1 Timothy 1:15-17

Hey, welcome back with us as we close out the week in 1 Timothy,
not quite the end of
the first chapter, but as we move toward the resolution of chapter 1,
we continue today starting with verse 15.
This is,
if 1 Timothy has some sound bites versus you may have heard,
this is one that
comes up in worship now and then,
it’s a part of some liturgies.
It is also a moment,
we’ve talked about this before,
in fact, we mentioned it yesterday,
in Paul’s writing he does have these moments where he kind of
almost gets caught up and
he gets very emotional and he gets almost liturgical and we see that here at the end
of our passage.
So, let me just start,
we’ll jump in here in verse 15,
“The saying is sure and worthy
of full acceptance that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners
of whom I am
the foremost.” That, Michael, this is really interesting in that on one hand,
we have straight gospel theology,
Jesus Christ,
it is sure,
it’s worthy of full acceptance,
take it to the bank,
Jesus Christ came for the purpose of saving sinners,
but then Paul makes it biographical,
of whom I am the foremost,
I am the chief sinner.
Paul has used language like this in other letters,
so this isn’t unique,
but it is interesting
because Paul wants the readers to understand,
not just Timothy, but the others who will hear this letter,
that he considers himself the most unlikely to have been called into
Christ’s service.
With his history, he mentioned that yesterday in that passage,
he now says,
“I am the foremost
sinner.” That’s no small phrase,
that carries a lot of baggage.
I think it’s very interesting the way that Paul personalizes his own relationship with
that larger theological statement.
Yeah, I think that we sometimes miss the force of that,
to be honest, Clint, the extent to which Paul hinges his authority,
not on his personal merit,
not on the work that he’s
done.
By the way, we miss this, maybe especially us Protestants with our focus on salvation by grace,
which is certainly a Pauline idea,
but I think we miss the extent to which Paul could rightly claim
authority of the subject matter.
I mean, Paul is obviously well studied.
Any scholar who has done work on the book of, say,
Romans is going to tell you that
Paul is a thoughtful individual,
he’s a well-read individual,
and in many ways he’s a generative
individual.
When he makes an argument,
Paul’s not just repeating party line,
he’s doing some new
work, and his work has become the literal foundation level,
the backbone upon which
we as Christians now stand as people of faith.
So looking at this phrase,
Clint, I want to note,
when he says that Jesus Christ came
to save sinners, and then he adds himself of whom I am the foremost,
I think that that
does two things.
First of all,
it makes a rhetorical case.
In other words, it is to say that Paul is putting himself in a position of leadership
over these false teachers.
He’s of course a mentor to Timothy,
and he’s saying that he doesn’t deserve that position.
It’s rather been given to him by grace,
and he’s been saved by the one who gave it to
him by no merit or work of his own.
So I think there’s a leadership aspect at play.
But I also think there’s an example aspect.
When Paul,
the Apostle,
writes to Timothy,
his mentor,
and says that he,
Paul, is a sinner, I think we as the reader, as a Christian,
take from that, and rightly take from that,
an invitation to find ourself in the same kind of relationship,
that we too are sinners,
that we too are the ones who Christ came to save,
and that our understanding of the law,
our understanding of what it means to be Christian,
should be informed by the reality that we too, like Paul,
are the ones who Christ came to save.
It’s not them,
it’s not those people,
however we define them,
it’s us.
And that’s an essential element of receiving the gospel.
Yeah, just two quick things about this single verse.
I’m not sure there is a better summary of Paul’s understanding of the gospel than the
first part of this verse.
The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance that Jesus Christ came into the world to save
sinners.
That’s a wonderful encapsulation of how Paul understands the gospel.
The purpose of Jesus Christ
is to save sinners,
and that is true.
That is trustworthy.
That is acceptable.
And then the second thing here is very subtle of whom I’m the foremost.
This is, of course, humility on Paul’s part.
It is indicative of his understanding of who he is,
both by himself and in Christ.
But
you also have to understand it stands out against the backdrop of teachers who have elevated themselves.
Remember that in this first chapter,
we’ve had Paul refer to teachers of the law who
think they have some secret knowledge,
who think they understand something,
who stand above those they would teach,
as if they alone know this
truth, this hidden truth, and they have to uncover it for others.
And Paul is being an example of exactly the opposite.
Look, I’m not standing above anybody.
Jesus came to save sinners,
and I’m the worst sinner.
I was a blasphemer.
I was a persecutor.
I was a man of violence.
I don’t have any special knowledge of anything.
I have been saved in Jesus Christ.
And because I’ve been saved in Jesus Christ,
that’s what I can speak about, and that’s
what I can teach.
And I think he doesn’t come out and say it,
Michael, but I think this is a significant
contrast to those that he’s not happy with.
Yeah, right.
And in many ways,
Paul often makes an argument that is intended to undo his opponents.
And in making that argument,
he also shows the path forward.
And to your point,
I think the simple word to define this claim is humility.
Paul,
I think sometimes he does use humility to make a point against his adversaries.
But here, I think as a reader,
this is true spiritual exemplar kind of work,
that he’s making the case to Timothy,
who is a leader.
This is how you lead.
And I think that should inform our reading of it.
Yeah, so let’s move on here the next verse 16.
But for that very reason,
I received mercy so that in me, the foremost,
Jesus Christ
might display the utmost patience.
Making me an example to those who would come to believe in him for eternal life.
So this is along the lines of what we heard yesterday.
I received mercy as the worst sinner.
Christ showed me mercy that he might display patience to others,
that he might make me
an example of those who would come to believe in him.
Not quite.
I mean, Paul’s not playing the martyr card here.
But along the lines of if Jesus could reach into my life in the place that I was and with
the things that I was doing,
then it should be,
it should inspire confidence in others
that Jesus can reach out into anyone’s life.
And I think, you know,
Paul believes that and Paul is preaching.
So there’s some overlap of those things.
But again,
Paul reaches into his personal experience and says, “Jesus was supremely
patient with me.” And that’s an example for all who would come to believe in him for eternal life.
And notice,
again, very subtly,
that whenever Paul is going to talk about what do you need to be saved,
it’s never secret decoder rings.
It’s never mix this passage with this passage.
And if you squint at it just right,
you’ll begin to see it.
It is clear.
It is obvious.
It is completely knowable.
It is understandable.
It is the gospel of Jesus Christ.
And for Paul,
it’s that simple.
And not only is it that simple,
but that’s the thing that must be understood.
Now, Clint,
wouldn’t you say in some ways,
verse 15 here,
this saying is sure worthy
of full acceptance.
“Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners.”
This is, I think, one could make an argument at least,
the linchpin argument for Paul,
that fundamentally Jesus had a purpose.
It wasn’t an accidental kind of discovering of his identity.
It wasn’t that Jesus one day woke up and decided that he needed to do good in the world.
He wasn’t just a great teacher on a mission.
I think he would make the very firm case that Jesus was single-minded in his purpose
to save the lost.
When Paul says, “I count myself as chief among those,” Paul is making the case that I think
we see fleshed out in so much of his other work that ultimately it’s not about our status.
And it’s not about where we start,
whether we grow up in a Christian home or not.
It’s not about even the fruit of our conduct.
We know that our choices have consequences,
and the choices we made long ago have ways
of still reaching into our present,
but when Paul looks to Jesus,
he sees mercy that has come by grace,
by Jesus’ own purpose and his own determination.
Clint, to your point,
that sounds really, really elementary.
That almost sounds like first grade Sunday school kind of material.
To Paul’s credit, he doesn’t need to use fancy words to communicate his point,
but if you’re going to look deeper,
what may appear to be shallow is the depths of the gospel.
And maybe, as we turn to verse 17 here in a moment,
we’ll see
that there is a lot of
beauty in what Paul’s sharing,
and it is a cause of celebration.
It moves the spirit,
at least I think it should if we read the text rightly.
It should move us to the same gratitude that Paul experiences.
One of the upsides of what we’re doing going just a couple of verses at a time is that
it hopefully gives us an opportunity to kind of dig in and hopefully share some depth in the passage.
One of the downsides is it’s easy to disconnect with what we’ve already seen,
because even just a few verses ago,
that may be several days.
But remember,
early on in this chapter,
we had that list of sins,
right, of lawbreakers.
The law is not for the innocent,
but for the godless,
the sinful, the unholy, the profane, the murderers of father, mother, the purgers,
et cetera, et cetera.
Now,
what, again, if we look at this in the backdrop of Paul’s theology,
what do we see?
The law is to convict us of our sin.
Jesus is to save sinners.
So again, we have for Paul a clear hierarchy.
The law is not unhelpful,
but the law’s help to us is in pointing us to the necessity to
be saved in Christ.
All that the law can do is show us that we are unlawful,
to show us that we are sinners,
to show us that we have broken it.
The law is only a mirror to convict us,
and having been convicted,
we then must turn past
the law to Christ,
because what did Christ come to do?
Save sinners,
including Paul,
who counts himself among the chief of them.
And as Paul considers this,
as he kind of retells this,
he is moved to one of these
moments of praise.
So let me read it here,
and then we can unpack it a little bit.
To the king of the ages,
immortal,
invisible,
the only God,
be honor and glory forever and ever.
Amen.
And when Paul puts an amen in,
you know that he’s done this.
We saw this in Romans.
We saw this in Philippians.
We see these moments where Paul kind of is moved to an almost lyrical,
an almost liturgical
kind of moment,
to the king of the ages,
immortal,
invisible, the only God,
be honor and glory forever and ever.
In reflecting on what God has done in Jesus Christ,
Paul can only stand in awe of it,
and only can give praise of it.
And, you know,
I don’t know.
These are the moments where I just really appreciate Paul,
and I think that he helps
us both at a theological sense and as a
devotional sense as well.
I don’t know if you agree with this,
Clint.
I think the danger sometimes of studying the Bible is that we dissect it,
and you know that you have to kill a thing to dissect it,
to open it up,
to break it into parts.
But sometimes we get into the words,
you know, what did that word mean,
or what does this
grammatical structure mean, or
what does it mean in this context?
Now, all that’s important.
I mean, don’t get me wrong,
but sometimes it’s worth stepping back,
right?
And let me put this up.
Look at verse 17.
It’s worth seeing the
laudatory,
joyful,
uplifting of beautiful words.
I mean, this is prayer at its best,
a kind of adoration,
a kind of thanksgiving.
We often find that words fail us.
You know, we don’t know what to pray,
or we don’t know how to say thank you.
You know, Paul comes to a moment in his writing where he just sets aside the argument.
I mean, this doesn’t advance his point.
It doesn’t help Timothy grow as a leader.
It doesn’t help him address these conflicts within the church.
Those conflicts remain.
But for a moment,
Paul’s moved.
And as readers, I think it’s okay,
not only okay, I would say, it is an important measure of our reading of the scripture,
that we stand under them,
ready to be inspired and taught by them,
that at some moments we, like Paul,
will be lifted up
and say thank you, God,
to the one, to the only one who could have done this or planned it,
to the one who goes beyond all time and all ages, right?
Paul steps back to see the grandeur for just a minute.
And I think as a reader,
we can do the same.
And if you do that,
for just a moment, just step back.
Clint, it is inspiring.
It’s beautiful.
The idea that Jesus would come with but one purpose,
and that is to save sinners
of whom we are included,
that is an incredible plan.
And if we really allow the force of it to hit us,
I think we would join our words with Paul’s.
Yeah, and I certainly understand what you’re saying,
Michael.
This isn’t instruction for Timothy,
but I do think it’s instructive because Paul
believes deeply that ultimately the gospel will always point back to Jesus Christ and
through Christ to God.
And so at some level here,
I think Paul is displaying,
if not outright saying,
he is displaying the reality that preaching and teaching that points back to the teacher
is incomplete,
that the best preaching,
the best teaching, the best theology, will not be about the one who gives it.
And again,
think in the background.
There are these men who are out there saying,
“We have this thing figured out.
We know the truth.
We understand it.” And Paul says, “Look, that’s not it.
If you want to follow the gospel,
that is never going to point at a person.
Even myself,
the chief of sinners,
that’s going to leave you considering and reflecting on
the work of God and Jesus Christ.
And to that, we can only say,
“Amen.” And I do think by framing it that way,
it must encourage Timothy to kind of keep the main thing,
the main thing.
Because Timothy might think,
“Yeah, this is about dealing with all of these issues.”
And they do need to be dealt with,
but this is really about something far bigger than that.
It’s about what is the nature of the gospel in the church,
and how does it come to people,
and what does it do to people who receive it?
Yeah, I think that’s really,
really helpful, Clint.
And I think maybe as we sort of think on this section of text that we addressed today,
I do think there is something instructive as Paul turns autobiographical, as he uses
that “me”
language. So the same for us.
There’s a sense in which we too might learn that we are tempted in our daily life to allow that
circle to revolve around our own experience,
our own friendships, our own work, our own problems, no matter how small or great they might be.
What Paul does here is make it clear that above and far beyond,
both temporally and spatially,
all of those problems that we’re aware of is a God who has a master plan at work.
And if we truly believe in that plan, I mean, Clint,
I think it would inspire us as disciples,
as Christians,
to return thanks to express a kind of awareness of God’s greatness,
as we see Paul doing right here.
Yeah, and I don’t want to run us over on time,
Michael, but I do think maybe one last word
potentially would be helpful.
I think it is
helpful at the risk of unpacking,
I guess.
This word “save” is important, but sometimes misunderstood.
In the church, we sometimes read that as synonymous with “go to heaven.”
But this Greek word “save”
means more than just the state of our souls after we die.
It is a word that has a sense of wholeness,
a sense of life.
When Paul says he came into the world to save sinners,
he doesn’t just mean get them into heaven.
He means fill them with something,
fill them with depth,
with genuineness,
with joy, with peace, with wholeness.
This is a big word,
and because of the way we’ve sometimes used it in the American church
or in the history of the church,
sometimes we make it a small word,
and I think we do it
a disservice because it is far larger a concept than we sometimes read it to be.
Yeah, I think that’s very fair.
I think that the occasion will come in this book to flush that out even more.
Yeah.
Well, friends, thanks for being with us on a Thursday.
We hope that this finds you well wherever you are.
Hope it encourages you and inspires you,
and we look forward to seeing you next week
when we continue on through First Timothy.
But until then,
be blessed.