First Timothy lesson 21 question 9

We are in lesson 21, right? And we were kind of halfway through. We just started the question. Let me set it up. We've been talking about exercise and spiritual exercise, physical exercise, and Question eight says, to what extent is godliness profitable? We talked a lot about that. And then question nine is one of those thousand answers. Where is the only life? Did we answer that? I put my mark that we finished there.

We're talking about Peter, or Paul's talking, writing to Timothy about the issue of godliness and how Timothy, if there's ever been a man in scripture that has a lot written to him and about him about spiritual growth, Timothy's your guy. And so godliness has a promise for the present life. Why? it has a promise for the life which is to come.

So I recognize that one of the most difficult things for believers is to be able to distinguish which source of life am I relying on right now. Is it what the Bible calls the old man or death, or is it the resurrected life of Christ, which is it? And so when you say, what is the only life? Well, life, the only really life is the life of the resurrected Lord Jesus.

It's like last week, Wednesday night, we were talking about marriage and Mike said, well, what do you think about the marriage between same-sex people? I said, according to the Bible, it's not a marriage. It just isn't a marriage. So you could say, according to God's word, life is in Christ, and that's the only place it is.

We have creatures walking around, and we have those who are lost walking around, but they don't have life. They have a life principle that causes them to be mobile, but that isn't life. Even Christians. Yeah, because they really... I always think of Ephesians 2, verse 1, and you were dead in your trespasses of sins in which you formerly walked. Like you're walking around dead, right?

Yeah. My buddy Strong used to say, do you want to see how death operates? I said, yeah. He said, well, go stand on the main drag in Denver, Colfax Avenue. There it is. It's going up and down, death. cars, people, everything, functioning and death. The only life which is in Christ Jesus, 2 Peter 1, is life indeed. Let's quickly look at some verses.

2 Peter, I'm sorry, 2 Timothy 1.1. 1 Timothy 6.19, and then somebody else look at 1 Peter 3.10, and 1 Corinthians 3.21.

Let's look at all of those, because they're really, so 2 Timothy 1.1. If you have it, read it. Paul, an apostle. 2 Timothy. Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, according to the promise of life in Christ Jesus? Yeah, life in Christ Jesus.

1 Timothy 6.19 Store up for yourselves a good reserve for the age to come, so that they may take hold of life that is real. Interesting. So like I said, there's the present life in Christ and the promise of eternal life. And eternal life is not functioning forever. Eternal life is to know the Lord Jesus and the Father.

All right, we'll compare 1 Peter 3.10. Who's got that? Go. For he that will love life and see good days, let him refrain his tongue from evil, and his lips that they may speak no vile. Interesting. So that talks about not only the life, but how it performs.

And the last one is 1 Corinthians 3, 21. Actually, you can read down to verse 23. 1 Corinthians 3, 21. through 23. What's that again? 21 through 23. for all things belong to you. Whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or things present or things to come, all things belong to you. And you belong to Christ. And Christ belongs to God.

Pretty cool. There's that order. Yeah, there it is. the chain of command of stability. So we're looking at the issue of life. And life is in Christ Jesus. Life for the lost isn't, we call it life, what else? But if you say, how's your death going today? Have a death day. So now watch what he says next.

Verse nine says it's a trustworthy statement deserving full acceptance. So the trustworthy statement he's referring to in verse nine, what is the trustworthy statement? Is it eight or is it 10? So if the trustworthy statement is verse eight, for bodily discipline is only a little profit, but godliness is profitable for all things since it holds a promise for the present life and for the life to come. Paul says that that's a trustworthy statement. You get that? He says this is really, he said it another way, this is really an important statement that you can trust. What do you trust?

Well, the second half of the verse says, godliness is profitable for all things. Godliness is what, Christlikeness? Is life manifested through us? This problem of all things and holds promise for the present life. What's the promise? What do you think the promise for the present life would be?

What's the overriding thing? What's the overriding thing that should be going on in every Christian's life every day? What's the issue? And don't tell me it's good works, because it's not. Trusting the Lord for what? What are you trusting him for? What's that? For the life we have ahead. For the finished work.

Yeah, for the conformity work that's going on, the conformity to the image of Christ. Because Christ is the godly human being, for lack of a better way to say it, and to be conformed to his image is godliness in the believer. And that process vis-a-vis the Holy Spirit goes on all day long every day for a Christian. Sometimes we cooperate, sometimes we don't. You know, sometimes we listen to, you know, another song, so to speak.

And then, it's a promise for the present life. So here's a promise of godliness now. You know, it's no fair saying to God, well, I'll get holy when I die. No, we're gonna do that now. We're starting now. and a hope for the future or a promise for the present life and also for the life to come. So what's the promise for the life to come?

Simple answer, total conformity. Everyone in this room knows that the minute that you leave the planet, the Lord calls you home, you're face to face with the Lord Jesus. Guess what you are? You're just like him. The sin nature is gone and you have this one single life now that's manifesting full on all the time.

But that's now. Well, there's a now and a future. Right. See, that's why I think identification is so much misunderstood. It's because there's the the sanctification process. Yeah. See? Yeah. And what the cross really is. Yeah. What it really means. What glory is. Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to talk about that later because it's really, it's a critical point.

It isn't, it isn't so much that that what we call the identification truths are misunderstood, I think it's that they're not taught. If you don't know what they are, then you don't, now think about this. If you have human life that's tainted and controlled by the sin nature, and there's this other life, which is the resurrected life of Christ, and no one ever teaches you that you left this and went here through the cross, what chance do you have of ever living that way? Because you're gonna spend all of your time making this man or trying to make this life look like that life.

And the problem is, you can't do it. Identification is a finished work. Yeah, I know it is, positionally. Do you see what I'm saying? If you're never taught from God's Word the identification truths, you don't have a shot. You're stuck here, and you're stuck here really working hard trying to make parts of this life look like it's Christian. What's the other problem with that?

You're doing all the work. The life in Christ, you don't do the work. It's done in you. It's like we depend on our works to progress. Yeah, progress. It's just like working for your salvation. I keep telling my Catholic buddies that Jesus is called the Savior, not you. There's a reason why he has that title. Because he's the one that does the saving. Right.

But the problem is Adam will do anything but die. Skin for skin. That takes a lot of time to go through what God's gonna bring you through to know Him and the value of that. Yeah, and we somehow have an attitude that spiritual growth and the trials and sufferings of spiritual growth are things to be avoided when really what's going on is that God is as gentle as He possibly can. is teaching us to walk away from Adam. Because there's no existing benefit there and there's no promise there either. I like how Coach puts it. I think this is how he put it. It's like you're in a garbage dump and you're shoveling trying to find something good in that But it's all garbage. It's all garbage. You've got to light the match.

And I really do think that spiritual growth, the pain and suffering part of it, that's why Paul gloried in his sufferings. He understood why he had them. And it's to teach me, oh, I don't want to rely on this person anymore, this death over here. I see what you're saying, Lord. Some of us are really stubborn about that. Well, the birth truths are the foundation for identification truths. Well, yeah, you've got it. Typical of God to do things in sequence, yeah.

Okay, so, now, verse 10 and 11, I put them together. For it is for this we labor and strive, because we have fixed our hope on the living God, who is the Savior of all men, especially of believers. Prescribe and teach these things. Okay, so the word for, in verse 10, introduces a statement in support of the previous declaration in verse nine. A trustworthy statement.

So my question, number 10, is how much effort are we to expend in pursuing godliness? Now, I'll give you some hints. When you see in verse 10, for this we labor and strive. Labor, it's the word K-O-P-I-A-O, K-A-P-I-O, to labor to the point of exhaustion, and strive, a Greek athlete, athletic term meaning, speaking of the participation of the athlete in the Greek games. Now, for those of you who know about the Greek games, you know, one is that if you had 10 guys in a sprint, one guy won and got the crown, the other nine might be put to death. Lots of incentive. So notice what he says, for this we labor and strive.

So my question is, how much effort are you to expend in pursuing godliness? He said like the parable of the leper. No. There were 10 and only one came back Praise God. We're talking, we're not talking about gratitude. The point is, is how much effort should a believer expend in pursuing godliness?

This verse says you should expend to the point where you're exhausted and you're to endure any painfulness that goes along with it. That doesn't sound like grace to me. Well, is this in the context of the gospel, laboring as a teacher for the purpose of sharing Or is this for the Christian life in this context? I think this has to do with the implementation of godliness in a believer's life. Godliness can be described as the life of the resurrected Christ.

Donna? Well, in some respects, that question almost seems like one of your trick questions. Oh, really? Because, you know, you talk about pursuing godliness. I mean, you could take that a lot of different ways. You know, I think in the verse it says the reason that they labor and suffer reproach is because they trust in the living God who's the Savior of all men. So, you're not really...godliness in a lot of respects you can look at that as an outward manifestation or an outward look of godliness that really doesn't have a whole lot to do with the interior.

Okay, that's good. Doesn't it start on the principle of rest? No, I don't think so. Where does it start? That's a great question. Where does this striving for godliness begin? We're dead in Christ. We can do nothing. Our efforts are not to issue us what Christ has done. Close.

I think you have to know first, and once you know, then you strive for understanding who you are in Christ. So you have to know what he tells you is true about you, and then I'll, and we've, a lot of this is doctrine. So where does the striving happen? It happens in God's word. Right, right. And you know, a striving isn't in the sense that the flesh is trying to, get God's Word down so that it can wear it around as a merit badge.

But you begin to understand that God's Word was the place where you got the information about salvation. It's the only place it is. And so you became saved because you learned the facts about who the Savior was and what He did and how you can avail yourself. And you recognize that He did the work I believed him, he saved me. Okay, now that I'm saved, wow, there's a lot to learn. What is this new life all about?

When you look at a one-year-old, from birth to one-year-old, They move 4,000 times a minute. Notice that their body is constantly, and their mind is going all the time. What are they doing? They're striving. To what? To grow up. And when it's time to feed, they let mom know it's time to feed. They squawk. You know? So. It's light produces light. But it's not, how do I say this?

I want to get the idea in here that there really is a striving after you're saved for godliness. And it isn't striving so that I can earn merit badges. It's a striving because there's so much about the Lord Jesus. I want to know him and know about him and know what he's done that I can never put the book down. Donna. So I think, you know what you're saying, there's a huge difference between striving based on words and striving based on understanding grace.

Yeah. Yeah, that's a good point. We think grace is a free ride. Do you understand what I mean by that? That I'm going to get everything and I don't have to do anything to earn it. You don't. But grace is a motivator. It of itself motivates the striving. You see that?

It all develops into a rest. Well, it develops into a rest except for the fact that this verse sort of negates rest. It talks about striving and trials. That's a mental issue, a lot of it. So the issue is, can you, as a growing believer, rest in a trial? Can you strive to the point of exhaustion I'll use this example of last week or the week before.

Some of the people I know that really do strive, I was talking to a guy who was teaching and doesn't live in Denver, and he was preparing for a lesson and he figured in his schedule he had about two hours to put a lesson together. So he sat down with God's word and he went through it. And he became cognizant of the time four hours later. And he said, that was the best four hours I ever spent in my life. Striving. He was at rest, but he was striving. And whatever was supposed to happen two hours ago, he spent these four hours doing that.

At the same time, when the verse says, especially believers prescribed in teaching these things, the Lord Jesus came with a message, and we're studying Luke, I'm not Luke, but Mark on Tuesday. What I've noticed in there is how much work, how much striving the Lord Jesus was doing.

To do what? To get the message of grace out. I have a question, Mike. Yeah. Or maybe a thought first and then your thoughts on it. But I'm looking at this, the context of this, and we're talking about physical fitness being of little value and godliness being the goal, which is much greater value. And we know that it's a trustworthy statement, right? So then he goes into labor and strive and this word strive kind of I looked it up in Zodiates and it says reproach to defame, disparage, generally means to rail at, revile.

And so I was thinking like this is not something that is like how does this fit in our faith and the thought was that occurred to me is that striving is, in a sense, Galatians 2.20, right? Like, I've been crucified. I strive against the old man by faith in the new man, and that leads to godliness. I don't—and labor and strive, those are both, like, words that could lead to self-effort to try to get somewhere, but he then goes on to having fixed our hope on the living God. So there's a contrast there, and I'm just wondering if strive is actually to put off the old by faith and put on the new by faith. Is that accurate? Yeah, I like that. I think, I think, how do I say this?

I think initially that's the step, the striving towards godliness, and then it goes from there, and this verse accurately says, prescribe and teach these things. So you can't adequately teach striving unless you've been in the game. You can't accurately teach the concrete of hope unless you have hope and God has brought you through. You can't teach rest and suffering unless God has brought you through that. So I think what this is talking about is not only your own struggle in spiritual growth, but also the struggle that once you have a modicum of spiritual maturity, now what's your job to do? Walk around and say, I got it, see ya. No, now we're supposed to be prescribing this and teaching it to others, not annoying them, but we're to share what we know is the steps of spiritual growth. and striving and suffering are part of that, okay? So when he says, and this might help, J.D., because we have a fixed hope on the living God, what does that mean? What does a fixed hope on a living God mean? What's hope?

It's an absolute certainty that may or may not have been I may or may not have entered fully into what I know is absolutely certain. That in and of itself takes time. I have a hope, you should have a hope, that during my lifetime on the earth, the conformity to the image of Christ is going to take place every single day. And I'm thankful that it is. And I can see it. And I know that God works all things together for good. I know that.

And so I rest in that fact, but I said in question 11, is hope referred here to the wishing the living God will do something? What we do is we put our hope on something that's already been done. And so you have positional truth that's going to be implemented in my life, in your life. God always functions from a finished work. He's never making something happen as He goes. My conformity to Christ, your conformity to Christ is because you've already been placed in Him.

So He's working from that position. Do you see that? Like a soldier going to war. laboring, struggling in this process is normal, Donna. Miles. Yeah, I was just gonna say, I think that's really the key, Mike, you know, taking hold of that which God has already done by grace. And that's a struggle because our old man doesn't want us to do that. No, no, that's right. And therein lies the struggle. You know, and I read this someplace and I've been running around. You know how you read something a month ago and it's still running around in your head?

One of the biggest tricks I think that Satan works on, or your sin nature works on you is, you can do this, it's not gonna harm you. Really? If it isn't in this realm of activity, yeah, it is gonna harm you. Better to trust God. Yeah. You know, I can do this because it's not gonna harm me. Yeah, it is. Yeah, it is.

Because God means it when he says he wants you to be godly, he wants you to be like the Lord Jesus. And he's expending his efforts to conform you to that. And so when you say, well, this thing that's not godly isn't gonna harm me, that's a lie. It is gonna harm you.

Okay. But the old man has to find that out. No, he doesn't. It's the new man that's gotta find it out. No, no. The old man is not a decision maker in this process. So. So does the phrase, I'm the living God who is the savior of all men mean that he's gonna save everybody? It's possible for all men to be saved, so he is a savior to all men. Okay, yeah, right answer. It doesn't teach universalism, it just teaches that he is the only savior. He's it, which excludes you. You can't save yourself. You gotta trust him. The word savior means savior, deliverer, preserver. I love that.

This name was given by ancients to deity, to princes, to kings, in general to men who had conferred signal benefits upon their country, and in the more degenerate days, by way of flattery to persons of influence. Thayer said that, so. People looked at Caesar as their savior. That's how they looked at him, especially when they made him a deity. Oh, and I wrote it down, the cult of Caesar The state religion of the Roman Empire, the reigning emperor was called savior of the world. In the sense that he was the preserver of mankind by reason of his benefit reign.

I had a guy call me yesterday, a Christian guy. He said, I'm really, really more and more depressed about the world situation. I said, you mean Donald Trump isn't the savior of the world? No, he's not. No man is. One could find in this statement the idea that God is the preserver of the entire human race in the sense that he provides care for them. He sure does.

You know? Oh, I'm over. So, Miles, guess what? Yeah? You can do about the last paragraph and then pick up next week, okay? Am I up next week or the week after? Oh, I don't care. You call it. Whatever works for you. Well, my parents are out next week, so I might have to wait till the week after, but unless nobody else can teach, there's a possibility. Yeah, okay. We'll talk about it this week. Let's close.

Father, we thank you again. We thank you for your Son, the Lord Jesus, who is the Savior, who is the Savior of the world, but also our personal Savior. And with salvation came this position of resurrected life in Him and striving to have that life manifested through us is part of what the Christian walk is all about. We thank you, Father. We pray in your Son's precious name. Amen.