Being Useful to God

Introduction

We all want to be useful. The reason that a lay off from your job or even a retirement can be difficult is because we suddenly feel that we are just not useful anymore.

My father’s greatest fear was that he would get old, become a burden, and not be useful anymore. I often heard him say that he would rather drop dead today than reach a point where he was not useful anymore. God spared him that fear for he did die suddenly while still being useful.

Now, from our Christian perspective, how do we become and remain useful to God? We are going to explore what the Apostle Paul though along these lines from the second chapter of Second Timothy.

Remember, Second Timothy is a letter that Paul wrote to this young preacher, just starting out, named Timothy. He is giving Timothy instructions about how to handle people that are in the church. He is giving Timothy instructions regarding how to determine the false believers, and false teachers, from the true Christians.

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.

My first point is to:

Separate from Ungodly Relationships

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.

Paul describes the church as a great house. In any house there are certain items that are elevated in value above other items in the house. In your house you probably have some dinnerware that is pretty plain, maybe plates that are mismatched or of lesser quality, like plastic plates, maybe you even use a lot of paper plates. But when you have guests over for dinner you break out the good stuff. You get out those plates that may on display in a china cabinet or are setting on a high shelf in the cupboard and only come down for special occasions.

I remember as a young man being invited for dinner to my fiance's house. I found out that my fiance’s mother was big on entertaining. When I arrived, I noticed she had put out the whitest linen tablecloth I had ever seen. She had her best china laid out on the table. The plates were ivory colored with gold pattern and trim. The utensils were gold plated and heavy.

I remember my finance's mother glaring at me when I accidently dropped a fork and it hit the plate with a loud clang. It was obvious that she valued that dinnerware.

It is the same in the church. Some people in the church are serious about their Christian walk, they are the ones trimmed in gold. They strive to stay in the will of the Lord, they financially support the church, they are students of scripture, and they are continually working on developing their relationship with the Lord.

In this same church there are others who are not so serious about their Christian walk. They are negative, they sew dissension, they hinder others in their goal to develop their relationships with the Lord.

The verse is telling us that you cannot be useful to the master until you separate yourself from those things in the household that are dishonorable.

Separating yourself from the dishonorable can take many forms, one of most important of which is separating yourself from those people who will take you in the wrong direction.

There is a reason that when a person is released from prison on parole, he is required to not associate with those who have a criminal record. History has shown that you will not reform if you place yourself back in the same environment that you were in that led you into trouble in the first place. You have to separate yourself from those ungodly relationships.

Now don’t take this wrong. I’m not saying that you cannot witness to those around you who ungodly. I think our mission is just the opposite. What you cannot do is become enmeshed with those ungodly elements to the point that you become carried along with that crowd.

The second thing you must do to be useful to God is to:

Flee Evil Passions

English Standard Version Chapter 2

22 So flee youthful passions and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.

Often times the best strategy to avoid a situation that is likely to get you in trouble is to flee. Remove yourself from the area as quickly as possible. This is what Joseph did when he found himself unchaperoned in the house with Potiphar’s wife.

Genesis 39:12 ESV

12 she caught him by his garment, saying, “Lie with me.” But he left his garment in her hand and fled and got out of the house.

When temptations come, let me first suggest that you ask God for strength. Ask God to show you the way He has prepared for your escape. Also you must be careful not to deliberately place yourself in a position to be tempted.

We are all different and are not subject to the same weaknesses and temptations. To one, alcohol may be the temptation. To another, it may be impure thoughts and acts. To another, greed and covetousness, might be their biggest temptation, and to yet another, it might be criticism and an unloving attitude.

Regardless of what your greatest temptation might be, be assured that Satan will tempt you at your weak point, not your strong point.

Also, scripture wisely gives us options to take the place of those things we are fleeing from. As we are fleeing from temptation, the scripture gives us a direction to go. It says pursue righteousness, pursue faith, pursue love, and pursue peace, and pursue it with others. We know Paul was writing about the church, so he is saying to pursue all the honorable things with the company and support of those honorable ones, from your own church family.

The next step is to:

Be a Person of Peace

2 Timothy 2:23 ESV

23 Have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies; you know that they breed quarrels.

Have nothing to do with foolish, ignorant controversies. Some examples I can think of: Arguments on Facebook, Twitter feuds, Road rage, angry letters to the editor of the local newspaper. Maybe an argument over politics would apply in this case.

Political arguments can become very heated and divisive, but in the end, it is not likely that anyone is going to change their political views because of your compassionate and well thought out arguments. Another example might be a person who wears some item of clothing that is clearly inappropriate just to try and stir things up a bit.

What Paul is really talking about here is false teachers in the church. How do you recognize a false teacher? Check what they are saying against scripture. Sometimes a false teacher is hard to recognize. They may not have shifty eyes, or may not be twirling the end of their handlebar mustache. They may look like anyone else. Or they often will look better than everyone else.

What they have to say may sound good, it may tickle the ears, it may make you feel good about yourself and your life. False teachers will often appear to be very knowledgeable and confident about their teaching.

The only way to identify a false teacher is to compare what they have to say against scripture. They may tell you they have a “new revelation.” That is a warning sign to be very careful about what this person is saying. You don’t need a new revelation, you already have the best revelation right there in your hand, you need to stick to what you find in scripture.

The last step we will discuss regarding being useful to God is:

Become a Servant

2 Timothy 2:24–26 ESV

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.

The verse says to be kind to everyone. You know, some people are easier to be kind to than others are. I’m sure you have met some people who have such a defensive attitude that it is really difficult to be kind to them. After tasting that resentment from them we tend to say, “That person does not deserve my kindness.” But look at the scripture. Does it say be kind to those who deserve kindness and graciously accept it? No, it says be kind to everyone.

1 Thessalonians 2:7 ESV

7 But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children.

It also states that you should be able to teach. The only defense against the false teacher is a devoted follower of Christ who is able to teach. And teaching does not mean that you have to be a Pastor, a preacher, or a Sunday School teacher. You can teach a better, and more well received lesson, with your life before others that you ever would be able to from a lectern or a pulpit.

And to what purpose must we teach? So that “God may perhaps grant them repentance leading to a knowledge of truth.” You see the goal of our efforts is not to impress people with our biblical knowledge, or astound them with our teaching prowess, the goal is that others might come to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ.

Conclusion

So, to recap, what steps will make us more useful to God?

Separate from Ungodly Relationships

Flee Evil Passions

Become a Person of Peace

Become a Servant

We all want to be useful. We especially want to be useful to God, but to be useful to God requires something on our part. It doesn’t happen automatically just because we get saved and put our trust in Jesus Christ. It requires some work on our part. It takes some preparation. It requires some changes from the way we did things in the past.

We must take some active steps to bring about those changes. Bible study and prayer are important, in fact they are vital, but more is required. We must examine ourselves. We must examine our relationships, we must examine or activities, our habits. And most of all, examine our attitudes.

We have to change our hearts from the selfish “what I want” heart that we all know so well, to the kind and loving heart of a servant.