Introduction

In the late 1990’s a story came out about a six-year-old girl who had been found in her mother’s attic.  Since she was a one year old, she had been left in the attic, chained to a bed in a room filled with trash.  When authorities found her, she could not talk. She communicated with only moans and whimpers.  She was emaciated, her hair was matted down and the room itself was filthy.  One officer said that as he stood at the window, the smell was to overwhelming he almost gagged.

The child was malnourished and unloved and completely neglected.  She was underdeveloped in every way – physically, emotionally, socially and mentally.  She was the product of an extreme and abusive form of child neglect.  It reminds me of the spiritual state of many people here in our valley…

Many people here in our valley are spiritually underdeveloped.  They are under-nourished with Biblical truth.  They are confused and disoriented with all of the conflicting messages they are hearing.  They are spiritually neglected and they coming up with some pretty strange ideas…

This week, one of my kids talked to a classmate who wholeheartedly believes in a strange UFO cult that combines creationism with alien conspiracy theories.

• There is a lot of spiritual activity in this town, but there is not a lot of healthy spiritual fruit.
• People like to talk about spiritual things here, but when confronted by the truth of God’s Word, they are often put off.
• Some people talk in hushed spiritual tones (speaking about energy and auras and vibrations) while they live lives that are in contradiction to God’s commands.
• Some spiritually malnourished people here in town feel like God’s commands are for a time long ago and don’t apply to today.

But, I’ve also found some genuine disciples here in this valley… people who are starving for the Word, who are earnestly seeking to explore the depths of scripture and who want to know Jesus more personally.  There are believers here who are trying to stand up and resist the prevailing spiritual tone of our community.

Many of those who are trying to stand up for Christ gather here at this church. Living for Jesus in this town is a tough, uphill battle.  I get tired sometimes. Many of us push on in spite of our fatigue, but often we grow weary in the fight.  People who are spiritually tired can become timid about their faith.  I hope this morning’s message is an exhortation to tired Christians.

Timothy was tired from constant testing and tribulation.  He was pastoring a church that was plagued with spiritual uncertainty and weakness.  Some people in the church, like Phygellus and Hermogenes, had abandoned the faith completely – and possibly taken some people with them.  Others people like Hymenaeus and Philetus were teaching false doctrine.  Timothy may have been tempted to quit the ministry altogether.  In this letter, Paul is telling Timothy to be strong.  He’s saying to Timothy:

• Never mind what other people may be saying about you or what they are doing behind your back.
• Timothy, push ahead.
• Never mind how weak you feel in your own self.

Now if Paul’s exhortation stopped there, it would have been futile.  You and I can’t tell someone to pick themselves up by their bootstraps and consider our job completed. It would be like telling a turtle to be fast or a cow to flap its hooves and fly.  You and I need to point people to the power they need.

Timothy tended to be timid and he couldn’t change that on his own.  This scripture is not a summons for Timothy to be strong in his own strength.  This is a summons for Timothy to “be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.”

Our strength comes from the power of Christ

“You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus.”

When Timothy was weak, Jesus was very strong.  

Examples of strong Christian living

Our world is pretty confused when it comes to spirituality.  Some people don’t even know what a godly man looks like.  We need some clear pictures of a godly man.  In 2 Timothy 2:2-6, Paul presents four key elements of a strong, obedient, spiritual life.  These are four strong examples of Christian living.  He begins by encouraging Timothy that godly men teach other people godliness.

Example #1: Teacher

² And the things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable people who will also be qualified to teach others.

Paul has massively invested into Timothy over the years.  Timothy travelled and did ministry together with Paul.  Timothy has sat under hours and hours of Paul’s teaching and instruction in the faith.  Paul is telling Timothy to take all the things he had heard him say over the years and entrust those truths to other reliable men.

What about you and I?  Has someone made a spiritual investment into your life? Thinking back over my life, I can think of a number of people who have made significant spiritual investments into my life and into my ministry.  There are currently a couple of elders at the PV campus who are actively investing in both me and this ministry here in at Canyon Verde.  Let me just mention one of the other people who invested in my life in the past.

I was a lot like Timothy at one point in the ministry.  I had been part of a Christian musical group that had an emotional breakup.  I went on to work for two churches that were very difficult places to minister.  I was tired and beat up and I needed a new beginning.

Pastor Steve at Desert Springs needed a youth pastor and I needed a new start in ministry so that began a five year ministry relationship.  Pastor Steve had a huge heart to train young men for ministry.  If I remember correctly, he had already personally trained over thirty men for some kind of full-time vocational ministry.

Pastor Steve hired me and then took me with him as he ministered to the church. He showed me how to use my Bible college training in the real world.  He showed me how to:

• Make a hospital call
• Run a wedding
• Plan a funeral
• Set-up a missions trip
• Choose ministry leaders
• Run an evangelism ministry

…and many other things.  Pastor Steve made spiritual investments into my life that have been growing and maturing ever since.  He often told me that ‘the gospel never returns void.‘  There are always spiritual dividends for spiritual investments.  I came across this story.  It’s the testimony of a man named Luke Short.

Luke Short short lived during the late 1600’s and early 1700’s.  At the age of 103 years old, he was sitting under a hedge in Virginia.  While he was sitting there, he remembered a sermon he had heard 85 years earlier from a famous puritan named John Flavel.  As he recalled the sermon, he asked God to forgive his sins through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  Nearly a century had passed between the time Luke heard Flavel’s sermon and his conversion to Christianity! He died 3 years later and on his tombstone it reads, “Here lies a babe in grace, aged three years, who died according to nature, aged 106.”  ‘The gospel never returns void.’  Sooner or later, by the grace of God, the faithful teaching the gospel always has its reward!

For those of us who have had either pastors, professors or other godly men or women invest into our lives, we have a charge to pass on that investment to others.  Godly men teach other people godliness.  Every Christian is commissioned to pass on what they know to other people.

All believers are called to some part of the discipleship process, no matter what their gifts may entail.  Parents, Sunday school teachers, and youth leaders are responsible to pass on God’s Word to the absolute best of their ability.

Every godly man and woman is called to be a discipler and to be an encourager to other believers.  Don’t expect the pastor to be the only encourager and discipler in our church – I’ll never get to everybody!  Godly men and women teach others what has been entrusted to them.

The second figure that Paul uses to illustrate a strong spiritual life is that of a soldier.

Example #2: Soldier

Paul uses the analogy of a soldier to underscore the truth that growing in our faith will require suffering to some extent.

³ Join with me in suffering, like a good soldier of Christ Jesus. ⁴ No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs, but rather tries to please his commanding officer.

Paul knew soldiers.  Do you know why?  He knew soldiers because he so often found himself in prison and under arrest for the gospel!  Paul not only calls Timothy to serve the Lord as a soldier, but as a good soldier of Christ Jesus.  A godly life is marked by being “all in.”  A good soldier of Jesus is never trying to do just the minimum duty, but wants to serve Jesus with everything they have to give.  There are three marks of Christ-honoring, soldier-like, sacrificial service to Jesus

Suffer hardship without giving up

³ Join with me in suffering, like a good soldier of Christ Jesus.

I like this British army recruitment soldier that says, “I was born in Dudley, but I grew up in Iraq.  Those who serve in the armed forces know that the adversity they face makes them stronger and more mature.  Serving in the army requires tremendous sacrifice.

• Soldiers suffer the trials of basic training.
• They experience the loss of personal freedom
• Some will face the fatigue of combat
• Some will die defending their country

When a soldier signs up for training in warfare, it will require from them a total life commitment.  A soldier in active service does not have a nine to five job.  Can you imagine an infantryman looking at an approaching enemy and saying: well, it’s after 5 o’clock.  I’m off duty.  I’m going to sit this one out guys.

A soldier is on call twenty-four hours a day, 365 days a year.  His body, his health, his skills and his time – all that he is and all that he can do – belong to the military. He is expected to put his life on the line without hesitation for the good of his country.

Tertullian put it this way, “No soldier comes to the war surrounded by luxuries, nor goes into action from a comfortable bedroom.”  Military service is a good metaphor for the Christian life.  Spiritual adversity makes Christians spiritually strong.  Like the soldier, a Christian should not expect Christian service to be easy.  Growing in Christian maturity requires endurance during trials.  James says in James 1:2-4,

“² Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, ³ because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.⁴ Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”

Soldiers don’t get medals for cowardly sitting on the sidelines.  They are rewarded for courageous service to their country in the midst of a battle.  Christians don’t earn spiritual blessing by sitting on the sidelines either.  God rewards the courage of faithful believers in the midst of adversity.  Courageous service means that we don’t get caught up in civilian affairs.

Avoid entanglement in the world

⁴ No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs

Paul’s not saying here that a soldier for Jesus should lose all contact with their former life and former relationships.  He is saying that we should not get so caught up in friends and places that we become trapped in them.

If you talk with a military family, they are moving all the time.  When a soldier is commanded to relocate, he can’t say to his commanding officer, “Look, I really like my friends and my house and the park here in this town.  I’m sorry Sarge, but I’m not moving…”  That would never fly!  When the military tells a soldier to go, he goes and he does not let anything hold him back from the officer’s command.

In the same way, a good soldier of Jesus Christ refuses to allow anything earthly or material to interfere with his duty to the Lord.  The disciple has a fervent desire to please the one who has enlisted him.

Pleases his commanding officer

⁴ No one serving as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs, but rather tries to please his commanding officer.

Christians are often tempted to be man-pleasers rather than God pleasers.  If you or I are trying to make everybody happy in our lives, don’t be fooled – that is not godly behavior.  The very nature of a Christ-honoring life will make some people upset with you (and with me).  A strong desire to try to make everybody happy is an integral part of our fallen nature.

• Many Christians fall into the trap of trying to please bosses or coworkers or neighbors or friends over trying to please the Lord.
• Many pastors fall into the trap of trying to please their congregations over trying to please the Lord.

Being a people pleaser is not the same as being a peacemaker.  Don’t get confused.  Here’s the difference between a peacemaker and a people pleaser:

• A peacemaker is someone who points people to Jesus and has the courage to speak God’s truth from His Word into people’s lives.  Jesus is the prince of peace and is the only One who can bring real, lasting peace into hostile relationships!  James says, “¹⁸ Peacemakers who sow in peace reap a harvest of righteousness.” James 3:18
• A people pleaser is trying to make everybody happy.  BUT…people pleasing does not ultimately lead to peace but rather to moral and spiritual decline.  Making peace with sinfulness or with the world always requires making a compromise with the world.  Compromising in order to please others ultimately means compromising God’s truth, God’s standards and your personal holiness.  People pleasing will require forsaking Jesus as your first love.

We have to remember Paul’s testimony in Galatians 1:10 where he says, “If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a bondservant of Christ.”  Next, Paul then turns to one of his favorite illustrations and compares the Christian life to that of an athlete.

Example #3: Athlete

⁵ Similarly, anyone who competes as an athlete does not receive the victor’s crown except by competing according to the rules.

Remember that Paul was a tentmaker.  That means that he was a leatherworker. As a leatherworker, he may have been around the Greek games.  Paul would have been familiar with athletics.  He knew that in order to win, an athlete must contend and wrestle and struggle.  In order for a Christian to win, he must also contend and wrestle and struggle.  So, who is the Christian struggling against?

Paul is not saying that we are competing against other believers.  In fact, trying to be “more spiritual” than everybody else is self-exalting behavior not Christ-exalting behavior.  So who is our competitor and what is our prize?

• Our competition is against our flesh, the world, Satan and those who serve Satan.  That’s what we are contending, wrestling and struggling against.
• Philippians 3:14 says that our prize is the “upward call of God in Jesus Christ.”

My son is a triathlete and I’ve been to a number of races in this last year.  I’ve observed three things about triathlete’s that have spiritual implications:

1. An athlete who does not train hard during the week will never win on the weekend.  In a long-distance race, sometimes they won’t even finish.
2. A Christian who does not train in the Word on a regular basis, will not win the battle against Satan and his flesh.
3. An athlete who is holding anything back, who lets up in any one event or who keeps anything in reserves will not win first place.  Skill and form are important, but it’s not the only factor.  The athlete who wins is not necessarily the one with the most skill or the best form, but the one with the most focus and most determination across all three events.
4. A Christian who is most powerfully used by God is not necessarily the one with the most skill, but the one who uses their skills the most faithfully.  A believer who is holding back in some area of their life never accomplishes all that God wants them to achieve for His Glory and for His Kingdom.  That believer is liable to have a really disappointing finish at the end of his life.
5. If an athlete break the rules, they will be immediately disqualified no matter how well they ran the event.
6. A Christian can’t just make up the rules as they go along and expect God to be pleased with their lives.

Just to be clear, Paul’s not talking about rule-keeping to earn salvation.  He is talking about the desire of a true believer to walk in holiness and to walk according to God’s Word.  The rules in God’s Word are given to us for our joy and for our benefit.  God tells us over and over again, if we do things His way, our lives will be better.  Psalm 119:1 says, “Blessed (or HAPPY) are those whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord.”

On the other hand, we can’t expect our lives to be blessed by the Lord if we ignore His instructions on how to have a blessed life. The reward for faithfulness is reserved for those who compete according to God’s standards.  “…anyone who competes as an athlete does not receive the victor’s crown except by competing according to the rules.”

There are no shortcuts in sports.  Athletics requires discipline and training and hard work in order to win.

• Millions admire athletes, but few try to imitate them.
• Millions admire their performances, but few attempt their training.

Many people will admire the ethics of godly people, but only a few will have the courage and the discipline to live lives that God rewards.  Paul is telling us to stop watching other people do ministry and to get into the game spiritually.  If athletes train for trophies and men’s applause, then how much more should we train and sweat for that which is eternal?!

The best example of a person who is diligent in their work is a farmer.

Example #4: Farmer

⁶ The hardworking farmer should be the first to receive a share of the crops.

Just like soldier and athletes, farmers cannot take any shortcuts when it comes to reaping their harvest.  The difference with this illustration is that farming is not very glamorous work.

• The soldier has the excitement and glory of battle.
• The athlete has the thrill of competition and the cheers of the crowd.

The farmer on the other hand in not applauded by his fans.  Nobody wants his autograph.  Nobody is taking a selfie with Farmer John out in his field.  He does not call a press conference when he bails his hay.  He just faithfully does his work day in and day out.  Farmers are a picture of faithfulness.

Farming is a great analogy for ministry.  Ministry work is not always glamorous. If you are in the nursery, caring for the babies, you might not receive a round of applause when the parents come to pick up their child.  BUT… you do get to see some of the first fruits of that child growing in their relationship with Jesus as you sow spiritual seeds into the next generation.

Life Application: Reflect on your Life….

• Through the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit, there are certain things the godly men and women need to endure in the service of their King, like suffering and trials.
• There are certain things God commands a believers to avoid so that he will not become entangled with the affairs of this world.
• There are mandates a disciples need to observe in order to stay qualified for ministry service.

Through it all, Paul gives us this encouragement, “…Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.” (1 Cor 15:58)

Verse 7 says, “⁷ Reflect on what I am saying, for the Lord will give you insight into all this.”  The word “reflect” is a good literal translation.  The Greek word means to “consider carefully, ponder and mull over in the mind.”  But what is lost in the translation in the command aspect of this word.  The word is an imperative.  In our language, we don’t strongly tell someone to “reflect.” In the original language, Paul was giving a strong warning, not some kind of academic or mystical advice.

Paul is commanding us to: look at our lives and determine if we are living in the pattern of strong, purposeful and mature Christianity.  It’s like he’s asking these questions of each one of us:

• Are you devoting yourself to guarding and teaching God’s Word?
• Are you willing to do anything or give up anything in the service of the Lord?
• Are you keeping a proper distance between yourself and the affairs of this fallen world?
• Are you continually preparing yourself for the next season of ministry for the Master?
• Do you understand self-denial for God’s glory?
• Are you willing to do anything the Lord commands?

Let me end with a quote by JC Ryle:

“I will never shrink from declaring my belief that there are no “spiritual gains without spiritual pains.”  I should as soon expect a farmer to prosper in business who contented himself with sowing his fields and never looking at them until harvest, as expect a growing believer to attain mush holiness who was not diligent about his Bible-reading, his prayers, and the use of his Sundays.  Our God is a God who works by means, and he will never bless the soul of a man that pretends to be so high and spiritual that he can get on

Teaching Outline

Our strength comes from the power of Christ – v. 1, Romans 8:37

Examples of strong Christian living – v. 2-6

Example #1: Teacher – v. 2

Example #2: Soldier – v. 3-4

Suffer hardship without giving up – v. 3, James 1:2-4

Avoid entanglement in the world – v. 4a

Pleases his commanding officer – v. 4b, James 3:18, Galatians1:10

Example #3: Athlete – v. 5, Philippians 3:14, Psalms 119:1

Example #4: Farmer – v. 6

Application: Reflect on your Life – v. 7, 1 Cor. 15:58

• Are you devoting yourself to guarding and teaching God’s Word?
• Are you willing to do anything or give up anything in the service of the Lord?
• Are you keeping a proper distance between yourself and the affairs of this fallen world?
• Are you continually preparing yourself for the next season of ministry for the Master?
• Do you understand self-denial for God’s glory?
• Are you willing to do anything the Lord commands?

“I will never shrink from declaring my belief that there are no ‘spiritual gains without spiritual pains.’  I should as soon expect a farmer to prosper in business who contented himself with sowing his fields and never looking at them until harvest, as expect a growing believer to attain mush holiness who was not diligent about his Bible-reading, his prayers, and the use of his Sundays.  Our God is a God who works by means, and he will never bless the soul of a man that pretends to be so high and spiritual that he can get on.” – JC Ryle