2 Timothy 3:14-4:5 Pastor Nathan P. Kassulke
The Fourth Sunday after Epiphany Sunday, January 30, 2022 “Our Agenda Is the Word of God”
What was Timothy going to do? That was an important question when Paul wrote him the letter we call 2 Timothy, the letter that provides us with our sermon focus for today. Paul wrote from prison. He had written from prison before, but at some points his prison-writing was really more like a house arrest situation. Not anymore. Paul was chained. He had an expectation that he wouldn’t remain chained very long, but that was not because he thought the Roman authorities were going to release him. He had an expectation that this very letter could be the last letter Paul ever had a chance to write. What would Timothy do without his mentor and helper and encourager, Christ’s Apostle Paul? What would he do in the face of false teachings and many other challenges? What would he do as he faced temptations and hardships? And as important as that question was, it’s a question that was answered many centuries ago. The reason we want to consider it is that it helps us answer another important question: what are we going to do? What are we going to do as a church? And what are we going to do as individuals living out our own lives and callings? Paul had an answer for Timothy, and it is the same answer for us. Using a word that has provided our theme for this Sunday, we could sum up the answer to these ever-important questions this way: our agenda is the Word of God. The Word of God is clearly a significant focus in this section of Scripture. The very first exhortation here, late in the last letter Paul would ever write to his “true child in the faith” Timothy (1 Timothy 1:2), was to continue in those things he had learned. In fact, Paul explains, Timothy had known the Holy Scriptures from infancy. What an incredible blessing! Timothy’s mother and his grandmother had been shining examples for Christian mothers and grandmothers to come. They had made it a point to instruct and teach Timothy from the very start in the Word of God, the Scriptures. He could look back on his life and never find a time when he wasn’t aware of God and his Word. That teaching had laid a foundation for his entire life. Maybe that’s the case for you, too. I wonder how many babies have been brought to the baptismal font that still stands in front of this church. And so many of those babies were brought because mom and dad and grandmother and grandfather wanted to raise that child in the knowledge of God’s Word. In other words, that baptism would have been followed up with instruction at church and in the home. And I know that’s not the story for everyone here, but it is for many. But even in that there’s a temptation, isn’t there? There is a temptation for us to move on to something else. In many aspects of our lives, we grow older and hopefully wiser and that means we put away things that were part of our childhood. We have moved beyond them. We certainly study different things in high school or college than we did in Kindergarten. I have yet to meet a college student whose major is “rhyming words” or “single-digit addition.” And we could very well be tempted to think that the Bible stories we learned in Sunday school are not worthy of our consideration now. We could think that Jesus was an important part of our life before, but now it’s time for a new adventure or a new outlook. Timothy could have been looking for the next steps for building a church or the self-help book for the man losing a mentor. Paul didn’t point Timothy to a self-help book. He pointed him to a book about God’s help. He didn’t point Timothy to anything new or different. His critical encouragement for Timothy was this: continue in what you have learned. Continue in the Holy Scriptures. Continue in what you have been brought up in since the very start. And here’s the reason why: Scripture is God-breathed. When we say it is God’s Word, we don’t mean that it is what somebody thinks about God or thought about God. We mean that God determined the very words that he wanted written down for the sake of his people. He breathed those words into the hearts of men he had chosen, men like the Apostle Paul himself. Paul followed in the tradition of prophets who did not say what they wanted to say, but what God wanted them to say. And all whom God chose to write his Holy Scriptures had the Holy Spirit leading and guiding the entire process so that every single word of Scripture comes to us from the very heart, the very breath, of God. Is there any surprise then that it is useful for us? Of course not. It is useful in every way. It teaches us. It rebukes us. It corrects us. It trains us in righteous living. For many it has done so as far back as our memories can stretch. For others perhaps we know the particular time when God’s Word became a part of our lives.
But no matter our situation, the Word of God, breathed out by him, serves its greatest purpose by calling people to salvation. As Paul writes, it is “able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.” As much as Paul wanted to prepare others for his impending death, including the many churches he had started on his missionary journeys, Paul knew that he had salvation ahead of him. His approaching death would be sad for those he left behind, but it would be for him the most blessed beginning of an eternity with his Savior. And that is what he most wanted to share with everyone. Salvation. God’s Word is so vital in our lives because from infancy we were God’s enemies. We were born already steeped in disobedience and rejection of God. We were born on a path that could only lead away from God and could only lead to hell. But God through his Word and sacraments snatched us off of that path and put us on a new one. He gives us wisdom for salvation. He gives us faith in his Son Jesus Christ. That’s the power of the Godbreathed Holy Scriptures. That’s what makes them useful for everything in this life and the next, because anything less than that would fall short of what we truly need. Continue in the Holy Scriptures. Of course, our own sinfulness is not the only challenge we face. Timothy’s own sinfulness was not his only challenge, either. Paul speaks about a time when people will line up to hear things that scratch their itchy ears. That’s quite a picture, isn’t it? When something itches, it will bother you until it gets scratched. You can power through and ignore it for a bit, but that just makes it worse. Itchy ears will hear what they want to hear. They will keep looking elsewhere until they find it. What sorts of things might itchy ears want to hear? Many supposedly Christian churches have drawn large crowds by telling people that Jesus will make them rich or successful. People hear that they can have their best life and have it now and all it takes is faith. That’s not what the Bible says, but it is something itchy ears like to hear. Other ears simply itch for something new or different. They don’t want to hear what they already know. They want something that they find more interesting or more exciting. And many ears itch to hear a message that lines up with something else in their lives, like their political convictions or their understanding of science. What do your ears itch for? Thankfully, God changes us in a way that makes our ears, which could easily itch for sinful things or uncertain things or ultimately unimportant things, into ears that itch to hear about his love and his salvation. There is something the same about the message we hear at church week after week. It’s about the same Savior and about the same salvation. And it should remind us that we are the same naturally sinful people who always need the Savior. But there’s a temptation there for us as a church, too, isn’t there? There is a temptation that if we just say the things people want to hear, we could fill the church and we could fill the church’s treasury. We could make things more interesting or exciting on a Sunday morning. We could make everything about a popularity contest where our own preferences determine what we do and say and sing and how we sing it and say it and do it. But our agenda is the Word of God. We are going to say the things that he says. We are going to correct and rebuke when needed. We are going to do what Jesus directs us knowing that he is going to come back as a righteous judge over all people. We are going to focus on his kingdom. We have been using the term “agenda” throughout our service and even in the sermon today. That word is used in a variety of ways in some specific contexts. We wonder about politicians who have an agenda. We think they might have some hidden motive beyond what they tell us. An agenda is used in meetings like our Ministry Board meetings or Voters’ Meetings. It is a written plan for the way the meeting will be run, the topics that are going to be discussed. Or we might use an agenda, a written planner for our days and weeks, something to help keep track of our appointments. An agenda can be a positive thing, or it can be a negative thing. Our agenda is our plan. It defines our purpose. As Christians, our agenda comes from God. His plan for us and his purpose for us are revealed in his Word. We are not all called to be pastors or teachers, but we share an agenda with a pastor like Timothy even as we carry it out in different ways. Our agenda is the Word of God. The plan and purpose of our lives is to know God’s Word, to live according to God’s Word, and to share God’s Word. May God grant that we all share that agenda according to his grace.
The Text: 2 Timothy 3:14–4:5 (EHV) 14As
for you, continue in the things you have learned and about which you have become convinced. You know from whom you learned them 15and that from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. 16All Scripture is God breathed and is useful for teaching, for rebuking, for correcting, and for training in righteousness, 17so that the man of God may be complete, well equipped for every good work. 4 I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and Christ Jesus, who is going to judge the living and the dead, and in view of his appearing and his kingdom: 2Preach the word. Be ready whether it is convenient or not. Correct, rebuke, and encourage, with all patience and teaching. 3For there will come a time when people will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, because they have itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in line with their own desires. 4They will also turn their ears away from the truth and will turn aside to myths. 5As
for you, keep a clear head in every situation. Bear hardship. Do the work of an evangelist. Fulfill your ministry.