Our Scripture Portion.

(1 Tim. 1:1-171Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the commandment of God our Saviour, and Lord Jesus Christ, which is our hope; 2Unto Timothy, my own son in the faith: Grace, mercy, and peace, from God our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord. 3As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine, 4Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: so do. 5Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned: 6From which some having swerved have turned aside unto vain jangling; 7Desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm. 8But we know that the law is good, if a man use it lawfully; 9Knowing this, that the law is not made for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and for sinners, for unholy and profane, for murderers of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, 10For whoremongers, for them that defile themselves with mankind, for menstealers, for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing that is contrary to sound doctrine; 11According to the glorious gospel of the blessed God, which was committed to my trust. 12And I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that he counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry; 13Who was before a blasphemer, and a persecutor, and injurious: but I obtained mercy, because I did it ignorantly in unbelief. 14And the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. 15This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief. 16Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting. 17Now unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honor and glory for ever and ever. Amen. (1 Timothy 1:1‑17)).
The writer of this article addresses you assuming that you have opened your Bible at the verses indicated above and are going to follow him with your eye upon the passage. Consequently all long quotations of Scripture are avoided and mere references cut down to a minimum.
If you do not read with the Scripture open before you it is hardly likely that you will derive much help from your reading.
Read carefully. Read prayerfully. Read thoughtfully.
THE epistle before us is the first of a group of four which were written by the Apostle Paul to individuals. They were all written rather late in the Apostle’s life of service, when declension was becoming pronounced in the church, and consequently the heart of that devoted man turned more especially to reliable and trusted disciples who stood firm when others began to slip. This imparts a certain general resemblance to the four, though each has its own clearly marked features.
We might perhaps characterize them as follows: —
 
1 Timothy. The Epistle of godliness.
 
2 Timothy. The Epistle of courage.
 
Titus. The Epistle of sobriety and soundness.
 
Philemon. The Epistle of Christian courtesy.
At any rate godliness — or piety as some translate the word — is stamped very distinctly upon the epistle we are now to consider, as any concordance will show. It becomes a very urgent necessity when spiritual life is on the decline.
In his opening verse Paul presents his apostleship as proceeding from God our Saviour — not from Jesus our Saviour, as we might have put it. He is going to bring before us the living GOD as both Saviour and Preserver (2:3; 4:10) and so he commences on this note, and presents the Lord Jesus to us as our hope. When declension sets in it is well for us to know a living God as our Preserver, and to have our hopes centered not in churches, bishops, deacons, nor in a man of any kind, but in the Lord Himself.
Having saluted Timothy in verse 2, Paul at once reminds him of the responsibility resting upon him as left at Ephesus during his absence. Already some were beginning to teach things which differed from the truth as already laid down. These strange doctrines were of two kinds, “fables” (or “myths”) and “genealogies.” By the former term Paul indicated ideas imported from the heathen world, even though they were the refined speculations of Grecian schools; by the latter, ideas imported from the Jewish world in which genealogy had played so large a part. Timothy however was to abide in what he had learned of God and exhort others to do likewise, since the end of what was enjoined was love springing out of a pure heart, a good conscience, and unfeigned faith. This was that which God desired to see in His people.
The certain result of turning aside to fables or genealogies is questionings (vs. 4) and vain jangling (vs. 6). Christendom has largely turned aside to the teaching of fabulous assertions in the name of science on the one hand, and on the other to genealogies connected with religious succession, apostolic and otherwise, with all the ritualism based thereupon, consequently the religious arena is filled with questioners and resounds with the uproar of vain jangling. What God aims at producing, and does produce where the truth holds sway, is love, and what is ministered is “God’s dispensation which is in faith.” The A. V. reads “edifying” but evidently the correct reading is “dispensation” or “house-law” — the alteration of one letter in the Greek word makes the difference. Love furthers all those things that God has ordered as the rule of His house.
The “commandment” of verse 5 has nothing to do with the law of Moses. The word is virtually the same as the one translated charge in verse 3. Verse 5 states the object Timothy was to have in view in the charge which he observed himself and enjoined upon others.
There were those at Ephesus who were enamoured of the law and desired to be teachers of it, and this leads the Apostle to indicate the place that the law was designed to fill, of which these would-be law-teachers were entirely ignorant. The law was not enacted for the righteous but for sinners. Hence to strenuously enforce it upon those who were righteous, because justified by God Himself, was not a lawful use of it. Paul does not pause in this passage to state that which the law of Moses was designed to effect. It was given to bring in conviction of sin, as is stated in Romans 3:1919Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law: that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may become guilty before God. (Romans 3:19); verse 20; and Galatians 3:1919Wherefore then serveth the law? It was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made; and it was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator. (Galatians 3:19).
The law itself is “holy and just and good” (Rom. 7:1212Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good. (Romans 7:12)) whatever men may do with it. Verse 8 of our passage states that if lawfully used it is good in its practical effects. If wrongly used, as by these law-teachers, it works mischief, though perfectly good in itself.
Let us all be very careful to use the law lawfully. It is a most potent instrument of conviction for sinners. It deals unsparingly with the terrible list of sins given in verse 9 and 10, but besides all these there were other things which the law did not specifically mention but which were contrary to all sound teaching, and the Apostle alludes to these at the close of verse 10. Only notice that he does not say, “contrary to sound doctrine according to the holy standard established by the law” but, “according to the glorious gospel of the blessed God,” for the gospel sets before us a standard of conduct more lofty than the law.
The law did not set forth the maximum, the utmost possible that God could expect from man, but rather the minimum of His demands, if man is to live on the earth; so that to fall below the standard set, in one item on one occasion, was to incur the death penalty. Now however the gospel has been introduced and Paul was entrusted with it. He speaks of it as the “glorious gospel,” or more literally, “gospel of the glory” of the blessed God.
There is for the present moment but one gospel, though spoken of in various passages as the gospel “of God,” “of Christ” “of the grace of God” “of the glory of Christ” and as in this verse. So also the one and the same Holy Spirit is variously characterized in different passages. This is in order to teach us the depth and wonder residing in both the many-sided characters that they wear. How striking then is the character in which the gospel is presented to us here, and how suitable to the subjects in hand!
What could exceed the moral filth and degradation of those who had come short not only of the law but of “the glory of God” (Rom. 3:2323For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; (Romans 3:23))? Their portrait appears in verse 9 and 10. Then in verse 11 Comes “the gospel of the glory of the blessed God” followed in succeeding verses by the dark picture Paul gives of himself as an unconverted man. Look before and look after and we see nothing but the shame of cursed and unhappy man. Into the midst comes the glad tidings of the glory of the blessed, or happy, God. A contrast indeed!
The Old Testament has told us that, “it is the glory of God to conceal a thing” (Prow. 25:2) so that busy and inquisitive men are baffled in their researches again and again. Our New Testament passage tells us that it is also the glory of God to reveal Himself in the magnificence of His mercy to rebellious sinners; and the latter glory is greater than the former. If any ask, what is glory? We may answer, it is excellence in display. The Divine excellence may be displayed in such a way as to be visible to the eye, but on the other hand it may not; yet the glory of a moral and spiritual sort which reaches the heart by other channels than the eye is no less wonderful. When Saul of Tarsus was converted a glory smote him to the earth, blinding his eyes, but the glory of that exceeding abundant grace of our Lord “with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus” (vs. 14) opened the eyes of his heart without dazzling the eyes of his head, and that is the glory spoken of here.
The sin of Saul of Tarsus abounded, since full of ignorant unbelief he aimed in his injurious antagonism directly at Christ Himself, by blasphemy and the persecution of His people. Hence he was, and he felt himself to be, the chief of sinners. The abundance of his sin was met however by the super-abundant grace of God. Did ever the glory of divine grace more brightly shine than when the rebel Saul encountered the risen Saviour? We think not. Yet we all owe our salvation to the same glad tidings of the glory of the blessed God. We all have reason to sing,
Oh! the glory of the grace
Shining in the Saviour’s face,
Telling sinners from above,
God is light, and God is love.
By the time this Epistle was written not a few crisp statements of truth had passed into sayings. “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners,” was one of these. It is endorsed as faithful and worthy of all acceptation―hall-marked as it were — by the Apostle’s own experience as the chief of sinners. No sinner is beyond the grace and power of a Saviour, who could deliver such an insolent, persecuting blasphemer as he.
How all this shows up the folly of such as were desiring to be law-teachers, and landing their votaries in vain jangling. How weak and beggarly is all that beside this!
Now the astonishing mercy extended to Paul was not shown him for his sake alone but that there might be set forth the extent of divine longsuffering. His was a pattern case showing the full extent of the Lord’s dealings in mercy, lifting him from the depths of verse 13 to the heights of verse 12.
Think for one moment of his conversion as recorded in Acts. Jesus had just been made Lord and Christ in resurrection. The early apostolic witness was rejected in the martyrdom of Stephen. Saul played a directing part in that outrage and proceeded forthwith on a career of violent persecution. From his lofty seat in heaven, clothed with irresistible might, the Lord looked down upon this outrageous little worm of the dust and instead of crushing him in judgment converted him in mercy. Thereby He gave a most striking delineation of His gracious ways and of the extent to which His long-suffering would go.
Henceforth Paul becomes a pattern man. Not only a pattern of mercy but a pattern to believers. He exemplifies and shows forth the truth in its practical workings in the hearts and lives of the people of God. It is because of this that again and again in his epistles he calls upon his converts to be followers of himself.
The more majestic the Person who shows the mercy the greater the depth of the mercy displayed. Hence the Apostle views God in the height of His majesty and not in the intimacy of relationship. True, God is our Father as revealed to us in Christ. We do stand in this tender relationship as His children: still He is, “the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God” and this enhances the wonder of the mercy which He showed to the Apostle and to us. In response to such mercy Paul ascribes to Him honor and glory to the ages of ages.
Surely we too feel impelled to join in the doxology and add to it our hearty “Amen!”
F. B. HOLE.