Let's open our Bibles together please to 1 Timothy chapter 4. We must never miscalculate the cleverness of our spiritual foe, the devil, nor his tenacity in his attempts to sidetrack us from serving God. Always the devil is seeking to cause the church to compromise the message. In chapter 1, Paul instructs Timothy that a church to be an authentic church must stay on track with its message. Always our enemy is seeking to get us to forsake our God-given priorities.
In chapter 2, the Apostle Paul tells Pastor Timothy, here are the priorities of ministry. Be sure you include them in the order of your church. Always the devil is seeking to get us to diminish the role of leadership in the church. In chapter 3, the Apostle Paul writes to Timothy and says, here are the qualifications for leaders. Here's what leaders are to do. And by the way, don't forget the important central role the church has in the plan of God.
As we come to chapter 4, we see the Satan seeks to infiltrate the church with false teaching, false ideas. And we've been learning about the importance of guarding against this attack. Especially in the later times, says the Holy Spirit, an apostasy or a falling away will take place. As professing Christians, pay attention to deceitful spirits spewing out their false ideas. While true believers will not apostatize, we are nonetheless warned of the danger of false teaching.
Last week we learned that we can build walls of defense to protect ourselves against false ideas. The walls of defense are to nourish ourselves with a healthy spiritual diet, to commit ourselves to regular spiritual discipline, and thirdly, to involve ourselves in rigorous spiritual duty. If we do those three things, we will have three walls built in our lives to protect us from false thinking. But there is yet another line of defense to protect a church from false teaching and false teachers.
That line of defense is its leadership, whose qualifications and roles have already been discussed by Paul. And now these people, like Timothy, the pastor at Ephesus, are given to understand the crucial role in the church's defense and safety. In the text we are looking at today, there are ten commands given by Paul to this pastor. These ten commands are all given in a continuous, ongoing, progressive sense. In other words, you never get to the place that you've finally done this one.
He says, always as an ongoing practice of life, do these ten things. You may want to underline the verbs as we read through the text beginning in 1 Timothy 4.11. Prescribe and teach these things. Let no one look down on your youthfulness, but rather in your speech, conduct, love, faith, and purity, show yourself an example of those who believe. Until I come, give attention to the public reading of the scripture, to exhortation and teaching.
Do not neglect the spiritual gift within you, which was bestowed upon you through prophetic utterance with the laying on of hands by the presbytery. Take pains with these things. Be absorbed in them so that your progress may be evident to all. Pay close attention to yourself and your teaching. Persevere in these things. Now notice the last sentence, for as you do this, you will ensure salvation both for yourself and for those who hear you.
Whenever you see the word salvation or the verb save, you always need to look at the context to see what kind of salvation is involved here. In this particular text, I don't believe he is talking primarily about our eternal salvation that we receive by trusting the Lord Jesus Christ, which is kept for us, and we are kept for it. But he is talking about being saved from what he is warning us about in this chapter, false teaching.
He says if leaders will do these things, then you, he says to Timothy, and those who hear you, the church, will be kept saved. That is, saved from false teaching. Now notice the ten verbs. Describe, teach, let no one look down, show yourself, give attention, do not neglect, take pains, be absorbed, pay close attention, persevere. Pithy, short, right to the point, in your face kind of commands.
We are not going to look at all ten of them separately, but we are going to summarize them in four directives. Four statements of responsibility, four directives given to church leaders. My point this morning is that a church will be saved from the persistent peril of false teaching if its leaders follow God's directions.
Now by way of application, we can say so will a small church, so will a Sunday school class, so will a cell group, so will that parachurch ministry, so will that Christian school that you are involved in, so will the home schooling situation. If leaders will pay attention to what Paul says here, the leaders themselves and those in their charge, be it two people or two thousand people, will be kept from the error of false teaching.
Directive number one is found in verses 11 and 13 and in the verbs connected with this. I'm summarizing it this way. Paul says to Timothy, carry out your public ministry. In other words, do for that group following you what you've been called to do. You're a leader and it's important that as a leader you do what you're supposed to do because that means the growth of the body. Timothy's work, like the work of all elders, was primarily to convey God's message to his people.
In doing this, he is commanded by Paul to prescribe these things. Sounds almost medical, doesn't it? Prescribe these things. It really means to charge these things to them, command them, order them. Paul is here implying that Timothy has the authority to do that. Timothy's authority as a pastor was not exactly the same authority that Paul had as an apostle. Pastoral authority and apostolic authority are two different kinds of authority.
But notice that there is authority here that is given to Timothy to command the people of God regarding these things. We're in a day when authority is undermined overtly and covertly. It's a tough day to be in leadership, be it in the church or be it in the world. I think of those who are trying to lead us governmentally, either through appointed offices or elected offices, and the tough job they have of trying to lead people in a day when people don't want to be led.
They don't want to be told what to do. You see there is authority given to those who are in leadership. God gives authority to leaders. Timothy is told here, you are to command, you are to order the people of God about these things. Then he is to teach. Twice this verb is used. To teach means to lay out truth in an orderly fashion so that others can grasp it. Someone who has the gift of teaching is able to do that.
They are able to explain the truth in such a way that other people are able to understand, oh, that's what that means. And not only that, they assimilate it into themselves so that they experience life change. You see teaching is more than dumping truth on people. It's more than giving people an outline. Teaching means to communicate truth persuasively so that people are led to change their lives as a result of the teaching. That's what Timothy is to do. That's his public ministry.
That's what many of us are doing in leadership roles. And in fact, in a sense, all of us are in leadership roles because there's somebody following us that we can teach and should teach. And then he talks to Timothy about the public reading of the Scriptures and the importance of that. We do that every Sunday, at least before the message. I'm not so sure that there shouldn't be other planned times in our services when we do nothing but just read the Word of God.
Now remember the context of that day. They did not have their own personal copies of the Scripture. And so the public reading was all that they had. So they were to read it every week. But we also are to read the Scripture, though our context is different. I think there's benefit in hearing the Word of God read in a congregational setting. And then the word exhortation is used in verse 13. The word here is to admonish somebody.
The verb means to call someone alongside of you to give them encouragement. It's the picture of the coach again who calls the player out of the game over to his side. He tells him what he wants him to do and then he pats him and sends him back into the game. That is the role also of a leader. Here we derive the concept of counseling. The word is not here, but that's what biblical spiritual counseling is.
It means that someone comes aside, you help them understand what God says regarding that problem and you send them back into the game. So Paul says to Timothy, look the best thing you can do to guard the church against false teaching is to do your job. That's the best thing every one of us can do in the sense of teaching those in our charge what God has to say. And as we teach them the truth they become alert then when error approaches.
There's no greater protection against false ideas than the teaching of true ideas. There's a second command that I believe Paul gives to Timothy. It's found in verse 12 and though there are two verbs here I'm summarizing it in this one statement or directive. He says to Timothy, cast your life a respected pattern. All of us are casting out from our lives a pattern to other people. And what he says to Timothy is cast your life a respected pattern.
Don't let people look down upon you he says because of your youthfulness. Now Timothy was a man of 40 years of age. If that's any consolation to those of you who think you're old at 40 so be it. But he says to Timothy, don't let other people despise your youth but cast your life as an example of what believers are like. And he gives five specific areas. First he says in speech. All of us surely understand the importance of words. Even Napoleon Bonaparte saw that.
He says it is astonishing what power words have over man. Words have tremendous power because words mean something. Words communicate ideas. You look at films as some of us have in the last few days in this anniversary of Auschwitz. You look at films of the Nazi multitudes and Hitler speaking to them and you see the trance that is there. I believe there was spiritual power being exploited there. That it was demonic what was taking place.
But words with his oratory, his words, he changed the course of a nation and led the world to the very brink of terrible, terrible disaster. We are to be an example in the good sense of words. Words can bless, words can curse. And so we are to use our mouths for good. James says that the tongue is small but it's powerful. He compares it to a bit that turns a horse, a rudder that turns a ship, a spark that kindles a fire.
So as we think about leading others, be it our children, be it a small Bible study, be it a church, we are to remember that we are to be an example of what a believer is like with our words, our speech. And then he talks about conduct or lifestyle. In the past our lifestyle was patterned after the world. We walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, writes Paul to this same church, Ephesians 2 verse 2.
But now believers have been rescued from that old pattern and we are to have a new pattern. And this pastor is told pattern your life in a respectable way so that other people will understand what a lifestyle as a Christian ought to be about. What about the people watching us in our place of work? What about our children looking at our lives, evaluating what we do and what we say and trying to put them together? We also need to cast our lives a respected pattern in lifestyle and conduct.
And then he uses the word love. Here's the word agape and what he's saying is that leaders are to show genuine concern for the welfare of their followers, including those who don't even deserve it. We're to show God's kind of love and cast our lives with a pattern of love that people may understand that that's what a believer in God does. Dwight L. Moody wanted to start a Sunday school for street urchins in Chicago in the 1850s.
But he was not allowed to start a Sunday school class in any of the organized churches. They looked at him and saw who he wanted to bring to church and they said forget it. And so he went out onto the streets and got boys and girls together and rented a room and began a Sunday school class. Eventually hundreds of street children in Chicago in the 1860s came to Moody's Sunday school. He became so famous that Abraham Lincoln visited the Sunday school on one occasion.
One little boy was asked, why do you go to Moody's Sunday school when there's a church right here? And the little boy just simply said, because they love a fellow over there. I would hope that people sense the love of God in our hearts as we lead them. And then the area of faith. He says we're to cast our lives in a respected pattern of faith, both in the sense of believing God and of being faithful to God. Someone has said a church will rise no higher than its leaders. It's true of every group.
And so whatever role of leadership we have, we must cast our lives in a respected pattern of faith so that those following us will understand what it means to trust God, what it means to be faithful to God. William Carey did so. His great missionary work in India, that part of the world. One of his statements was, attempt great things for God and expect great things from God. He not only made that statement, he lived it. He lived it and cast his life a pattern of faith.
And finally he talks about the area of purity. Purity of mind, purity of motive, purity of message. Keeping our hands and our hearts clean in a very dirty world. And in so doing, casting an example of what believers are like, a pattern of purity. Leaders casting their lives into such a pattern will inevitably influence others and will help protect those following them from false thinking and false living.
What great protection for a church, for a Sunday school class, for a Bible study group, for a ministry, and having leaders that set an example. Number three he says to Timothy, verse 14, cultivate your personal gift. Timothy had a charisma from God. That's the word here for gift. In one sense all of us are charismatics. It comes from this word charisma. A charisma refers to that blend, that custom designed blend of spirit endowed abilities that God gives to us.
He knows who we are, he knows our background, he knows our purpose in the world, and therefore he gives to each believer a gift, a charisma, a grace gift. We don't choose it, we don't ask for it, he gives us charisma to us. And Paul tells Timothy now do not neglect that gift. The implication being that he was what? Neglecting the gift. Are you neglecting your gift? Elsewhere Paul says to Timothy stir up the gift of God that is in you.
He's talking about developing, cultivating the gift that God has given us to serve him. What is your gift? What he is telling us here is that as leaders grow, as leaders stay on the cutting edge there is a protection for those who follow them. But when leaders become complacent, become content, when the fire goes out then the followers are left vulnerable to false thinking.
General William Booth gathered some of his soldiers together in the organization he started, the Salvation Army, and he said to them, young men, take heed to the fire in your own hearts, for it has a tendency to go out. Is the fire burning brightly inside of you? Is there a fire of intensity and fervency about serving God and developing and growing as a person and that gift inside of you that God has given you to be cultivated? Are you making the most of it?
If you are, then you are a defense to your children. You are protecting them from false ideas. You are a defense to that Sunday school class or the people in that small church. You are a defense to that cell group. If you as a leader are cultivating your own giftedness and growing, stretching. Fourthly, verses 15 and 16, he says to Timothy, concentrate on your primary priorities. Trying to figure out priorities is always a challenge, isn't it? What is most important to do?
I believe that he lays out before us here four critical priorities for every leader. I don't care what role you may have, be it a parent, a husband, a wife, a pastor, an elder, a deacon, a Sunday school teacher, a small group leader, four critical priorities. Concentrate on these. The first one is in verse 15 when he says, take pains with these things, be absorbed in them. If there is anything un-American, it is taking pains with something. We do everything we can to avoid pain.
We will take pills and shots. We will do anything we can to avoid pain. He says here that in a spiritual sense, we are not even to be afraid of pain. We are to give it our very best. What? Our calling. That's what he's talking to Timothy about. When he says, take pains with these things, be absorbed in them, he's talking about his calling. What he's supposed to do.
One priority that you have is to be the very best leader you can be in your home, your small group, your church, your ministry, where God has placed you. Priority number one that he points to is our calling. He says, be absorbed in it. Take pains with it. Make progress so that others can see that progress. In verse 16 he gives a second priority. He says, pay close attention to yourself. Here he talks about character. The second priority for a leader is character.
Our reputation is of course what people think we are. Our character is what God knows we are. Too often we pay attention to the reputation and forget the character because it's not so easily seen. But character is critical for a leader. One may have the ability to take his cause or his movement to the top, but it's his character that will keep it there on the cutting edge. Ability and character are not the same thing. To be a leader you have to have both.
He says here that we are to pay close attention to our character. People may doubt what you say, but they will always believe what you do. What you do reveals your character. Third, he says, pay close attention to your teaching. The third priority is creed. What do you believe? What do you stand for? Do you know? If you don't, you are leaving not only yourself vulnerable, you are leaving your followers vulnerable to false teaching.
He says pay close attention to your teaching, to what you say you believe and what you teach other people, your creed. Be sure the content of it passes the word of God. Some of us depend upon other people to teach our followers what they ought to believe. We depend upon the youth pastor to teach our children what they ought to believe. We depend on the Sunday school teacher to tell our children what they ought to believe. We parents, we are the leaders of our homes.
God says pay attention to your creed. That's true in absolutely every area where we are leaders. Pay attention to what you believe. Your followers will be affected by it. And finally he says persevere in these things. The word means abide, remain, hang on to these things. Abide in them. He's talking here, think about conduct again. He's saying let these things that you are professing, let them be the thing that guide your life.
One of the most amazing machines in all the world to me is a 747 jet. I could stand all day at airports and watch 747s take off or land. Those magnificent machines as they lift off the ground look like they're just floating like a balloon because of the immensity of their size and coming in for landing. I'll never forget the first time I rode on one. It's been over 20 years ago now. We were coming back from Europe, flying from Germany to Kennedy Airport.
And as we approached Kennedy, began our descent, we entered into heavy clouds, couldn't see a thing beyond the tip of the wing. And we got lower and lower and lower, still couldn't see anything out the windows. And finally we broke through the clouds and I don't think it was more than a second or two from the time we came through this low layer of clouds until the wheels touched on the runway and we were there. And they didn't touch like that, they touched like that.
Just like a feather coming in. I was absolutely amazed. How can they do that? Well of course we know they have computers on board that give navigation directions to the airplane. There's a radio signal this plane is following in. They can't see anything out there, the pilots are blind up in the front, but they're following their instruments, which are following a radio signal coming out from that airport. So they can actually land that plane blind. They don't have to see the runway at all.
They can bring the plane in because of the navigational computers on board. I believe that's what he's saying here about our conduct. We are to remain on the signal. We're not to deviate in our flight pattern. We're to persevere in these things. We're to stay on the signal so that we will arrive safely at the destination. Persevere, he says in these things. How do these directions apply to you in your leadership role?
As an elder, as a deacon, as a husband, a wife, as a parent, as a teacher of a Sunday School class, as a leader of a small church, as a Bible study leader, as a cell leader, as a committee member, as a leader in a parachurch ministry. In whatever role in which you stand before others in the name of Christ, will you take seriously, please, what the apostle says to leaders here? Because those who are following you are depending on you.
And if you will do what God tells you to do here, as he says, not only will it save you, but it will save those that are following you from a life of ruin because of the influence of false teaching and false thinking that is so prominent in our world. What is it that only you can do in your God-given role? I mean there are things that you do that others can do, right? But what is it that only you can do? When you isolate that, carry on. Carry on with it. That's your primary task.
Carry on with it. What kind of a pattern is your life leaving for those who are your followers? Are you growing as a person in what you're doing? Are you developing? Are you cultivating yourself spiritually? Is that progress evident to others? Are you taking heed of your calling, of your character, your creed, your conduct? To the extent that we do that, we'll be the leaders God wants us to be. As I said before, leadership has never been easy.
I don't think it's ever been harder than in society as it is today. I read recently about Martin Van Buren, the governor of the state of New York. You may remember his name because he became later the president of the United States. In 1829, he was the governor of the state of New York. He wrote a letter to the president at that time, which was Andrew Jackson. He was in his first year of two terms and he served as president. He wanted to get Jackson's commitment to preserve the canal system.
I don't know if you're familiar with the canal system that was built in America in the early 19th century, but it was a vital part of our whole transportation and commerce system. It linked rivers and lakes so that these huge boats could carry goods from one place to another. Here's where he wrote. Now listen, here's a leader, a governor, writing to the leader of the United States.
Here's what he says, the canal system of this country is being threatened by the spread of a new form of transportation known as railroads. The federal government must preserve the canals for the following reasons. Number one, if canal boats are supplanted by railroads, serious unemployment will result. Captains, cooks, drivers, innkeepers, repairmen, and lock tenders will be left without means of livelihood, not to mention the numerous farmers now employed in growing hay for the horses.
Two, boat builders would suffer and tow line whip and harness makers would be left destitute. Three, canal boats are absolutely essential to the defense of the United States. In the event of the expected trouble with England, the Erie Canal would be the only means by which we could ever move the supply so vital to waging modern war.
As you may well know, Mr. President, railroad carriages are pulled at the enormous speed of 15 miles per hour by the engines which, in addition to endangering life and limb of passengers, roar and snort their way through the countryside, setting fire to crops, scaring the livestock, and frightening women and children. The Almighty never intended that people should travel at such breakneck speed.
Well, suppose Andrew Jackson had said, oh my goodness, this is right, we've got to do this, we've got to put down the railroads. What would have happened in the development of the United States? You see, leadership is tough. It's a call of decisions that are not always easy to make. We all make them all the time. May God help us to be the kind of leaders we need to be so that those who are following us will be led in the direction that pleases God.
Let's pray together. Oh Father, I pray that whether we lead as parents, as husband or wife, as deacons or elders, as teachers, as leaders of other kinds of ministries, as leaders of cell groups, whatever we're doing, may we lead well. May we take to heart what you have said in this text. Because of the leadership, because of the obedience to your word, may we save ourselves and others from the potential ruin of false thinking and false living. You are a holy God.
May we be your holy people and holy leaders in this world. In Jesus' name, amen.