Part 1, In Pursuit of Godliness Series
1 Timothy 1:1-7
Our world is broken. We see Russia invading Ukraine, and millions of Ukrainian refugees fled from their cities. It has been an ugly war, as so much destruction and sufferings have been everywhere in that country. We also have global inflation rates soaring very high. In Canada alone, currently, the inflation rate is 6.7% which is a new 31-year high. Gas price here in Ontario peaked more than 2%. On March 16, 2022, Statistics Canada reported that food prices rose 7.4 per cent in February, and this is the largest yearly increase since May 2009.[1] And the church, isn’t spared from brokenness. We see leaders falling to sin. Economic hardships pushed Christians to work even on Sundays missing the worship of the Lord. There’s chaos and materialism, among other things.
And this was also true to the 1st century church. Paul dispatched Timothy to the Ephesian church as a response to problems. They have false teachers teaching erroneous doctrines (1 Tim. 1:3-7; 4:1-3; 6:3-5), the chaos in their worship (2:1-15), lacking qualified leaders who can model faith (3:1-14), and materialism (6:6-19). So, Paul says to Timothy, “But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, and gentleness. 12 Fight the good fight of the faith. Take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made your good confession in the presence of many witnesses.” 1 Timothy 6:11-12.
The pursuit of godliness was not just for pastors like Timothy, but for all of us who are in Christ. The word pursue gives us the idea of a persevering effort. The Word of God tells us to have an unrelenting effort to practice godliness amid this broken world.
There are several traits of godliness that I want to share with you from this study, but we don’t have much time to cover everything today, so we’ll have part 1 for now, and I’ll share the balance next Sunday.
1. Godliness proves faith. vv. 1-2
“Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope.” 2 To Timothy my true son in the faith: Grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.” 1 Timothy 1:1-2
· Paul apostleship came to him as a command from God.
· Timothy was a young person when Paul met him in Lystra.
· It was Timothy’s grandmother and mother, who might have prepared him to faith in the Lord. See 2 Timothy 1:5.
· Acts 16:2 says, Timothy has a reputation of godliness, a living proof of his faith in the Lord. See also 2 Timothy 1:5.
· Paul discipled Timothy and assigned him lead the Ephesian church.
2. Godliness rejects erroneous doctrines.
“22 even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe.” Romans 3:22.
· The righteousness of God is freely given to anyone who believes in Christ as Lord and Savior.
· The righteousness of God will produce the desire to reject anything that opposes God.
“3 As I urged you when I went into Macedonia, stay there in Ephesus so that you may command certain people not to teach false doctrines any longer 4 or to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies. Such things pro-mote controversial speculations rather than advancing God’s work—which is by faith. 5 The goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. 6 Some have departed from these and have turned to meaningless talk.7 They want to be teachers of the law, but they do not know what they are talking about or what they so confidently affirm.” 1 Timothy 1:3-7.
· Some false teachers imposed their myths and endless genealogies, they enforce their own convictions and traditions, simply because they’ve always done things that way before.
· Some false teachers saw themselves as righteous because of their family heritage leading to Abraham.
We’ll cover more traits of godliness next week as we strive to live in it, so plan to attend!
[1] Restobiz, Access May 21, 2022, https://www.restobiz.ca/how-much-more-expensive-are-food-prices-becoming-in-canada/
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