Timothy & his spiritual growth

We started last Sunday our study in 1st and 2nd Timothy and Titus. We want to take today a little bit of an atypical look in that we're going to focus on Timothy and his spiritual growth. What's interesting is this guy Timothy, even though he doesn't show up until Acts 16, shows up in a great portion of the rest of the New Testament. In fact, we know more about Timothy than a number of the apostles in terms of what happened next. Real interesting. It is as if God said, no, believers need to know about this Timothy guy. So here's Timothy.

He is one who remains with Paul beginning his second missionary journey. If they met before that, it's not mentioned, but Paul's second missionary journey is the place where Paul selects Timothy to go along with him for ministry. Let's take a look. Take a look at this three pages in the back here. This is the ones page 1 of 3, 2 of 3, and 3 of 3. And what we'll want to do is to walk through Timothy's life, at least what's revealed to us here. And so the first part is Paul's first missionary journey. If you want to take a look at that, that's on the map on the left lower corner on page 3. Can anybody summarize for us what happened on the first missionary journey, Paul's first missionary journey?

Who went, what happened, and where did they go? Barnabas was with him. Barnabas went to Cyprus. First they went to Cyprus, went across there. What's that emphasis? Well, if you look at the map there, the first thing that they did is they went into what is now southern Turkey. At the time, he went into the cities of the Roman province of Galatia. and went through these five cities. And matter of fact, what they did is they looped through, first to do evangelism, and then as they looped back into those same cities, they appointed elders in each of the cities.

So then the next step that we see is in Acts 16.1. Here is Paul on his second missionary journey. And so in Paul's second missionary journey, he comes into, it says here Paul came to Derbe and Lystra and a disciple was there named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who was a believer and his father was a Greek. Alright, so here's Timothy. Now, think about Timothy. Here you have Timothy whose father was a Greek and whose mother was Jewish.

It's not supposed to happen, right? And so what it means is that Timothy's probably grandfather just didn't care and put together this marriage of a Greek and a Jewess. But that was not supposed to happen according to the Mosaic Law, right? Not supposed to put those two together. But nonetheless it took place.

So here's Timothy. So here's this disciple Timothy. Based on Timothy's background, He was, at this point in time, how old? Well, what's interesting is that was actually after some time. You know, don't let anybody look down at your youth. And by that time, Timothy was approaching 40. So at this point in time, Timothy is probably more in his late 20s, more likely in his late 20s when he's going out with Paul. So real interesting, that's what he picked.

Yes? You were talking about the fact that he was from a Jewish and Greek family. Wasn't that the knock against the Samaritans? Because they weren't pure Jews and they were You're talking about the Samaritans? Yeah. That's why they wouldn't even cross into Samaria, right? So this is a big deal. Yes. Yeah, I mean, it's a problem because you've got, here's Timothy of a mixed background, right?

And in fact, one of the things it says there in Acts 16.1, Paul circumcised him.

And why did we say he would do that? Basically, his father didn't see to it when he was a kid because in the Jewish tradition, according to the Law of Moses, what would be the age when you would be circumcised? Eight days, right? So, he was not circumcised and here he was well beyond eight days at probably around age 27 or 28. He was circumcised then, yes, and he probably remembered it.

So here's Timothy in his late twenties. Here's Timothy having been circumcised by Paul. Did Paul want to abide by the law and make sure Timothy was righteous or what would be the reason for circumcising him at that late stage? Basically it was an accommodation so that it would not be a tripping point for Timothy to minister to Jews. But for Titus, who was a Gentile, he not only did not circumcise him, but actually refused to have him circumcised.

So that's an interesting distinction there. Okay, so let's step into the next part. Acts 17, 4 and 5, Then immediately the brethren sent Paul out as far as the sea, and Silas and Timothy remained Now those who escorted Paul brought him as far as Athens and receiving a command for Silas and Timothy to come to him as soon as possible, they left.

What had taken place is Paul had gone first into Philippi, right? And then into, where did he go after Philippi? He went to Thessalonica, a nearby city. And at Thessalonica, Paul ran into trouble, and so then Timothy and Silas remained behind. Why would Paul leave Timothy and Silas behind? Did he just forget about them, or did he go, oh no, I forgot about them, you know? What happened? Why would he leave them behind?

The car broke down. The car broke down, yeah, yeah, that's it. It must have been what brand? An Accord. An Accord, okay, all right. Why did he leave them behind? They had work to do. What's that? They had work to do. Now why particularly would he leave them behind? Why didn't he just say, hey guys, it's hot in here, let's get out? Why would he leave these two behind and go ahead?

They were establishing the churches. They were doing the apostolic work that Paul couldn't do because he was being an evangelist. In this case, Paul was being pressed, you know, with persecution that was basically threatening his life, but he could leave these other guys behind and continue the work of teaching and establishing the churches. Why is it important to teach in the churches when you are establishing a church? I mean, why not just evangelize and say, hey, we're out of here?

Ah, okay. The church most definitely needs to be teaching and you can't have the teaching going on without that taking place initially. If people don't know what teaching is, they can't turn on to it. Yes? Plus it's a sound doctrine that wasn't Timothy, I think later on it says here that Timothy was sent teachers, so to establish sound doctrine. That's right.

In other words, one of the things that we'll see as we go through both 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus is that the pastors and teachers, the elders and teachers are to establish what is true, teach that, and to make a distinction between that and what is false.

And boy, there was all kinds of false teachers, people who would invent all sorts of things. And so Timothy had to stay behind there to teach the people in the church. Now that they had had some evangelism take place, they had a church body, but they needed to be taught. So here's Timothy, and he's staying behind to teach.

Let's think about this now. Timothy has spent some time with Paul, traveling with him. They've gone through from the middle of what is now Turkey up to the northwestern coast, and then over to Philippi, and then over to Berea and Thessalonica. And so here is Timothy. What do you think has taken place with Paul and Timothy during this time? Let's think about this.

As they're walking, do you think Paul just whistled and hummed and things like that? Or what do you think Paul did as he was traveling with Timothy? Paul would have taught him. Let's look at one other thing. Here's Paul and he's making tents. Do you think he's just going to make tents alone and say, Timothy, you go away and leave me alone so I can make my tents? Not likely. As a matter of fact, as we'll see farther on in our study, what is more likely is that, here's Paul and he said, Timothy, ever learn how to make tents? No. Well, you're going to learn and you're going to learn a few other things too.

Here, take this and cut this along this line here and while you're doing that, let me tell you some things. Yes, the length of the sentences. Paul was not short on his length. He has, in all of Greek literature, modern and ancient, he has the first and second place for length of sentence. Those are the first, that's the first chapter. Yes, yes, and in Greek it is common and proper to say things that in English you would not say.

Okay, now, so here is Timothy who's spending time with Paul as they walk, as they work, okay, and then aside from that Paul would be in Churches doing what? Aside from evangelism, he would do what in the churches? He would be teaching, and Timothy is there seeing how Paul teaches, right? And when you establish a church, seeing what Paul teaches. So Timothy is gaining understanding, not only by being directly spoken to by Paul, but also watching Paul as an example. Here's something else to look at. In verse 17 there, do we get the indication that Timothy is left behind alone? He's not left behind alone at this stage. He is with who? With Silas. Yes, he's with Silas.

What do you think is the value in that? Did he just happen to leave them behind and it was pure accident there was two of them or what do you think was the value in that? One of them works alongside another and so there's an ability to help and train up. Yeah, teach each other. Yeah, Silas might say, you know, Paul taught me this. And Timothy said, oh yeah, that's good, you know, because I didn't know that. Or it might be vice versa. So he has the two of them together. So notice Paul's pattern here.

Paul has very likely spent time with Timothy personally, perhaps along with others who are traveling. and has taught him directly. Paul, even when he leaves Timothy behind, leaves him behind with another so that they're able to work together and support each other. Learn from each other, right? It's one of the reasons why what we typically do here at Holly Hills is in the electives, we will oftentimes have the electives team taught. where we'll have more than one teacher in the elective. And so that provides similar opportunities, right?

Alright, here is Acts 18.5, the next one.

But when Silas and Timothy came down from Macedonia, Paul began devoting himself completely to the Word, solemnly testifying to the Jews that Jesus was the Christ. What do you think it means for Paul to devote himself completely to the Word. Wasn't he devoted to the Word before? What's the distinction? Pardon?

I think that's very likely what it means. Yeah, that Paul was able to commit his time entirely to that instead of saying, hey, I got to work half the day with these tents here in order to keep the necessary funds going. He may have accumulated some enough funds or gotten some gifts enough to focus for a time completely on his ministry. Yeah. Well, and also Dennis, later Paul asked for those parchments when he was in prison, even toward the end. In 2 Timothy, yeah. Right, even toward the end of his life. So, I think, well, obviously a lot of the New Testament comes out of the Old Testament.

All right, and what did he testify? I testify that Jesus was the Christ. All right. Was. And why does it say was? The tense is was. Thank you All right, let's Let's think about that The Christ, what does that mean? The Messiah. In other words, in Greek, they would write this down, and it would be the Christos, definite article, which was the Greek way of saying Christos being anointed, saying the same thing as the Messiah, that Christ was the Messiah.

So when he says that, why would he do that? Why would he say, and be emphatic, Jesus was the Messiah? Why would he be emphatic with that? I think because of the Damascus Road. I mean, he came to that realization through a miraculous event, and his teaching followed after that. Paul was Timothy's spiritual father, just like Christ was Paul's spiritual father.

Okay, there might be that aspect. You're thinking of something? I was wondering if it said is, would that indicate that he hadn't died at the crucifixion and was risen and ascended? Would it mean that he was still I don't know, I'm not that familiar with the tenses, but that certainly indicates something.

Jesus asked his disciples, who do you say that I am? And what did they answer? Some say this, but nobody says who do you say that I am? And what was their answer? You are the Christ, see? So when he's referring to Jesus was the Messiah, he's saying when Jesus came and was on the earth and walked with the disciples, he was the Messiah and how many people recognize that?

Yeah, not many. Very few recognized him as the Messiah. The disciples did, and some others with them. But by and large, Israel had rejected that he was the Messiah. He was a teacher, right? He was a rabbi. Yeah, they might say he was a rabbi, or maybe even a fool.

But there was only a very small number, comparatively speaking, that actually said he was, as he came and was on the earth, the Messiah. recognize him as the Messiah at that time. So here's Paul and what he's saying is, here is when Christ was here on the earth, he was in fact the Messiah. We know from the rest of what Paul taught and wrote and everything else, yes, Christ is in the heavenlies. So he is now there. But what he's trying to get him to recognize is, look, When Christ came, he was the Messiah.

And most of Judaism, most of the Jews missed that. They didn't get the point. Yeah? I heard something on a radio program that said that they didn't get the point, and maybe the apostles even quite didn't get the point because they didn't have the Holy Spirit yet. The apostles were slow to catch it. Here's the interesting thing. It seems that they recognized that He was the Messiah, but they didn't seem to recognize all of what that meant. In other words, when Christ said, I'm going to go to the cross, and I'm going to die. Oh no! They certainly didn't get that aspect of it, did they? They didn't understand it.

They were willing to say, you're the Messiah, and what that means is, you're going to come and boot these Romans out. And you're the Messiah, and that means that you're going to be the king of Israel, and you're going to reign as king of kings and lord of lords over all the Gentiles. But in terms of the full description of what he was sent to do, which included dying for sins, they didn't get it.

That's certainly the case. They didn't get the whole picture. So when he says, was the Messiah, it's not saying, well, now he's dead. It's not saying that he isn't in a position now, but he's saying when he came, he came as the Messiah. And in great mass, the Jews did not recognize that.

I would have to take a look at that. Are you talking about the one that's here in the PUREX? Yeah, I'd take a look at that and see what that's about. Certainly in the future, will Christ be the Messiah on Earth? Yes, yeah. He came the first time, his first coming, as the Messiah. He was by and large rejected. He will come a second time, and there will not be the opportunity to reject him. That won't work, right? So, he indeed will be, yes.

Okay, and also, doesn't it also, the was could be that he was the, while here and now and forever, he was the complete fulfillment of all the prophecies in scripture. Certainly, yeah. And I think that's probably what Paul would have used for his point of reference. Yeah. You know, every one. Yeah. Every prophecy. All of it. And I think that's part of what Holly was putting her finger on, and that is the conception.

What does it mean that he's the Messiah? It was oftentimes skewed and off to one side and incomplete. When Paul would present him as the Messiah, it would mean, look, it means this, and it means this, and it means this. And you guys need to understand the whole scope of what it means for him to be the Messiah.

He's not just this guy that comes and boots the Romans out. I just can't imagine how excited he must have been to read the Old Testament scriptures like Isaiah, Jeremiah, the prophecies, and to know that it had been fulfilled and people had been looking forward to it for so many years, and he actually had met years ago, and it was just complete fulfillment.

It just makes the hair stand up in the back of my head. I can't even think of that. You can imagine. I think the disciples probably had a great many moments like that of, whoa, people have been waiting for centuries for this, and here's the guy. I ate dinner with him. I walked with him. I talked with him. I saw him risen. I saw Thomas go and poke at the wounds. Yeah, that must have grabbed them.

No question about it. And the fact of his image being so commonplace and not what everybody expected. He wasn't a Saul. He wasn't taller than everybody else. He was common. And to see him and to know that this was the fulfillment. Wow. How God works. This most certainly must have grabbed them. And let's look at one other point. Here's Saul, now turned Paul. Here's Saul, now turned Paul, and he says, and I used to be convinced just like you that this Jesus was not the Messiah. But I'm here to tell you, yes he is! And here's what that means. Right? And so Timothy is alongside this.

And then we look in Acts 19.22, and having sent into Macedonia two of those who ministered to him, Timothy and Erastus, he himself stayed in Asia for a while. Now, so here's Timothy and Erastus, a different fellow.

Did Paul mess up? What happened to Silas? Are these guys, Timothy and Silas, supposed to stay together all the time, or what's the deal? Well they were kind of, they used to run messages back and forth and stuff also, didn't they? They would be there for a while and then actually Paul would hear from them. So they were, I mean they didn't have cell phones so that's kind of how they got the message.

Here's what's interesting is that you'll see various personages show up and then drop off the scene. What's interesting is while Luke wrote the whole book of Acts, in parts of it, you know, we can see later on, in parts of it, he says we and us, right? But for other parts, Dr. Luke drops out of the story. And so it appears he, you know, stayed, like for example, stayed at Philippi and let some of the rest of them move on. So part of what you have is people ministering for a stretch of time and dropping in and out of the storyline. But what we see that's real interesting is Timothy stays in here for a good stretch. He is the guy alongside Paul while others are coming and going. Yeah. They weren't supposed to stay outreach and then come back.

So you will in fact have variation. And then they would go out and sit and minister and complete their assignments and then come back. So you had variations in ministry. Even here at Holly Hills, think of this. I mean, okay, he'll send me off to the Czech Republic and Uganda. Just recently, Mike has made a couple of trips out to California to help with some of the believers that are out there. And so that's one of the things that will happen is you'll have people that will stay behind at a place, that will go out and carry out ministry and then come back. And so you will have this kind of variation in who's there.

But one of the things that's interesting is that you see Timothy continues to be a part of the story here. whereas others come in and drop out. Timothy continues along in this account and then even into the next missionary journey. Let's look here. So then Acts 20 verse 4, and he was accompanied by Sopater of Berea, the son of Pyrrhus. and by Aristarchus and Segundus of the Thessalonians, and Gaius of Derbe, and Timothy, and Tychicus, and Trophimus of Asia. So you have various names, and of these various names, Timothy is the one who is most often spoken of and we have the most information about. Timothy is accompanied by various, various ones, but he's the one that seems, along with Paul, to be most steady in his presence there.

Okay, let's take a look at page two there. Here's Paul and Silvanus and Timothy to the Church of the Thessalonians, and God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ graced you in peace. And then chapter 3, verse 2, we sent Timothy, our brother, God's fellow worker in the gospel of Christ, to strengthen and encourage you as to your faith. But now that Timothy has come to us from you and has brought us good news of your faith and love, that you always think kindly of us, longing to see us just as we also long to see you.

So now here's something interesting. First and second Thessalonians, the two Thessalonian letters, are some of Paul's earlier letters written to the church at Thessalonica when the church was quite young. Why all the mention of Timothy? What do you see here? Why all the mention of Timothy in this letter? Okay, so here's Timothy to establish his validity, if you will.

Okay. What else? I think it also establishes his authority because Paul always referred to him and Paul couldn't be everywhere at once. That's right. So he was an apostolic, we use the term an apostolic delegate. Some churches have made a lot of the idea of apostolic succession And that in fact is not biblical, but an apostolic delegate like Timothy or Titus is something that is biblical, but it's not something that is passed on like you continue to pass on the baton.

What gets passed on from one generation to the next? Apostolic succession? No, what gets passed on from one to the next? Yeah, it is not apostolic succession that the Bible talks about, but doctrinal succession. Timothy, these things that you have heard from me, among others, the other witnesses, that's the ones that you see here, among the other witnesses, teach these to others who are faithful, who will in turn teach others also. So it's not apostolic succession, it's doctrinal succession.

Alright, here's 2 Thessalonians, Paul and Silvanus and Timothy to the church of the Thessalonians in God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. One of the things that we see happen here both in Acts and in each of these letters is Paul is recognizing that Timothy is someone who spent time with the Thessalonian church. And so rather than dropping him out, He is making sure that his name continues to be mentioned and the contact continues to be made. In fact, Timothy spent more time with the Thessalonian church than Paul did. Because Paul had moved on, he was basically forced out by the persecution there, but Timothy stayed. They knew Timothy better than they knew Paul.

Here's Romans 16.21. Timothy, my fellow worker, greets you, as do Lucius and Jason, and Sosip the pedder, my kinsman."

Let's ask this question. Who was the letter of Romans written to? To the church in Rome. Had Paul ever been there when the letter was written? He was not there. Had Timothy been to Rome, to the church in Rome, when this letter was written, the Book of Romans? Actually, we have no record that he was there. As a matter of fact, while it is possible, there's no record that he was there.

But there did seem to be lots of interaction between the church at Rome and others. Yeah. Was it Apollos and Priscilla that had been to Rome? Was that it? Somebody established that church in Rome. Yeah. In matter of fact, where would be the first opportunity to establish a church in Rome? How would that happen? Well, maybe through being a prisoner.

What happened on the day of Pentecost? Believers, there were believers from where? All over the place in the Roman Empire and outside of it, including Rome. That would have been the first opportunity to establish the Gospel from believers who were there in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost, already there, right? But there was interaction here and some contact, believers that had contact with one another, including some contact with Timothy. If Timothy was ever in Rome, we don't know.

1 Corinthians 4, 17 and 16, 10. For this reason I have sent to you Timothy, who is my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, and he will remind you of my ways which are in Christ, just as I teach everywhere in every church. What does he mean by my ways which are in Christ? Because remember, Timothy is going to carry on this ministry. He's going to remind you of my ways which are in Christ. What does it mean to teach my ways which are in Christ? He's a continuing person. Okay. What does he mean by in Christ? What does in Christ mean? Yeah, we were placed in Christ.

So it's interesting as he talks about it. He didn't say, I'm just going to have Timothy teach you about Christ. But he particularly said, Timothy is going to tell you about all the things that are relevant here about being in Christ. He's going to teach you about identification.

And, remember, what word did he say? Remind you. So it means, what did they teach before? About being in Christ. About being in Christ. So if he's reminding them, he says, I've been teaching you that. You were taught that before. Timothy taught you that before. And he's going to come and teach you again. It must be important if he's going to remind him and emphasize it and teach some more on that topic, right?

Okay. And now, if Timothy comes, see that he is with you without cause to be afraid. That's interesting. For he is doing the Lord's work as I also am. That's an interesting point. We're going to find, as Paul writes to Timothy later, what he talks about not being timid. That's curious. Does that give us a clue about what Timothy may have wrestled with? Yeah.

Well, you said here that he sent him to false teachers. So, you know, anytime you go to false teachers, it's the same situation that Paul had when he approached the Jews and was trying to teach He has, you know, distorted it as it was. They still believed it, so they attacked him. Well, even here it says Acts 14, 21 through 23. It says, through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God. So that was the message Paul had to instill in Timothy as well. And Titus and Luke.

And that's why nobody was there when he was in prison toward the end underneath Nero. All the persecution. Yeah. I mean, it was horrible. I mean, didn't they make Christians candles in Nero's garden? Yeah. Torched them. Alive. Yeah. Torched them. That's what I call suffering. Yeah.

Now we look in 2 Corinthians 1.1 and 19. Here is Timothy. listed as a co-author or at least present. It's possible that Timothy acted as a scribe, as Paul dictated. And then so here's this Sylvanus and Timothy mentioned again. By the way, Silas is a nickname for Sylvanus, right? So that's why you see the two names are mentioned together.

Here's Philippians 1.1 and 2.19.

Here's Paul writing from prison. This is after the Book of Acts time is completed. He is in prison. House arrest is probably the way to best characterize it in Rome. He writes Philippians, Paul and Timothy. So here he is as a bondservant. So by this time, By this time, at the very end, Timothy is indeed in Rome, as is Paul.

Alright, so he's writing along with them. Now, here's something else. As Paul is dictating these letters and writing these letters, and Timothy may be acting as a scribe, but he's at least present for this letter writing, do you think Timothy's still learning some things? Okay? Yeah, most certainly. Here is Paul, inspired of the Holy Spirit, writing scripture, and Timothy is there. Yes. Yes.

You most certainly can believe that Timothy is learning things, and what we find is a number of Paul's letters mention Timothy, and this is one of those places. mentioned Timothy as being present. So here is a fellow who is hearing, perhaps even being the writer, as Paul would speak, that would be right there present as scripture is being put down on the papyrus. And then in verse 19, But I hope in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy to you shortly, to the church at Philippi. So here's Timothy as an apostolic delegate being sent in various places. He's going to go from Rome, where Paul is, to Philippi.

And then Colossians 1.1 also from this prison or house arrest. Paul an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God and Timothy our brother is with them in each case. Next one here Philemon also written from prison. Paul a prisoner of Christ Jesus and Timothy our brother to Philemon our beloved brother and fellow worker.

Yeah. I just have a real basic question. That's wonderful. This is an interesting thing. Paul is under house arrest, but the house arrest just means you're not going anywhere, but you actually have a fair amount of interaction and latitude. That's part one.

The other thing is when we think of prison, my second son's a prison guard in Nevada, and the guys are held down quite tightly. And while outsiders are allowed to help out in various ways and even visit, The main support of that prisoner, food, clothing, whatnot, it comes from the state. That was not true in the Roman era. Basically, if you were in prison in the Roman era and you didn't have outside friends, you're in bad shape because the Romans aren't going to worry too much about feeding you or clothing you or if you get sick or something, they don't care. Other people are coming and going. He's having all sorts of visitors with him, Timothy included, people bringing him things, people that are interacting with him.

He would be chained to a Praetorian guard, this would be kind of like the royal echelon of the Roman soldiers. He would be chained to a Praetorian guard, but otherwise free to talk and visit and write and that kind of thing. So he's under house arrest, but lots of visitors coming and going, still able to talk and interact and write letters, dictate letters. Yeah, all those were still ongoing.

And it's because it's a house arrest situation, not a tight nailed down prisoner situation. And also because of the character of things at the time, where it was typical to have people come and bring things to you or take things from you even in those days because otherwise the government isn't going to foot the bill. You better hope you have some friends. Does that help? Yeah. Okay.

Let's take a look here at 1 Timothy. Now this is getting into the books that we're studying. 1 Timothy 1, 2 and 18 and 6, 20. To Timothy, my true child in the faith, grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father in Christ Jesus our Lord. So this command I entrust to you, Timothy, my son, in accordance with the prophecies previously made concerning you, that by them you fight the good fight. Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to you. Interesting, this word entrust gets used a couple of times in that one letter. When something is entrusted to you, how does that strike you? What do you think? It is entirely put under your responsibility. You've got it, right?

What's interesting is when you look earlier at Timothy, Paul's taking him alongside and spending time with him, and if he leaves Timothy somewhere, he leaves him with somebody else, now he's saying, Timothy, you're the guy. I'm entrusting things to you. Not to you and this guy, to you. So Timothy has been brought from a point of initially, okay Timothy, look, you've got to learn these things, and watch me, and you're alongside somebody else, to Timothy, this is now entrusted to you. So you've seen Timothy go through this process where at first he's the learner, then he's learning alongside and seeing other examples, and then finally he's at a point where, okay, I'm entrusting this to you. This is now yours.

Yeah? Yes, and we're going to continue to see evidence of that. He did have an issue with timidity and being scared. And it's one of the reasons why Paul not only writes about that in various ways, we see it in several places and we'll see it as we go through the books.

There's not only that, but he also says, you know, Timothy, I charge you. And he didn't say that to Titus. So he's wanting Timothy to understand, look, you've got to carry this out, don't back off because you're feeling afraid. You may have a tendency to be timid, don't. Yes?

Along with that, I think with Paul teaching Timothy, as Timothy gains confidence in God's Word, there's probably a more less timid behavior and less fear. Here's something else that Paul had spent time with him enough to know what are the things that Timothy is challenged with. What are the things that Timothy is challenged with? For each of us, the Lord is bringing us to things so that the Lord challenges those things where we need to grow.

One way to put it is, in terms of our circumstances, the conforming, we need what's happening to us. That's one way to put it. We need what's happening to us. That's one part. We also need the teaching that we're getting. We need that. The Lord has deliberately put us with opportunities and with resources and even circumstances, and those are not accidental.

And notice all the different things that were going on with Timothy. These are not accidental. Yeah. Did Barnabas disappear out of scripture after the first missionary journey? Do you know? No. And as a matter of fact, that's something we're going to take a look at. Very interesting. Barnabas is another fellow who has a very special role Let me quickly summarize what happened.

Here's Barnabas, he goes with Paul on his first missionary journey, and John Mark, the author of the Gospel of Mark, John Mark, goes with them, and what happens? He has a blowout, right? And he bails in the middle of this missionary journey. Well, but then the next thing, second missionary journey, Barnabas wants to take John Mark, and what does Paul think of this?

No, no. We're not doing that. We've already seen that. But what's interesting is that the indication is that Barnabas does work with John Mark, and later on you see John Mark writing the Gospel of Mark. You see both Peter and Paul spending time with him. As a matter of fact, we're going to see as we study through this that Paul even asks for John Mark. That's what's amazing about this. So what that's telling you is this guy Barnabas is a very special guy with a special ministry. where he was the one who kind of stood up for Paul and said, nope, this Paul guy is okay. He's alright. You guys need to listen to him. He's not coming in here trying to trick anybody. You need to listen to him.

And then he works with John Mark, who flamed out on the first missionary journey to the point where Peter is working with him. and he is writing one of the gospels, and Paul is actually asking for John Mark to come. This Barnabas guy is amazing. What's interesting is his name does not come up prominently after that, but the impact of his ministry, which goes on quietly, is phenomenal. It's amazing. Here is John Mark, the flame out, that after ministry with Barnabas, is now a guy that two different apostles have significant association with, and Paul, who first said, I don't want that flake going with us on this journey, is later on asking for the guy. Barnabas had a cool ministry.

Is that also a picture of it, the gift of edification? And Eric Clayton coming alongside. He's that picture, right, in Scripture? Yes. He comes alongside, a son of encouragement. The ministry of Barnabas is not loud and prominent, but it is astounding.

Here you have this flame-out, flaky John Mark, who turns around to be someone very useful. and one that the Apostles have significant call for and contact with as time goes on. So anyway, that's a quick address. We're going to continue to look at that as we go through this study here. Let's quickly wrap this up. Here's Paul in 2 Timothy, writing to Timothy. Paul's last letter that we have, possibly his last letter, period.

And then Hebrews 13.23, take notice that our brother Timothy has been released.

That is, that Timothy has now spent some time in prison, apparently not afraid, huh? Right? Apparently not afraid to stand out there, and even at the risk of going to prison, yep, that's what he does. So it sounds like Timothy has even learned something, right? He doesn't back away from the trouble out of fear, but instead has learned what Paul has been trying to teach him.

Yeah? In Timothy 1 where it says avoid worldly, empty chatter and opposing arguments, also called knowledge, So could it be that maybe that was part of his thing, too? He was listening to what other people were saying and getting kind of freaked out? Yeah.

What you see Paul exhorting Timothy about is a good indication of, one, what's happening, and two, what are Timothy's issues? He's trying to address, of course, both. Here's what you're going to run into, and here's what you have to deal with in your own life. So yeah, good point. And these kind of things are going to be valuable observations for us as we go through.

Yeah. Okay, on your map here where it's got Tarsus? Yes. And I assume that's, well it's Galatia, so that's Turkey. Right. So I assume that's Paul's birthplace, right? Tarsus, yeah, is where Paul's from. So he went through there, what, on his second birth? What's interesting is he goes through Tarsus, but there's not any indication that he spent a lot of time ministering there. But that is his hometown. Isn't that curious? It is.

And if he was a Pharisee, would that mean that his father was probably a Pharisee too? Not necessarily, because his father is one who would have passed on his tent making ministry. As a matter of fact, there are some indications of where his father would have gotten actually well off from selling tents to some of the military activity there. But Paul was trained under Gamaliel. who is mentioned in the New Testament. His grandfather was Hillel, a very well-regarded and well-known rabbi.

It seems to me, if Paul did not even say anything during the time that they spent together, Let's pray. Lord, as we look at Timothy's life, we can see how he went from being in a compromised household, a Greek father and a Jewish mother, a compromised household, to becoming a believer in Christ, to being selected by Paul to travel with him, to being mentioned and in some way co-authoring a number of books in scripture, and even being mentioned for the last time in Hebrews, having learned some lessons about things that Paul had been trying to instruct him on. And we thank you for the example of Timothy, and we thank you that he was a man who quite evidently grew spiritually, and a man who learned the lessons that he was being taught. And we pray that we would learn from him. And we thank you for seeing in the pages of scripture, seeing Timothy conformed, seeing Timothy transformed. and growing in you. And we do thank you for these things. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.