January 5, 2020

2 Timothy 1:8-18: Suffering for the Gospel

Preacher: Josh Tancordo Series: 2 Timothy: Faithful to the End Scripture: 2 Timothy 1:8–18

2 Timothy 1:8-18: Suffering for the Gospel

Please turn with me in your Bible to 2 Timothy 1. If you’re using one of the Bibles we provide, that’s on page 834. I mentioned last week that the Apostle Paul wrote this letter to his young protégé Timothy while Timothy was leading the church in Ephesus. And this is actually the last letter we have from Paul. He was in prison as he was writing it and expected his imprisonment to result in him being killed for the sake of the gospel. And that did happen—Paul did indeed die as a martyr. So this letter really contains some of Paul’s last words to one of his dearest friends. And today we find ourselves in 2 Timothy 1:8-18. 2 Timothy 1:8-18: 8 Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, 9 who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, 10 and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, 11 for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher, 12 which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me. 13 Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. 14 By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you. 15 You are aware that all who are in Asia turned away from me, among whom are Phygelus and Hermogenes. 16 May the Lord grant mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, for he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains, 17 but when he arrived in Rome he searched for me earnestly and found me— 18 may the Lord grant him to find mercy from the Lord on that day!—and you well know all the service he rendered at Ephesus. 

It’s one thing to say you believe the gospel but something else entirely to be willing to suffer for it. Yet so many Christians throughout church history and even in modern times have been willing to suffer for it—sometimes even to the point of death. I think of Polycarp, a Christian who lived from 69-155AD and who served as the bishop of a city in modern-day Turkey called Smyrna. One day, during a season of especially severe persecution, the authorities learned where Polycarp was being hidden by torturing two slave boys and sent soldiers to arrest him. When the soldiers arrived, Polycarp’s friends wanted to sneak him out, but he refused, saying, “God’s will be done.” He then actually welcomed these soldiers as if they were friends and requested that food and drinks be served to them. After that, the soldiers arrested him even though he was eighty-six years old and brought him to the arena, where the Roman governor said to him, “Curse Christ and I will release you.” Yet Polycarp replied, “Eighty-six years I have serve him, and he has done me no wrong. How then can I blaspheme my King and Savior?” Then, after a few more attempts to persuade him, the governor began to threaten him, saying he would have him burned alive. Yet Polycarp responded, “You threaten me with a fire that burns for a season, and after a little while is quenched; but you are ignorant of the fire of everlasting punishment that is prepared for the wicked.” So the fire was prepared. Polycarp then prayed out loud, “I bless you, Father, for judging me worthy of this hour, so that in the company of the martyrs I may share the cup of Christ.” And that is indeed what happened that very day as Polycarp was burned alive.

Now you and I may not be facing what anything like what Polycarp faced for being a Christian, and we may not be facing what Paul faced as he sat in a Roman prison writing this second letter to Timothy. But the fact is that if we’re faithful to follow Jesus in our present culture, we will experience some degree of opposition and marginalization and perhaps even scorn for the sake of the gospel. And we can probably expect to experience those things more and more as our society continues on its current trajectory. So our main passage of 2 Timothy 1:8-18 is an extremely valuable one for us to take to heart, because in it, Paul encourages Timothy to join him in suffering for the gospel. That’s the main idea of the passage. Paul encourages Timothy to join him in suffering for the gospel. And there are three reasons Paul gives Timothy for why he should embrace this suffering. Number one, the grace we’ve received in the gospel. Number two, the hope held out in the gospel. And number three the calling we’ve inherited in the gospel. 

The Grace We’ve Received in the Gospel

So first, let’s look at the grace we’ve received in the gospel. We read in verses 8-10, 8 Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, 9 who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, 10 and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus….” So after Paul urges Timothy to “share in suffering for the gospel,” he reminds him of how God has, first, “saved us.” And when you read those words, it’s good to ask the question “What exactly has God saved us from?” And the answer is that God’s saved us from both the guilt and the power of sin. He’s saved us from the guilt of sin through what’s called justification, which is him declaring us righteous in his sight. That’s something that happens immediately at the very moment someone becomes a Christian. And in addition to God saving us from the guilt of sin through justification, he also saves us from the power of sin through what’s called sanctification, which is the lifelong process of a Christian gradually becoming more like Jesus in the way they live. Then, in verse 9, Paul writes that God has not only “saved us” but has also “called us to a holy calling”—that is, he’s called us to live out the salvation we possess in a life a holiness. 

And, as verse 9 continues, all of this has come about “not because of our works” as if we had earned it “but because of his own purpose and grace.” You see, salvation isn’t our work but rather the work of God from beginning to end. He’s the one who had a “purpose” before time began to save certain people. Then he’s the one who sent us a Savior in the person of Jesus. Jesus existed as God from eternity past but entered this world in human form so that one day he could die on the cross. And the reason he died on the cross was to suffer the penalty we deserved—the penalty for our sins—before triumphantly resurrecting from the dead three days later. And the good news of the gospel is that whenever anyone stops trusting in themselves and instead puts their faith in Jesus to save them, that’s exactly what Jesus does. Again, he saves them from both the guilt and power of their sin. And all of this is a demonstration of the incomparable “grace” of God—a grace “which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began,” verse 9 says. So notice that Paul doesn’t appeal to mere emotions or shallow clichés as he seeks to motivate Timothy but rather to the solid bedrock of gospel truth. Shallow clichés might lift your spirits a little bit when you’re scrolling through your Facebook feed, but they’re not going to provide the depth of conviction you need to stand steadfast in the midst of suffering for the gospel—or any other kind of suffering, for that matter. You can’t build your life on those kinds of things. What you need is to roll up your sleeves and get into the Bible and acquire a substantive knowledge of the bedrock truths of the gospel mentioned in this passage—namely who God is and what he’s done for us in Christ. That’s what gets you through hard times. And what a precious message of grace the gospel is.

The Hope Held Out in the Gospel 

Then not only does Paul talk about grace we’ve received in the gospel, he also talks about the hope held out in the gospel. That’s the second reason Paul gives Timothy for joining him in suffering—the hope held out in the gospel. In verse 10, Paul says that Christ Jesus “abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.” Now in what sense do you think Jesus “abolished death”? Well, clearly Christians still experience physical death, so it can’t be that. Instead, Jesus abolished death in the sense that Christians don’t have to face what the Bible calls a “second death,” which is a spiritual and eternal death separated from God. And in the act of abolishing death, this verse says that Jesus “brought life and immortality to light through the gospel.” You might think you have “life” now, but according to this verse, “life” in its truest sense is still to come in the future. Unfortunately, a lot of times we have it backwards. We speak of heaven as an “afterlife,” implying that the real life takes place now and heaven is just something that happens after that. But according to the Bible, heaven is best spoken of not as an “afterlife” but as real life in its truest and fullest sense. That’s the hope held out in the gospel. 

And that’s what makes anything we might suffer for the gospel worth it in the end. Even if we suffer terrible things in this world—like many of the early Christians did and like some Christians today do who are persecuted for the gospel in other countries—it’s still absolutely worth it if it means obtaining the hope of heaven held out in the gospel. As Paul himself observes in 2 Corinthians 4:16-18, 16 So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. 17 For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, 18 as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal. 

The Calling We’ve Inherited in the Gospel

Then finally, Paul encourages Timothy to share in suffering by reminding him not only of the grace we’ve received in the gospel and the hope held out in the gospel but also, number three, the calling we’ve inherited in the gospel. In verses 11-12, Paul talks about being “appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher, which is why I suffer as I do. But,” he says, “I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that day what has been entrusted to me.” That, of course, is the gospel. The gospel had been entrusted to Paul but would ultimately be guarded by God. Yet Paul’s not the only one who had been entrusted with the gospel—Timothy had been entrusted with it as well. So Paul tells him in verses 13-14, 13 Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. 14 By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you. That was Timothy’s calling. And not only was it Timothy’s calling but it’s also our calling. We have the calling to “guard the good deposit entrusted to [us].”

And the way we do that is by faithfully sharing it with others and passing it along without altering it in any way. We see this imperative of not altering the gospel very clearly in verse 13, where Paul tells Timothy, “Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me.” Don’t deviate from it. Don’t try to change it in order to supposedly make it better. Listen to this from the book The Archer and the Arrow by two guys named Philip Jensen and Paul Grimmond. They write, “The Mona Lisa is probably the world’s most famous painting. It currently resides in a purpose-built, bullet-proof case in the Louvre. It is considered so precious that it has only been exhibited outside of the Louvre twice in the last century. In 1963, it was displayed for a time in the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C., and then in the spring of 1974 it was hung in the Tokyo National Museum. Can you imagine what might have happened if those responsible for delivering the painting decided that the Mona Lisa was a little short of artistic merit? What if they had whipped out a brush in transit and added a nice floral pattern to the border or updated the dress to the duck-egg blue fashion of the day? ‘We thought it was a little dreary and we wanted to brighten it up a little.’ This would not have been an acceptable excuse. Their job wasn’t to improve the painting, but to deliver it in its original condition. How much more with the word of God!” So our job as Christians is to deliver the gospel without changing it. “Guard the good deposit entrusted to you.” 

And by the way, notice the way I phrased this third point. I spoke of our calling to guard the good deposit as “the calling we’ve inherited in the gospel,” implying that receiving this calling is inseparable from receiving the gospel. You know, sometimes people say that whenever you marry someone, you’re marrying not only that person but also that person’s family, right? And in a similar way, whenever someone receives the gospel and is saved, they’re also receiving a calling. This calling to spread the gospel is one that we’ve inherited in the gospel. And I believe that’s certainly implied in verses 13-14. The gospel is not only something that saves us but also something that’s been “entrusted” to us. Like I said last week, the gospel came to you because it was going to someone else. 

Conclusion

So Paul encourages Timothy to join him in suffering for the gospel by reminding Timothy of these three realities: the grace we’ve received in the gospel, the hope held out in the gospel, and the calling we’ve inherited in the gospel. And whenever Christians wholeheartedly embrace these realities and demonstrate a willingness to suffer for the sake of the gospel, it’s a beautiful thing. That’s the best word I can think of to describe it. It’s just beautiful. 

I read a story not too long ago about a young woman named Natasha Zhdanova. This story is told by Sergei Kourdakov, a man who was commissioned by the Russian secret police back in the day to raid Christian prayer gatherings and persecute believers with extraordinary brutality. Sergei writes the following: 

I saw Victor Matveyev reach and grab for a young girl [Natasha] who was trying to escape to another room.  She was a beautiful young girl.  What a waste to be a Believer.  Victor caught her, picked her up above his head, and held her high in the air for a second. She was pleading, “Don’t, please don’t.  Dear God, help us!”  Victor threw her so hard she hit the wall at the same height she was thrown, then dropped to the floor, semiconscious, moaning.  Victor turned and laughed and exclaimed, “I’ll bet the idea of God went flying out of her head.”

On a later raid, Sergei was shocked to see Natasha again.

I quickly surveyed the room and saw a sight I couldn’t believe!  There she was, the same girl!  It couldn’t be.  But it was.  Only three nights before, she had been viciously thrown across the room.  It was the first time I really got a good look at her.  She was more beautiful than I had first remembered—a very beautiful girl with long, flowing, blond hair, large blue eyes, and smooth skin, one of the most naturally beautiful girls I have ever seen . . .

I picked her up and flung her on a table facedown. One of my men held her down and I began to beat her again and again.  My hand began to sting under the blows.  Her skin started to blister. She moaned but fought desperately not to cry.  To suppress her cries, she bit her lower lip until it was bitten through and blood ran down her chin.

At last she gave in and began sobbing.  When I was so exhausted I couldn’t raise my arm for even one more blow, and her backside was a mass of raw flesh, I pushed her off the table, and she collapsed on the floor.

After that incident, Sergei was shocked to encounter Natasha at yet another prayer meeting.  But this time something was different. He writes:

There she was again—Natasha Zhdanova! 

Several of the guys saw her too.  Alex Gulyaev moved toward Natasha. Hatred filling his face, his club raised above his head.

Then something I never expected to see suddenly happened.  Without warning, Victor jumped between Natasha and Alex, facing Alex head-on.

“Get out of my way,” Alex shouted angrily.

Victor’s feet didn’t move.  He raised his club and said menacingly, “Alex, I’m telling you, don’t touch her!  No one touches her!”

I listened in amazement.  Incredibly, one of my most brutal men was protecting one of the Believers!  “Get back!” he shouted to Alex.  “Get back or I’ll let you have it.”  He shielded Natasha, who was cowering on the floor. 

Angered, Alex shouted, “You want her for yourself, don’t you?”

“No,” Victor shouted back.  “She has something we don’t have!  Nobody touches her!  Nobody!”

. . . For one of the first times in my life, I was deeply moved . . . Natasha did have something!  She had been beaten horribly.  She had been warned and threatened. She had gone through unbelievable suffering, but here she was again.  Even Victor had been moved and recognized it.  She had something we didn’t have.  I wanted to run after her and ask, “What is it?”  I wanted to talk to her, but she was gone.  This heroic Christian girl who had suffered so much at our hands somehow touched and troubled me very much.

Several years later, the Lord opened Sergei’s heart to the message of the gospel, and as he later reflected on Natasha, whom he never saw again, he wrote:

And, finally, to Natasha, whom I beat terribly and who was willing to be beaten a third time for her faith, I want to say, Natasha, largely because of you, my life is now changed and I am a fellow Believer in Christ with you.  I have a new life before me.  God has forgiven me; I hope you can also. Thank you, Natasha, wherever you are. I will never, never forget you.

And the reason I share that story with you is to illustrate what a beautiful thing it is when Christians continue following Jesus faithfully even in the midst of suffering and persecution. As you just heard in Sergei’s story, that kind of faithfulness is a powerful witness to the watching world. In fact, I can’t help but wonder whether that’s one of the key things that we, as Christians in America, are missing in our witness today. Now, obviously, our ability to bear witness to the gospel through suffering is limited. We can’t help that. However, there are a few things we can do. 

The first thing we can do is to simply live a consistently Christian life. Follow Jesus faithfully in your day-to-day lifestyle. Live out the gospel. And when we do that, there will be certain times and situations in which we’ll be marginalized in various ways. People will sometimes exclude us from things. They’ll look down on us and perhaps even shun us to a degree. And when that happens, embrace it. Embrace whatever challenges you encounter for being a faithful Christian. 

And as I mentioned earlier, it looks like we’ll have the opportunity to do that more and more as our society continues on its current trajectory. Yet is it not an honor to be identified with Jesus in that way? Is it not an honor to face the rejection he faced and to face it for his sake? Acts 5:41 states that after Peter and John were given a public beating for preaching the gospel, they left “rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name”—that is, the name of Jesus. So is it not an honor for us to suffer rejection if we’re suffering alongside Jesus? Is it not an honor for us to be misrepresented by the mainstream media? Is it not an honor for us to be mocked by the skeptic? Is it not an honor to have some of our own friends or even family turn their backs on us or at least to lose interest in having a close relationship with us because we’re following Jesus? Hebrews 13:12-14 says it like this: 12 So Jesus also suffered outside the gate in order to sanctify the people through his own blood. 13 Therefore let us go to him outside the camp and bear the reproach he endured. 14 For here we have no lasting city, but we seek the city that is to come. So are you prepared to go to Jesus “outside the gate”—as an outcast—and bear that reproach? And are your eyes looking not toward any earthly city but rather toward that city that is to come?

And along those same lines, let me also encourage you to do something else as well. Devote your life to spreading the gospel even to the point of significant personal sacrifice. Devote your life to spreading the gospel even to the point of significant personal sacrifice. Let people see that, just like Natasha, you love Jesus more than anything. I mean, it’s good to put Christian things on social media and pray before your meal at a restaurant. Those are very good things to do. But how are you ordering your priorities in life? How are you spending your time? How are you stewarding your money? To what degree is your life focused on doing what God has left us here to do? For example, when was the last time you shared the gospel with someone? What efforts have you made to do what we talked about last week and pursue a discipling relationship with someone? Are you devoting your life to spreading the gospel even to the point of significant personal sacrifice? You know, perhaps the most telling sign of whether or not someone truly believes the gospel is what they’re willing to give up for the sake of the gospel. And of course we know from the teachings of Jesus that anything we give up will be restored to us a hundred times over in the form of sweet fellowship with God in the present and eternal rewards in the future. And most importantly, Jesus is worth it.

other sermons in this series

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Mar 15

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2 Timothy 4:6-8: Finishing Well

Preacher: Josh Tancordo Scripture: 2 Timothy 4:6–8 Series: 2 Timothy: Faithful to the End

Mar 8

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