The book of 1st Timothy was written to
instruct Timothy to confront false teachers and teaching by allowing the truth
of the gospel to shape the life of the church and her members. In 1
Timothy 3:15, Paul calls the church “a
pillar and buttress of the truth,” meaning that God desires for the church
to uphold and support the truth of the gospel.
I’m calling this series Molded by
the Gospel: How the Gospel is to Shape the Life of the Church. What I mean is that there is a certain shape,
or mold, that the truth of the gospel is supposed to give to the life of the
church. It is supposed to mold us into a
“pillar and buttress of the truth.” It is to affect and shape how we live in such
a way that it’s very own truth is supported and upheld.
Last week we saw how the gospel calls us to be a warring people; this week we are going
to see how the gospel calls us to be a praying
people. In 1 Timothy 2:1-7, Paul urges Timothy to keep the priority of prayer
for the sake of the gospel’s progress among all people. This passage reminds us that God calls His
people to be a praying people for the sake of God’s fame among all people. This
passage gives us three ways in which the church is supposed to be a gospel-shaped,
praying people.
[2:1] First
of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and
thanksgivings be made for all people, [2] for kings and all who are in
high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified
in every way. [3] This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our
Savior, [4] who desires all people to be saved and to come to the
knowledge of the truth. [5] For there is one God, and there is one
mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, [6] who gave himself
as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time.
[7] For this I was appointed a preacher and an apostle (I am telling the
truth, I am not lying), a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth. (1 Timothy
2:1-7 ESV)
I.
A People Shaped by the Gospel Know the Priority
of Prayer (2:1a)
This first phrase here in chapter two shows us the
priority of prayer in the church. It is
to be done “FIRST of ALL” (2:1).
Prayer is one of the highest priorities for the people of God both
corporately and individually, meaning that we as a church should be a praying
church and that you, as an individual should be a praying person. God, in His wisdom has chosen to make the
prayers of His people vital to the success of His mission. Why? I
believe it is because prayer glorifies God in a unique way. It expresses both dependence upon God and faith
in God like nothing else does. It says
to God, “We need you” and, “You are able.”
It is an expression of the truth that only God can and that God
can! A lack of prayer, then, would
express the opposite. A lack of prayer
would express a lack of dependence upon God and a lack of faith in Him.
There is another word here that points us to the
priority of prayer. The word “then” ties what is about to be said to
what has just been said. Paul has just
charged Timothy to wage good warfare against false teaching and teachers with
the truth of the gospel. How is Timothy
to wage this war? First of all, he is to
pray! He is to wage this war on his
knees. We see this same pattern of a
call to warfare and prayer in Ephesians
6:10-20. After calling believers to
put on the whole armor of God, Paul then instructs them to pray: [18] praying at all times in the
Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all
perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, [19] and also for
me, that words may be given to me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the
mystery of the gospel, [20] for which I am an ambassador in chains, that I
may declare it boldly, as I ought to speak. (Ephesians 6:18-20 ESV)
Are we a praying people? Are you a praying person? When
we survey the church today, it seems that in most places God’s people are more
prayer wimps than prayer warriors. One
pastor said, “If I announce a banquet,
people will come out of the woodwork to attend.
But if I announce a prayer meeting, I’m lucky if the ushers attend!”[1] God’s people have forgotten the priority of
prayer in the church. Let me encourage
you to take advantage of our church’s corporate opportunities to pray. Also, set a time to spend some quality time
in prayer everyday and seize opportunities throughout the day as well (commute,
shower, etc.). Model the priority of
prayer before your children. The gospel
calls us to be a praying people.
II.
A People Shaped by the Gospel Know the Particulars
of Prayer (2:1b-2a)
Paul mentions four types of prayer here. “Supplications” are specific requests
that we make in response to needs. “Prayers” are a more general term for
praying in general. “Intercessions” refer to drawing close in order to converse
confidently and intimately with someone.
“Thanksgivings” are just that:
the giving of thanks to God. This type
of prayer recognizes God’s answers to our prayers and that every good and
perfect gift is coming from above and also that every bad thing is being used
for God’s glory and my good.
Paul then mentions the objects of our prayers. He
says that prayers are to be made “for all
people.” He is not saying that you
need to take a census of the world and mention every person by name. That would be impossible. The phrase “all people” in this passage does not mean all people without exception, but all people without distinction.[2]
The examples that Paul gives are “kings
and all who are in high positions.”
This means that we are to pray for those in authority. We will say more about this in a minute, but
for now consider what this would have meant for first century believers. Paul just told them to pray for Nero and
other pagan, Gentile officials. Paul is
telling this church pray for more than just the people who are in their circle
or the people whom they enjoy praying for.
He is calling them to pray for all kinds of people.
To summarize this point, God here is calling the
church to all kinds of prayer for all kinds of people. The listing of different types of prayer
isn’t intended to be conclusive or to be a formula. It is meant call us to pray in different
ways. One thing that I notice among
Christians is that we often fail to pray because we don’t know what to say or
how. What we learn here is that there
isn’t only one way to do it. We are
simply called here to come to God on behalf of all people’s eternal good.
[8] For everyone who asks receives, and
the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.
[9] Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a
stone? [10] Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent?
[11] If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your
children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to
those who ask him! (Matthew 7:7-11 ESV) My children don’t always know how to properly
communicate with me, but that doesn’t stop them from trying and that’s because
of the relationship that we enjoy. It
invites them to come to me with anything as best they know how in
confidence. We enjoy the same privilege
as God’s children! So pray already!!!
III.
A People Shaped by the Gospel Know the Purpose
of Prayer (2:2b-7)
What I want to do here is first give you the
purpose that this passage gives us for the type of praying that Paul is calling
for here and then show you how that works out in the life of God’s people. The
purpose of prayer is to see all people come to a saving knowledge of the truth
of the gospel for the glory of God. The
initial purpose that Paul gives for this kind of praying is “that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life,
godly and dignified in every way” (2:2). But
that is not the ultimate purpose, because he further says in 2:3-4 that “this” (us praying for all people so that we may lead a peaceful,
quiet, godly, and dignified life) is good and pleasing to God because He “desires all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the
truth.” So at the heart of all of
our praying should be a desire for God’s name to be made great among all people
for their eternal good.
Now how does this work and what does us living a
peaceful, quiet, godly, and dignified life have to do with the salvation of all
peoples? Three truths here put together
the answer for us. First, God desires all people to be saved
(4). Again, this means all people without distinction, not all people without exception. That is not to say that God doesn’t desire
the salvation of all people without exception, it just means that it is not the
sense that the phrase “all people” is
used with in this passage. It didn’t
mean that we are to pray for all people without exception in verse 1 and it
doesn’t mean all people without exception are ransomed by Jesus’ death in verse
6. That would teach universalism (that
everyone is going to heaven regardless of how the respond to God’s offer of
salvation). The Bible is clear that only those who respond to God’s offer of
the gospel in repentance and faith will be saved. This bring us to our second truth.
The next truth is that only those who come to a saving knowledge of the truth of the gospel
will be saved (4-6). There is one
and only one Mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus. A mediator is a person who makes peace
between two parties. Jesus became our
Mediator with God by becoming a man who would become our ransom (the price
required to set someone free from something).
Jesus offered Himself as a substitute payment for our sins that place us
in debt to the just wrath of God. And this
is the one truth that a person must know and respond to in order to be
saved. A person must come to the
understanding that there is one God and one Mediator between God and men, the
man Christ Jesus, and that Jesus became our one Mediator by becoming a man who
would become our ransom and respond to that truth in repentance and faith. That is what it means to come to a saving
knowledge of the truth. So the while the
offer of salvation is inclusive, the application of salvation is
exclusive. Only those who come to a
saving knowledge of the truth will be saved (Acts 4:12).
The third truth that put how this all works
together is that God will convince
people of the truth of the gospel with the lives of His people. This is where we connect our living a
peaceful, quiet, godly and dignified life with God’s desire to see all people
saved. “Peaceful” means tranquil, and has to do with a person’s inner
circumstances. “Quiet” has to do with a person’s outer circumstances. “Godly”
simply means character that is like God.
And “dignified” has to do with
earning the respect of others with how we live.
So think through the progression of this passage
once more. We are to pray for all people
so that we can live this way and “this”
pleases God because He desires that
all be saved. In other words, the reason
that leading a quiet, peaceful, godly, and dignified life so pleases God is
that it must aide the mission to see
all people come to a saving knowledge of the truth. To come full circle, this type of life commends the truth of the gospel, serving
as a “pillar and buttress” to the
truth. To say it another way, we are
praying for all people to the end that we would be “salt” and “light” in the
earth, so that others to see our good works and to give glory to our Father who
is in heaven (Matt. 5:13-16).
Think through what this means in praying for those
in authority. It certainly means that we
should pray for their salvation. But it
ultimately means that we should pray that God would use them in ways that will
provide for maximum progress of the gospel.
Sometimes that will mean freedom from anarchy, persecution, and economic
hardship, because that will be most beneficial to God’s kingdom. But sometimes that may mean the
opposite. Sometimes persecution may be
the catalyst that causes the church to flourish as a watching world watches a
suffering people live with inner peace and godliness and in so doing earn the respect
of some of those persecutors to the point where they too become believers. We are to pray for all people, especially
those in authority, so that events will unfold in order to put God’s people in
a position to maximize the display of the transforming power of the
gospel.
The bottom line is that we should so desire the
fame of God’s name among the nations that we are moved to fervent prayer and
consecration to God. Are we a house of
prayer for the nations or a den of robbers (Mark
11:15-19), more concerned with our own gain than with the fame of God’s
name among the nations for their eternal good?
May the heart of the Lord’s Prayer become the heart of our prayers, that
God’s name would be hallowed and that His will would be done on earth as it is
in heaven.
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