The Work

Just grab our bibles, grab our bibles and turn to sewod Timothy chapter two,

Second Timothy chapter two. And you're like, what I thought we were

doing romans these days, Well we are, thank you. We're taking a

quick detour, very quick into Second Timothy chapter two because reasons. And if

you don't have a Bible, just raise your hand, and we are passing

those out right now. And if you don't have a bulletin, that's gonna

be helpful too, because there's a place to take notes. So just raise

your hand, keep it up if you need a Bible or a bulletin,

and turn with me to Second Timothy chapter two. We're going to be in

verses one through six, one through six, and I'm going to ask our

sister to come and read our sermon text for us, and then we'll just

jump right in Second Timothy one Thruce two, Versus one through six. You,

then, my child, by the grace that is in Christ Jesus,

and what you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, and

trust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also share and suffering

as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. No soldier gets entangled and civilian pursuits

pursuits since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him. An athlete

is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. It is the hard

working farmer who ought to have the first share of the crops. This is

God's work, it's men. I want to start by making a distinction between

following Jesus and helping other people follow Jesus. Now, the thing about that

distinction is they can't be separated. Following Jesus involves, like, unless you're

five years old, Following Jesus involves helping other people follow Jesus. It's a

part of the life. And helping other people follow Jesus, well, that's

got to entail following Jesus. Otherwise that's hypocrisy. Right, So the work

that includes the life, right, But for our purposes, without separating those

two, I want to draw a distinction between the life following Jesus and the

work helping other people follow Jesus. Again, you can't separate them, but

I want to draw that distinction because this morning, what we're going to get

into is about the work. It's about helping other people follow Jesus, which

is the work for all of us. It's the work for all of us.

And what I want to do this morning is I want to give you

a vision, a biblical vision of the work, or perhaps remind you of

or refresh in you, a biblical vision of the work of helping other people

follow Jesus. And when I say biblical vision, I do mean to contrast

that with sort of a contemporary idea of helping other people follow Jesus that has

become very consumeristic and convenience oriented and has a very casual approach to eternal things.

My desire that we would catch a biblical vision of what it really looks

like to help other people follow Jesus. And I mean to do this,

I might get amped up. I might sound like a coach in a locker

room at some points. I don't mean to scold. I really don't.

I'm I'm excited to actually point you to something that's way more rewarding and way

more satisfy. It the kind of vision of the work that we can give

our lives to. And TWI Timothy is a book about things you can give

your life to. Paul's writing to his protege Timothy from death row, and

he's reminding Timothy of this vision of the work that was worth giving his life

to and will be worth Timothy giving his life to, and Timothy's trainees,

and those trainees trainees, and the trainees trainees of the trainees, and worth

giving their lives to, worth us giving our lives to its. Essentially,

he tells him this, and this is for us too. Your hard disciple

making work will be rewarded. Your hard work of helping people follow Jesus will

be rewarded. So this morning, our roadmap is very simple. We're just

going to walk through this sentence sort of piece by piece as it corresponds with

the content of these verses. Right, We're going to start with disciple making

work, and then we're going to talk about it being hard, and then

we're going to talk about it being rewarded. And when I went over this

at home, it was long. So I'll preach fast, you listen fast,

and we'll go out and buy an apple pie. So let's jump Your

hard disciple making work will be rewarded. Let's talk about disciple making work.

How should we think about the work, How should we conceive of this work

of helping people follow Jesus. Well, look at verse two. Why you've

heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, and trust to faithful men

who will be able to teach others. Also, now quickly, I want

you to notice that this is about gospel teaching. Right. The work is

about gospel teaching. It's about what you've heard from me. Like verse eight

of the previous chapter, this is about the testimony about our Lord. This

is the good deposit to be guarded. Right, Disciple making work is about

passing on gospel teaching. It's not about expanding a social club. It's not

about promoting a political ideology. Gospel teaching is the focus of disciple making work.

It's about our passing on the testimony about our Lord. Okay, I

want us to notice that first. But what I want to really focus in

on is that this disciple making work, what I want you to notice,

how I want you to conceive of and get this vision in your mind of

this disciple making work is a multi generational dynamic. A multi generational dynamic,

and by that I don't mean biological generations. I'm not talking about grandparents,

parents, child, grandchild, right, I'm talking about spiritual generations. Do

you see it there? In verse two, I'll use my fingers to demonstrate,

Timothy, what you've heard, what you have heard from me in trust

to faithful men who will be able to teach others also. So in one

verse, Paul is already discussing this multi generational dynamic with four generations in view.

What you have heard from me and trust to faithful men who will be

able to teach others also. You see it, right? This is why

two Timothy two to two is the theme verst for our small group ministry,

right, because as we gather together in small groups, we do mutual ministry,

for sure, but that's not all we do. We're not just doing

mutual ministry. We're also multiplying leadership, right as small group leaders look out

for apprentices in whom they can entrust more ministry, and that small group then

multiplies, and now we got two small groups and two small group leaders who

are looking for people to entrust to it. Tell works, it's a multi

generational dynamic, which is why, which is why I can do this thing

and ask you to give me a name for this object. Apple's a great

name. I think Apple is a great name. For this object, you

could also call it an apple tree maker. Yeah, and what you could

call an apple tree perfectly good name for an apple tree, you could also

call an apple maker. So then this could be called the maker of apple

making apple makers, just depending on how you looked at it. If you

had a multi generational dynamic in view. In other words, what you would

call a disciple perfectly good name a Christian, you could also call a maker

of disciple making disciple makers, because that's what the work looks like. It's

a multi generational dynamic. Are you tracking with this? Are you getting that

picture? Because that picture's key. You don't have this picture. The whole

thing about how this goes is lost and you're a part. You are a

part of the whole dynamic if you're a Christian. So how do you live

this out? How do you play a part with the part that you have?

Well, it kind of depends on where you are in that dynamic.

Right now and I say right now, because it's always on the move.

You get that right, You know it's always on the move. Not if

you know it's always on the move. I have no place in here where

I tell you it's always on the move. Like it's not in my notes.

I just want to make sure you know it's always on the move.

You were playing one role in that dynamic and then lo and behold, you're

playing another role in the dynamic, and that's just maturation. Okay, But

how you live this out really depends on where you are right now in the

dynamic. And so let's let's just start with start with its kind of the

newest kind of being in the newest in the dynamic. The others. Also,

if you look at the verse right right, you pass on faithful men

teach others also, So the younger or the younger in the faith, how

do you live this out? Really, it's about being humbly teachable. It's

about being humbly teachable if you are, if you are young or younger in

the faith, it behooves you to be humbly teachable, receptive, not naive,

not gullible to false teaching, but a learner. You know, whenever

young women ask me about some young man that they're considering dating or getting serious

about, one of my first questions is how teachable is he? Some of

my first questions because I'll just tell you if a young person is teachable If

a young person is humbly teachable, they will grow fast, they will mature

fast, and they will be a joy to be dating or married. Too.

If a young person is not teachable, or someone who's young in the

faith is not teachable, they will not grow fast, they will not mature

fast, and they will be a pain to be dating and married. To

teachability. But if you're in a different place than the dynamic, and again

it's always on the move, and in fact it doesn't even stand still like

ever, like being humbly teachable is a part of like every part of this.

Right, but you might be you might be one who is in this

dynamic the faithful men who are teaching others also, or you could say faithful

people. That word could be translated to people, right, which is to

say, like, this whole dynamic is not narrowed to pastoral ministry alone.

You need to just look at Titus chapter two, like older women teach younger

women. Right, So the whole multi generational dynamic thing is, it's not

narrowed to pastoral ministry or narrowed in any way. This is how it works,

This is how helping people follow Jesus works. And if you're in that

place right now. How you live this out is being faithfully able, just

being faithfully able. By faithful I mean committed to sound doctrine, committed to

sound doctrine, which is not the same thing. It's just exactly the way

you've always believed things to be. It's what Scripture teaches right, committed a

sound doctrine and able, faithfully able, and ability is proven by activity,

right actually doing the thing of investing in others. Older Christians can I have

a word? Younger Christians need us to engage them. It doesn't have to

be complicated. You can simply listen and observe to whatever spiritual struggle they voice

in small group or spiritual aspiration that they voice in small group, and then

just follow up with them and see if they they've got time for lunch the

next week, Ask them how it's going, encourage them from the scriptures,

ask them if they need help. They might, they might ask for help

from you. And suddenly, suddenly, there you are about the thing of

faithfully teaching others. Also what you've learned about following Jesus. Suddenly you're helping

somebody else follow Jesus. And you don't need a lectern, A plate of

enchiladas will do. But y'all, us younger Christians need us to engage them.

This should be a practice. This should be a habit. This isn't

a just this week because Josh preached about it sort of thing. This is

a habit, an ongoing thing for life. Well, there's another place in

the dynamic, right the others also the faithful people, that you could be

at the place where you're like Timothy in this dynamic. The place that Timothy

is in this dynamic is about in trusting ministry to people. And if you're

at this place in the dynamic, that is really the way you live this

out is by wisely intrusting, wisely in trusting, the helping of other people

follow Jesus to others who might not be you, to help them follow Jesus.

You're engaging with others, helping them follow Jesus and in some way sometimes

passing them off to others who can help them also. And the key is

wise and trusting. Why is in trusting? In trusting is how multiplication happens.

In trusting is how the multiplication of ministry and the multiplication of leaders,

the multiplication of churches and the multiplication of impact happens. But it's whyse in

trusting right. He says to faithful men, this is the good deposit that

Timothy is charged to guard. That means, that means a big part of

the work at some point is assessing and evaluating. It's kind of an intimidating

role. I can testify that I have not always done a good job this.

Once upon a time I was teaching Bible classes in a in a big

church in Austin, Texas, and I was done just teaching Bible classes.

I was launching Bible classes. It was a big church, so it was

launching Bible classes for a certain demographic, like adults in the young adults in

this age range, and and and then I would I would bring in a

co teacher, and then I would hand the class off to that co teacher,

and then go launch another Bible class for that church in another age range,

and grab a co teacher and hand off that Bible class. I had.

I had the multiplication vision. I was ready to do some intrusting.

But there was one young man who was a really gifted communicator, and I

didn't assess very well his commitment to sound doctrine, and after handing the class

off to him and in fact going to another part of the city to help

plant a church, so I wasn't even a part of this bigger church anymore.

He began to teach false doctrine, and I met with him multiple times

and tried to persuade him otherwise. I met with the church leadership, and

fortunately that church leadership was able to remove him from that teaching position. But

I'm the one who put him there, or they put him there based on

my vouching for him, and I will never forget that lesson. It's the

kind of experience that causes the word faithful to jump out in bold text in

this passage. And there is a time for you in this whole dynamic of

how we go about helping people follow Jesus, where the role that you may

have is wise and trusting. Embrace it, don't shy away from it.

Be wise. Now, the last role in this four generational dynamic here is

Paul. Right, there's Paul. What you've heard from me, Timothy,

and trust to faithful men, and and and here's the thing. If you're

at that point death row, which we will all be on death row in

some form or fashion. The role is this, be gloriously replaceable. Be

gloriously replaceable. Right in a different prison, at a different time, he

wrote, to die is gain. To remain would mean faith fruitful labor.

For me, to remain would mean fruitful labor. But to die is gain.

One of the glorious things about a ministry where you're putting people's eyes on

Jesus is that when you get hit by a bus, the people's eyes never

have to wavern. You put their eyes on Jesus, and they stay right

there, even while they're eating potato salad at your funeral reception. And it

is a glory. It's a glory to do the work, but it's a

greater glory to be replaced. And to sing from the old hymn, farewell,

my friends, A do A do. I can no longer stay with

you. My glittering crown comes into view, and all is well, And

as your heart sings that to know that the good deposit entrusted to you has

been entrusted to those replacing you with responsibility and care and faithfulness, what is

more glorious than that, especially when you know that your departure is quite inevitable.

So what is the work? Far from merely a consumeristic once a week

Bible lessons sing along that we just attend. It is a spiritually multi generational

dynamic that we are all a part of, and in it we get humbly

teachable, and we get faithfully able, and we do wise in trusting,

and we are gloriously replaced. Hallelujah. We are makers of disciple making,

disciple makers. But here's the thing about that. It's hard. I heard

one clear, amen. I heard others going, We're going to admit that.

Amen. It's hard. It's hard. It's supposed to be. And

that's key to understanding this work. It's hard. Look at first three share

in suffering as a good soldier of Christ Jesus. What kind of suffering is

he talking about. He's not talking about just suffering in general, not even

talking about persecution. He's talking about the suffering of hard work. Right.

He uses these three metaphors of hard work right here, Soldier, athlete,

farmer. He uses the same metaphors in One Corinthians chapter nine, and in

both cases carry the idea of dedication and integrity and diligence. That's the suffering,

dedication, integrity, and diligence, So in verse four he uses the

metaphor of a soldier. Look at verse four. No soldier gets entangled in

civilian pursuits, since his aim is to please the one who enlisted him.

Right, helping others follow Jesus will entail dedication devotion. If you allow yourself

to get into angled in the things of this world, you may find that

you are not on this mission at all. It reminds me of the parable

of the soils from Mark four. Jesus says that the word is sown,

scattered like seed. And there are some who receive the word, and they

take it in, and it finds root in them, and they are dedicated,

and they follow Jesus. They take up their cross, and they follow

him, and they help others follow him, and they produce thirty sixty one

hundred times what was sown. Praise God, Who's for that? Thirty sixty

hundred thirty sixty hundred. Jesusays there are three other types, though. There

are those who they just reject the word. The word comes, they reject

it. Others who seem to receive it, they're like forgiveness, Heaven,

sign me up. But when it comes to taking up their cross. When

the hard things come, they're like, ah, I know, I didn't.

I didn't. I didn't realize it was like that. And then that

other group. Also, there's another group that seems to take in the word,

but when it comes to their devotion, their faith, or at least

the fruitfulness of their faith is choked out like a plant amongst weeds. And

Jesus says, and here's what chokes out that plant, the cares of this

world, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things. And I

can just pretty much guarantee you if you're caught up in the cares of this

world, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things, you are

not going to do much in helping other people follow Jesus. You will forfeit

thirty sixty one hundred, and you may be forfeiting Jesus. It takes devotion.

It's hard. Also this also integrity. Look at verse five. An

athlete is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules. Helping others follow

Jesus is going to entail integrity, like running a marathon without like shortcutting the

course. You know, there are people who cheat at marathons. There really

are those people. Somebody looking at you. The only marathon runner I know

in here that is never cheated, to the best of my knowledge. There

there's actually an organization that investigates marathon cheaters and it's headed up by a guy

named Derek. Derek Thomas, Derek Murphy, Derek Murphy. Here's what Derek

Murphy says about marathon cheaters. He says, it's almost never premeditated. I

mean, there's some elaborate schemes, but it's almost never premeditated. People are

just usually just doing something really, really hard, and they make a snap

decision. Their brain goes, it would just be a lot easier to just

off, they go. It just be easier to do this. It'd just

be easier to let integrity slip. And so Paul says to Timothy in his

earlier letters, keep a close watch on yourself and the teaching persists in this,

because it's going to be a lot easier to just it'd be easier to

silence people harshly in this work of helping people follow Jesus, right, but

we're instructed to confront opponents with gentleness, to endure patiently. That takes integrity.

It'd be easier to just take a few verses out of context to prop

up a point you're trying to make. I'm sure this point is biblical.

But in the work we're instructed to study so that we make sure we're handling

scriptures along straight lines takes integrity. It's hard, and in the work of

helping people follow Jesus, I guarantee your brain at some point is just going

to say it'd be easier to just expect it and then with integrity, finish

the race well. Lastly, he compares the work to being a farmer.

This is about diligence verse six. It is the hard working farmer who ought

to have the first share of the crops. Right, Helping people follow Jesus

will entail diligence. Diligence. I suppose that there are endeavors where it doesn't

really matter if you work hard or not. Right, there's not a big

difference between just showing up and showing up with a plan to really get something

done. There probably are endeavors like that. Farming is not one of them.

I can tell you good farming means good hard, hard work. So

if you're a landowner and you wanted to see your land produce. What you

wanted was hard working farmers in your fields, because when it comes to fruitfulness

and health and multiplication, there is a world of difference tied to hard work,

tied to diligence, and making disciples is one of those endeavors where there

is a world of difference between just showing up and showing up with a plan

actually gets something done. The form does not equal the function. You can

gather for small group and actually do very little in actually mutually ministering to one

another. You can have an accountability partner and have very little accountability. There

is a way to do this that's just phoning it in, just showing up.

And don't get me wrong, showing up is better than not showing up.

With showing up, at least there's hope an opportunity keep showing up.

It's like it's like the spare tire, the donut, right, You're just

like I don't know, I don't I don't got anything, but I'm going

to show up. It's like you put the doughnut on the car and like

I'm still moving forward. There's a time for that, and if that time

is now in your life where you're like, I'm just going on sheer willpower

and just showing up. Praise God. He is strengthening you to show up

and the opportunity will arrive and suddenly you'll find that you've gone from phoning it

in to leaning forward and helping other people follow Jesus. Keep showing up and

diligence. The diligence that you stepped in is going to look like following up

with people. It's going to look like praying for them. It's going to

look like noticing things, observing things that you can encourage in their life,

or even confront talk about diligence. That makes it hard. And one thing

I'd like to point out to those who tend to overwork, diligence does not

mean frantic busyness or neglect of rest. Right, we're giving a Sabbath principle.

Your body, your mind, your soul need real rest. As a

different sermon, Right, frantic busyness. If frantic busyness is sucking the life

out of your own following Jesus, how do you think frantic busyness is going

to be the way to help other people follow Jesus? Yeah? Different sermon.

So know to those things, but understand it's supposed to be hard.

We ask ourselves that right is helping Jesus, helping people follow Jesus supposed to

be this hard. It's helpful to know the answer, because we'd be tempted

to quit. Right, So, small group, bleeder, when you get

that group me at ten minutes to seven o'clock, that so and so is

just not feeling it. Just look at your spouse and say, it's supposed

to be hard. When older woman, when you're meeting with a younger woman

and she is making all kinds of foolish decisions when it comes to men,

and she's using spiritual sounding nonsense to justify herself, and you go home discouraged.

Just remember it's supposed to be hard. But don't miss this. The

strength for what is hard doesn't come from ourselves. It comes from the grace

of Christ. Look at verse one right For you, my child, be

strengthened by the grace that is in Christ Jesus. We do not rely on

our own strength. We are not putting any trust in what we can accomplish

in ourselves. The results are up to God, and He has new mercies

for you every morning in the work. It's supposed to be hard, but

he gives you the strength. Now lastly, and I'm late, so we

can't miss this. Your work is going to be rewarded. You see the

rewards in each of these metaphors, right. This is the good soldier who

gets the commendation. This is the athlete who gets the trophy, who gets

the crown. This is the farmer who gets the guaranteed payout. This is

what the Holy Spirit is saying here that yes, this is what disciple making

looks like. And it's hard, but it is rewarded. And Paul himself

is holding him He's holding himself out as an example. Rising. Look at

me. I'm finishing the race. It's been hard, but I'm about to

receive a crown. And the one who place that crown on my head will

be the one who did the hardest thing of all. He received the most

stunning betrayals. And I was the work, and you, Timothy, were

the work, saving us, forgiving us, taking judgment in our place.

And that's you and me too. And now you and I get to step

into that work. And it's hard, but we will see the one who

did the hardest work, and we will receive our crown from him. We

get the reward from him. And you say, well, what is it?

What is the reward? I have never known a single biblical writer to

be really picked about that concern, and neither of mine. Here's what I

know. If it's Jesus that's rewarding the work, like he has shown me

his sweetness and generosity in the middle of the day out in the field,

I can't imagine the lavishness of the feast in the evening in the master's house.

I trust his rewarding. Let's not forget we will be rewarded for our

hard disciple making work.