Naylor Community
Christian Church
Naylor, Georgia
I. Introduction
-- turn in Bibles to 2 Timothy 2:11-13
2
Timothy 2:11 Here is a trustworthy saying:
If
we died with him,
we will also live with him;
12
if we endure,
we will also reign with him.
If
we disown him,
he will also disown us;
13
if we are faithless,
he remains faithful,
for he cannot disown himself.
-- the film, The Monuments Men,
tells the story about the rescue of great works of art from Nazi control in
occupied Paris -- in addition to all their other atrocities, the Nazis were
collectors of art and precious treasures -- and they would take these treasures
from the people they oppressed, collect them all in one location, and then
eventually ship them back to Germany for Hitler
-- in the movie, a woman named Claire
Simone was an art enthusiast who tried to live as normal a life as possible
under the oppressive Nazi regime -- because of her knowledge and expertise, she
was forced by the Nazis to facilitate the pillaging of the great works of art
of Paris. -- Claire did as she was commanded, but in an act of defiance, she secretly
cataloged each piece of art, how it was boxed, and its destination, and she
marked each piece with a small colored sticker so it could be identified later
-- she kept this catalog without knowing whether it would ever be useful or
just a dusty record of art—or if it would be confiscated and destroyed.
-- when news of her role in the collection
of the art from Paris became known to the U.S., James Granger went to Paris and found her,
asking her about these pieces of art and what she knows about them -- he was
happily surprised when she showed him the catalog she had kept, which would
serve as the documents the Monuments Men would use to find and save the
precious works of art before they made their way to Germany
-- but until James Granger showed up,
Claire had no idea that anyone cared about her record-keeping efforts -- for
all she knew, she was one woman in a city occupied by one of the most powerful
militaries on the planet -- She was one woman battling against the whole
Nazi-engineered system -- And for all the time before James Granger arrived,
she kept working subversively and systematically, without any assurance that
her work would ever be put to use
-- Claire’s efforts remind us of our role
here on earth today -- as Christians, we live in territory occupied by the
Enemy -- and it is tempting for us to give up hope that our work for Christ—our
small deeds of compassion and kindness, our faithfulness to our families and
jobs and churches—will come to anything
-- in the midst of persecution -- of
trials and tribulations -- of false teachers and false Christians -- it is easy
to fall into despair
-- But unlike Claire, Christians have an
assurance of hope -- Christ's resurrection guarantees our future -- Our service
to Christ may feel insignificant, and yet Claire exhibits for Christians an
inspiring example of how to live faithfully in Enemy-occupied territory
-- this is an apt description of
what Paul is trying to impress on Timothy in this second letter to him --
Timothy has found himself in a community that is being tested with trials and
tribulations both within and outside the church -- unbelievers in the community
were persecuting this small Christian church, and they were under considerable
strain -- and to add to that, the church was being infiltrated by false
teachers and false Christians -- by people who were not of Christ but who were
pretending to be Christians and who were affecting the faith of the people in
the church and causing the people in the community to view Christians
negatively because of their actions
-- so, in these verses, which are
probably part of an early Christian hymn, Paul is urging Timothy to cling to
Christ -- even in the midst of persecution and suffering -- hardship and trial --
even when faced with false Christians and false teachers inside the church -- because
Christ will not fail to deliver on His promises and commitments to His people.
-- the essence of this hymn is to stress the
outcome of one’s faith or unbelief -- to those who are saved and endure in
their faith, they can rest on the promise of eternal life and a place of honor
and authority in the Kingdom of God with Christ -- but for the unbelievers who
deny the Savior, they will have no part in the kingdom and will face
condemnation for their unbelief and rejection of Jesus
-- so, these verses are divided into
two parts -- the first two stanzas of the hymn provide reassurance to saints
who are going through suffering, trials, and tribulations -- the last two
stanzas of the hymn are warnings for unbelievers and false teachers
-- let’s look together at these
verses and see what we can learn about enduring and persisting in our Christian
lives as we continue to live in enemy-occupied areas here on earth
II. Scripture Lesson (2 Timothy 2:11-13)
--
verse 11
2
Timothy 2:11 Here is a trustworthy saying:
If
we died with him,
we will also live with him;
-- once again, we see that Paul is
passing these verses on to Timothy as a trustworthy or faithful saying --
something that we have learned through this sermon series as a foundational
truth of Christian faith -- something we need to learn and to meditate on and
to depend on as critical to our walk with Jesus today
-- don’t neglect the word of God,
especially verses and passages called out like this one, because it is life
itself -- it is a foundation for us and will be a light to our path if we will
but trust it
-- here in the first stanza of this
hymn, we find the first reassurance to the saints -- the first promise of
Christ to believers
-- Paul reminds us here that if we
died with Him -- with Christ -- that we will also live with Him -- which begs
the question, “What does it mean to “die and live with Christ?””
-- this is a picture of our
salvation and redemption through Jesus
-- as a reminder of the gospel, the
Bible tells us that we are born sinners -- that when we are born, we are
corrupted by original sin and are born in sin -- and this original sin, also
called in the Bible our sin nature, our flesh, or the old man, is the reason we
sin
-- as it is said, we are not sinners
because we sin -- we sin because we are sinners -- in other words, it is not
our actions that make us sinners -- it is who we are that causes us to sin in
our lives
-- and because of this sin nature,
we are condemned to Hell because all have sinned and fallen short of the glory
of God
-- but God sent Jesus into the world
to save the world, so that through Him -- through His atoning and
substitutionary death on the cross in our place -- the sin debt and penalty for
sin that belonged to us was paid by Jesus
-- and if we believe in Jesus -- if
we repent of our sins and ask Jesus to forgive us our sins and to give us
eternal life -- if we put our faith and trust in Him -- then our old self --
our sin nature -- is put to death and we are born again as new creations
-- in a very real sense, when Jesus
died almost 2000 years ago, we were identified with Him -- His death becomes
our death -- and when He was raised to life through the power of God, we became
alive in Him
-- that is why the Bible uses the
image of death and resurrection to describe the spiritual state of the believer
-- Colossians 3:3 -- For you died,
and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.
-- Romans 6:8 -- Now if we died with
Christ, we believe that we will also live with him.
-- and in John 14:19, Jesus said, “Before
long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me. Because I live,
you also will live.”
-- so, Paul reiterates the promise
of the gospel and salvation to Timothy here to give him hope and strength for
endurance during his trials and tribulations -- for this spiritual reality of
our death to sin and life in Christ is also a promise of what will happen after
we physically die -- for our physical death is not the end of our life, but we
will continue to live with Christ forever
-- When James Calvert went out as a
missionary to the cannibals of the Fiji Islands, the captain of the ship he was
traveling on tried to dissuade him and turn him back. -- he told Calvert, "You will lose your
life and the lives of those with you if you go among such savages” -- Calvert
replied, "[I cannot die, because] We died before we came here."
-- this promise that if we died with
Him, we will also live with Him speaks to our lives on earth, because we know
that our death through Christ has led to new life in us today
-- because of Jesus, we have died to the
power of sin in our lives -- to the power of the world -- to our flesh and our
earthly desires -- and to the powers of darkness
-- and the Holy Spirit works within
us to renew us from the inside out and to bring us to life within our mortal
bodies, as we are sanctified and become more and more like Jesus everyday
-- verse 12
2
Timothy 2:12 if we endure,
we will also reign with him.
If
we disown him,
he will also disown us;
-- as we mentioned, Timothy and the
other members of his church were facing persecution, trials, and tribulations
that were testing their faith -- times were hard, and it was easy to become
discouraged and to lose hope
-- so, Paul reminds them of the
promise from Christ that for those who endure and overcome in this world, we
will reign with Him
-- the word that is translated as
endure here calls for a continuous enduring -- and it means that we do more
than just remain and stand under pressure, but that we do so with a vibrant
hope that is found in Christ
-- true faith and true belief in
Christ always encourages endurance -- we are enabled to endure because the
Spirit enables us to do so -- we endure because the Spirit of Christ indwells
us and empowers us
-- keep in mind that endurance, in
and of itself, does not save -- but it proves our salvation because endurance
is a sure sign that a person has the Spirit within -- without the Spirit, we
would never be able to endure or overcome this world and the enemies of the
faith
-- Paul reminds Timothy of the
promise of Christ that if believe in Him -- if we endure faithfully to the end
-- we will reign with Him in eternity
-- Revelation 20:6 says that
believers will be priests of God and of Christ, and they will reign with him
for a thousand years -- and Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 6 that we would judge
angels
-- until I read C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of
Narnia and watched the movies that were made a few years ago, I didn’t really
understand how we could reign with Christ -- but I came to understand that we
reign as coregents with Christ, in the same way that Peter, Susan, Edmund, and
Lucy reigned as the kings and queens of Narnia, but did so under the ultimate
authority of the true King Aslan
-- this would have been an important
promise to Timothy -- as we have noted, the epistle of 2 Timothy was written
with a theme of enduring persecution and suffering -- throughout this book,
Paul urges Timothy to be faithful, to keep holding on to what he had been
taught, to be strong in the grace of Christ
-- this promise from Christ that
those who died in Christ will live with Him and those who endure will reign
with Him would have given the Christians in Timothy’s church hope as they stood
on the promise that Christ was with them and would help them endure and
overcome all they were going through -- and that one day, they would emerge
victorious and triumphant on the other side, and reign with Christ in eternity
forever
-- so, those were the two promises
of hope that this hymn gave to believers as they sought to live for Christ in
enemy-occupied territory
-- now, let’s turn to the last two
stanzas, which warn unbelievers and false teachers of the fate awaiting them if
they do not repent of their sins and put their trust and faith in Jesus
-- look back at the second part of
verse 12
-- depending on your translation,
this verse might say, “If we disown Him, He will also disown us” or it might
say, “If we deny Him, He will also deny us”
-- we can make the case that the
best translation of this is the word, “disown” -- disown means to “refuse to
acknowledge or accept as one’s own” -- where deny means “to declare untrue --
to assert the contrary of -- or to contradict”
-- so, to deny something is to
simply say that you don’t accept the truth as a matter of fact -- to disown
something, though, means that you have heard the truth, and you know it is
true, but you still refuse to acknowledge or accept it for yourself”
-- it reminds me of Chesterton’s
statement, “The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has
been found difficult; and left untried.”
-- there are many ways that we can
disown or deny Christ, both by word and by action -- as H.R. Reynolds wrote: “We
may take the part of His enemies, or ignore His supreme claim to our allegiance
-- we may transform Him into a myth, a fairy tale, a subjective principle, or
find a substitute in our own life for His grace -- and we may assume that He is
not the ground of our reconciliation, nor the giver of salvation, nor the sole
Head of His Church.”
-- one thing we do need to address
here -- all of us, in one way or the other, have denied Christ in our lives --
maybe not with our words, but surely with our actions as we continue to sin and
do that which Christ commanded us not to do
-- so, what does this verse mean for
us?
-- well, there are two types of
denial discussed in the Bible -- the Judas type of denial and the Petrine type
-- the denial of Peter on the night when Christ was betrayed into the hands of
the Jews -- and it’s important for us to understand the difference
-- the Judas type of denial is a
continual and permanent denial -- it is a deliberate turning away from the
truth -- it is a definite decision by a person to reject the person and the
promise of Christ and to deny Him in word and in deed
-- Peter’s denial of Jesus was
different -- it was a temporary sin -- it was a sin forced in a moment of
extreme trauma -- and Peter, the rock of the early church, gave in to his
desire to save his life above all else, and denied knowing Christ with his lips,
but in his heart, his faith was sure
-- Peter’s denial was transient and
temporary -- and it was followed by intense sorrow, guilt, and repentance --
Judas was sorry for what he did, but he did not repent of his sin and refused
to turn back to Jesus in faith
-- there may well be times in our
lives when we deny Christ with our words or our actions, even though we are
true believers and continue to live in faith and trust in Jesus -- and such
denials require repentance and prayers for forgiveness -- but this is not what
Paul is referring to in this verse
-- Paul is referring here to the
denial of an unbeliever or an apostate, someone who confessed Christ but then
turned away from the faith -- of those false Christians and false teachers who
were infiltrating the early church, including Timothy’s church
-- verse 13
2
Timothy 2:13 if we are faithless,
he remains faithful,
for he cannot disown himself.
-- faithless literally means “without
faith” -- it is a reference to a lack of saving faith in Christ
-- the Greek term translated as faithless
here is used 8 times in the NT, with most translations rendering it as unbelief
or without belief
-- this is referring to a continual state
of unbelief, not to a believer who has moments of doubt or crisis of belief --
just as we do when we deny Christ through our words or actions, there are times
when believers can have weak moments when our faith is shaky -- when life and
trials cause us to become discouraged or despair -- that doesn’t mean we are
without faith -- it just means our faith is diminished at the moment because of
the circumstances
-- but the Bible tells us that if our
faith in Jesus is as small as a mustard seed, we still believe -- the seed of
faith is present, unlike those who are faithless or without faith at all
-- Isaiah 42:3 says, "A bruised reed
he will not break, and a flickering candle he will not snuff out!" -- if
we are Christians, the Spirit of God resides within us, and He will work on our
behalf to empower us in our doubts and despairs so that our flickering flames
of faith might be kindled into a roaring fire
-- the faithless ones that are referred to
in this verse are those who are not believers -- those who have disowned Christ
and have refused to receive Him as their Lord and Savior -- they are without
faith -- without the Spirit -- and without hope because they have refused to
turn to the only source of salvation
-- there were many false believers and
false teachers in the early church who professed Christ with their lips but who
were far from Him in their hearts -- and their presence in the church caused
Timothy and the other true believers to question the promises of God
-- so this verse affirms the truth of the
promise, that our unfaithfulness does not prove God false nor negate His
promises -- God and His word remain true, regardless of whether we believe or
do not believe -- whether we have faith or do not have faith
-- it is like the old saying about
believing in faith even when we cannot see the object of our faith:
“I believe in the sun even when it is not
shining. And I believe in love, even when there's no one there. And I believe
in God, even when He is silent.”
-- this verse calls to mind Paul’s
argument in Romans 3:3-4 as he addresses the fact that the Jews failed to live
up to the law of God that they professed to esteem and uphold -- the question
he raises in these verses is, “If the Jews have refused to believe in Jesus as
the Messiah, does this mean that God’s promises are null and void?” “Does
Israel’s lack of faith undermine and nullify the faithfulness of God?” Paul’s
answer is very clear. “No!” Israel’s unbelief does not, in any way, undermine
God’s covenant promises, or His faithfulness to these promises. God will show
Himself true, even if all men prove to be liars (which they are). [Precept
Austin]
-- the reason why God remains faithful is
given to us in the end of verse 13 -- “He cannot disown (or deny) Himself”
-- Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and
forever -- He cannot deny His nature and character -- He is truth and can be
nothing but true -- He is holy and can only be holy -- this is why His promises
are always yes and amen in Christ -- because He cannot lie and change into
something He is not -- we can trust Him because He is unchanging and right in
all that He is and all that He does
-- He is completely faithful because He is
holy and right and just -- and there is nothing that will make Him any
different
-- these last two stanzas point out that
people who deny and disown the Savior will be denied by the Savior -- their
condemnation is secure -- they won’t get into heaven -- but their lack of
faithfulness doesn’t negate the truth of the promise of God
-- even though men don’t believe in Him
and actively reject Him, God will still remain faithful to Himself, and to His
promises
-- God means what He says: He will keep
His Word. His promise of glory and His pronouncement of judgment are sure. Some
people will be saved and glorified, and others will be denied and condemned.
-- we recognize this great truth in the
hymn, “Great is Thy Faithfulness,” when we sing:
Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my
Father,
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions they
fail not;
As Thou hast been Thou forever wilt be.”
III. Closing
-- One of the greatest Christian
leaders of the last century was John Stott, rector of All Souls Langham Place
in London and a peerless preacher, Bible teacher, evangelist, author, global
leader and friend to many.
-- in his notes, Os Guinness wrote that he
had known Stott for many decades, but the event that he would never forget
would be his last visit to Stott’s bedside three weeks before he died
-- Guiness wrote, “After an unforgettable
hour and more of sharing many memories over many years, I asked him how he
would like me to pray for him. Lying weakly on his back and barely able to
speak, he answered in a hoarse whisper, "Pray that I will be faithful to
Jesus until my last breath." [Source: Os Guinness, Impossible People
(IVP Books, 2016)]
-- the prayer of Stott captures the heart
of this passage and the hope that is in this early Christian hymn -- in the
face of persecution -- in the face of trials and the tribulation -- in the face
of false Christians and false teachers -- we can find hope for endurance
through the great promises of Christ -- His promise of salvation through our
death and resurrection in Him -- His promise that we will reign with Him in
eternity forever -- and the promise that He is faithful and that He and His
word can be trusted without fear
-- for those who reject Him -- for those
who deny Him and disown Him -- they will suffer the consequences of their
actions and face condemnation and hellfire -- but even for them, the promises
remain -- that if they will but repent and turn from their sins and turn to
Jesus for forgiveness and salvation, they will be saved and we be brought into
life as a new creation in Christ
-- so, with this great promise that we
find in this fourth trustworthy and faithful statement of Paul, let us close in
prayer and in worship to God
-- let us pray
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