story is the antithesis of genuine concern for his people.

We can’t assume that just because someone teaches the right Gospel that they have a genuine calling or concern for the people around them. This is why we put our ultimate faith in Christ, not in any person. But among people that we can trust, we should seek out those who have a discernible, genuine care for others, as well as strive to have that genuine care among ourselves for one another.

So how do we do that? How do we have a genuine concern for others?

It starts with a genuine relationship with Jesus.

2 Timothy 1:5 (ESV)

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.

Later, Paul reminds Timothy of his relationship with God through grace.

2 Timothy 2:1 (ESV)

You then, my child, be strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus,

When we are reminded of the grace of Jesus Christ… That He freely gave of Himself, not for His own benefit, but for our salvation from sin and death, it should be a kind reminder of the grace we received, and the grace we can now freely give to others.

Now, for Timothy to grow in this, he needed someone who knew him to help him be the man he could be.

Have an Unbiased Voice in Your Life

Philippians 2:22 (ESV)

But you know Timothy’s proven worth, how as a son with a father he has served with me in the gospel.

Paul raised Timothy up in the faith. He has spent countless hours and days with Timothy, training him in ministry and therefore, Paul knew he was someone who could be trusted. And not only did Paul trust him, he knew his partners in ministry trusted him, too. That’s why Paul puts forth Timothy’s “proven worth.”

For someone to have this kind of relationship, it takes years of friendship and togetherness. Paul and Timothy spent the time necessary to know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that they could trust one another.

We looked at this a little earlier.

And for someone to grow in trust, it’s also clear that there can’t be manipulation or bad motives. Instead, the friendship must have certainly gotten to the point at which the unbiased voice of Paul’s friendship to Timothy had come out.

We all need an unbiased voice in our lives. A previous pastor I served under would often say that we need friends who “aren’t impressed by us.” That was Paul to Timothy. Paul wasn’t impressed by Timothy. He was his mentor. He was his spiritual father. He could call Timothy out on anything that was not going right in Timothy’s life.

We all need a voice like Paul’s in our lives. We need those unbiased voices of people who just aren’t all that impressed by us to step in and say, “Hey, here’s where you can improve. Here’s where you need to step up your game. Here’s where you’re being disobedient to God.”

Without correction, we develop arrogance. To make an illustration, I want to take your attention to one of the most difficult sports in the world. It’s called Baseball. In baseball, there are two key areas of correction that often need to be addressed in players. We’re just going to look at one… It’s the swing. Players, even professionals, constantly need to perfect their swing. That’s why players get so streaky in the game of baseball. They’ll go on weeks of batting success only to bottom out and tank the rest of the season.

Oftentimes, they will fall out of habit and do something wrong with their swing. You see, a bat-swing is so finnicky, that if you pull your hips just a fraction of a second too early or too slow, you’ll end up with wildly different results. It could be the difference between a double-play and a home run. There are an infinite amount of variables that go into perfecting the baseball swing. And it only takes that little bit of a misstep to mess it all up.

These players, even professionals, need swinging specialists who can give them an objective evaluation and make suggestions as to how they correct their swing. And from there, the player has to practice, practice, practice just to get it consistent. It’s not easy.

Similarly, we must commit to the practice of seeking the wellbeing of others through our care for them.

Seek the Interests of Others

Philippians 2:21 (ESV)

For they all seek their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ.

“They all seek their own interests,” again, here’s Paul talking about the issues he is facing amongst the other Gospel preachers in Rome. It’s as though they are doing all of these things out of rivalry with Paul. So who can he trust? Timothy, who looks not to his own ambitions, but to the interests of the people he is serving, namely those in Philippi. He doesn’t look to his own comforts, but to the needs of the people.

Now, I think I need to pause here before we go any further and talk about what it means to have genuine care for others. Because there’s a stark difference in caring for others, and the whole idea of “needing others to need me.” So let’s look at what needing others to need me, looks like.

I want to give it a name. The selfish selflessness. Selfish selflessness looks like needing to be needed. It looks like an emotional breakdown when someone doesn’t need me anymore. It looks like getting my self-worth and value out of how I care for others. The thing about selfish selflessness is that it really isn’t selfless. It looks at others as projects, not people. It looks at others as objects to one’s own happiness rather than people.

Selfish selflessness is bad for the person on the other end of the relationship because they become smothered by the “care” that the codependent person is trying to offer. You see, the problem with a relationship like this is that when the plug is pulled, and the person offering the care is no longer offering that care, the person on the other end has no idea what to do with themselves. We all need space to thrive, and even space to mess up.

A lot of times, this happens with parents who won’t allow their kids the freedom to learn from a mistake, or a spouse who does everything for their wife or husband.

In selfish selflessness, a person’s identity become wrapped up in the person they are trying to care for. This is a major issue, because the only person we are to lose our identity to is Jesus. And when we take our identities and wrap them up in another person, we place that person in a spiritual place where Jesus should be.

The point of caring for one another is not to receive your joy from that… Your joy comes from Christ! And out of the outflow of that… You take joy in acting as Christ would act toward your neighbor.

Just as he says…

Matthew 22:37–40 (ESV)

And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

This is a call to destroy our instincts. The instinct of self-preservation, self-advancement, and general self-centeredness. Kill those things, for they have no place in the Kingdom of God. You cannot fuel the Christian life with selfishness. It is only fueled by a love for Christ and a love for others.

So let’s take a look at what genuine concern looks like. 3 basic commitments:

Responding to needs - A genuine concern for someone hears a need and responds appropriately. And I say “respond,” on purpose. There’s a difference between responding and reacting. Sometimes all we can do is pray. But other times, we need to put down our plans for the afternoon and tend to a need.

Reaching Out - When you haven’t heard from someone in a while, maybe it’s time to make a phone call.

Regular Prayer - If we truly believe God can intervene and help those in need, we ought to be in prayer for others.

These are basic things we can do to care for others. It all flows from the most caring act in all of history… That Christ would give His life for us.