Sermon Transcript
Alright, here’s the problem. Most of us, if not all of us, can at times, or all the time, feel some level of fear or nervousness or anxiety about sharing our faith, what we believe about God, sharing that with others who who do not already believe the same things that we believe. So, I’ve been asking various groups over the last couple of weeks, do you ever feel timid when you share what you believe about God with others? Does that ever happen? Everyone who has answered has said, yes, that happens, at least sometimes.
For most people, they answered, it happens always. Now, if you’re here this morning and you don’t identify as a Christian, welcome. We’re so glad that you’re here. You’re a big reason why we do all these things. But maybe this is news to you this morning.
Maybe this is the first time that you have heard that the people around you right now might feel nervous telling you what they believe about God. Does that surprise you if you’re not a Christian? Did you know that there’s a lot of Christians who feel that way? Do you get nervous when you talk about your spiritual beliefs, whatever they are, even if your spiritual beliefs are, I have no spiritual beliefs? Do you get nervous when you tell somebody, I have no spiritual beliefs?
Well, a lot of times it makes Christians nervous. If they are talking to people who aren’t Christian, at least in this country, at least right now, which means maybe one thing, maybe more things, but it means at least one thing. If you have a Christian friend, if you’re not a Christian and you have a Christian friend who has ever broached the subject with you, who has ever said something like, would it be all right if I If I tell you what I believe about God, or if they said something like, I really think you need Jesus in your life, or even, would you come to church with me? If you have a Christian friend who has ever said anything like that to you, this is what it means, at least, that your friend, your Christian friend, considers you, considers your welfare, considers maybe your eternity, important enough that he or she was willing to step through some fear or anxiety to talk with you. It means you matter enough to your Christian friend that he or she was willing to do something that was a little scary, if not a lot scary, in hopes that you would benefit in some way.
So, what would be great for you to hear this morning if you are not a Christian Because we’re going to kind of talk about this insider challenge, this challenge that Christians face when we feel nervous about sharing our beliefs. And you might start to wonder, what can I get out of this? Like, I don’t need to learn how to share my faith because I have no faith to share. Here’s at least one thing that you can get out of it and you can reflect on as we chat this morning. The only reason that your Christian friend would have brought up faith to you, or maybe just invited you to church, is because that friend cares about you to some extent and thinks something about Jesus is super important for you to hear.
That’s what you should get out of this, at least. Here’s another thing, action item for you as you leave today. You can ask your Christian friends if they have ever felt scared or nervous or timid when they brought up their faith, and then you can listen to why they feel that way. That would be a great learning experience for you. I’m sure, I mean, you’re like the rest of us, right?
You want to better understand the world. You want to better understand the people who live in it, the people who are around you right now. You want to better understand them. Of course, we all do. So, just ask your Christian friends if they have ever felt that way.
And then listen to what they say, and you’ll learn something. As I have asked that question for the last couple of weeks, here are some of the answers that I have heard, which some of them surprised me, and some of them I personally feel myself. So, for the Christian here, if you weren’t already apprehensive about sharing your faith, I’m going to give you a bunch of reasons that you can start being apprehensive. About sharing your faith. So, these are in no particular order.
Number 1, what if I don’t know the answer to a question that they ask? Like, I share with them what I believe and they ask me some question about an obscure Old Testament reference or the latest research on the origin of the universe and I don’t know the answer. What happens then? Related to that, number 2, I can’t anticipate how the conversation will go when when I share my faith, and I only want to do things that I can plan for every moment and contingency in advance.
Number 3, which this might have been the most common, worried if I share with them, it will harm our relationship somehow. They will be mad at me, or it will make them angry, or they won’t want to be my friend anymore, or they’ll begin to shut me out of their life, or they’ll just change the way that they act around me. Number 4, which is related, I don’t want people to think I’m weird. I want to be liked. I might not be liked or liked as well if I bring this up.
Number 5, worried that they will think the only thing I care about is their conversion. Worried that they will think the only reason I care about them is so that they will become a Christian. Worried they will feel like a project instead of feeling like my friend.
Number 6, worried that it will limit my career opportunities if I am public about my faith. And number 7, worried it won’t do any good. Worried I’ll go through the trouble to try to help them see who God is, and it won’t happen, and then I will feel like a failure because they still don’t see who God is. So, Christians, can you relate to any of those? Ever felt any of those?
Ever? Me too. This really seems to be a problem for those of us who call ourselves Christians. Now, if you’ve never felt any of those, fantastic! You can take a nap this morning.
Although, before you go to sleep, hang on a second, before you doze off, just one last thing. If you don’t have any fear at all, it might mean you have something just as bad, which is arrogance, hardheadedness, abrasiveness. That might even be worse. You aren’t afraid because you love to argue and win and tell people they are wrong and push them around. You are a bully.
And if that describes you, then you can’t take a nap and you need to pay just as close attention as the rest of us who have some amount of anxiety. The text that we are looking at this morning as we continue our study in this small book of 2 Timothy, which we’ve learned 2 Timothy is actually a letter that was written by one ancient person, Paul, to another ancient person, Timothy, both of whom At times, both Paul and Timothy seemed to have some amount of trouble or anxiety when they shared their faith. So, it’s super applicable to us today. We’re looking at 2 Timothy 1:6-14, which is printed in your bulletin insert or will be up on the screen. You can follow along however you want to.
This is just one small section of one small letter that was written a long time ago. Paul writes to Timothy, he says, for this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands. For God gave us a spirit not of fear, but of power and love and self-control. So, let’s take a small break here. So, we’ve already eliminated the abrasive bully.
Did you notice that? Like, this says self-controlled and loving. So, when you share your faith with someone, that person ought to walk away thinking, well, I don’t agree with everything you said, but you were measured in your delivery, you were self-controlled, you were not hot-tempered, you never raised your voice, it was not an argument, it was controlled, respectful, it was loving, I didn’t feel pushed around, I felt cared for. If the person didn’t walk away feeling that way, you’re doing it wrong. All right, continuing, verse 8.
Therefore, do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, or do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord in other versions, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works, but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought to life and immortality to light through the gospel, for which I was appointed a preacher and an apostle and a teacher, which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me. Follow this pattern of sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. By the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you. As we work through this small portion of this ancient letter, we will see the reality of fear, when it seems to come up, and how Paul instructed Timothy to deal with it.
So, first, the reality of fear. One reason why I appreciate Scripture as much as I do is because of how real it is. Paul acknowledges to Timothy that it will take some work to overcome our fears or our shame when we talk about Jesus. He assumes that Timothy’s gonna have this problem, and then the rest of the church is a second audience. He assumes that they will have some hurdles they will need to jump when it comes to talking about their faith publicly.
And perhaps Paul assumed they would have some trouble because he seemed to have some trouble. 2 Corinthians 10:10, Paul is accused of being timid. 1 Corinthians 2:3, Paul says he feels weak and fearful when he preaches. Ephesians 6:19, Paul asked for people to pray for him so that he would have boldness when he shared about Jesus. All of that collectively shows that Paul probably had some amount of anxiety when he talked with others about Jesus, which should give us here today, when we have those same troubles, it should give us some comfort.
I mean, the man who was largely responsible for kind of getting Christianity airborne in the 1st century, he was nervous, at least to some extent, when he talked to people about the faith that he had. And he acknowledges Timothy probably has the same issue. He says, verse 8, don’t be ashamed to testify about our Lord. Don’t be ashamed to tell the story of Jesus. Like Timothy, even though I know this story about Jesus is one that you love, even though, Timothy, I know you rely on this Jesus story for your hope and peace, even though I know this story, I know it means the whole world to you, I also know you might have fear when it comes to sharing it with others.
He acknowledges that reality. He tells Timothy, verse 6, to fan into flame the gift of God, which means it’s not going to happen all on its own. This passion and desire Timothy has to share Jesus with others, it’s one that needs to be nurtured, fanned into flame. Timothy’s gift that needed to be fanned was probably in preaching and teaching, which we learned in a previous letter that Paul wrote to him, 1 Timothy 4:14. So, we might think that this text that we are reading today about fanning into flame only applies to those who are specially gifted to preach and teach, but that wouldn’t be a correct reading because all of us have the responsibility to share what we have experienced with Jesus.
But here is the observation, if even those who have a special ability to preach and teach, if even they still need to put in effort to overcome anxiety when they share about Jesus, if they have to put in effort, how much more the rest of us? I mean, if Paul and Timothy felt timid and needed to take that little ember in their heart and fan it into flame, What about everybody else? Here’s the point. The desire, the ability, our comfort to share our faith with others is not going to just happen all by itself. To overcome feeling ashamed will take deliberate steps on our part.
Okay, that was the reality of fear. Now, when specifically is it that Paul assumed Timothy would experience this fear? When does fear seem to come up? When does it tend to happen? It’s when we speak about Jesus.
We experience fear when we speak about Jesus. Do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord, verse 8. The shame is attached to speaking about Him. Paul was suffering because he had spoken about Jesus. Verse 11, Paul says he was appointed a preacher, a herald of this message.
Verse 12, he says, this is why I am suffering as I am. It is because of the proclamation of this message. He is physically in prison as he writes this letter to Timothy because he has spoken of Jesus. Speaking is where we run into a problem as well. Isn’t it?
We are probably far more comfortable with what is usually called lifestyle evangelism. Let me just treat others well. Let me always do the right thing. Let me be an example with my life. Let me live sacrificially.
Let me volunteer a lot. Let me do the humility thing. I will treat other people better than I treat myself, and that will count as me sharing my faith. They will understand Jesus by me living like this. In general, that type of evangelism doesn’t give us much anxiety or fear.
We are comfortable with that. We are not ashamed to be associated with good works. We’re like, please associate me with good works. We’re not ashamed to be associated with serving others. There’s, there’s no fear in that.
Here’s the problem though. No one will ever learn the saving story of Jesus unless we use words. There is no way for someone to become a Christian without some very specific information which cannot be articulated only through doing nice things for people. You’re like, but doing acts of service for others opens the door for me to be able to talk with them about Jesus. You’re like, I can show others that I really care about them as a person and not a project.
They’re not a project to me. I can show them that by serving them, and then when they know for sure that they matter to me without any agenda, they will understand the reason I’m telling them about Jesus is because I care about them and not because they’re some project to me. And I’m like, great! Do that! I’m all for that!
Please do that! But did you hear what you just said? Acts of service open the door for you to be able to talk. We must actually speak the message or write it down. Or, I don’t know, act it out in a play.
You could get creative with the medium, but the saving message that Jesus brought to earth cannot be articulated only through being nice. Now, being nice is important, okay? Good works are important, but they are all side effects of the main message, that good works are downstream results from the primary event, and the message cannot be known from its side effects. So, what is the main message? What is it that Paul spoke that got him put into prison?
What is it that Timothy was potentially afraid to speak? Paul outlines it briefly in verses 9 and 10, but it is, one, Jesus came to save us, verse 9. Jesus did not come to be our example primarily. He came to do what we have failed to do, which is live up to God’s standards, to live a life pleasing to God. We have failed to do that.
We have not lived up to God’s standards. Jesus did it for us. And then in the end, Jesus gave us credit for the perfect life He lived, and He took the blame for the messy life that we have lived. That is how He saves us. Number 2, this gift of salvation was not something we earn.
It’s not because of our works, verse 9. Jesus saves us from the blame we deserve just because God wanted to do it. It was according to His own purpose in grace, not because we performed well enough, because we didn’t. Number 3, after Jesus takes the blame for the life we have lived by dying on the cross, he raises to life again in victory over death, giving us not only a pardon for our evil actions but also everlasting life with God, verse 10. Number 4, now that we have new life with God, God gives us a holy calling to live in step— this is verse 9— with his desires for us.
Which, of course, includes treating people well. But you can see how treating people well is like downstream results in the chain of events. It is the result of these other actions that God has done for us. It is not the main event.
No one will ever understand that message unless you speak it. You can be nice all day long, But it will never come into anyone’s mind, oh, wow! Jesus paid the price I owe!
No one will ever think that unless you use words. Maybe you’re going to give everybody in your office cookies for Easter. Great. Do that. If you’re making a batch, send me some too, okay?
But no one is ever going to see the cookie sitting on their desk and think, oh, I get it now. My immoral behavior has put me under the righteous judgment of God, and I therefore stand condemned before Him. But He loved me so much that Jesus came to take the condemnation that I deserve and give me the credit for the perfect life He lived. Then, after He died, He rose to life again, giving me victory over death and everlasting life with Him.
Nobody is ever going to get that from a cookie. It won’t happen. Now, if Jesus’ message was only, be nice to others, then maybe your example could point to Jesus’ example and people could start following Jesus’ message without ever really even knowing anything about him. But since that is not the primary message, No one will ever get it just by watching you. Jesus, why did Jesus say He came?
Jesus says He came to give His life as a ransom for many. Jesus says He came to seek and save the lost. Before He was executed, Jesus says, this is the purpose for which I have come into the world, to be executed.
He came to die for our sins so we wouldn’t need to die for our sins.
That is specific information that no one will ever deduce just by watching our actions. It must be articulated. Faith comes by hearing, hearing by the Word of God. How will they hear unless someone tells them? We must speak it.
Must. There is no other option. But speaking it makes us nervous.
So, how does he instruct Timothy to deal with this nervousness?
First, the bad news for some of us. In encouraging Timothy, Paul does not guarantee success. He does not guarantee that person will still like you. He does not say there is a way to anticipate every question you may be asked. He does not ensure your career will be safe.
He does not guarantee that person will feel valued instead of feeling like a project. He does not pat Timothy on the head and tell him it’ll be okay. So, what is his answer? How does he encourage Timothy toward boldness? At least 3 ways, and you won’t like the first one.
I don’t either. He says, verses 8 and 9, he says, don’t be ashamed. Instead, and we are like on the edge of our seat and we are like, yes? What is out there other than being ashamed? We’re like, great, I’m so glad to hear there is another option besides feeling ashamed.
We’re like, I’m going to get out my pen. Tell me, Paul, what is this alternative to feeling ashamed? He says, instead of being ashamed, suffer.
Like, what? Yeah, instead of shame, suffer. Join me in suffering for the gospel, as if those are our only 2 choices.
But if you think about it, it’s true. Those are the only 2 choices, because we could either act or not act. We could share our faith or we could not share our faith. Can you think of another option? If we choose not to choose, that’s the same as not acting.
So those are options. We can act or not act. Share our faith or not share. Those are 2 options. Not acting, option 1, gives us shame because we haven’t done what we needed to do.
That’s one option. Not acting equals shame. Okay, option 2, we could act. We can share our faith and therefore according to Paul, suffer. We don’t like either of those.
We don’t like feeling ashamed. We don’t like suffering. I get that. Me neither. But it’s going to be one or the other.
So pick one, shame or suffering. There is a fork in the road It will be one of them. Player’s choice.
We’re like, isn’t that a bit of a false dichotomy? Isn’t there, isn’t there like a way to share without suffering? Can’t there be a magic third option you’re not telling me?
Well, consider this. Maybe this will motivate you to embrace suffering. In order for you to become a Christian, Jesus had to suffer.
There was no other way. And remember, He wasn’t too thrilled about the idea either. He was praying before He was crucified, and He said, God, if there is any other way for us to do this, can we please do it some other way?
And God said, No, this is the only way.
So, maybe God is saying to us the only way certain people will come to faith in Jesus is if we suffer. Maybe there is someone out there who will see you take a stand and share your faith, which will put something of— something that you value in jeopardy. Something will be in jeopardy. Sharing your faith might put your career in jeopardy, it might put a relationship in jeopardy, it might put your reputation in jeopardy, but you take a stand anyway, and you share what you believe. And maybe the act of you putting yourself in harm’s way is the very thing that it will take for someone else to say, wow, This must be real, and I need to pay attention.
If that was the case, if your suffering would lead to somebody else getting it, would it be worth it for you? Would you do it then?
Second tip for dealing with fear, trust God with the results.
Paul says, verse 9, God is the one who saves. He does it according to His own purpose and grace. And he says, verse 12, I am not ashamed. Oh, tell us why you are not ashamed, Paul. I am not ashamed because I am convinced God is able to guard what He entrusted to me.
The weight is not on us to come up with the precise combination of words and inflections and illustrations that will make someone get it. There is no such thing. You don’t have to have all the answers for someone to get it. That’s not what will make them get it. In fact, you could have all the answers.
I’ve actually seen this happen. You could back somebody into a corner rationally, apologetically, where the only intellectually honest conclusion is, God is real and I need Jesus. You could do that, and people can still say, Nope, don’t want that, don’t believe it. So if the right answers don’t make someone get it, what makes them get it?
God. He saves according to His purpose and grace. It’s ultimately up to Him. I’ll tell you one of the greatest comforts to me When I am stressing over, did I convey everything correctly? Did I say enough?
Did I say too much? I don’t want to end up like pushing this person away. One of my greatest comforts is church history because I’ll tell you, looking back over the last 2,000 years, there are large amounts of time where it seems like even the just simplest gospel message, just like the the smallest bare bones of like, I trust Jesus to reconcile me to God, even something just like that simple was completely absent from the teaching of the church. And yet, people still got it. The message was preserved.
The message still moved forward. Even the times where it seemed like preachers were intentionally trying to get it wrong, like, and use their position for their own means, Other people still saw through all of that and they trusted Jesus anyway. God will guard the message. God will do the saving. You can relax a little bit, perfectionist.
It’s not in your hands anyway. Now, that doesn’t let us off the hook, of course. We’ve still got to tell them. How will they hear unless somebody tells them? And actually, right after Paul says that God will guard it, he turns around and tells Timothy, verses 13 and 14, Timothy, you got to guard it, and you got to make sure that what you say is in fact the true message.
He says, keep the pattern of sound teaching that you learned from me, verse 13. But then he adds this little caveat at the end, verse 14. He says, do it by the power that God’s Spirit gives you. So, yes, do your best to get it right. Of course, but you can relax a little bit because it’s really in God’s hands.
Thirdly, Paul says he is not ashamed because he knows the one in whom he has believed, verse 12. Paul isn’t ashamed because he knows the one in whom he has believed, which makes us, one, kind of ask a probing question. Of ourselves, and at the same time, it kind of points to a practical way that we might be able to begin sharing our faith if we don’t know a place to begin. The probing question is, do we know God in such a way that we are not ashamed to be identified with Him?
If people find out what we believe, Are we embarrassed?
Or do we know Jesus in such a way that we love being associated with Him?
Even if it costs us something, do we see Him as enough?
That’s a probing question, isn’t it?
Be honest with yourself about that. If you’re embarrassed of Him, Confess that, pray about it, ask Him for help.
Okay, the practical way to share our faith, which this kind of points us in the direction of. He says, I know in whom I have believed. So, you share what you know about Jesus that made you believe.
Don’t share some canned answer of what belief is. Just share what you know about Jesus that makes you put your trust in Him, which we will all have different reasons, okay? Like C.S. Lewis says in Mere Christianity that his first initial step toward Christianity was when he realized he couldn’t call anything objectively wrong unless there was a set standard of morality that came from outside the world and outside of culture, and that’s why he initially began to believe. That may not even make any sense to you.
If not, don’t share that reason. That’s not why you are a Christian. That’s not what you know about Jesus. But you have a reason. You know something about Jesus, and it is why you decided to trust him.
That’s what you share with people. I’ll tell you my reason, which I’ve told you before.
Jesus is the only one who will accept me. That’s why. Morally, I’m not proud of myself. At best, I’m a failure. But Jesus will still have me.
No other God is offering me that with everything that’s in my past and everything that’s in my heart. But Jesus does. He still looks at me and says, seeing everything, he still looks at me and says, come here. So I say, okay, man. I mean, if you’re still willing to have me, I’m yours.
Like, I’m sold if you’re still willing to have me. What about you?
Figure out the reason you believe and then whittle that down to the size of a tweet. And then look for opportunities to share that with people. Like, maybe someone at work gets caught doing something they aren’t supposed to do, and everyone is condemning that person. And you, number one, show that you still accept that person, but then two, when you have the chance, in the right time, in the right tone, you say maybe something like, hey, I’m a Christian because Jesus accepts me when no one else will.
Or maybe you know someone who is hurting unfairly, unjustly, and again, when you have the chance, you say, hey, I’ve been there, and I hate it. Maybe you say, I found hope because Jesus also suffered unfairly, unjustly, and He says He’ll carry our sorrows.
Or maybe someone’s looking up at the stars and says, wow, that’s amazing! And you say, the only way I can make sense of its beauty is if someone— if somebody made it.
Maybe that doesn’t have anything to do with why you believe. If not, don’t share those. Maybe you saw the sacrificial love of Jesus, you bought in, and you found out that it’s real. Maybe you realize the reason why you feel so insignificant is because you keep trying to center your life around yourself instead of centering your life around the only one who is truly significant, and then you started centering your life around Him and it made all the difference. I don’t know your reason, but you do.
The nice thing about sharing what you know about the God that you know is you don’t have to have all the answers. Someone asks, well, what about higher criticism of the Bible? What about the fossil record? And you say, I don’t know. I mean, if you have those answers, great, like, share them, please.
And by the way, seek answers to all those questions. Just go ahead. Like, by doing so, my faith has only increased. You don’t have to be scared of questions like that. Please ask them.
If the truth is the truth, it will be the truth no matter what you ask, always. So, ask away, learn. But in the meantime, when you don’t know those answers, you can say, I don’t know, but I do know something.
I do know the sacrificial love of Jesus is real because I felt it. I do know I can always count on Jesus. I don’t know the answer to your question, but I do know that Jesus embraced me when nobody else would. Early Christians, if they would have said, or if they didn’t know an answer, they might have said, I don’t know the answer to your question, but I do know that Jesus was dead and then he came back to life. Like, he was really dead, I poked him, and then he really came back to life.
I had a meal with him, so I’m with him. That’s why I believe. Like, if you can predict your own death and resurrection and pull it off, I’ll be with you, but you didn’t pull it off, so I’m with Jesus. That’s why I’m with him. That is what they might have said.
Have you figured out why you believe?
I know you don’t know everything. You don’t know everything about your best friend either, but you know enough, you know enough to trust your friend, to count on your friend, to believe in your friend, You know enough about Jesus, too.
And that’s what you can always confidently share.
Let’s pray.
Father, You gave us a spirit of power and love and self-control, yet so often we feel timid and afraid, Lord, to talk about You for some reason. So, I pray that you would be transforming us right now, that you’d be changing us into what you say that we are, that we would love to talk about you, especially this week as we’re heading into Easter, Lord. I pray that you’ll bring people to mind and open the door for conversations for us to share about the God that we know.
Lord, when you open that door, give us the confidence to step through it. We ask all those things in Jesus’ name. Amen.
