Lecture XVI · Mission of Timothy

AT this point, with the freedom of a familiar letter, the apostle passes on to a new subject,—his intention to send to them Timothy and Epaphroditus. I shall draw your attention at present to the first part of the passage, in which he speaks of sending Timothy. Paraphrased a little, this is his statement: ‘ But, passing from these matters, I hope, relying on the kindness of the Lord Jesus—who knows that in the interests of His kingdom I have formed the desire—to send Timothy to you shortly, for your solace and help, and that I also may be cheered by hearing from him, on his return to me, of your condition. I name him, because I have no man with me like-minded with him, who will with genuine interest care for your state. For all the persons whom I might otherwise have chosen, are seeking the furtherance of their own matters, not of Christ’s. But ye know the proof of trustworthy character which he has given, in that, as a son serves his father, he has served with me for the advancement of the gospel. Him therefore I hope to send, immediately on my seeing how my own affairs are to stand, as regards the issue of my trial. But I trust in the Lord that I also myself shall come shortly.’

You will observe that, in the zoth verse, where our version has ‘I have no man like-minded, who will naturally care for your state,’ I have, in this paraphrase, for ‘ naturally’ substituted ‘with genuine interest.’ Such is the exact force of the original word,—‘ genuinely,’ as opposed to ‘spuriously,’ to everything like pretence and duplicity. By ‘naturally’ our translators, I think, meant ‘ with the affection which beseems the new nature, the spirit becoming those who are brethren in Christ.’

The apostle, in this passage, as you see, exhibits to us two sharply-contrasted types of Christian profession. We have, first, unspiritual professors: ‘all seek their own, not the things which are Jesus Christ’s’ In making this statement, the apostle has not before his mind the Christian church in Rome generally, nor even its more prominent members or ministers. Such a supposition is disproved by his mode of speaking regarding these brethren elsewhere in the Epistle, particularly by what he says in the 14th and 17th verses of the 1st chapter, ‘Many of the brethren in the Lord, waxing confident by my bonds, are much more bold to speak the word without fear,’ and this ‘ of love, knowing that I am set for the defence of the gospel.’ Looking at the connection in which the statement _ before us stands, its reference must be simply to those of the professing Christians within Paul’s reach at the time, of whom he might naturally have thought as suitable messengers to the church of Philippi,—that is to say, probably, the men, in all _ likelihood few in number, who had personal acquaintance with that church, and at the same time had aptness to teach and comfort and advise. Whether among those at this time in his thoughts were any whose names are known to us, from the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistles, as having been more or less closely associated with him in travel and preaching, we have no means whatever of determining. ΟΥ̓

these the apostle declares that ‘a// seek their own, not the things which are Jesus Christ’s’ Taken rigidly, in fulness of

meaning, these words describe unregenerate persons, enemies of God. Indeed, no language could with more exactness exhibit the grand contrast of character between men of the world and believers, than these, that the one class ‘seek their own (things or interests),’ the other ‘those of Jesus Christ.’ I think it, however, exceedingly unlikely, all things considered, that, in the case before us,—or even in the somewhat similar but yet stronger statement made in another Epistle regarding Demas, ‘ Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world’ (2 Tim. iv. 10),—Paul meant his words to be taken as intimating a definite judgment that the character of the persons spoken of was fundamentally worldly, and thus that they had. utterly apostatized in heart from Christ. ‘Whosoever is born of God,’ says the Apostle John, ‘cannot sin, because he is born of God,’—that is, from the very nature of the new life the will is turned toward holiness, so that fully conscious and deliberate violation of the law of God is impossible. But with this fact is quite compatible the same apostle’s other statement, ‘If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us ;’ the ground of the compatibility being expressly set forth by Paul, ‘If I do that Z would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me.’ As in a river, whilst the current is carrying the great body of the water on to the sea, yet a strong wind may arrest the progress of the water on the surface, or even to some extent reverse its direction ; so, while the current of a true Christian’s character is toward conformity to the divine will, yet the strong blasts of temptation can influence it not a little. The deplorable strength of tendency to self-deception which remains even in a Christian heart, often leads it to tolerate or even love what, when shown to it in true colours by the Divine Spirit, it shrinks from with utter abhorrence. And the sinful state of feeling may continue for a long time. David was for many months hardened in gross sin, in the matter of Uriah ; and even amid the brighter light, and more abundant spiritual influences, of Christianity the same

may be,—long seasons of torpor or backsliding, particularly through the subtle power of those insidious sins which somewhat resemble virtues, and take their name—such as faithless cowardice, calling itself wholesome discretion; or avarice, under the name of prudence. Our apostle, then, I apprehend, in the statement before us, simply mentions as a fact that, at the time he wrote, the professing Christians to whom he refers were so obviously under the power of worldliness in some form—probably enough the comparatively refined form of the desire of self-display as religious teachers in the metropolis of the world—as to make it unlikely that they would be willing to go to Philippi on a Christian mission, or that, if they undertook it, they would throw themselves into their work heartily and effectively. This is all he says. Whether this character was with them superficial and temporary, or pervasive and permanent, he was not called on to decide.

I suppose that, however often we have read this Epistle, yet most of us never come to this statement without a feeling of wonderment crossing our minds. That any professing Christians of the first age should be described as grievously unspiritual, and particularly persons so prominent in the church that the apostle could think of them as in some respects fitted to be his representatives to the church at Philippi,—this strikes us as something altogether unnatural. Our astonishment springs from a misconception regarding the character of the primitive church, which to some extent has hold of us all, through a vague impression that the exquisite outflow of Christian love at Jerusalem, of which the earlier chapters of Acts tell us, lasted all through the first ages, and had its counterpart in every congregation. A study of the Epistles is fitted to give us a different idea; convincing us that, almost from the very outset, Satanic subtlety, and human depravity and weakness, began to mar what divine grace had made so beautiful. The same evil influences wrought in the primitive church which work in the church still Alas, brethren, it would not surprise

us greatly to hear Paul, if he were to revisit the earth in our time, say of a large number of the present race of church members, and of a considerable proportion, at least, of those who bear office, ‘They seek their own, not the things which are Jesus Christ’s.’ In the wide-spread and manifold evidence, even, it may be, in the very management of the affairs of the church of Christ, of self-seeking, leading to jealousies and envies, paltrinesses and wickednesses,—in the seemingly exclusive, or all but exclusive, devotion of so many who have named the name of Christ to money-making or mere worldly pleasure,—in the frequent indisposition among church-goers to give liberally, or even at all, of their money, or their time, or their thoughts and labour, to Christian work, so that our foreign missions, and at home our Bible societies, Sabbath schools, town missions, and other religious agencies, are imperfectly supported, and fall far short of doing the good they might do,—we see, I fear, too plain reason to think it likely the apostle would speak so, to be much surprised. It would not surprise us greatly to find him, in a letter sent to warn ἃ modern congregation of his intention to visit them, saying, ‘I fear lest, when I come, I shall not find you such as I would ; lest there be debates, envyings, wraths, strifes, backbitings, whisperings, swellings, tumults ; and that I shall bewail many which have sinned already, and have not repented of the uncleanness, and fornication, and lasciviousness, which they have committed.’ Now, seeing that this language is actually employed by the apostle with reference to professing Christians in his own day,! you see that the moral and spiritual tone of the primitive church, taken generally, was, perhaps, not greatly different from that of the church as it exists among ourselves.” Might it not reasonably excite surprise, think you,—ought we not to be most deeply abased,—that this is all we can say, with any show of truth? The inheritors of the religious teaching and holy examples of eighteen centuries of Chris- 1

2 Cor. xii, 20, 21.

-tianity—eighteen centuries of the dispensation of the Holy Spirit ; living in a land where Christianity is the religion universally professed, and where its influence has largely purified 7 and elevated the general tone and habits of even worldly ᾿ society ;—should we not be profoundly humbled that all which can be asserted of the professing church of Christ,—of any average congregation, for example, like our own,—is that probably it is not greatly worse, morally and spiritually, than the church of Rome or of Corinth, whose members had the sensual seductions of heathenism all around them, and had their religious steadiness and purity opposed by every influence of general society, and in many cases, no doubt, by the influence of nearest kinsfolk? Ah, Christian brethren, when we think of our religious light and privileges, and, above all, when we consider the sublime self-sacrifice for us, through which we have been redeemed,—to us well belong shame and confusion of face, because of so many of us the apostle’s words may be spoken—alas! because of a// of us, to some extent, it may be truly said, that ‘ we seek our own, not the things which are Jesus Christ’s.’

How partial among us, through this prevalence of unspirituality, is the enjoyment of Christian peace! How lamentably rare is that influence of consistent holy example, which should be the church’s most powerful evangelistic instrument! To how deplorable an extent are Christians withheld from active exertion in the service of Him whom they call Lord, or enfeebled in such work if they undertake it! To this last point, you observe, the apostle specially adverts, stating that, through want of spirituality, the persons of whom he is speaking could not, ‘with genuine or natural interest,’ care for the Philippians. True and warm piety is the cardinal qualification for religious work. It is a great power, even standing alone; : and where this is wanting, the very finest combination of other ¢ qualifications is, after all, but a beautiful body without a soul. Personal religion, true healthy spiritual life, is the only prin-

ciple of true healthy religious activity. A non-religious worker in any department of religious labour,—a person taking part in any of the agencies‘of that church which the Lord purchased with His own blood, who himself has no saving knowledge of this Lord,—this is a monstrosity, a thing awfully unnatural in God’s universe. And yet, alas, my brethren, in this world, which man’s sin has in many things made an unnatural world, it is to be feared that there are not a few such monstrous things ; and that, in that day when the secrets of all hearts come to be revealed, many who have long, and to the eye of men respectably, held office in the Christian church, and in various ways taken part in Christian work, will be found castaways.

With these unspiritual professing Christians the apostle in the passage before us contrasts the character of Timothy. This eminent evangelist was a native of Lycaonia, in the centre of Asia Minor. Faithfully and lovingly taught by his mother, a pious Jewess, to long and look for the Messiah promised to the fathers, he was led, on Paul’s first visit to those regions, to recognise in Jesus of Nazareth the great Deliverer, and to give Him his heart. On the apostle’s second visit, four or five years afterwards, finding Timothy highly commended by the Christians of the district, he took him as his companion, to give such aid in missionary work as a very young man could, and to be trained for full efficiency as a preacher of the cross. From that time onward we find him in constant connection with the apostle, either as his companion, or as carrying on some separate ministerial work which Paul had entrusted to him. Of his character, as seen so closely and under very testing circumstances during many years, the apostle gives his judgment in the passage before us; and calls on the Philippians to attest the accuracy of that judgment from their own knowledge, for Timothy had been among Paul’s companions on his first visit to Philippi, and had perhaps been there several times afterwards : ‘ Ye know the proof of him, that, as a son with the

father, he hath served with me in the gospel? This mutual affection and esteem continued unbroken. The very last words of the great apostle which have come down to us, are those written to Timothy from his prison at Rome, when martyrdom was very near,—in which he calls him his ‘ dearly beloved son,’ and entreats him to ‘do his diligence to come unto him shortly.’

The praise given to Timothy in the present passage is very high. His work and his dangers had been similar to those of Paul himself; and his persistent stedfastness from the beginning, in encountering them, proves faith to have very quickly become mature in the young disciple. Another young man, you remember, who had previously been associated with Paul in the same way, John Mark, cousin! of Barnabas, and probably the Mark who wrote the second Gospel, left the apostle and Barnabas in Pamphylia, and ‘went not with them to the work’ (Acts xv. 38). He, like Timothy, was a man of true piety; yet the energy of his young faith yielded for a time under the pressure of the fear of toil and peril. But Timothy was enabled to stand firm. The relations, too, which, in the carrying on of his Christian work, he bore to the apostle, whilst in the most important respects they were fitted to be a great support and stimulus to him, yet in others added, or at least by many a man would have been felt to add, to the difficulty of his position. Where two or more men are called to labour together in arduous and delicate work, all of them having a deep sense of personal. responsibility, difficulties of necessity constantly arise, which an isolated worker does not encounter. And in a kind of work, such as any of the forms of ‘labour in the gospel,’ in which success depends largely on the existence of ’

The original word in Col. iv. 10, rendered in our version ‘sister’s ‘son,’ really means, beyond doubt, ‘cousin.? Some scholars think there is reason to believe that, in the older English, the expression ‘sister’s son’ was occasionally used in the sense of ‘ cousin,’ like the similar word “ Geschwisterkind’ in German.

affection and confidence between the labourers and those whom they desire to influence for Christ, it is obvious that singular watchfulness, self-restraint, largeness of spirit, delicacy of feeling, are needed in men working conjointly. Hence the proverbial rarity of thoroughly comfortable colleagueships in the ministry. In the case of Paul and Timothy, however, the difficulties were, so far as appears, completely overcome ; and this was due to admirable qualities in both. The grand simplicity and unselfishness, the mellow Christian wisdom, the — exquisite patience and gentleness, of the apostle, fitted most pleasantly in with a charming meekness, and humility, and unselfishness, and affectionateness, in his young friend; so that the relation they bore to each other was one greatly and, no doubt, growingly helpful to both. The apostle saw with delight the maturing grace of his beloved companion ; and Timothy’s heart was ever full of thankfulness to God for giving him such a friend. How full and satisfying the testimony of the apostle is,—how gladdening, as the evidence that amid all his sufferings and sorrows—some of the bitterest of them, as we have already © seen, from unspiritual and disappointing associates—this affection between him and Timothy remained so firm, and was so sweet to him! ‘As a son with the father, he says,—or yet more beautifully, according to the exact meaning of the original, ‘as a son serves his father,’—‘ so he with me has served unto the furtherance of the gospel, —the first clause bringing out, by the comparison, the relation between Paul and Timothy; the second, instead of precisely finishing the comparison, passing off, with much elegance and delicacy, to exhibit their common relation to God, as an elder and a younger participant in that glorious service which is perfect freedom. With all becoming filial love, and trust, and veneration for his spiritual father the apostle, —thus Timothy, journeying on through life by Paul’s side, together with him served God.

The character of Timothy is certainly a very beautiful one, —one which all the right-minded among us cannot but most

=< “~ v ἣ Υ̓͂ vERS. 19-24.] Mission of Timothy. 209 earnestly desire to see mirrored in ourselves, and all who are dear to us. Now we are told expressly regarding him, more fully, I think, than with reference to any other New Testament saint, what was the mode of early training through which, by the blessing of God, he became the man we find him. To this, for a little, I will turn your thoughts, as the most fitting and profitable practical close to our meditations on the present paragraph. In Paul’s Second Epistle to Timothy, he mentions that ‘the unfeigned faith which was in him, had dwelt first in his grandmother Lois and his mother Eunice,’ and that ‘from a child he had known the Holy Scriptures.’ It is plain, then, you see, that, for the production of this character on which we have been looking with such admiration, God had blessed parental teaching and influence, and particularly parental training in the Bible. The duty of prayerful, thoughtful, hopeful religious education of children is therefore, I think, that which a study of the life and character of Timothy is most fitted to commend to the consideration of Christian parents.

Of all societies known among men, a family is that which has the strongest, tenderest, and most sacred bonds. Its ties are those by which God, herein displaying the unsearchable riches of His love in Christ, binds believers to Himself; for He is our Father, and all we are brethren. In no other relation among men does nature excite so warm an affection for those with whom we are associated, and so deep an interest in their welfare ; in none, therefore, does grace originate so ardent a desire that their souls may ‘prosper and be in health.’ If, then, men and women who are not specially bound together by any earthly ties, feel themselves impelled by their common needs, their common longings, their common mercies, to constitute such a church as meets in the house of public worship; surely natural affection, purified and ennobled by the influences of grace, should constitute every professing Christian family—the very infants of which, remember, are by baptism members of the great visible O

community of saints—a ‘church in the house,’ for instruction and discipline and common worship.

The position that in a household there should be religious teaching, seems to me one so self-evident, as not at all to call for proof. Truth, understood and believed, being the instrument of conversion,—and growth in clearness and breadth of view, and in liveliness of faith, being the means of growth in likeness to God,—advancement in religious knowledge is one of the principal objects in our association as a church, and our exercises in the sanctuary; and the case is precisely similar with the ‘church in the house.’ There must be teaching, and this obviously by the parents. To take children regularly to church, and to give them opportunities of religious instruction at day schools, Sabbath schools, and Bible classes, is well ; but parents who think on the matter, must feel convinced that, while these are most valuable auxiliaries, yet not one of them, nor all of them combined, can be a satisfactory substitute for their teaching. To them God in His providence has said, ‘Take this child and nurse it for Me, and I will give you your wages ;’ and specially from them at the last will be demanded an account of this stewardship. They cannot strip themselves of this-responsibility. No wise parent, therefore, will think that αἰ the teaching of his children can or should be handed over to others,—the more especially as he knows that the bond which nature has knit between parents and. children, and all the holy and beautiful affections which hover round it, give to parental instruction a force that.cannot be possessed by any other.

If parents are to discharge this duty of teaching, they must themselves, according to their opportunities, be students of the truth to be taught. A religious teacher, whether in a wide or narrow sphere, will certainly fail to build up those whom he professes to instruct, in that Christian wisdom from which holiness and comfort spring, unless he be himself a faithful student. Only conscientious learners can be successful teachers. _We never know how much we need to know,—

how little we know clearly and exactly,—how much that we thought we knew well, was laid hold of by the mind but loosely and vaguely,—till we are called upon to teach others. One good reason, I am afraid, my brethren, why teaching by parents is far from being so common as it should be, is that many professing Christian parents, when they attempt it, find themselves culpably ignorant of divine truth—more ignorant than their pride of heart permits them to acknowledge even to themselves ; and one grand advantage which would accrue from a general, persistent, and faithful discharge of the duty of parental instruction, would be the manifest advance of the elder people themselves in the knowledge of the Word of life.

That teaching may be successful, it must be painstaking and thorough ; not contenting itself with a mere parrot repetition of words, but resting not till every step taken be understood, so far as the various ages and capacities of the members of the family admit. It must be kindly and earnest, too; not seeming to be a burden or a mere duty to the teacher, or so conducted as to be a burden and a weariness to the taught, but welcomed by both as a privilege. ‘The real desire of the parents must be, and must be felt to be, to win to Christ the souls which nature has made the most dear to them. - Ah, brethren, can worse be said of unspirituality, than that it brings men into the position of ‘not naturally caring for’ the souls even of their own children? Above all, such teaching, to be successful, must be conducted in the spirit of prayer,—under a deep sense of the insufficiency of all human instrumentalities, left to themselves, and with earnest wrestlings for the gracious influences of the Spirit. Where special prayer, however brief, with the family, for a blessing on the instruction, forms a part of the service, the force of the teaching will be intensified many-fold.

Besides such teaching of the household collectively, a wise parent will, at suitable seasons, take the members of the family

apart, and deal with them individually, plainly, earnestly, and affectionately, regarding their spiritual position and prospects. Such private appeals may be ‘as nails fastened in a sure place,’ whereby all the truth taught is secured by God to the soul for evermore as a saving power.

In the teaching of their children, a Christian father aif mother will lovingly and judiciously co-operate. But let me specially remind believing mothers—the Eunices of my audience—that, while their children are at the most susceptible age, the mother’s influence and opportunities are commonly both particularly great. Innumerable Christians, many of them eminent in the service of their Master, have traced their conversion to the teaching and prayers of a mother. ‘To mention but one recent instance,—the biographer of the illustrious General Havelock says: ‘ His religious impressions were traceable to the influence and the efforts of his mother, when he was a little boy. It was her custom to assemble her children for reading the Scriptures and prayer in her ownroom. Henry was always of the party whenever he was at home from school ; and in course of time he was expected to take the reading, which he generally did. It impressed him; and, under these pleasant circumstances, he knew, like Timothy, the Holy Scriptures from a child.’ May God multiply such mothers!