“As I urged you when I was going to Macedonia, remain at Ephesus so that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine, nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies, which promote speculations rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith.”
1 Timothy 1:3-4 ESV
The truth about God in Jesus Christ must be constantly fixed in our minds. The “speculations” that stand against the truth of the gospel, that is by faith, is nothing less than the purity of the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Only this truth, that Jesus Christ died for our sins, and that we’re free only in Him, free from the penalty, power, and presence of sin, is the basis for Christian living. If we miss this we’re like a firefighter who plays with matches and smokes in bed.
Or like a Cowboys’ fan. Sorry. Just kidding.
Real love is the preaching of the gospel and the constant living reality of moving within the sphere of grace into which we’ve been saved. This means, by way of inference, that real love demands the hatred of false doctrine. Blessed be the peacemakers doesn’t apply to those who peddle in the myths and the legalistic nonsense of our day. Peacemakers are those who stand on the sure ground of grace in Christ and the solas of the faith. We’re saved by faith alone, grace alone, by Christ alone and we know this by the Word alone…and all things are for God’s glory alone.
Okay, that said, to see the word “myth” in our text today conjures up images of Greek mythology or perhaps fanciful stories. This isn’t the point and we must not leave it at that. The basis of Paul’s entire letter to Timothy is presented and moves forward from this point. Real doctrine, that is the gospel and all it entails, is true love. Thus, to be ambivalent about truth is to be unloving. Does this mean that we’re argumentative and contentious? By no means. To borrow from Paul’s manner of speaking, then how are we to be saved if we’re hostile in our hearts? Don’t we know that we’re saved not by works, but by grace? A contentious spirit is one that’s either proud or insecure. Both of these eradicated by the truth of the gospel.
The antidote of pride is the knowledge of how much grace we need. Likewise, insecurity is overcome by the fact that Jesus Christ died for your sin…personally…and that He loves you. You aren’t merely pardoned and sent on your way, but adopted as a son. So much personal conflict and worry is overcome when we come again and again (as many times as needed) to the cross to see who we are in Christ. It’s an irony of sin that the most quarrelsome of men are often stricken both by pride and insecurity. The two are flips side of the same coin of sinful self-reliance. But the one who is secure in Christ, aware that the security has nothing to do with their merit, but His grace and love, overcomes both spiritual maladies.
So, as we move on to confront the myths and false doctrine, let’s first remember that the greatest myth of all is that sin isn’t far worse than we think and that, consequently, grace isn’t more amazing then we can fathom. Yes, indeed, if we knew for a second how horrible sin is, how truly ugly and repugnant, we’d weep with all our soul. And why don’t we know this? It’s because the holiness of God scares us and offends us so we suppress it. This is the greatest myth of all. Yes, evolution is a dangerous myth. Yes, false religions and all that. Yes and yes. But they all proceed from the first cause, which is the suppression of the divine nature and eternal power of God that’s clearly perceived in creation. God is awesome. God is divine. God is utter and sheer power and beauty and truth. And sin is, therefore, so immensely ugly and so profoundly untruthful as to bring down the just wrath, in all His power, of our righteous God.
But we get grace.
Oh, how we get grace.
We speak sometimes of this thing called “common grace” – you know, the sunshine or personal talents in the saved and unsaved alike. But there’s nothing common in God’s gifts and it’s an unfortunate turn of phrase even if necessary. Nothing about God is common and he or she who treats Him, even for a moment as such deserves, when you really think about it, instant death. I know, I know…this is an amazing and fearsome thing to hear. Even in church! God’s holiness, His perfection, isn’t a popular subject with sinners. It’s something we like to suppress. On the one hand we’re terrified of Him and on the other, we’re loathe to consider how holy He truly is lest we face our sinfulness.
Nevertheless, the slightest sin – even failure to appreciate a sunset to His honor, or give thanks for a sip of good coffee – deserves His response. Our low view of God’s holiness is our greatest lie (myth). And Paul’s letter to Timothy starts the way it does precisely because Paul knows this. A human letter is full of praise of man; a letter inspired by the Holy Spirit is founded on the truth of the gospel and obedience of faith, lest any man may boast. No man is fit to confront error in Christ unless that man is truly humbled before Christ. No man can reprove others with godliness unless his heart is first broken in thousands of irredeemable pieces because of remorse over sin and then miraculously knit back together by the loving hand of the Father. None of us is doing God a favor. None of us acts as His counselor. None of us is the indispensable man or woman of the church and it’s the one who knows it’s grace and only grace that’s of true use. And none of us is useless to Him either because it’s God who gives gifts.
And that’s the amazing thing about the opening of Timothy. It starts with praise of God. It stands up upon the foundation of the faith – which is salvation through faith alone, lest any man is tempted to boast. It states plainly that this doctrine is the key to it all. And then, in love, because love has been poured into our hearts, we confront error and urge others to come to Christ.
The gospel of Christ should be everywhere in our lives and thoughts. It’s the starting point upon which the pastor, teacher, elder, deacon, man, woman, boss, worker, and anyone else in creation, builds their life. And it’s the direction in which all of our work points.
For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things.
The man or woman who’s not gospel saturated is going to miss all this. They’ll do “work for the Lord” that builds houses of straw, dwellings of self glory, condos of contention, apartments full of domination and confusion. The man that isn’t more concerned with how his sin impacts those around him, and who doesn’t marvel that he’s saved at all is in no wise fit to confront error because he, in fact, lives in it still.
Ah, but we get grace and so much mercy. We get it because He died for us. That we aren’t crying great tears of joy every second of our lives is due to on one hand practical concerns, yeah…but worse, because we become convinced that grace is common. And in turn that God’s awesomeness and divine nature are common as well.
Before we move on to confront the errors of culture we must check our souls first. We must “sanctify the Lord Jesus in our hearts” (1 Peter 3:15) and regard Him always as the perfect preeminence that He surely is. We aren’t called to have false piety but a true and logical view of sin’s horror. Only in this way do we come to see God’s mercy in Christ in anything close to the right way.
And this is the wall that separates us from being arrogant or contentious with others. Later we’ll read about gently rebuking and exhorting. None of that is possible if the attributes of sanctification, gained through a steady diet of feasting on the incredible reality of grace – the miracle of it in our daily lives – isn’t there. True love manifests itself in those who seek the glory of Christ in all things rather than getting their own way. A contender for the faith seeks to win others to Christ, not their own way of thinking. A useless controversy is one that doesn’t end at the cross to the glory of Him who saves us.
The Enemy’s work is through lies and distortion. The myths are the false beliefs of the time…the dominant ideas raised up against the truth about God. And the great myth is that sin isn’t so bad because that leads to the horrific thought that the cross isn’t the most important thing to ever happen. For this reason we pray that the Lord opens our eyes and hearts. For this reason we cry out to Him so that we behold wonderful things from His word, that is, that we begin to think of the world according to His precepts, not our own. And we cry, “Father, conform us to the image of your Son, who died for us, and washed our feet.”
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