Bible Study 18

Title: Life conscious of the work of Jesus Christ!
Text: 1Timo. 4:6-16
6 If you put these instructions before the brothers and sisters, you will be a good servant of Christ Jesus, nourished on the words of the faith and of the sound teaching that you have followed. 7Have nothing to do with profane myths and old wives’ tales. Train yourself in godliness, 8for, while physical training is of some value, godliness is valuable in every way, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come. 9The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance. 10For to this end we toil and struggle, because we have our hope set on the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe.
11 These are the things you must insist on and teach. 12Let no one despise your youth, but set the believers an example in speech and conduct, in love, in faith, in purity. 13Until I arrive, give attention to the public reading of scripture, to exhorting, to teaching. 14Do not neglect the gift that is in you, which was given to you through prophecy with the laying on of hands by the council of elders.15Put these things into practice, devote yourself to them, so that all may see your progress. 16Pay close attention to yourself and to your teaching; continue in these things, for in doing this you will save both yourself and your hearers.

Interpretation
The main objective of Paul is that all in Ephesus know that the mystery of our faith is Jesus Christ our Lord, that “he was revealed in flesh, vindicated in spirit, seen by angels, proclaimed among Gentiles, believed in throughout the world, and taken up in glory.” 1Tim.2:15. Anybody who finds any spirituality more profound than the incarnation, passion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is on the wrong side of the truth. It is astounding that God (the Word) became flesh, it is astounding that the sinless, the innocent became sin (2Cor.5:21) for the sake of humanity that is disobedient to God. It was for humanity who is enemy of God by dishonoring God and profaning God’s name and glory that the blameless had to die for. Whoever finds anything worthy of teaching, or spends time on teaching instead of teaching this fundamental truth is wasting his/her time and misleading the listeners.
Therefore Paul encourages Timothy to reinforce the teaching about the main doctrine of the church: the incarnation, passion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. A good servant will teach the basic teachings about Jesus. Idle people who cannot ground themselves in Bible study get interested in talks of spirituality that is rooted in human experience. Paul calls these “profane myths and old wives’ tales.” Paul teaches that Timothy should train himself in godliness. Godliness is not confiding in doing that and not doing the other in order to please God. Godliness is living life conscious of the passion, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Godliness is focusing on what Jesus did for us through taking the human flesh, suffering in human flesh, taking the sum of sin of all generations and die for us. Godliness is living a life that is guided by self control in consciousness of what Jesus did on the cross of Calvary.
Godly life takes some training. It takes some decisions to express one’s life as a Christian Person. We do not live godly life in order to be saved. No, we live a godly life because we are saved. Our new nature requires new kind of living. Therefore we have to harness our flesh whose sinful desires spring from our fallen nature. Paul gives the fact that the Greek athletes practice to earn their crown and we have to train ourselves for the Christian way of life. We should lose certain ways of talking, we should trash certain words and expression never to say them again, we should prevent our mind from thinking in certain ways. All this is not to earn anything, but it is to fit to our new nature mindful of the suffering and death of Jesus Christ. This is the discipline of eternal life for which we toil. We toil not to be saved, but to live as saved people. We keep the character of a person with new nature imparted on him/her because of faith in Jesus Christ.

We will continue with verse 11ff next week.
May the Lord Bless all
Rev. Teka Obsa Fogi
Pastor: Oromo Christian Fellowship