A Commentary in Simple English on 1 Timothy

CHAPTER 2

Verses 1 and 2 Paul and Timothy

God's grace is kind and gentle to us. Yet God's grace is also 'strong'. So Christians need to be 'strong' in the grace that is in Christ Jesus (verse 1). Many of the Christians in Asia had been weak because they had turned away from Paul. Timothy is not to be like that. He is to teach faithful men (verse 2) the truth about the Good News. He is to trust them with the Good News. Timothy has heard that Good News through many men. Now he is to 'deposit' it with others. Perhaps Paul means that the false teachers cannot be trusted to teach others.

So there are four stages: -

1) Christ gave Paul the Good News. Christ trusted Paul with it.

2) Paul in turn trusted Timothy with it.

3) Timothy is to give 'faithful men' the Good News. He is to trust these men.

4) These faithful men must be the kind of men who will teach others in their turn. This teaching will now be done from the written Word of God, the Bible.

Verses 3-7 Suffering and Reward

There are three 'pictures' in these verses. Timothy has to think about what they mean (verse 7). Perhaps the three pictures do not all mean quite the same thing.

First, in verses 3 and 4 we have the picture of the Christian Soldier (1 Corinthians 16:13; 2 Corinthians 10:3-6; Ephesians 6:10-18; 1 Thessalonians 5:8). Now a soldier does not have to fight all the time. But when the enemy is not far away, that is 'active service'. When the soldier is 'on active service', the army gives him his food and clothes so that he does not have to worry about those things. He does not have to think about anything except being a good soldier. He has to obey the orders that his officer gives to him. He is too busy to be mixed up in trade.

Now, Paul says, God is the great Officer who has called us to be his soldiers. Jesus tells us not to worry about food and clothes (Matthew 6:25-34). We want to please God who called us to follow Jesus. We can only be good soldiers of Jesus Christ if we give all our strength and effort to it. And, like any soldier, we must be ready to suffer. [2.1]

Then in verse 5, Paul says that it is not enough to do what is right. We must do what is right for the right reasons and in the right way. The Greeks in Paul's day loved their sports. Today we have our 'Olympic Games'. This name comes from the greatest of the Greek meetings for sports. Now a Greek could only take part in the sports if he obeyed all the rules. He had to prepare himself for about ten months before the games. The rules told him what he had to do to prepare to take part. And then when the day of the sports came, there were more rules for him to obey. A man might break the rules. He might come first in the race. But the judge would not give the prize to him. He would not win the race.

The Lord Jesus Christ will give every real Christian 'a crown of life' (4:7 and 8; Revelation 2:10; 1 Corinthians 9: 24-27; James 1: 12; 1 Peter 5:4). The Christian life is like a race. We must run the race to the end. We must not break the rules of the Christian life.

In verse 6 we have another picture. This picture is of a farmer (James 5:7). He gets on with his work (Ecclesiastes 11:4). The weather and the soil may not be quite right. But if he waits until they are, his work will never be done. Now in those days, many farmers did not pay rent in money. They did not own the land that they farmed. They had to give part of the crop, which they grew, to the man who owned the land that they worked. They were 'share croppers'. This is what the story which Jesus tells in Luke 16:1-8 is about. The share of the crop that goes to the landowner in a good year will be bigger. When the harvest is poor it will be less. The farmer must have enough food for himself and his family to eat. He must also have enough seed left over to plant the ground the next year. (See Psalm 126:5 and 6.) So the farmer ought to have the first share of the harvest.

Paul does not tell Timothy what this third picture means. He just tells him (verse 7) to think about all three. Timothy is a Christian minister. All good Christian ministers work hard. They cannot keep on in their work unless they have their own share of the blessing from God.

Paul tells Timothy that by God's help, he will understand. We know that often the first followers of Jesus did not understand what he did and said (Mark 8:17; John 12:16). They were very close to Jesus, but they did not know the meaning of what happened. We need to pray and to think quietly, because we want to understand what God says to us.

Verses 8-13 Hope in God

In verse 8, Paul says two great things about Jesus.

1. Jesus died, but God raised Him from death.

2. Jesus was a real man. He was 'descended from David'. He was not just any man. He was the Man that God had promised long before.

We were lost. God had promised to send someone to save us. He sent His own Son into the world. And this Son became a man.

Paul says that this is the Good News, which he believes and preaches. We can look at the first Christian sermon. In Acts 2:30, Peter says that Jesus comes from the family of David. In the next verses he says that God raised up Jesus from death. So when Paul speaks of 'my gospel', he does not mean that it is different from what Peter and the rest taught. He means that if the false teachers do not agree with what Paul preaches, then they do not agree with Peter and the other apostles. So (verse 9) Paul is in prison and in chains, but no one can stop the spread of God's word. If Paul is in prison, other Christians preach the Good News. If soldiers come to guard Paul, then Paul tells them the Good News. When Paul has to go to court, he preaches the Good News to his judges and to the crowds (4:17). If anyone could chain up the word of God there would be nothing gained by what Paul suffered.

Today, more than ever, it is true that the word of God is not chained up. Printing and radio make it possible for the Good News to reach people around the world. Books and radio go to places that no preacher can reach. God has his chosen people (verse 10) who will believe when they hear the Good News. Sometimes they are lonely. Sometimes they are very frightened. We need to pray for them.

God will give to us both grace and also glory. By his grace he saves us in this life. He gives us glory in the life to come. He will not give glory to anyone who does not know his grace in this life. Everyone who knows God's grace now may share in his glory too. Yet we must be ready to suffer and even die if we want to share His glory.

In verses 11-13, Paul gives us another of the 'faithful sayings'. This may well have been used in worship by the churches in those days. This 'saying' is very much like some sayings of Jesus (Matthew 10:33; Mark 8:38; Luke 12:8 and 9). There are four parts to this saying.

1. For if we died with him, we will also live with him.'
Jesus died for us on the cross. He died because of our sins (Galatians 2:20; Romans 6:3; Colossians 2:13 and 14; Colossians 3:3). So we share in his death. Our sins died on the cross with Jesus. But Jesus rose again from death. Just as we share in his death, so we shall share in his risen life. Yes, and we already do have a share of that risen life (Romans 6:4 and 8; 1 Corinthians 15:22; Colossians 3:4).

2. 'If we endure, we will also reign with him.'
Christian people sometimes feel as though other people just walk all over them. Jesus does not allow us to fight back. This is just what 'endure' means. It means to 'remain under'. We do not try to get on top of other people. This is the life we now live. It is life in between 'dying with Jesus' and 'living with him'.

Our verse says, however, that we shall do more than live with him. He reigns now as King. And we shall reign with him (Revelation 22:5, 5:10 and 3:21; Romans 8:17).

3. 'If we deny him, he will also deny us'. (See Matthew 10:33.) There are times when Christian people suffer because of their faith. It is a temptation at such times to 'deny him'. This means that we tell people that we are not Christians at all. It means that we say we are not followers of Jesus. Sometimes that seems to be an easy way out of suffering. Usually those who do fail in this way do not find that it is an easy way out at all. Those who make them suffer make them feel great shame because of what they have done. Often their sufferings become greater. Yet this is nothing to the shame we shall feel at the last day if we deny him. When the day of judgement comes, Jesus will deny that we are his people.

4. So in verse 13 we read: -

'If we are faithless, he will remain faithful.'
We may change but Jesus will never change (Hebrews 13:8). Jesus was faithful to us when he died on the cross. He did all that needed to be done so that we could be saved from sin and from death. Now that he is in glory, he is still faithful to us and he expects us to be faithful to him. Jesus will not change through all the ages to come, and this is why we can trust him (Malachi 3:6).

At the end of the verse, Paul seems to add something to this 'faithful saying'. He says that Jesus cannot deny himself. Jesus cannot say that he is not the Son of God. He cannot say that he is not Man. He cannot say that he is not the Saviour and the Friend of Sinners.

From the start of the letter up to this point, Paul has taught a law of Christian life and service. He has used some pictures from life around him to do this. These pictures were of soldiers, sportsmen and farmers. He has used the experience of Christ. He has used the experience of other Christians and his own experience. What he has taught Timothy is this: ' No pains, no gains.' A religion that costs us nothing is worth nothing. 'No cross, no crown'.

Verses 14-26 False teachers

In verse 14 Paul first tells Timothy that the truth which he has set out in verses 11-13 is truth which needs to be taught again to the Christians at Ephesus. This is not the kind of teaching that the false teachers want to give. Paul warns Timothy again about the danger of the 'word battles' which the false teachers liked. First, Paul says that it does no good. Teaching which does no good is bad. Any teaching which does not make the people who listen to it better is wrong. Then Paul adds that this false teaching turns people upside down. Once people in the church loved each other and wanted to do good to each other. Now that they have listened to the false teachers, they argue and quarrel with each other.

Then in verse 15, Paul says several very important things about Christian ministry.

1. Before we can stand up in front of Christian people to teach or preach, we must stand in front of God. It is no good to us if people say: 'I like to hear that man preach,' We need to know that God says: 'What you do is right. I am pleased with your work.' The false teachers tried to please men. We want to please God.

2. Then Timothy is to be like a man who works for someone else. He takes the work which he has done to the man who pays him. If his work is good he will feel no shame. If his work is bad his master will tell him that it is no good. He will not pay him.

3. Then Timothy is to be a man who handles the Word of God in the right way. Paul really says that Timothy is to cut it straight. No one can be quite sure what Paul had in mind here. He may think of a stone, which is cut for a building (verse 19). He may think of the straight roads that the Romans built. We are not to be like Elymas in Acts 13:10; he bent and twisted the ways of God which were straight. He may think of a father who shares food out to his children. But we should remember that Paul made tents. Now there was a difference between most workers and a very good worker in that trade. Most workers would cut a piece of leather or cloth, and waste the cloth that they cut off. The very good worker would not waste anything. He would cut the cloth or leather in such a way that what he cut away could be used for something else.

Now when we teach from the Word of God, we may say: 'I will divide it up. I will use this part. I will not make anything out of the rest of it.' If we are wise we shall use all that Scripture says.

In verse 16 Paul tells Timothy to turn his back on the word-battles of the false teachers (verse 14). The word-battles lead people away from the truth. 'Gangrene' (verse 17) is a very serious illness. Part of a person's body goes bad while they are still alive. And gangrene spreads and it quickly kills. So false teaching spreads quickly and kills.

Paul spoke about Hymenaeus in 1 Timothy 1:20. We know nothing more about Philetus than what Paul says here. These two men had made a very serious mistake. Christian people hope for the 'resurrection'. This is the resurrection of the body. Jesus rose from the dead. He was not then some kind of spirit. He had a real body. (See Luke 24:36-40.) This body is not less real than the bodies which we now have. It is if anything more real. We shall rise from the dead and have bodies like the body which the risen Jesus has (2 Corinthians 5:1). The difference is like that between a seed and the plant that grows from it (1 Corinthians 15:37,38,42-44). A seed is not much to look at. The plant is more beautiful and more useful than the seed. That is how our resurrection bodies will be different from these bodies which we have now. So Christians should hope for the resurrection and most of all because then we shall be with Jesus for ever (1 Thessalonians 4:17).

The two men probably thought that the resurrection was the same thing as the New Birth (John 3:3,7). What was so sad was that they took away a great part of the Christian hope. And they 'swerved' or wandered from the truth. The picture here is of a man with bow and arrows. He shoots the arrows at a mark or 'target'. This may be a stick of wood, which he has fixed in the ground. He shoots arrows at it. He tries to hit the mark, but he never does. Now Paul means that the mark or target is good Christian teaching. The false teachers try to give good teaching but their aim is not good enough and they miss the mark every time.

At the end of verse 18, Paul begins to give us another picture. In those days people built strong walls all round the cities. The wall was there to keep enemy armies out of the city in time of war. An enemy army might fight its way over the top of the wall. Or it might break down a gate in the wall. The enemy would have to fight hard to do this. But there was another way to get into the city. This was to dig under the city wall, so that part of the wall would fall down. They would 'undermine' the city wall. This would make a gap in the wall so that the enemy could get in.

Now Paul says that a Christian man is like a city. Our faith is like the city wall. It is there to keep out our enemies. God guards that wall for us (Philippians 4:7). The false teachers dig away under our faith to make it fall down. Paul says: 'It will not happen!' The 'foundation' (verse 19) is the bottom part of the wall. It is the strongest part. It may be buried in the ground where we cannot see it.. The whole weight of the wall rests upon the 'foundation'. It seems that we can see this foundation. It must be God who wrote two things on the 'foundation' of our Christian life.

1. The first is this. 'The Lord knows those who are his.' We do not always know who God's people are. We often get it wrong. God is never wrong. He knows all about us. He knows how weak we are at times (Psalm 139; John 10:14; John 21:17; 1 Corinthians 8:3; 1 Corinthians 13:12; Galatians 4:9).

2. The second thing is this. Everyone who 'names the name of the Lord' must stand well away from all that is wrong. 'To name the name of the Lord' means to call God our God, and to call Jesus our Saviour. Now this is no good if we do not leave our sins and keep away from the sins of other people. The 'seal' in those days had several uses. Here it is likely that Paul thinks of these words cut into a foundation stone.

In verses 20 and 21 there is another picture. It is a picture of a large house. That means the church. The master of the house in verse 21 is God. The things in the house are the Christians who make up the church. When important people come to the house for a meal the master brings out all the gold and silver dishes. Afterwards the servants have to clean the house. Then they will use things made from wood or pots made from earth or 'clay'. Remember we have read in verse 19 that the Lord knows who are real Christians. Often we do not. So Paul does not mean here that the gold and silver dishes are like real Christians. He does not mean that the people who are made from wood and earth (or clay) are not real Christians. Paul says to Timothy: 'Be clean. Keep yourself away from sin. Then you will be ready for God to use you in his work.'

In verse 22, Paul tells Timothy to run away from the strong or 'hot' desires which young people have. Most of us find as we grow older that our desires are not so strong as they were when we were young. Now Paul may just mean the desires that go with sex. Yet Timothy was probably about forty years old when Paul wrote this letter to him. Paul may mean something else here. The false teachers may well have been young men. Their desires were for success. They wanted people in the churches to honour them. They wanted people to think that they were clever. They became angry and 'hot' when they argued. With people like that around him, Timothy has to run off the other way! He is to aim at the right things. It is as though he too has bow and arrow and he shoots at a mark or target. Now we can see just what Paul meant in verse 18. There the false teachers shot their arrows. They did not just miss the mark. They shot at the wrong mark anyway!

So the mark at which we must aim must be the right one. This is righteousness, faith and love, and Paul here adds 'peace'. This may be because peace was not something that the false teachers cared about (See Romans 14:17 and 18.) If there is no peace in the church there will soon be no love. Christians who call out to God in prayer for help aim at these things. They want to pray together, read Scripture together and talk together about God's goodness to them. Paul says that these people call on God 'out of a pure heart'. Notice that in verse 19, we have to stand away from all that is wrong. In verse 21, we have to be made clean.

Now Paul goes further. We must have a pure heart. When we call out to God for help, we must desire his glory. We must not just look for something for ourselves. Perhaps we feel tired of these false teachers. Perhaps we wish that Paul would talk about something else. But we do still need this teaching. When the people who have begun gospel work and started churches move away, we should honour them and remember them. Other people may come along then. Their teaching is not quite the same. They seem very clever. Some people want to listen to them. We have to listen then to what Paul says. If these new people want 'word battles' do not listen to them. If they want to make people argue, do not listen to them.

We want love and peace. This, of course, is what Paul says in verse 23. The questions which the false teachers ask are silly questions. They are the kind of questions which people who have not been well taught will ask. If the question we ask is a silly one we must expect a silly answer. Wise men ask good questions. God will give them wise answers. But silly questions make people quarrel with each other.

In verse 24, Timothy is 'the Lord's servant' or slave; but so should all Christian ministers be. In Bible times a rich man might well push a slave out of his way in the street. The slave just had to put up with it. The worst thing that the slave could do would be to quarrel with the rich man. He would be punished for that. All that he could do was to tell his master what had happened. If his master cared for him, he would speak to the rich man about it. The slave would never know.

When other people wrong us, we must not quarrel with them. We must just tell our Master, our God in heaven. 'Take it to the Lord in prayer.'

So Paul says what any 'slave' of God must be like.

1. He must be kind to everyone.

2. He must be able to teach. Remember the people in verse 23 who had not been taught well and so they asked silly questions.

3. He must be 'forbearing' or 'not resentful'. He must put up with what is bad in other people for a while.

We should remember that Jesus was the Servant or Slave of the Lord. (See Isaiah 42:1-4; 50:6; 52:13-53:12 and also 2 Corinthians 10:1.) We are now his followers. We are called by God to serve other people.

Then verse 25 says that he must try to put other people right where they are wrong. He must do this without pride, that is, in a gentle way. He must be like Jesus (Matthew 11:28). These people have wrong ideas in their minds. So they need to 'change their minds', that is, to repent. God will help them to repent. Then the way will be open for them to come to a full knowledge of the truth of the Good News. The second part of verse 26 is not easy. In the first part Paul says that the false teachers are like men who have had too much to drink. Because they are drunk, they go to sleep. Or the devil has set a trap for them and they fall into it. If they do not escape they will die. They wake up. Now they are no longer drunk. They can break out of the trap. If they repent, they will escape. They will not die. They will do God’s will. [2.2]