Sermon Transcript
Well, that was fantastic. I hope you’re encouraged. What a great start.
What a great start to the year ahead of us. We just are celebrating today the work that God did this past year. So many good things, and then now to just be off to this next year. I can hardly wait to see Armadillo Willie in one of those man groups, or whatever his name is.
Yeah, that was fun. Thanks, thanks, manly person over there. We appreciate it. Never saw that side of you before, though. I kind of like it.
Most of our relationships, most of our relationships are like my relationship with Carrie Underwood or Bubba Watson. You might not know them and you might know them. I have no idea. Or you, you might say, actually, I have a lack of relationship with Carrie Underwood or Bubba Watson. I know a few things about Carrie.
I know she won American Idol back in the 4th season of American Idol in 2005. I know that she’s a country singer. I know that Carrie is married. I know that she’s expecting her 2nd child. I know that she’s a believer in Jesus Christ, and I know that we are somehow connected on Twitter.
So I sort of follow Carrie Underwood about as much as I follow anybody else that I’m on Twitter with, which is pretty much I never follow them. So I guess that makes me kind of one of her unofficial followers, me and the 8 million others that follow Carrie Underwood. So I sort of know Carrie. But not really. I really don’t know Carrie any more than I know Bubba Watson.
For those of you who don’t recognize the name Bubba Watson, Bubba’s a professional golfer. I follow Bubba on Twitter also. We’re tight, me and Bubba Watson and about 2 million other people. I’ve been following him on Twitter ever since I found out he and I have some things in common. I found out that he’s a believer in in Jesus Christ, so am I. I found out that he’s married, and I’m married, so that makes us, you know, we have that in common.
I found out that he likes golf, and I like golf. And I found out he went to a junior college, I went to a junior college. And I found out that he won the Masters, and that’s kind of where he distanced our relationship.
The fact is, I know about Bubba Watson, but I don’t really know Bubba Watson any more than I know Carrie Underwood. My relationship, you might say, with Carrie and Bubba in some way are like many of the relationships that we have— distant, impersonal at best. Even people that we actually meet and maybe even see on a regular basis, we just are still distant in those relationships. But that’s kind of life, isn’t it? We can’t share a close, personal relationship with everyone.
Not even Jesus had a close personal relationship with everyone, even among those that Jesus was closest to, he was closer to some followers than he was to others. So take for instance the 12 apostles. He was closer to the 12 apostles than he was to the 70 disciples that he sent out on mission in twos. He was even closer, however, among his 12 disciples to 3 of the men, Peter, James, and John. And among the 3, he even shared a closer relationship with one of them.
You probably know who that was. It was Peter. And when Jesus spent more time with people, he obviously did that intentionally. He had something on his mind. He wanted them to know and experience God’s love, and he wanted them to see how much God loved them and the plan that God had for their lives so that they could go out and connect with other people in relational ways so that others then would come to know and experience God’s love and plan.
For their lives. He wanted them to play a unique part in bringing God’s kingdom on earth. And so now we, we’re among the others, and it’s our privilege to connect with others, and it’s our privilege to share with them God’s love and God’s plan for their lives. And the thought of that for some of us may seem like daunting at the very least or beyond us, and in some ways it is, but in other ways, Connecting with other people could be one of the most significant and fulfilling things that we’re gonna do this next year, which is why today’s scripture focus should be, I think, of interest to all of us, especially here in the Silicon Valley where we are relationally challenged. We really are.
Relational connections are challenging at best, and they’re challenging at best due to probably a myriad of reasons, but there are a myriad of barriers. That can stand between us in relationships. Some of those are just time challenges. We just don’t have enough time, it seems like. We’re busy.
Some of it’s related to exhaustion. Some of it could be related to technology distractions. Technology distractions like smartphones. That oftentimes is just distraction in a relationship, or in-ear headphones. That just communicates, I’m not interested in talking to anybody else right now.
I’m just in my own world. And some of this is just related to a lack of desire to get to know other people, or individualism, or it could be sin. Sin could be standing between us and others, or a lack of love, fear, an introverted personality. There are a lot of things that could stand in the way of a relationship. The tragedy is, is that oftentimes what happens is that when barriers like that stand in the way of significant relationships, we miss out on what God would want to do in our lives through significant close relationships.
So that in these significant close relationships, we grow in our love for God and we grow in our love for each other in deep and life-changing ways. In ways like, you know, and you read the scriptures, in ways like others who had deep friendships grew. In ways similar to people in the past like Moses and Aaron. Or Jonathan and David, or Ruth and Naomi, or Elijah and Elisha, or Paul and Timothy. You know, when you look at these people throughout the Scriptures and others like them, they experienced what we’re going to call today the power of 2.
They experienced the power of 2. Today what we’re going to do is we’re going to zero in on one of those close relationships. It’s the relationship of Paul and Timothy, and the reason we’re going to be zeroing in on these 2 guys is because here at the start of the year, we’re gonna start a brand new series today in the book of 1 Timothy. And 1 Timothy is a letter that’s written by Paul to Timothy, who desperately— Timothy desperately needed some help from his dear friend Paul and his mentor. And my hope is that as we dig into this letter of 1 Timothy, we’ll benefit by the counsel that Paul gives to Timothy, and it will result in great gains in our relationship with God, and it will result in great gains in our relationship with each other.
And so at the outset of this year, what this could mean for us this morning as we just begin to think about the year ahead, what this could mean for us is it could mean a new commitment, a new commitment in the coming year and maybe in years to come to build close relationships, closer relationships than maybe we even have right now. The kind of relationship like the relationship Paul the Apostle and Timothy shared. And their relationship comes into focus in 1 Timothy chapter 1, and really you get kind of an introduction into their relationship in verses 1 and 2. So, if you have your Bible, turn there with me, will you? You might— if you brought— you got a bulletin, you could pull out the message note sheet, and you’ll just see both of those verses listed there for us.
But this is simply what it says. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope, To Timothy, my true son in the faith, grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. Paul begins his letter by giving a little introduction to he and Timothy’s life. First, we’re introduced to Paul, Paul the Apostle, Paul, one of the 12 chosen apostles that God saved and God commanded through Jesus Christ to take the gospel to the world, the good news. Or as you see it here in verse 1, the message of the hope of salvation, salvation that through Jesus Christ our sins in the past can be forgiven and we could have a brand-new standing with God.
We could stand in Christ forgiven, salvation that impacts our present life and salvation that’s ultimately going to impact our future so that we have an eternal life with God. So, this is salvation past, present, and future. That’s the gospel Paul’s talking about. And this gospel is a message— you notice there he says it’s a message of hope. It’s a message of hope through Jesus Christ, hope for everyone throughout the world.
And Paul’s story of taking this hope to the world is actually found in the book of Acts. If you’ve ever read through the book of Acts, chapters 1 through 12 focuses on the gospel going to Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria. And then you get to chapter 13, and the gospel begins to go to the whole world, and the key spokesperson, or the key missionary during that period of time was the Apostle Paul. And so, chapters 13 through 28 of Acts actually focus on the 3 missionary journeys that the Apostle Paul took over a 10-year period of time. The first journey was actually to Galatia, and if we could just take the region up here, you could see Galatia over there.
He spent about 2 years on his first missionary journey in Galatia. Did you see me? I started doing this with my fingers. I’m sorry. You’re going to have to forgive me because I teach these walkthrough seminars and this is how we remember these journeys.
We say, first missionary journey. You like that? First missionary journey. In fact, why don’t you just try that with me? This is first missionary journey and Paul went to Galatia, to Galatia, and so we circle Galatia when we’re teaching people this.
We say, first missionary journey. Actually, we say, 2 years Galatia, because he ministered on this journey for a couple of years. And part of the journey meant for him to go to Lystra. He went to Lystra and guess who lived in Lystra? Well, it was Timothy.
Timothy lived in Lystra, and Timothy, that ministry that he had in Lystra evidently had an impact on Timothy and Timothy’s mother and his grandmother. And in Lystra, Paul and Barnabas, they healed a lame man, and this man that they healed resulted in all kinds of crazy things there in the city. They actually began to declare Paul and Barnabas as gods. These people are gods, and so they were going to bow down and worship Paul and Barnabas, but they weren’t gods, but they were teaching about God. About God the Father and Jesus Christ.
And the result of that teaching was that the people, the crowd of people, those who rejected that message ended up stoning Paul, and they drug him out of the city and they left him for dead. That’s interesting, stoning and drug, it’s just right in the same verse. But anyway, so they stoned him and they left him, they drug him out of the city and they left him for dead. But God intervened and he healed him, and so they continue this first journey and they went on to Derbe after they left Lystra. They went on to Derbe and they preached there and a large number of people came to faith in Jesus Christ.
So it was an incredible first journey. And then as you read along in Acts, you come to his second— try that— second missionary journey. Did you get it? Second missionary journey. And this journey lasted for about 3 years.
So how long was the first missionary journey? How long? 2 years. Yeah, come on, stay with me. We got the first missionary journey is 2 years.
Where was it mostly focused? On Galatia. Then we have his second missionary journey, and guess what? This lasted for about 3 years, for about 3 years. And it’s fascinating because on this second missionary journey, Paul went right back through the city of Lystra, and while he was there, he met up with Timothy, with Timothy, who he was told at that point in time was a devoted follower of Jesus Christ.
Well, he wasn’t a devoted follower of Christ when Paul was on his first missionary journey, so something happened. Something happened between the first and the second journey, and it’s very possible that what happened was Timothy came to faith in Jesus Christ because of what Paul shared on the first missionary journey. But hearing that Timothy was a devoted follower of Christ, Timothy joined Paul in the second journey, and they went over to Macedonia— you see it over there— and to Greece. And their primary focus on the second journey was over in Macedonia and Greece, and Timothy was along for that second missionary journey. And then Paul took a 3rd missionary journey.
And this 3rd missionary journey, you could say 3rd journey, this 3rd missionary journey primarily focused on Asia Minor, down here especially in and around the city of Ephesus. On the 3rd journey, they primarily ministered at Ephesus. And Ephesus was the Roman capital of Asa— Asa— Asia. Asa was an Old Testament guy. Some of you know that.
But anyway, Ephesus is the Roman capital of Asia and is a city, listen, of about 250,000 people. And the city of Ephesus featured the Temple of Artemis. Artemis was the moon goddess. Some of you studied this. The temple actually in Ephesus was the largest and the most magnificent building ever constructed in the Greek world.
It was such an incredible marble structure. It was just huge. It was 420 feet long, 240 feet wide, so you can think larger than a football field. It stood over 60 feet high. It was supported— the roof was supported by 60— or excuse me, 117 60-foot columns.
117 60-foot columns. So, think of 6 stories high, that sort of thing. The splendor of the temple earned it a place among the 7 Wonders of the Ancient World. And in this world that was focused on idolatry, or this city that was focused on idolatry, Paul and Timothy on the 3rd missionary journey preached the gospel of Jesus Christ in the city of Ephesus for 3 years, for 3 years. And then after those 3 missionary journeys, Paul went back to Jerusalem.
And when he returned to Jerusalem, he was arrested and he was locked into prison over some fabricated charges that ultimately resulted in him being transferred to Rome where he was kept under house arrest as he awaited trial at the hands of Caesar. And ultimately, Paul, after that imprisonment in Rome, he was released and Timothy and Paul joined up again. They made their way back to Asia Minor. And when they came back to Asia Minor, guess what? They went back to Ephesus.
And ultimately, when they came back to Ephesus, and now it’s been at least 5 or more years that they’ve been away, When they came back to this church in Ephesus that they had spent 3 years helping grow up in Jesus Christ, when they came back to this church, they found widespread false teaching in the church and a number of other problems in the church. And that tragic situation led Paul to say to Timothy, you need to stay here in Ephesus and you need to pastor this church here in Ephesus while I’m going to move on to other ministries, which he did. He moved on to Macedonia. And it’s while Paul’s in Macedonia, from Macedonia, that he wrote 1 Timothy to give Timothy, his protégé, some much-needed wisdom, help, and encouragement. So, there you have the background.
Timothy now, after having ministered with the Apostle Paul for 15 years, he’s now in Ephesus. All alone. Paul is no longer there. And he gets this letter from Paul, and just put yourself in Timothy’s situation. This is the first time that he really is placed in a city to be the pastor of a church in a city.
He had some frequent visits to other locations, just short-term, kind of take care of a situation, but he is here now. And actually, this could be the place that he ultimately lives out his life. And so, here he is, he’s this young pastor, and he’s trying to figure it all out, and Paul writes this letter to him. Can you imagine how welcome it must have been for Timothy to get a letter from his friend and his mentor at this moment in time? I mean, I remember being over in Phoenix where God placed us in a church that had some major problems, and I got connected to a pastor who became an immense help to me every week.
We had a phone call for a couple of years where he gave me some important counsel. He prayed with me, and it made a huge difference in my life and my ministry. Well, you know what that is like because all of us find ourselves in situations where we’re like, how did I get here? I mean, come on, are you kidding me? And we would welcome any kind of help, like the help that Timothy is getting here from the Apostle Paul.
We would welcome help from a friend. We would welcome help from a counselor. We would welcome help from another mother or father, a married couple, whoever it is, a parent, a single. Come on, give me some help. Send me a letter.
I would welcome a letter at this point in time. You could kind of put yourself into that circumstance. So Paul sends some help, and he sends the help by way of a letter, and he says in verse 2, to Timothy, my true son in the faith. Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. What that tells me is that the Apostle Paul really loved Timothy.
The fact that he calls him his true son in the faith also suggests that Paul had some kind of part in Timothy’s salvation. We know that Timothy’s grandmother Eunice and Timothy’s mother Lois first came to faith, 2 Timothy 1:5. 1 and verse 5, they first came to faith before Timothy came to faith. And then Timothy came to faith later. How that happened, we’re not told, but as I suggested, it could have been during Paul’s first missionary journey when he visited Lystra and they heard— Timothy and his family heard the gospel preached, and it could have been that all 3 of them came to faith at that point in time, especially after all the crazy things that happened.
Where these guys were proclaimed to be gods, and they said, no, we’re not gods. And then they tried to kill him, and he didn’t die. And who knows what circumstances God would have used to bring this family to salvation, but they all came to salvation. And evidently, now Paul is writing to Timothy, a person who is a fellow believer, and he sees himself as his spiritual father. He sees himself as somebody who has in some way impacted this guy spiritually.
And that relationship that began evidently, as I suggested, fostered and it blossomed over a 15-year period of time so that when Paul wrote Timothy this letter now 15 years into the relationship and partnership, he’s just— Paul’s just deeply concerned about Timothy’s well-being. And he’s concerned about the well-being of the church in Ephesus. And that’s why Paul says to him in verse 2, that’s why he says he’s hoping that God the Father and Christ Jesus the Lord would bless Timothy with grace. Boy, isn’t that something to want for others, that he would be blessed with grace? What’s grace?
Grace is undeserved blessing. It’s undeserved kindness. That he would receive from God his undeserved kindness and favor. And he prays and wants for Timothy to experience mercy. And mercy, what’s that?
That’s not receiving what you do deserve. So if grace is receiving what you don’t deserve, mercy is not receiving what you do deserve, which is— what do we deserve? Well, we deserve punishment and we deserve judgment. But God in mercy gives us instead salvation and forgiveness for sin through Jesus Christ. And he prays and hopes for Timothy to have peace.
What’s that? Well, that’s that peace where we can have peace with God and there’s not this this barrier between us and God any longer through Christ, and that we could experience the peace of God. So, peace with God and peace of God. Paul prays that and longs to see that happen for Timothy, that he might experience grace and mercy and peace. Now, let me ask you, who wouldn’t want to experience that?
I mean, you probably got a friend, somebody you care about, and you would love to see them experience God’s grace and mercy and peace. Somebody that we love, obviously we want them to experience God’s grace and mercy and peace, not in a little measure, but in abundant measure. Now put yourself in Timothy’s situation just for a minute. Can you imagine getting this letter from the Apostle Paul? You’re early into the days of your ministry there in Ephesus.
It’s been tough. It’s been challenging. So challenging that the Apostle Paul is going to write a letter to try to help you with the challenges that you’re faced with. You’re probably at this point in time thinking, I can’t do this. I’m too young for this.
I must have been crazy when I said yes to this assignment. These people need help. In fact, they aren’t the only ones that need help. I need help. I’m in trouble.
And all of a sudden Paul sends this letter in the midst of the feelings that you’re having. Getting a letter like this would have meant the world to Paul, just like all those others that Paul had written to before. He ever ended up writing this letter. In fact, although Paul ended up writing 13 letters total, 13 letters total, and we have an indication that of those letters that Paul wrote, Timothy was there for 7, for the writing of 7 of those letters. He was there evidently when 1 Thessalonians was written and 2 Thessalonians and Romans and 2 Corinthians and Philippians and Colossians and Philemon.
And now Timothy is the recipient of a letter, that Paul cares that much about Timothy that he’s going to write to Timothy as his spiritual father. He’s going to write to him because he loves him, and this letter comes, no doubt, at just the right time.
Can I just ask you, do you ever write a letter to somebody that’s a Timothy? Somebody who, you know, is in a precarious situation, to somebody that you love and care about, to somebody who would benefit from, you know, your encouragement, your love, and your counsel, to somebody who just needs a letter for somebody to know that, you know, that somebody cares. This letter is about 1,600 words, which is a 4 to 5 page essay. It’s like a long blog. You say, oh, that’s too much for me to write.
Well, then go for the short one. You know, 3 John is the shortest book in the Bible. It’s less than 300 words, so a short blog, just even a short one. You know what it would mean to somebody to get a letter from somebody who sees the circumstances that you’re in? You know what it would mean, or they’re in?
It would just mean so much. It would mean so much. You see, that’s the power of 2. That’s what mentorship is all about. That’s what discipleship is all about.
That’s what friendship is all about, isn’t it? It’s all about coming alongside in a busy world, taking the time necessary, and boosting other people up, showing them that we really care. You know, what you have here in these 2 verses at the outset of 1 Timothy are really 2 relational reminders of why we should give more time to relationships, to building significant close relationships. 2 reminders. Number one, and you ought to write these down, every Timothy needs a Paul.
That’s the first reminder. Because every Timothy needs a Paul. You say, well, who’s a Timothy? Well, in this case, Timothy is somebody that was younger than his mentor. And it was somebody who was less experienced than his mentor, and that could be you.
You would love to connect with somebody who has more experience and who is older than you, to connect to a spiritual father, to a spiritual director.
If you’re a Timothy, I’m sure you would love to connect to a Paul-like person, somebody that you can learn from. My guess is that if you had that opportunity, you would say yes to that opportunity, even if, you know, they’re like just a couple of years older than you. I think about a friend of ours, his name is Darrell, and Darrell did Bernice and my premarital counseling. I didn’t realize it at the time, he was just like 5 years older than us, but he seemed like ancient, you know, he seemed really, really old at the time. But he was just 5 years, and we’ve kept in touch with him now for 40 years, and he’s still in our life.
And when we have opportunity, we connect with him, we get his advice. On many occasions, I’ve called him up and said, this is the situation I’m faced with, what do you think? Well, here you have younger Timothy, actually much younger than the Apostle Paul. Paul probably at this point was in his mid-60s, and Timothy at this point is probably in his early 30s. 30s, his early 30s.
You say, wait a minute, his early 30s? I thought that, you know, we’ve talked about how Timothy was young. Well, he actually was. In 1 Timothy 4:12, we get this reference. We’re going to be seeing this in our study in 1 Timothy, but it says, don’t let anyone look down on you because you’re young, but set an example for the believers in speech and life and love and faith and in purity.
You know, when we think of somebody who’s young, we usually think of somebody, you know, like probably the age that Timothy was. If he came to faith in Jesus Christ on that first missionary journey, then we could kind of figure this out, that Timothy was probably 15 or 16 at the time when he came to faith in Jesus. And this letter is written 14, 15 years later. It’s written about 63 AD, which means Timothy is probably in his early 30s. And you say, well, that’s young?
Come on, really? Well, actually, Irenaeus said this, 30 is the first stage of a young man’s age and extends to 40, as all will admit. That ought to make some of you feel really good right now. You know, like, oh, man, I’m getting old. No, you’re not.
You’re still young. I mean, according to early church fathers and people like that. And so you have Timothy, and Timothy was younger than Paul. And he was less experienced. Paul had been in more prisons.
Paul had been in more board meetings. Paul had been in more rejection kind of situations. He had fasted and prayed more than Timothy. He had shed more tears. In other words, if you ever get a chance, if you’re a Timothy and you ever get a chance to learn from somebody like that, meet up with them.
Don’t let go of the opportunity. Don’t pass up the opportunity. Shortly after Ryan Ingram planted Awakening Church in San Jose, he and I met. Ryan is a great guy. I wish I had his hair, but I don’t.
Ryan comes from a devoted Christian family. His dad is a pastor too. Maybe you’ve heard of him. His name’s Chip Ingram. He’s at Venture.
Well, Ryan and I and others hung out together at this Soul Care Retreat a few years ago. It was a fabulous experience. They had a few days together, so it gave Ryan plenty of time to ask a lot of questions from the people that were there that were older than him. You say, well, why bother? I mean, come on, Ryan.
Well, he grew up knowing the value of Paul-like relationships, and he took advantage of that moment to just pepper older people with questions. Is that you? When you think about, you know, the relationships that you have with others, do you see yourself— and you don’t— this could be any age, Timothy at any age— but do you see yourself as a person who is still learning and you’re asking questions and you’re learning from others and, and yes, building friendships with others that are older than you or more experienced so that you might benefit by their wealth of information? I meet right now with a couple of 30-somethings on a regular basis. It’s something I’ve done since coming to Silicon Valley.
I love it. The guys that I’m meeting with right now, they’re really eager to learn. I mean, the reason I say that is because why else would anybody meet with me at 7:15 AM on a Monday morning? 7:15 AM, right? Are you kidding?
Most of us would be in bed at that time if we could. I see the same thing here at Bridges, though. I really do. I see this among our students who gather, some of them on Sunday evenings and sometimes at other times and other evenings, but because they’re Timothys and they’re eager to learn and they want to grow and they want to make progress in their Christian life. Every Timothy needs a Paul.
Every Timothy. And there’s a second lesson here, and that is every Paul needs a Timothy. Every Paul needs a Timothy, somebody that you can pour your life into. Now, you know, the obvious one here obviously is your kids. If you have kids, then yeah, there’s your Timothy or Timothys.
But don’t stop there. There are all kinds of other people around us who are younger than you are. And by the way, the older we get, the more younger people there are. Around us, and pouring our life into them is not only a privilege— this is such a privilege— but it’s a divine obligation. It really is.
Scripture focuses on that because we have the privilege of making an eternal impact in the lives of people. When I think about a Paul impacting a Timothy, I think of 2 gems. I think of, first of all, Jim Stump. I don’t know if you’ve read his book yet, but if you haven’t read this book, One-on-One, you really ought to pick up this book and read it. Jim, several years ago, came and spoke here, and we’ve had some fun with him over the years doing a couple interviews and other things.
But Jim, for over 40 years, was in a ministry position over at Stanford. Ministering to athletes over there. He ministered to the football team and the tennis team and the baseball team. And really, it was all about Timothys. It was all about seeking out Timothys, people that did not have faith in Jesus Christ, and sharing the gospel with them, and many of them coming to faith in Christ, and then training them in the ways of the Lord.
He did that for over 40 years at Stanford. He’s moved now. He’s back in Texas, but he’s continuing to have a Timothy-like ministry as a Paul-like person. And then I think of the other Jim who told me that I should marry Bernice. It’s like, Dave, what are you doing?
Marry Bernice? Are you kidding? You know, why are you doubting? Come on, get this together. Well, Tim— Jim, that Jim, he’s still taking the time to build relationships with younger men and pouring his life into them so that when I see Jim— and both of these guys are in their 70s, Jim Stump and My other friend Jim over here, they’re still pouring their lives in their 70s into the lives of anyone and everyone.
They’re mentoring, mentoring. And I think that’s exactly the way it should be in God’s family. In fact, this Jim over here, he even mentored his daughter’s boyfriend. Think of that. He mentored his daughter’s boyfriend before he ended up— the boyfriend ended up dating his daughter and then ultimately marrying his daughter.
Now, how’s that for taking the matter discipleship seriously, huh? Yeah, this is good. And by the way, you don’t have to be old to be a Paul. If there’s just somebody younger that you can be a Paul to, then go for it. The question is, is who can you be a Paul to?
You know, our kids grew up in a Christian elementary school, and they— one of the things that happened there was they experienced the study buddy matchup. Deal that they had at the school. The study buddy matchup was an older child, a 6th grader, was matched up with a younger child, a kindergartner. So you get the 6th grader and kindergartner and they match them up. And the reason they matched them up was for encouragement and support, mentoring and, you know, studying and those sorts of things.
And I— we thought it was such a great idea, but really, as you look back on it, those kids at an early age were learning all about the importance of a Paul-Timothy kind of relationship. And my question for us, and especially as we jump into this next year where potentially we could build some close relationships, is it— have we gotten on board with that yet? Are we on board with that, or is it just a nice idea? I know it’s a nice idea, and I’m too busy and all the rest of it, but it’s really meant to be more than just an idea, but actually a practice. Practice in the church, that our life can have an impact on other people’s life in life-changing ways.
And the impact could be similar to the impact that the Apostle Paul had on Timothy and Timothy had on the Apostle Paul. And this impact could be such that it could make you a better person, which is something that we all need. And it could lead to a greater impact In our world, just like there was a greater impact because Timothy was along with Paul when Paul ministered in cities like Athens and Berea and Corinth and Macedonia and Jerusalem and Ephesus. Timothy was right alongside in every one of those cities that Paul ministered at, and the impact was great. I made a list this week.
I encourage you to do the same. I made a list this week of the men in my world who’ve had an impact on me, who’ve had a Paul-like impact on me, and immediately I came up with a couple, and then the more I started thinking about it, the list got up to 12, 13 different men. I’m a better person today because of these men who found time in their crazy busy schedule to build a relationship with me.
Some of them, it was just for even a year or 2, or maybe just a few months, but they had a season in my life and it was so important. And I think that’s where this epistle begins. It begins with relationship. It begins with a reminder of how we need to devote ourselves to making Timothy-Paul-like relationships. And if in the year ahead we ramp up in that area, we elevate the importance of that, can you imagine what that could do?
In the relationships that we share with each other and the relational impact on the world, I think that we will be better for it, and those that we build these close relationships with, they’re going to be better for it too. So friends, whatever you do, do not in this next year let your relationships be like my relationships with Carrie Underwood and Bubba Watson.
Nonexistent. Take the time to really get to know others and let others know you, too. Let’s pray.
Lord, as we jump into what is going to be an incredible year— we already see the beginnings of that. We are thrilled that central to all of that will be relationships. First, a relationship with you, and second, a relationship with others. And to just imagine that we could have a relationship with you for anybody who’s here or anybody that in this next year we have opportunity to build a relationship with that does not have a relationship with you. Oh God, remind us all the more of the incredible privilege it is to know you intimately, not just descriptively with our knowledge and what we can talk about related to who you are, but to know you personally, up close, personal, through Jesus, through your Son, who is the ultimate friend.
A friend of sinners. And so my prayer would be that anybody who’s here today that has not yet embraced Jesus as their friend would, that they would come to see what he has done for them and receive the gift of life that’s found in Christ and begin a relationship with you today through your Son. And as a result of this relationship, for all of us, Lord, may we be transformed, and may one of those areas where we are transformed in be and the relationships that we share with each other so that we don’t— we’re not satisfied for just, huh, I know the face, I know the name. But Lord, as much as we can, we would go deeper in relationships and experience much more in such ways that it will result in much fruit in our lives and in the world around us. And so help us this next year take major steps forward in the relationships that we share.
And may the Epistle of Timothy, this letter of Timothy, give us even greater biblical desire to think like you about matters such as this, so that our minds are transformed and they are renewed. They are renewed. We think differently, and it results in personal impact in ways that transform your church and your world. For we pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen.
