Word Picture

...the glory of Christ, who is the image of God
(2 Corinthians 4:4 – ESV)

In 2 Corinthians 3:18 we are told that those who are beholding the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory. And we are told that this change is by the Spirit of the Lord. We were made in the image of God, but that image was marred by the fall of man into sin. Now when we are born again, we begin to be transformed into Christ’s image. As we behold Him, the Spirit of the Lord changes us. The question is, how do we “behold” Him?

In this passage and our text above, the word image is “icon”, or picture, figure, representation. There are some churches that believe in having pictures that depict biblical persons or scenes and relics and such. They say they don’t worship them but they venerate, or revere them. I’m not so sure about all that, but in any event, that isn’t what the Apostle Paul means when he says we are to behold Christ.

We don’t become more like Jesus by looking at pictures we made, but by looking at the picture God has drawn, the “Word” Picture. The most beautiful pictures made by man can capture a sense of but not the substance of the real thing. However, God through the miraculous inspiration of the Holy Spirit gives us something of the substance of His Son in the words of scripture. In the bible we see Christ as He is, not in fullness but in truth. It is untainted by conception and aided by divine revelation.

Those things we think bring us closer to God, like a beautiful sunset, inspiring music, a thoughtful story, etc., are wonderful, and they serve a useful purpose, but the beauty of these things is only a shadow. They do not mediate the revelation of God to us or invoke the presence of God among us (1 Timothy 2:5). If those things inspire us to pray and give thanks to God for His creation and His common grace, then well. If we think those things bring special revelation of the saving kind, or that they are a ticket to the throne room, then we are in big trouble.

We are to come boldly before the throne of God by our prayers, not by our pictures (Hebrews 4:16). When James tells us to “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you ”, (James 4:8 – ESV) he means through the bible, prayer, and resisting Satan, not by looking at some artists conception, or by some means of grace not found in the Word.

The Sound of Silent Music

nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies, which promote speculations rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith.
(1 Timothy 1:4 – ESV)

You might be looking at the verse above and wondering what this has to do with music. Well it is a verse that in context is one of many sections where Paul admonishes church leaders to keep sound doctrine at the fore. When observing and studying the “pastoral epistles” of 1 and 2 Timothy and Titus, we see that Paul continually speaks of sound doctrine, of correction, rebuke, exhortation, public reading of scripture and truth before feelings. They seem to be silent on the style and content of music. In searching through the pastoral epistles you will notice he doesn’t tell Timothy (or Titus) to make sure they have a great praise band!

So Paul wasn’t concerned with music. Or was he? Indeed he was; if Paul continues on and on about doctrine, then the means of which it is delivered must also adhere to his strictures. By his silence Paul isn’t saying anything goes, especially if it is loving, has a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith. No he is saying that good doctrine will lead to those qualities in truth, which would lead to good music choices. He isn’t saying anything goes he is saying anything that goes must go according to his doctrine. When he says doctrine he means Gospel.

He isn’t implying that music isn’t important but he is obviously intending to say that music is secondary, it is an instrument for doctrine, doctrine first, and music as a means of delivery of doctrine. By concentrating on doctrine Paul doesn’t say don’t do music he is saying that all our music should be doctrinal leading to devotional. Right devotion is informed by right doctrine.

Music teaches us something, not just by what it says but also by what it doesn’t. If it is only fluff with no meat it is teaching us that doctrine doesn’t matter. It obviously does to Paul and to God since the NT focuses on teaching, and so obviously the content of our songs of worship must be doctrinally rich if they are to be biblically sound. Paul doesn’t downplay worship with music; he exalts it by exalting the Bible! First things first: in keeping his students focused on doctrine, he is keeping them focused on the content of their worship. It isn’t that “worship” is unimportant, but that it is, so much so that it needs to be seen in the right order. Focusing on the Bible will help us to focus correctly in worship.

Desiring Doctrine

desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions.
(1 Timothy 1:7 – ESV)

Right teaching MUST be under-girded by right goals. What is your desire, to teach the law or to teach love? Is your goal born from a love for being a teacher or from a love for the teachings themselves? Look at the words Paul uses in this passage, right doctrine is more important than personal devotion and desire. Of course there are those who have right doctrine but only in their heads, but right doctrine held rightly leads to right personal devotion and desire.

In their desire to teach the Word they were not really good students of the Word and so not good stewards of the Word. They strayed from the focus because they didn’t stay with the focus as a guide to their study and so they wandered off.

They try and teach strange things they swerve from the main aim and they had impure motives. What they wanted to do was to be respected as a teacher and they go off into areas they know nothing of and they handle the Word wrongly and deceitfully. They are and they become even more overconfident and unteachable (1 Timothy 6:3-5). These people did not even understand the implications of their own teaching. They didn’t have the Law right either and they were missing love. Their knowledge was superficial when they thought it super spiritual. Many think they are going deep but what they’re really doing is just splashing around a lot and making a lot of waves at the shallow end, or worse yet, diving into poison waters.

If you can’t explain the core don’t try and explain more. “I know the core, Jesus died for your sins”, well then is that just the jump off point into more stuff or is it the very life? Can you explain how the Gospel applies to every part of your life? Are you devoted to and desiring to learn that as a disciple? No, well then that is why it isn’t enough for you. The message of the cross isn’t the doorway to more stuff it is the stuff itself. It is the way to love as Jesus loved, and when we do that we fulfill the law from the heart (Romans 13:8-10 / Galatians 5:14).

A healthy church is about a people who love in the right way, they relate to God rightly and therefore to each other rightly. They will be increasing in the knowledge of God’s Word and in the grace of Jesus Christ and so therefore increasing in love and grace toward one another.

Our job as disciples is not just to find out the difficult things but concentrate on what we do know already. Are we even doing that? Then why think some new stuff is the key to doing the old stuff? The problem then and now is with people who seem to be or want to be advanced beyond applying the gospel to their own lives. Before you desire to teach some deep truths, you must be devoted to doing sound doctrine in your own life.

Stray Sheep

Certain persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain discussion,
(1 Timothy 1:6 – ESV)

These certain persons stray from teaching those qualities that issue from good doctrine, they go from a pure heart, good conscience and sincere faith into vain discussions, silly distractions, and such. They are straying from a love for the truth, and led by their desire to be teaching so-called deep truths. Paul is telling Timothy that he is down in the depths and that he has been given the deep truths, and that if others are trying to go “deeper’ they are leading people astray.

Looking at 1 Timothy 1:4,6,7 we see that the evil that the enemy sought to introduce, with regard to doctrine, had a twofold character; fables of human imagination, and the introduction of the law into Christianity. The first he dismisses as human folly, but the second he explains in verses 8-13, because the law does have its proper use. The law is to bring us to Christ.

In 2 Timothy 2:25-26, Paul appears to speak of believers who have been led astray through false teaching. Satan thus strives to hold people captive to do his will by deceiving them to believe what is false and misleading. If nothing else, this text emphasizes how crucial sound doctrine is. Elders must rebuke but eventually may need to remove those who lead others astray.

True love is never served by compromising the truth. There is no greater expression of love for another than the willingness to make painful and unpopular decisions for the sake of bringing an errant brother into the light. Greater love has no one than this, that someone lays down his life for his friends (John 15:13 – ESV). Lay down his life for his friend, willing to be wounded because of the backlash, waiting for God to vindicate the position and the truth of the friendship. Long term compassion for them rather than short term comfort for you.

Paul is saying, “Timothy, some of the sheep have wandered away, and you have to go get them and bring them back. You may die in the short term, but they live in the long term. You have to go and pick up the strays, even if they bite you at first.”

Doctrine Discerns

The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith
(1 Timothy 1:5 – ESV)

They say “doctrine divides”, well I like to say it better, doctrine discerns. The Word of God discerns (Hebrews 4:12), its teachings discern, not our feelings as foremost or other qualities, but the Bible and its teachings, and we line up and mature and grow in our discernment as we grow in God’s Word, and then we can discern more accurately (Philippians 1:9-11).

That is why we have some people, who know the Word of God in truth, these people can instantly know if some things are wrong, because they see something that doesn’t line up with biblical teaching. It is not those who get a spooky feeling about it, but those who have renewed their mind and been trained over time to discern. It isn’t their discern-o-meter, or some overtly mystical thing, but that their biblically informed conscience is working well. Yes, it can start out like a “check this out further”, or “check” in our spirit, but our goal should be to go from the “check” or “something doesn’t seem right” experience to the “I know this isn’t right because” experience, and this can happen as we get to know true doctrine more clearly over time.

It is okay, and actually it is very good if we sense something isn’t quite right, and we can’t quite put a finger on it, and so we go and check it according to the Bible (Acts 17:11). It is a right thing to do to test things (1 Thessalonians 5:21), but we want to grow up in God’s Word so much that we know it so well that we can test things quicker and more accurately and we can put a finger on it immediately. So the test isn’t if something seems pure, good, or sincere, but if it matches correct doctrine. A love for the truth, that is what Paul was teaching Timothy, and that was what the false teachers were and always are straying from.

Not that these things are the measure of good doctrine, but that Paul was wanting Timothy to teach good doctrine, and so the love, etc. would be in accordance with godliness. Purity, conscience, and sincerity are not the arbiters of truth. True doctrine will lead to a love that is truthfully pure hearted, has a truthfully good conscience, and a truthfully sincere faith, a true faith grounded in truth. One can be loving, pure in devotion, have a seemingly clean conscience, and be sincere, but still be wrong. Paul isn’t saying that these qualities are what make up good and true doctrine. Paul is saying to stick to true doctrine, as he has taught, and then you will be loving out of a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith.

It is not that good doctrine issues from these qualities but good doctrine will issue out these, true love issuing from truth. Ask yourself; do a truly pure heart, good conscience, and sincere faith come from us or from God, from being grounded in His truth or from our own efforts? Yes, we want sincere faith, a good conscience, and a pure heart, which will result in true godly love, and these are acquired through God Himself, and He relays these through the renewing of our minds by the truths of the Gospel, by true and right doctrines. We must learn to discern.

Loving Doctrine

The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith
(1 Timothy 1:5 – ESV)

Right teaching MUST be under-girded by right goals. The love Paul is speaking to Timothy of is a love that issues from the right source. We aren’t all the way there yet, but this is where we are to be going toward, and those other things, the myths and endless genealogies (1 Timothy 1:4) and the different doctrine (1 Timothy 1:3) lead us the wrong way, bad doctrine makes for bad practice. These things must be in the proper order; it is not that being good in practice means we necessarily have good doctrine (it can be a shadow for a while) but that right doctrine held rightly will lead to right practice.

We need to see clearly what Paul is saying to Timothy here. He starts in verse 3 by charging him to focus on good doctrine, and tells Timothy in verse 4 to stay away from those myths and such that aren’t a good stewardship of the faith. Then here in verse 5 he says that love is the target, but that it issues from certain things, and these things are the result of good doctrine.

The foundation is faith (vs.4) and the end result is love. Correct stewardship of the faith, correct doctrine (vs.3), will lead to correct and true love. Those qualities, a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith, are the wellspring of the love Paul speaks of, and they issue from a correct understanding and faith in true doctrine. And what Paul had taught Timothy was correct doctrine, which is what we need, and we don’t need new things Paul didn’t teach.

The charge is good doctrine, that is the first thing, not that if we find our way to these qualities, or that if we come to these ends, that our doctrine is okay, but that we need our doctrine to line up rightly and these qualities will be okay. Paul tells Timothy why he needs to be concerned with correct doctrine, so that these other qualities will be right. True doctrine will result in a pure heart, good conscience and sincere faith that will make for true love. If someone or something looks like true love, but it doesn’t come from true doctrine, if they don’t have true doctrine they don’t have true love, no matter how it looks or works.

The aim of the charge is love, but not any old type of love, but love that issues from these qualities and that love is made by doctrine. If someone seemingly has these qualities, but not true doctrine, it isn’t true love that issues forth. The charge is about right doctrine, and the aim of having right doctrine is having the right love, which issues from these qualities, which have been formed by the stewardship of faith, correct doctrine.

Again lets get the order right, so that we can have discernment, and so we don’t fall for a counterfeit. Good doctrine, the doctrine of the Apostles, the doctrines Paul taught in his epistles, it leads to a truthful state, one that has a pure heart, etc. and from this comes true love. Paul makes the connection between doctrine and godly love clear in this passage. We can see people do all sorts of good things, and they are good as far as helping humanity, but if these people organizations, religions etc. do not have the right doctrine then that love is only born out of common grace, not out of godly love, and not out of the stewardship of true, saving faith.

A Muslim or a Mormon can have a pure heart toward their god, a good conscience, and be sincere and love out of those things, but it still wouldn’t be a true, godly love because it isn’t done from true doctrine. Paul is saying to stick to true doctrine, as he has taught, and then you will be loving out of a pure heart, a good conscience, and a sincere faith.

Stay in the Corner

As I urged you when I was going to Macedonia, remain at Ephesus that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine,
(1 Timothy 1:3 – ESV)

Paul was admonishing Timothy to stay in Ephesus and to stay with the scriptures. Paul had already talked to Timothy personally about it, now he puts it in writing. The importance of doctrine cannot be overestimated. Just because it seems that false doctrine is pervasive and truth is scarce and no one is listening or learning doesn’t mean it is time to leave.

Certain persons were overthrowing the faith of many, and it is important that true shepherds and true believers contend for the faith, fight the wolves, correct, rebuke, admonish and exhort one another, rooting out those little pet doctrines that have ingrained themselves into individual lives and spread out unawares to others in the congregation.

What would be the “different doctrine” Paul was warning about? It would be anything not echoed by the New Testament writers, or logically derived from New Testament concepts, something that wasn’t related to the Gospel. Trying to reinvigorate OT types and shadows as offering some sort of new blessing is speculation at best.

Paul’s concern was not primarily that Timothy himself would begin to teach wrong doctrine. His concern was that Timothy would allow others to spread false doctrine. He had to stand firm against difficult people. No wonder he might have felt like leaving Ephesus. He wasn’t to present doctrine as an option; he was to command it like a military officer.

Timothy was to continue in the doctrine as Paul had taught; something new wasn’t something true (2 Corinthians 11:4,12-15 / Galatians 1:6-9). This applies to us just as much today as it did back then. Of course even old doctrines can be new to our ears. We do need to teach the old doctrines in ways that engage our lives today, but they aren’t new truths.

The old paths laid out for us in the bible have all we need for faith and practice. People who are looking for excitement and who are into novelty and those who are overly emotional want to say that to stick with the scriptures is to stay in a rut. Yet it would be a colossal mistake to underestimate what is being said here by Paul and in the New Testament. Paul is saying that there is absolute, unchangeable, spiritual truth, and that the Apostles were preaching it, and that they had a corner on it! We aren’t in a rut; we had best stay stuck right there in Truth Corner.