1 Timothy 1:1-4 | Episode # 1194

May 14, 2026

Hope Alive: Applying God’s Word to Your Daily Life

1 Timothy 1:1-4 

I am Chad Harrison, and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and had been serving as a pastor for over 25 years. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word verse-by-verse and find God's will for your life. The purpose of studying scripture is that you might know the character of Jesus Christ, and that you might see the world from the Father's perspective. That you gain wisdom that changes your life. I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open His word to you and allow you to see Him and to know Him. To know His will, that you might glorify Him and that you might walk in faith and power each day, especially today. In Jesus name.

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Transcript

This is Hope Alive, where we apply God's Word to our daily life. My name is Chad Harrison. I'm first a husband, a father, and a grandfather. I'm also the teaching pastor at Lake Community Church in Dadeville, Alabama, on beautiful Lake Martin. I've been serving as a pastor for over 30 years. I also serve as the Tallapoosa County District Judge. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word verse by verse through the Bible and to find his purpose and will for your daily life. If you would like sponsor this podcast, go to the Show Notes, where there's a link where you can make a donation. I pray in the name of Jesus that God would open his word to you, allow you to see him and to know him, so that you would know his will and his way for your life, that you might walk in faith and power each and every day, especially today. Word of God, please speak to the hearers of your voice today in the name of Jesus. Amen. Foreign. We've got Paul is the author of this book. And it starts out Paul. Okay? It starts out Paul. And he is. He is going to. He's going to identify his position. He is an apostle. He's one who has been sent to build and to. Lead, guide, start. He is a church planner. Obviously, y' all know about Paul's missionary journey. The letter he's writing is to a young man who is a pastor who functions in the roles. And we'll talk about that because there's some aspects to it that we'll really get into next week about the leadership role that he holds. But he is a young man. He's a pastor. And I'll say this at the start because it's important when you're studying about Timothy, it's important that you understand kind of his background, because what Paul says to him takes on a lot more significance. If you know Timothy's background, Timothy is like Paul. He is from what is today modern day Turkey. Okay. And you go, well, what do you mean he's from modern day Turkey? Well, you know that region up there that's north of the Middle East? It's Constantinople before. Before you actually enter into Europe. That's the city that sits on the strait that leads into what we call the Black Sea. And do y' all know. I know y' all know a lot about the Black Sea from recent events in history. Crimea and the two main countries that border the Black Sea, other than Turkey, is the Ukraine and Russia. And so that's the area that they're from, and that area is very Greek during this time period. What I mean by that? Well, there's a lot of Greek cities. In fact, the cities that are mentioned in the book of the Revelation, the letter to. The cities that we see in chapter two and chapter three are Greek cities and in what is modern day Turkey. And those Greek cities, those Greek cities are Paul's background. That's where his family's from. Now, Paul was both a Roman, meaning he had, he had, he, he had a Roman citizenship and he was 100% Jewish. Okay? And so he was, he was, and, and he was a, he was a learned Jewish young man, sat under the finest teachings in Israel. And so when you're studying Paul, you know that he is what we would call a lawyer today. He's very knowledgeable about the law. He's a teacher of the law. He was part of the teachers of the law. He was a Pharisee. All right? And I'm saying this because you need to kind of know these backgrounds because the things he says at the start and then what he leads to get it informs you, it gives you an understanding of what he's doing. Timothy, on the other hand, He is in both worlds, but not in as positive a way. Okay, What I mean by that. Well, the Jewish term for it is he is a mumser. Okay, and what does that mean? Well, that means he is the product of a, of a non biblical relationship. Now it just so happens that his product of a non biblical relationship is that his father was a Greek and his mother was a Jewish lady. And you go, well, how's that non biblical? Well, you know, you weren't supposed to marry outside of your, outside of Judaism. And his mother was Jewish and his father was Greek. Okay? And quite clearly not a believing Greek. Okay? And maybe they weren't even married. Okay? There's reason to believe that. Now all this is church history. And so it's not as firm like I'm not telling you scripture, I'm telling you church history, but that's important because it would be. He would, he would have, he would, he would be in both worlds and yet not accepted by both worlds fully. Does that make sense? And so that makes him very interesting, him being Jewish and Greek and perhaps the product of actually not even a marriage. Okay? And so that makes him a unique figure for Paul to deal with. And when we read this and read what Paul has to say to him personally in the very personal things he says to Timothy, you're gonna see Paul deal with that and encourage Timothy in His understanding of who he is in Christ, which is going to. It really is a beautiful. You can see Paul taking on the role of a spiritual father to Timothy. And that's really what's going on here. It is a letter to Timothy in which Paul takes on the role of a spiritual father and a spiritual leader. And in being a spiritual leader, he teaches. Well, he teaches Timothy how to lead, okay? And so this book is about leadership, and it is about leadership from a discipleship level. From a discipleship level. And so when, when, when you're studying it, you need to understand that First Timothy, second Timothy and Titus are books written for leadership. They're leadership pastoral books, okay? And that, that's how, that's how the church considers it. So Paul, verse 1, an apostle of Jesus Christ, he's been sent by Jesus Christ, okay? Now, interestingly in this book, and it is one of the few books that Paul pins as the author of, he does not mention at the start his. Now he's going to mention it here, but he's going to mention it as he relates to Timothy. He does not mention at the start how he is, you know, not one of the. One of the 12. He missed out on being a part of the. Part of the disciples, okay? And you can tell that he says that in the other books. When he'll mention, he'll say, he'll say, he'll say, you know, I'm an apostle, but the least of the apostles, or I'm apostle by a different means or a substandard means. Sometimes he'll almost. He'll almost diminish it because he realizes that he missed out on a whole lot when he wasn't a follower of Jesus Christ. And that's what makes me believe him to be the rich young ruler. But you see him understand that his position in the kingdom is not the same as the other apostles. And so when he says an apostle of Jesus Christ, notice by the what? By the commandment of God. Now, that's not just the will of God. And sometimes he will say that about his apostleship. He'll say, by the will of God. Now he's saying it by the commandment of God. And when you read that, you would go, well, what's the difference? Well, there's a big difference. And the difference is this. He is going to talk to a man who, who has a specific calling on his life, okay? And anything that you have to do with the Father, anything that you have to do with God, any relationship with God. In fact, Pastor Philip mentioned this last Night in our leadership meeting, anything that you were going to do from a spiritual, eternal God perspective has to be initiated by God. Has to be initiated by God. God has to be the author and the beginner and the initiator of it. If it's not God, well, it's just a waste of time, okay? I'm just letting you know. And I'm not even going to be positive about it, okay? A lot of people say, well, you know, there's good stuff. Not really. No, not if it don't come from God. It ain't good, okay? Because he's the only being that is ultimately good. Okay? And if it ain't from him, it ain't good. Okay? And so, so he, he, he understanding that it has to come from the will of God is important, but he's being very firm about this. He is saying by the commandment of God, which means he is saying, I, I was called as an apostle because God said for me to do such, okay? And he's identifying that and that connection with Timothy. Timothy understands that. And if God has called you to do something with your life, if God's placed, placed a burden of ministry, a burden of leadership, a burden, any of those things, if he's done that with your life, then you know it. You know it now you can run from it. There's fish out there, they'll swallow you. You know what I'm talking about. There's all kinds of, you know, you can argue with God on top of the mountain while you're not qualified or you don't fit or whatever, but when God by his will speaks to you about what you were made to be, that is the command of God. And he uses, he uses the most stern legal word he can use there. It's unambiguous. It's not a precept of God. It's not a teaching of God, it's not an understanding of God. By the way, all those things are God presenting His will. If you said, I received a precept from God, could you say, I received a commandment from God? Yeah, if it's a precept from his will, then yeah, it's commandment. Okay, but if I use the term commandment, I am saying that. I'm saying that the call that was on my life, the call that was on my life, the thing that God said for me is something that is legally binding on me. Now, if that's the case, then you can't get away from it. And second of all, if that's the case, Then you can't get out of it either. And there's a difference between getting away from it and getting out of it. Getting away from it means at some point in time, I find myself in a place where it's over. I'm outside of that commandment, you know, the orders have ceased to exist. Okay? Not the case. To put myself in a position where I couldn't do it would be in some ways. And we're going to talk about qualification, especially next week. In some ways we would deal with qualification, okay? I've disqualified myself from it. Okay. And could you, from a biblical spectrum. We'll talk about this next week for sure. In a lot of depth. Could you disqualify yourself for a time and season from doing something? Yes, you could. But you cannot permanently disqualify yourself, okay? Because that would be your ability to usurp a call of God or a commandment of God. You can't do that. You can't do that. The gifts of God, which would include all the good stuff we talk about, right? And I'm not just talking about spiritual gifts. We're talking about the gift of Jesus, the gift of salvation, the gift of redemption. All those things are. And I'm going to give you two terms. One of them is a spiritual term. The other one is a legal term. I'm going to give you these two terms, and they're important because they're. The word that is used there in the Greek can be translated either way. It says the gifts of God and the call of God are first of all without repentance. That's the spiritual terminology for it, okay? Which means that God does not pull back from his gifts. He does not pull back from his call. He does not repent from them. Okay? He also says it. Also here's the legal terminology. Terminology. The gift and call of God are irrevocable, which means they cannot be revoked. All right? Which is a legal term where if I offer you a contract and you at some point in time, over time, don't accept it, I can say I revoke. And if I say I revoke, then the contract is void. Okay? All right. Well, the problem with that, and remember, covenants are spiritual contracts, right? So God says my covenants are irrevocable. From a eternal legal perspective, they're irrevocable. Now, we're going to get into a lot of legal stuff here with me, okay? We're going to get into some legal stuff. Why? Because. Well, I hate to tell you all this. Most of the New Testament is written by a lawyer. Okay, all right. And he explains things from a legal perspective. Okay? And by the way, you go all the way back to Genesis, there's a lot of legal things going on, spiritually eternal things that we would call legal. A lot of that stuff's going on. And so he says, I am that by the commandment of God, of God, our Savior, and the Lord Jesus Christ. Now notice he is using his full title, the Lord Jesus Christ. All right? So I'm called by that. Now you go, Pastor. If you keep going at this perspective, we ain't even going to finish the book, Timothy. If you keep going at this rate, we're not going to finish the book, Timothy. But I want you to notice I'm laying framework for what we're going to read down the road, okay? He says. He says, our Lord Jesus Christ, our hope. All right? Now that word right there is one of the few times in the New Testament that that's used that is not also translated hope from pistio. Okay? In fact, this word is elpis e lpis. Okay? So it actually does come from the idea, but it is the word for anxious expectation, which means not only do I expect it to be, but I'm anxiously awaiting that expectation. All right? So he's calling Jesus Christ our anxious expectation. He is my anxious expectation. I'm anxiously expecting him to. To live up to who he is. Okay? I need him to live up to who he is. He says to Timothy, a true son in the faith. Now, considering what I told you about Timothy, that's a great way to start. What he's saying is, you're not a. You're not a false son. You ain't a half son. You're not a partially son. You're not a fatherless son. You're a true son. You're a complete son. The word true means complete and whole, okay? You're a true son. You're a whole son. You're a complete son in the pistio, in the faith. All right? And he's using that as a noun there, right? You're a complete son in the faith. You're not lacking anything. You're. You've got it all. You got it all. You're a true son in the faith. Now notice he says grace. Grace is getting what we don't deserve. Mercy, not getting what we do deserve. Two sides of a coin, right? Grace is not getting, is getting what we don't deserve. Mercy's not getting what we do deserve. And once you have both of those, you have the peace of God. Grace, mercy and peace. He's saying, grace, mercy and peace. I'm writing this to you so that you might function in the grace of God, in the mercy of God and in the peace of God, that you might experience that peace, that you might experience God's peace on your life. Grace, mercy and peace from God our Father, and from another time, saying, Jesus Christ, our Lord, or the Lord Jesus Christ. Notice Father, son, Father, son. He's doing this over and over and over again. He's making sure you see it. He's making sure Timothy hears it. There's a father and there's a son. This is the pattern. This is the way God's made it to be. Father, son, Father, son. Timothy needs to hear that over and over again. He is. He is. He is a true son of the faith. And now he said it twice in the course of two verses, right? I. As I urged you when I was. When I went into Macedonia, now he's telling him these. He's talking from a perspective here, okay? He's saying, I urged you. I'm going to go over some of the things we talked about before I left to go to Macedonia. Now you go, well, where's Macedonia? Well, that's all that's crossed the. That's cross across the straits in Constantinople. Macedonia is where somebody came from. That's real famous. Anybody know. Anybody know Bueller? Bueller. Alexander the Great, King of Macedon. Okay, He's Macedonia. All right. Paul was going over to Macedonia. He was crossing over and he's leaving Timothy. Where? He's leaving him. He's leaving him in Mesopotamia. He's leaving him. He's leaving him in Turkey, Modern day Turkey. He says. He said, I told you to do what? Remain in Ephesus. That's one of those churches in, in. In the Revelation, right? It's one of those churches. He said, I remain in Ephesus. Why? Because Paul had planted a church there. There's a church planted in Ephesus. Paul had planted it. He's telling Timothy to stay there. All right? That you may charge some. That they teach no other doctrine. Now let's get this. Now, first of all, you go, doctrine. What's doctrine? Doctrine. I don't understand. It's teaching, okay? Doctrine is teaching, okay? But when it's called doctrine, that means there's a hole to it, okay? It's not individualized teaching. It is a. It is a full teaching of Christ. Okay? Now notice what he says. He said, I left you there. That you may charge some not all. Not all. Only those who have been called to teach. Okay? That they teach no other doctrine. All right? That they teach no other doctrine. Now, what he's. He's giving him a hard task. Your job is to make sure that you teach what I taught. Now, this is important. This is really, really important, okay? Cause he's going to. He's fixing in. Just fixings from Alabama, for sure. He is about to explain the difference between teaching the law, which he is an expert in, and teaching the faith, which he is a expert in, okay? And there's a difference between teaching the two. He taught the law, now he's teaching the doctrines of the faith. And they're two different things, okay? And they're really two different things. And they're important that you know those two different things, especially if you're a leader, because there are the teachings of the faith, and then there are the Old Testament teachings of the law. You got to know the law in order to fully understand the faith. But you can't teach the law and teach the faith. Can't do both. Okay? And the doctrine that he's teaching is not the doctrine of the Pharisees, which Paul was. That's not what he taught. Now notice nor give heed to fables and endless genealogies. All right? What does that mean? You're not to be teaching. We're not teaching. We're not teaching stories. We're not teaching stories. We're teaching truth. We're teaching understandings of the faith. All right? Now, I want you to hear me. When I was young, I was taught that, you know, a sermon needed to have a joke or a poem or a story. Three points and an ending, okay? In fact, my first sermon that I had to write for seminary had a story, and then it had three points and an ending. My best buddy from seminary, Mike Owen, who's a missionary to Brazil. Now, his. Started out with a joke. And if you know Mike, obviously it would start out with a joke. Mike's joke was that he preached. We only had 15 minutes to preach our sermons, okay? His joke was there was an old man went to the grocery store, was trying to get. Trying to get some groceries. When he got to the register, they asked him a question. They asked him, paper or plastic? Now, a lot of people don't know what that is. Now we've gone from paper to plastic. Now to bring your own bags, okay? All right. But paper or plastic? And the old man said, it doesn't matter. I'm bisexual. Okay? I. Now, for us, that gives You a real good laugh. But at cemetery, it started as a low giggle and developed into a loud roar of laughing such that he could not finish his sermon. If you knew Mike, you would know that it's even funnier. But he said while that was going on, as everybody's laughing so loud that he can't finish his sermon. And he kept saying stuff like this, y', all, let's get back to Jesus now. And every time he'd say something like that, they would laugh even more. We had to stop the sermon. He didn't get to preach his sermon. I don't know what kind of grade he made in the sermon class, but he didn't get to preach his sermon. I want you to hear me. This ain't about stories. How many times do we. We use Christian materials that's all about stories and ain't about the doctrine or the teachings of the faith. I want you to listen to me. It ain't about stories. It's about the word of God. You got. If I. If I could. If for anybody, anybody who's wanting to do ministry, anybody who's wanting to teach the Word, anybody who's wanting to be a pastor, okay? Any of those things that you might desire to do. Listen, I told you, nothing happens good. Nothing happens spiritually, nothing happens eternally unless it's initiated by God. Okay? And if it's not initiated by God, it ain't going to work. And how does God choose to do it? He chooses to do it by revealing his Son, which is his Word. So if it starts with anything other than that, it's going to decay at some point in time. I know for sure. I know for sure if I convince you to do something for God, that eventually you're going to question what I convinced you to do. I know for sure if you heard the voice of God, that even if you try to get out, that hook is in you and it'll never leave. It's never going away. God told you something. It don't go away. God does not speak outside of his son. You hear that? I tried it all kinds of ways. I've done the popular stuff and, you know, just, you know, make people feel good. They feel good for a while, but eventually you get tired of that cake. It makes their stomach hurt. You know what I'm saying? It has no value. It has no nourishment to them. I've done it where I was a little bit legalistic. That don't work either. It's not a law. It's a relationship. But if it ain't the Word. Now, I will be legalistic about this. If it ain't the Word, it won't work. It doesn't have any permanency to. Has no permanency to it. So it's got to be the Word. He says don't give. Don't get. Don't. Don't get caught up in fables. I don't. You hear me? Endless genealogies, okay? The other books of the Bible that weren't in the Bible, I want you to hear me. If they weren't in the Bible, they never were in the Bible, so they're not missing from the Bible. Did y' all hear what I said? All right? Not other ancient texts, not other teachings. Don't get caught up in all that. That's what he says to Timothy. Don't listen to old wives tales. Don't do that stuff. Focus on what you were taught. Now, remember, he didn't have the New Testament. He has to focus on what Pete, what Paul taught him. He's got to remember that. He's now fixing to get a little bit of the Word of God in this letter, but he's got to remember what was taught to him, which is hard. We've got the Word and we wander off into genealogies and fables and stories and. How many times have I been on YouTube? YouTube. The. The story, the. The Bible story that didn't make it. I'm going, it ain't a Bible story then. Okay? It's a fable. It didn't come from God. Pastor, are you being dogmatic about it? Yeah. And you're going, well, what if they did mess up? Listen to me. Listen to me. In the beginning was the Word. Get this. God knew what the Word was. He was right there with Him. Are you listening to me? Now, I don't know if y' all know it or not, but God is all powerful. So he's able to make sure what he wants to say to humanity is said to humanity at the right time and at the right place and is kept so that might be said to all humanity from now until then, which is when he comes back, okay? And it's not broken and it is not messed up. Now, either one thing, One, one, one or two things have to be true. Either God's not God and he's not able to maintain his revelation, or what we have is his full revelation, right? When you carry it back to its principles, you know, a lot of people get shook. I've had people come up to me and I'VE seen people come up to other people, Pastor, what about the Book of Enoch? It's not in Bible. Well, people didn't. They. People didn't put it in the. God. People ain't got. People ain't got nothing to do with who put it in the Bible. They have nothing to do with it. Are you telling me God messed up and couldn't control his book? Well, you know them heathen emperors and popes back in the Middle Ages? They could have messed it up. No, they couldn't have. No, they couldn't mess it up. If they could, then they were more powerful than God. Can you name the emperor that's more powerful than God? No. It's a logical fallacy. Which causes disputes rather than godly edification. Notice these things. Cause what? Disputes. In fact, most of the time, they're couched as a dispute. Am I right? They cause disputes rather than godly edification, which means that. That God blows you with it. That God blows you with it. How many of y' all have been reading the Bible, felt the wantonness of God when he spoke to you from it? Okay, that's godly edification. How many of y' all been watching, you know, a video, and it said something about, you know, the Gospel of Judas or something, and it made you feel warm inside about the goodness of God. It didn't make you feel warm inside. You sitting there going, what in the world? Okay, what does it. Cause it causes division. It's not for the purpose of godly edification. Now, I'm gonna tell you what I'm gonna teach here is going to be tough, okay? I'm gonna be specific to it. But what Paul teaches, Timothy, is not easy. Okay? And in our modern culture, there's a lot of people that don't want to live by what the Word teaches. Are you following me? All right, that's just the way. There's a lot of that going on out there, okay? But you can be living wrong in the sense of you can not be living a godly life. You can. You can have slipped and slid and messed up and all that kind of stuff and still identify what the truth is. Because God, God. God shows it to you. He can edify you even in your failures, but he only edifies you with his word. I am going to just be in Timothy. All right? He's in First Timothy. As you go today, I pray that the Lord will bless you and keep you, that he'll make his face to shine upon you, and that he will give you hope and peace today. In Jesus name