Godliness and its trials

You would turn with me to 1st Timothy. 1st Timothy chapter 4. Let's read the context beginning with verse 6. 1st Timothy 4 and verse 6. If thou put the brethren in remembrance of these things thou shalt be a good servant or minister of Jesus Christ nourished up in the words of faith and of good doctrine whereunto thou hast attained but refuse profane and old wise fables and exercise exercise thyself rather unto godliness or god bodily exercise profiteth little but godliness is profitable unto all things having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come. This is a faithful saying unworthy of all acceptation.

Let's read in 2nd Timothy chapter 3. 2nd Timothy chapter 3 verse 10 but thou hast fully known my doctrine manner of life purpose faith long-suffering charity patience persecutions afflictions which came unto me at Antioch at Icodium at Lystra what persecutions I endured but out of them all the Lord delivered me yea and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. I think that's all I'll read. I've had this upon my mind for a number of weeks.

Two expressions in Timothy, 1st Timothy and 2nd Timothy. A little expression in chapter 4 of 1st Timothy. Exercise thyself unto godliness.

And then in 2nd Timothy chapter 3 all the determined to live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. I'd like to speak to you about the exercise that we should have for godliness and the difficulties of that pathway. I hope you and I appreciate that among all the desires that we might have in our life all the purposes that we might aim for and all the ambitions that sometimes control us and direct us in our pathway there's a great ambition that we ought to have that should supersede everything else that is a desire to be godly.

There's a great need for godliness among us. I see and I'm sure others can see as well that there's an increasing attitude of casualness, of complacency, of you might say going about the motions and outwardly living a life that is conforming without the inward reality of genuine longing desire to live godly. I take it that's a great emphasis that the Word of God places upon this subject.

In fact you'll find it emphasized I believe from the very beginning to the end of our Bible. The book of Psalms begins with that first Psalm that does not use the word godly but it's evident that that's who he's speaking about. And he describes a pathway of the godly and makes it very clear that that pathway is a contrast with the ungodly.

And I would take that first Psalm as really indicative of the entire character of the Psalms because if you read those Psalms without even using the word godly or ungodly you would find that there's a definite contrast that the Psalmists are giving us between those that are living a life that truly pleases God and honors his name and those he says that are the ungodly in the world. Chapter 4 verse 3 just as the first time you find that word godly in the book of Psalms he says regarding the godly he says those are the ones who God has placed for himself. God places a great emphasis upon that.

I believe we need to realize it is still the emphasis of the desire of God for you and me today and in very simple terms and I don't want to be very complicated in speaking about this, it's very practical. That's really what God's desire is for each one of us. You notice in this verse in first Timothy chapter 4 he says there are two things that are imperative as he writes to Timothy.

He says refuse and he says exercise. Both of them are in the present imperative tense. That indicates it's not a once-for-all act but it's a continuation that needs to be maintained.

It should be the characteristic of our life. He says refuse. He says refuse rather profane and old wise fables but exercise thyself unto godliness.

Now I've been asking myself and I'll ask you in this meeting is that really sincerely and honestly the highest desire of my heart? I hope it is. I wouldn't be able to tell you that in all honesty it always has been but I feel a great need of it in my soul today and before anything else happens in your life and mine we should have a great longing to be godly. First Timothy of course is in the environment of a local assembly what has house of God character.

It's not the house of God but it is of the character of house of God that is maintaining and displaying a character of life, a manifestation of the person who dwells in the house. We're associated with him. The one who is the most godly person that ever lived and walked in this world.

Chapter 3 and verse 16 certainly emphasize that. He says great is a mystery of godliness. There's never been a greater display of the reality of what godliness really is apart from the Lord Jesus.

There have been many godly men that have lived in the past but none could rise in comparison with the Lord Jesus Christ and yet as we said this morning there's a certain mystery about his humanity and all that he was as he moved before men and perfect representation of all that God was. I've noticed in this epistle that Paul writes to Timothy both of them I should say that there's an emphasis upon the need for godliness. Second Timothy perhaps is emphasizing more the individual aspect of it.

First of all but he's looking at the collective aspect of how it's important. In first Timothy chapter 2 he says that while we live in this world that we have a responsibility not to vote necessarily in elections and I don't believe in that. I don't believe in voting by the way.

What he does say we're to pray. Pray for all men and for all those who are kings and those who are in authority that we might live a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and honesty. We find again in chapter 2 and verse 10 that he speaks about women sisters in the assembly and how they would display godliness by their attitude and by their attire and by their actions.

Practically displaying that and we read also in chapter 6 he says godliness with contentment is great gain. Far greater than anything else that we could gain in this life is to have godliness and be content. You know why a person is godly is content is because their lives are centered not upon possessions and not upon the things that are material.

They're centered upon that which is pleasing to God and honors the Lord Jesus. I think that when you read in the book of Proverbs you don't read the word godly so much perhaps never but you read an expression that is very similar and you'll find it in the first chapter in verse 6 he says the fear of the Lord is the summit of wisdom. Our Bible says the beginning of wisdom but I think the word really is a thought it's the highest point it's the highest attainment of wisdom and those that are truly genuinely wise recognize that this is a priority and it must be expressed in the life.

I want to very simply look at six different points in relation to this subject that's been on my mind and I won't use the P's I'll use the D's. I want to think about the definition of godliness. You say what is godliness? Well as I've said already one expression that comes very close is the fear the reverential fear of the Lord.

A reverential attitude toward the Lord that motivates and controls and defines a character and restricts my movements and determines what I do and what I don't do. In fact what I even think about it's the reverential respect and realization of the greatness of all that is expressed by the Lord. One has said that the thought of godliness is the act and the attitude of bringing God into every affair of my life but not acting independently or self-sufficiently or ignoring the fact that I am personally responsible to him in every aspect of my life.

I never remember whether it was Noah or Daniel Webster that I'm quoting but it's one of the Webster boys and they said something that made a profound impact upon me some years ago. That is that this man was asked what most carefully defined the character of the aspect of his life what he did and how he lived. He said my accountability to God.

That's a great principle to regulate a person's life is the fact that we are all accountable to him. You're not your own you've been bought with a price Paul says. So the definition of godliness is the reverential attitude toward God that expresses a realization that he is worthy of the absolute highest expression of my life and he is worthy of my obedience and submission to him including God in every aspect of all that we do.

When you read that first Psalm you'll notice that those three verses they talk about the man that is truly blessed. Blessed in every aspect of the word the blessednesses or the happinesses the contentment of this man. He says blessed is the man and he's marked by what he doesn't do.

He doesn't walk in the counsel of the ungodly. He doesn't stand in the way of sinners. He doesn't sit in the seat of the scornful and I believe those expressions are all progressive in the wrong direction.

He's seen by what he doesn't do and I would relate that to the spiritual aspect of a Nazirite. He's marked by his associations. What he's not associated with remember the Nazirite had to avoid every contact with the dead and those things are in that verse are the aspects of the dead.

Though he says he avoids all of those things he's marked by what he doesn't do. Verse 2 tells us what he does do. Our brother Duncan was telling us this morning the tremendous value of meditation.

Occupation of the soul with the Word of God. He says his delight, the inclination of his heart, the longing of his heart and mind is in the law of his Lord. And in his law doth he meditate day and night.

So his constant occupation is directed toward the value and the importance of the Word of God and how it applied to his life. It's not something he just reads in the morning a chapter and off he goes. I think sometimes we do that.

Of course in our day sometimes people don't even do that. But certainly it's the most necessary thing not just to read but it's vitally important to meditate and allow the Word of God. Let the Word of God dwell in you richly.

In all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs. Singing with grace in your heart unto the Lord. God desires us to have such an inclination.

It's the idea of a man that is leaning toward it because of his strong desire and appreciation for something. Well he says his delight is in the law of the Lord. That's what he does.

That's the mark of the godly. Not only what he doesn't do but his appetite, what he is enjoying, what he is feeding upon is the definition of the godly. He tells about also his appearance.

He shall be as a tree planted, stability, fruitfulness, and all the fragrance of a life that is continually being sustained by the power of the Spirit of God and its refreshment. He shall be like a tree that is planted by the rivers of living water. His leaves shall not wither.

Bringeth forth his fruit in the season and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. There's a description of the godly. I think the three verses following which deal with the ungodly are also describing the godly person by means of a contrast.

He says listen the godly person is not one who is like the ungodly. The ungodly is not so he says. They're like the chaff which the wind driveth away.

No value, no weight, no genuine impact and so far as their life is concerned. You know the chaff was something that was had was just blown away in the winnowing process. It's what's left in the field normally.

No he says that person who was godly is one who has genuine weight and value in the sight of God. And he says the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. It tells me that the godly is a person that has a position that it can enjoy of being accepted in the person of the beloved one and enjoyed fellowship with God and confidence in the things of God.

He says therefore he says the Lord knoweth the way of the righteous for the way of the ungodly shall perish. There's what God desires for your life and mine. Let's not throw that away.

Let's not just minimize that importance but God is emphasizing that continually. That's what godliness should be expressed by in your life and mine. But not only looking at the definition but I want to look at the fact that it's desired.

It's desired by God first of all. That's really why God made man in his own image. God made man in the beginning to enjoy fellowship with him and to live a life that was constantly impressed with the reality of God in his life.

God made man to be God conscious. Sin has ruined that relationship. It's a great desire of God in his entire creation but even more it's the great desire of God for each one of us.

It's a great desire that is seen in all that he has produced, his purpose for man. It's a desire that is seen also in the pattern of the life of Christ. We talked to yesterday, we heard brethren speaking about being like the Lord Jesus.

I wonder if we really want to be like the Lord Jesus. In all the devotion of his life to his God, the perfect obedience to the will of God, the pathway that he was willing to take and submission knowing what was before him. It's a pattern of Christ.

It should be also the practice of the believer. It's how it's the spirit of God in you and me, the one that indwells us, he wants to control us and he wants to have his way to produce in us a character of life that is honoring to the Lord Jesus and pleasing to him. I'm sure you're aware of the fact that any one of us could go through the outward motions.

You know, 2nd Timothy, apart from the passage I read, has no other mention of godliness but it does tell us about those who have a form of godliness but they deny the power of it. In other words they're outwardly appearing to display something that is not genuine, it's not real. God helped us to avoid being like the Pharisees.

They were outwardly conforming to righteousness and legalistically maintaining the standard but there was no heart in it. There was no real desire for it and we can become very much like them in ourselves. It's a great desire of God for us.

Why did he save us? Well you say, well he saved us so we won't go to hell. That's wonderful and that's true but the great emphasis of the scripture is that God saved us so that we might be like his son. He wants to produce that in every one of us.

So God's desire is for us to express that in our lives. I want to think about the distractions of godliness. He tells us first of all that we need to refuse profane and vain, empty, wise fables.

I don't know for sure what he is referring to in the mind of the apostle and spirit of God but I would suggest that it goes back to the first part of the chapter where these kinds of teachings that were prevailing were only distracting the believers for the purpose God had for them. They were the things that were getting them occupied with outward legalistic practices and even Gnostic heresies. He says refuse them.

It could have been referring also to Jewish traditions and the mythical kinds of things that they were oftentimes taught that were embedded in their minds. He says there are those who would come among you. He says that the spirit is indicated that would seek to lead the believers astray, forbidding to marry and to eat certain meats and to be occupied with all these different things.

He said refuse them. Refuse the profane things but also the old wise fables. They may not seem so dangerous perhaps in some ways to the minds of many but he says they're only distractions.

Let me just say to each one of us here today dear brethren and sisters we have many things that would distract us from the desire and the purpose to live a life that is godly. You may be distracted by your own interests and the pleasures of this life. You may be distracted by the political problems of our world and the social impact of all the difficulties that are taking place.

You may be distracted by ambition to gain a great position or to advance in the corporate ladder so to speak or to gain more land as a farmer to have a bigger activity. We can be distracted by all kinds of things because the devil will do everything possible to put things in your mind and in my mind to get us occupied with anything of a lesser character and make us forget that the greatest ambition that God has for us as we might live in view of eternity, that might live in view of seeking to please God. Oh he said they're distractions and that's why he says all the determined to live godly.

That's what you have in 2nd Timothy chapter 3. He says here's the pattern of my life. Here's the way I've lived. Here's the things I have suffered.

Here are the difficulties that I've encountered. He says having that presented to you they that determined or have made it their will to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecutions. You remember in Luke chapter 9? The Lord Jesus describes to his disciples a pathway that is on that's going to lead him to Calvary.

All the difficulties he's going to encounter and Pilate's fall and all the refusal and all the blasphemy and all the physical abuse. Then he says whosoever or if any man determines to follow me, let him take up his cross and follow me. It's a matter of the will.

It's a matter of brethren and sisters of priority in life. It's a matter of determination that that is going to be most important in my life and that is what I'm going to seek to carry out for God. I go in more quickly.

He says exercise thyself unto godliness. That brings me to the point of discipline. I take it that he says exercise because of the fact.

It's simply not natural. It doesn't just happen. Paul is writing here to a man that is addressed as a man of God.

And yet he says there's a need for you to constantly being occupied in exercise. Unto godliness. Now, we always exhorted to exercise.

Good for your body. Helpful for your mind too. But this word exercise was a word that would be indicative of the strenuous activity under a trainer that a person would involve themselves in in order to gain some proficiency or some ability.

It really comes from the idea of being naked. It's a word that is in the Greek language is gumnatso. That is a word that we get gymnasium from.

And in those days those that really wanted to exercise themselves they went to a location where they stripped off their outer clothing or perhaps all their clothing to engage in strenuous directed exercise to gain the advantage. To gain the results that would come from it. In other words it wasn't just a matter of going out for a walk a half a mile every day or something like that in physical terms.

It was involving the intense activity of a directed determined individual that was going to gain something that would be a benefit to his life. Now he says you do that in terms of godliness. A person that did that would only do it because he recognized the importance of it.

He'd only do that because he would realize this is of prime importance. And he wouldn't be satisfied with anything less. And I have to say personally I don't know that that has ever been an exercise of that nature.

It ought to be. I want it to be. But he says you and I as believers need to realize that in our life since God saved us his purpose is that we might dedicate ourselves to determined activity, exercise of the heart and soul to be godly.

Now is it important enough for that? Is it important enough for you and me to determined in all of our heart and soul to be godly? It's discipline. It means saying no to things. It means saying yes to others.

It means submission to the word of God. It means obedience to what the word of God says. It means a determination to live in constant communion with the Lord.

Jesus by the spirit of God. Discipline. Well then I look at the aspect of that involves also development.

Doesn't happen overnight. That word exercise is a sense of continuing to do it. Doing it because God wants us to do it.

Doing it because it's valuable. Continuing. And we ought to be more godly now than we were when we were first saved.

We ought to develop in godliness as we go along in Christian living. And we need to ask ourselves am I really growing in expression of God's purposes worked out in my life? Well it's a wonderful thing. It's that which brings joy to the soul.

It's that which brings blessing to the life. It's that which makes us useful in God's service. It's that which brings honor to the Lord Jesus.

It's that which makes you and me more effective in the local assembly. Well he says exercise. Be continually exercising yourself unto godliness.

He says godliness or rather physical exercise is profitable a little. And we believe that. But he says godliness is profitable in all things.

I mean promise of the life and its effect upon our lives presently. That which is for eternity. The life that now is.

There's benefit in that. There's an importance in it. And God desires it for you and me as believers to identify with the Lord Jesus.

But he also tells us in 2nd Timothy chapter 3 there are difficulties. He warns him. He says all that make up their mind and determine that I am going to live godly in Christ Jesus.

They'll suffer persecution. You might receive persecution from your believing for brother and sisters. You make up your mind to be godly brother and sister.

And there will be others that will find fault with you. You might receive criticism and opposition from your friends. You might find there's even opposition within the flesh would resist that.

And there might be opposition in terms of even physical oppression. He says all that determine, make up their mind and resolve by the grace of God that I will live godly in Christ Jesus. They will suffer persecution.

The difficulties along the way. But God never promises an easy path. We like to choose the easy path.

We like the one that has no bumps and no hills and no difficulties in it. But that's not the pathway that the Lord wants us to take. The pathway of development and growth is against the tide.

It's against the opposition. It's in spite of the difficulties. That's all because of the fact that's what the Lord wants.

That's what pleases him. And that's what will result in eternal reward. Exercise thyself.

Young believers here, I speak to you especially. I look back on my life 62 years since God saved me. I think the wasted time and the useless years that were spent makes me want to weep.

But it's never too late. Young, old, middle aged, exercise thyself unto godliness.