Standing Firm in Appraising Grace
What matters most when all your teaching and preaching is said and done?
As I urged you when I was going to Macedonia, remain at Ephesus so that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine, nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies, which promote speculations rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith. The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. Certain persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain discussion, desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions. Now we know that the law is good, if one uses it lawfully, understanding this, that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners, for the unholy and profane, for those who strike their fathers and mothers, for murderers, the sexually immoral, men who practice homosexuality, enslavers, liars, perjurers, and whatever else is contrary to sound doctrine, in accordance with the gospel of the glory of the blessed God with which I have been entrusted. I thank him who has given me strength, Christ Jesus our Lord, because he judged me faithful, appointing me to his service, though formerly I was a blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent opponent. But I received mercy because I had acted ignorantly in unbelief, and the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost. But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life. To the King of ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen. 1 Timothy 1:3-17
Like Ezra, the Apostle Paul had cream-of-the-crop credentials. Before his conversion Paul knew the advantage of training, talent, and top billing as a leader and teacher in Israel (Philippians 3:4-6). It could be argued that after his conversion Paul possessed more training, talent, and top billing than his apostolic colleagues, but in the spirit of Ezra (more importantly, Jesus) Paul did not rely on his scholarship, skill, or status, but on the appraising grace of God in Christ.
Paul warned Timothy that his people would encounter teachers and preachers who think they know the law they teach, but who have failed to apply that law to themselves, considering themselves righteous (1 Timothy 1:3-11). By contrast, Paul wanted folks to learn from his example as one who knows his law-breaking heart is being transformed into a law-keeping heart by the mercy of God in Jesus, the Savior (1 Timothy 1:12-16). It is interesting to note that teachers and preachers who fail to apply the Law and the Gospel to themselves will fill the ears and hearts of their hearers with empty, speculative talk (vv. 4, 6). If we focus on the proper proclamation and application of the Law and Gospel, we’ll have no time for “vain discussions” which will never engender a “love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith” (vs. 5).
At the end of his life of preaching and teaching, Paul still stands firm in the appraising grace of Jesus. A man who once called himself the “least of all the apostles” and then the “least of all the saints,” now considers himself the worst of sinners, the one most in need of the good news of God’s grace in Christ (1 Corinthians 15:9, Ephesians 3:8, 1 Timothy 1:15-16). Paul gave Timothy an inside look at what kind of preparation led the aged apostle to be the Church’s premiere preacher/teacher. Paul shows us how to properly apply the Law of God to our hearts, setting them on Jesus as He is offered in the Gospel, aiming them at the studied pursuit of loving God and others, and practicing that faith-expressing-itself-in-love as an example to others.
Think over the teaching and preaching you have offered to others: Has it been filled with the proper application of the Law that leads to powerful proclamation of the Gospel? Do you spend too much time on secondary teachings without laying a solid foundation of the Gospel which is “of first importance” (1 Corinthians 15:3)? Think over your preparation for teaching and preaching: Are you regularly applying the truth and grace of Jesus to your own heart? Can your people look to you as an example of how to do this in their own lives?
