Good morning, brothers and sisters.
I’d just like to read a couple of verses before I get into things. Luke 2:49—the middle of the verse. The Lord is speaking, and He says:
“Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?”
And then in Revelation 3:2. This is the Lord speaking to the church at Sardis:
“I have not found your works complete before God.”
Let’s pray.
Father, I thank You this morning that You have given us a Shepherd, the Lord Jesus Christ. He can lead us into all truth, and He can lead us into the perfection that You have planned for us. Even though, Lord, we may be lacking, He can lead us to the place where we are satisfying to You and are satisfied in what we have found in You.
Lord, we ask today that You would open Your Word to us in a way that will draw us out to You. We do not ask that there would be just wonderful things coming out of my mouth, but Lord, we are asking that You would speak to us in a way that goes deep into our hearts and our spirits and causes us to respond. Only You can do this, Lord, and we are asking that You will do this. In Jesus’ name, amen.
The verse in Luke about being about My Father’s business—I was asked, a little over a year ago, to speak at a retreat in San Diego, and the Lord gave me that very thing. He will not let me get away from it.
One reason He will not let me get away from it is that verse in Revelation: “I have not found your works complete.” I have been haunted by these things and asking, “Lord, how can I accomplish these things?”
You can look at things differently. You can look at that verse in Revelation as very negative: the Lord looking at you and scolding you, saying, “You’re not complete.” That is generally the way I take things. I am a very negative person. Matter of fact, I thrive on negativity.
You can ask the coaches I played with. I liked it when coaches were negative because it meant improving. But as I have gotten older, it is hard to take. It is hard to take when you know that you are coming up short.
If I look at this negatively, it can be very crushing, because I do not think I have that much longer to go. I am not in my twenties anymore. I am not a spring chicken. Maybe I will last till Hal Stevens lasts, unless the Lord has come back, but I am past my prime. Yet this is a word of the Lord for me: “I have not found your works complete.”
Now, I can look at it negatively, or I can take it as a word that God is desiring to do something. God is desiring to do something in my life and therefore is seeking that response from me. Instead of saying, “Lord, I’m past my prime,” I look to God and say, “All I can do is give You myself, because I can’t do anything else.”
So that is basically my testimony right now. It does not sound too great, but that is where I am at. I will just be frankly honest.
For about the last year, I have really had it on my heart to speak out of three different books: 2 Timothy, 2 Peter, and 1 John. These were the last letters written by these great apostles before they died.
The reason I wanted to look at them was this: if they knew they were going to be with the Lord, what would be the last thing they would want to tell us? What were the last things that must have been important to them? “Lord, before I go, let me give these folks something that will encourage them and keep them on track.”
In a way, this is also a transitioning time. I remember a couple of years ago in Toronto, Dana gave some ministry on transition men—how one generation is passing the torch to another. He used Joshua especially as an example.
But I cannot relate to Joshua. I just cannot relate, because Joshua was a man of war. I am a man of peace. I grew up in the sixties. Joshua was a strong guy, and no, I am not. Joshua was a man of men. My best relationship in my family was with my mother, and so, unlike Jacob, I am a smooth man.
It is hard for me to relate to Joshua, even though spiritually we can. But Timothy—I can relate to Timothy.
Timothy was called. Timothy was called of God, and I can relate with that. We have all been called into this life. We have all been called to a purpose.
Timothy was gifted. We have all been given a gift. Some do not have the same gifts as others, but we have all been given a gift. In that way, we can relate: called and gifted by God.
Timothy was a sickly, weak person. Paul tells Timothy to have a little wine for his stomach’s sake. He was sickly and weak. We can say that was in the outer man. Now, I am not sickly and weak in the outer man, but it is the inner man that counts. God does not look on the outside. I can look at my inside and say that I am sickly and weak.
Timothy was timid, and I can relate with that—just afraid, not confident, worried about how things are going to happen. It is interesting to me that Paul, in his letter to Timothy, is passing on the torch to this one who is sickly, weak, and timid.
You might think, “Paul, what is wrong with you? Has your old age gotten to you? Have you just become sentimental?” No. In 2 Timothy 1:12, the reason Paul is able to pass this on is because he says:
“I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed.”
Paul is doing something that, in natural ways, does not seem right. But in what God is doing, it is the right thing to do: passing it on.
At this writing, Timothy had been in Ephesus. Paul had given him charge there. What most people say about Ephesus is that Paul committed the greatest revelation he had to the Ephesians. Here Timothy was in a situation with people who knew these deep mysteries, and he was asked to minister to them.
Something else is interesting. If you look on a map, it is not that far from Ephesus to Laodicea. I want to use that in a spiritual way: it is not so far from Ephesus to Laodicea.
Ephesus was a place where they knew and challenged those who said they were apostles and were not. Yet, in that great knowledge they had, the love of God began to wane. When the love of God in your heart begins to wane, pretty soon you become satisfied with who you are and what you have done. Then, all of a sudden, we find the Lord on the outside, knocking to come in. It is not that far.
What kind of footing does Paul start Timothy on? We are going to read a few verses, and then I will talk. I am not going to give a verse-by-verse account of 1 Timothy or 2 Timothy, but there are some things that have struck me—things the Lord has been speaking to me.
I am not preaching at you. I am more kind of sharing what the Lord has been speaking to me.
Second Timothy begins:
“Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, according to the promise of life which is in Christ Jesus,
To Timothy, a beloved son:
Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord.
I thank God, whom I serve with a pure conscience, as my forefathers did, without ceasing.
I remember you in my prayers night and day, greatly desiring to see you, being mindful of your tears, that I may be filled with joy,
when I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you, which first dwelt in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am persuaded is in you also.”
Paul starts Timothy out by putting him on very good ground. I think that any time the Lord speaks with us—especially if it is reproving, or even calling us to repentance—He puts us on good ground first.
The first thing Paul wants to do in the last letter that he writes is to say to Timothy, “Beloved son.” You are beloved. To Paul, Timothy was beloved.
If you remember the history in Acts, Paul came to Lystra and found Timothy. Timothy was saved, and later Paul was so taken with this young man that he took him on his missionary journeys. Timothy responded well to Paul because he kept following him. He was with Paul all the time.
So much so that Paul could say in Philippians that he had no one else to send because Timothy had his heart for them. Timothy had been loved, and Timothy loved back.
The whole thing is our standing. Paul is saying to Timothy, “You are a beloved son.” Actually, I think it says “beloved child.” You are beloved.
The word beloved is the same word used by the Father when Jesus was baptized:
“This is My beloved Son.”
It is the same word used when the Father was telling Peter, James, and John how satisfied He was with His Son on the Mount of Transfiguration:
“This is My beloved Son. Hear Him.”
What does it mean to be beloved? I know these are old, quaint words, because we do not use them much anymore—except older people. I put that even past myself, although I found myself saying it once this year and was taken aback. I thought, “I can’t believe I said that.”
Beloved means to be dear. We begin letters, “Dear so-and-so.” What does dear mean? It means you are so close. You have such an affection for the one you are calling dear. It is a very affectionate term.
It does not mean that, because a person is dear, they cannot be reproved, rebuked, or called to repentance. It is because they are dear that those things can happen. Because you are dear, you may be disciplined. Because you are dear, you might be called to repentance.
We have been hearing a lot that we need to repent, but we have to understand the repentance in the heart of God when He calls us to repent. It is because He loves us so much—because we are beloved. That is what we are to respond to.
When He calls us to repent, it is not because He wants to judge us. I always think of John the Baptist calling people to repent and saying to the Pharisees:
“You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?”
That is how I tend to look at repentance. But when God calls us to repent, it is because He loves us and wants to bring us back to the place where we should be.
That is why, when the ministry of John the Baptist started, and even the ministry of our Lord Jesus, the word was, “Repent.” Let us get back, because He loves us. We have gone off the path.
The first word to Timothy is, “You’re My beloved.” That is a hard concept. When Ernie Heil was here, he talked about love and allowing God to love us. That is really a tough deal for us.
We find ourselves unlovable in the eyes of God—not in the eyes of other men. I can be very lovable to other people. I think other people even think I am lovable. But when I come before the Lord, sometimes I just say, “Lord, how can You even look at me? How can You even have me? Why don’t You just blot me off the face of the earth?”
That is me. I do not know what you are like, but sometimes I think we all feel that we are just the most miserable, and that the Lord almost has contempt for us.
But, brothers and sisters, we are beloved. Some of us have to have our minds transformed by the Word to know that we are beloved.
The priests in the Old Testament wore something on their hat, or on them, that said, “Holiness to the Lord.” I think some of us need to start wearing a little placard on ourselves that says, “Beloved of the Lord,” just as a reminder.
I remember when I was a carpenter in a job that I really hated. I did foundations, and if it rained, the trenches filled up and you could not work. If I woke up and saw that the sun was shining, I would just think, “Crud,” because I did not like it.
Sometimes I wonder how many of us wake up and the first thing we think is, “I’m still me. I’m just still me.”
We need to see that we are beloved. I am not saying we should cover up what is wrong with us. There is stuff wrong with me, and the Lord is not going to wink at it, because He loves us too much. But despite that, we need to know that we are beloved.
We need to wake up and say, “Lord, I thank You this morning. As I wake, You love me, and I can count on that through the day.” I think that will have a tremendously freeing effect on our lives.
I want to share a hymn with you. I know I like to share hymns. It is in your hymnbook, I think number 590. It was written by W. Robinson. There are a couple of words in my version that are a little different from yours, but listen to this:
Loved with everlasting love,
Led by grace that love to know;
Spirit, breathing from above,
Thou hast taught me it is so.Oh, this full and perfect peace!
Oh, this transport all divine!
In a love which cannot cease,
I am His, and He is mine.
In other words, You have taught me that You love me. This is so. This is true.
Because you know this, heaven above is softer blue. Your whole demeanor, your whole outlook on life, changes.
Earth around is sweeter green;
Something lives in every hue
Christless eyes have never seen.
Birds with gladder songs o’erflow,
Flowers with deeper beauties shine,
Since I know, as now I know,
I am His, and He is mine.
Now this is a wonderful one:
Things that once were wild alarms
Cannot now disturb my rest;
Closed in everlasting arms,
Pillowed on the loving breast.
Oh, to lie forever here,
Doubt and care and self resign,
While He whispers in my ear,
I am His, and He is mine.
Just to know—do you remember the first time that you knew that God loved you?
For some of you who were raised in a Christian family, that may be a hard thing, because it almost seems as though you have always known God loves you. It can become so familiar that it does not mean the same thing as it does to those of us who were in the world before we got saved.
Oh man, I can remember vividly the first time I really realized that God loved me. I was raised in the Catholic Church. I always saw Jesus on the cross. I knew He died for me. But to realize that His death was to bring me to Him—to bring me to the Father so that the Father could love me—I cannot tell you how wonderful that was or what light came into me at that moment.
Brothers and sisters, it is for us also to know. Paul says the first thing to Timothy: “You’re beloved.”
It is almost like Joseph, the patriarch Joseph. Remember his coat of many colors? That was a sign of Jacob’s love for him. His brothers ripped it off him, but all the time Joseph was in Egypt, when his brothers first came to him, what was the first question he asked? “How is my father?”
When he made himself known to them, the first thing he said was, “Is my father still alive?” Why did he ask that? Because he knew his father loved him.
Even the prodigal was beloved of his father. I am not saying we should go out and do what the prodigal did. I am just saying, how great is the love of God for us?
We read last time: “What can separate you from the love of God?” What is the answer? I think the only thing that can separate you is an unrepentant heart, because that way you will not accept God’s love for you. He has made provision for your sin.
The first statement to this weak brother, this timid brother, is: “You’re beloved.” You must remember that above all things. First things first: you are beloved.
Now, I have been talking about God loving us, but this is Paul speaking to Timothy. I never see Paul as a very affectionate man. I do not see him as that touchy-feely kind of guy: “Oh Timothy, come here, let me give you a hug.”
I picture him saying, “Did you memorize those verses? Incidentally, did you know that you are buried with Christ?” That is the way I see Paul. After all, did he not chase Mark away? I think he did. I think it was his harshness toward Mark that drove him away.
But even in 2 Timothy, we see that Paul softened quite a bit:
“Mark is useful to me.”
Secondly, in verse 3, Paul says, “Without ceasing, I remember you in my prayers night and day.” It is a wonderful thing to know that you are being prayed for.
Somebody called me last night and said, “I know you’re speaking tomorrow, so I want you to know we’re praying for you.” What an encouragement. What a nice encouragement.
I remember in California, when Floyd Paine first started going up to the Bay Area, he would not go up without first saying, “Brothers, I feel that the Lord is calling me up here to do this. Will you be with me? Will you pray for me?” It is a big thing to be prayed for.
It is wonderful to be prayed for by the saints, but there is Someone greater than the saints who is praying for us. Hebrews 7:25 speaks about the Lord Jesus.
We do not know how great, how big, the ministry of the Lord Jesus is. We look at Him as coming to earth, living before the Father, and offering up His life—the greatest sacrifice ever given. The Son of God offered up His life for sinners like us.
Many people look at that as being the end of His ministry. But no. He was raised from the dead and ascended on high. People think He is up there just sitting until His enemies are made His footstool—waiting for the Father to give Him an ottoman.
But no, He still ministers. Hebrews 7:25 says:
“Therefore He is able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them.”
He makes intercession for us. He prays for us. To me, that is a wonderful thing.
How does He pray for us? You ever think about how the Lord prays? The Father hears His prayer. There is one great example of His intercessory, high priestly prayer: John 17.
Beginning in John 17:9:
“I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours.
And all Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine, and I am glorified in them.
Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are.
While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled.
But now I come to You, and these things I speak in the world, that they may have My joy fulfilled in themselves.
I have given them Your word; and the world has hated them because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.
I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one.
They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world.
Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth.
As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world.
And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth.
I do not