1 TIMOTHY

Chapter 1

This whole chapter hangs together as one topic.

v1-9: There are these Judaeizers in Ephesus who teach what is beyond necessary for salvation: specifically, that anyone who is a true Christian has to obey all of the Old Testament law. 

v4: It sounds here as if these teachers were ethnically Jewish people who told the gentile Christians they should listen to their teachings because these people could trace their lineage far back into Hebrew antiquity. Paul says such teachings only invite more questions, in other words confusion, which God is not the author of. 1 Corinthians 14 33

It also appears these teachers were employing extrabiblical Jewish tradition, called here fables.

v5: The point of the law is love (Romans 13 8-13.) This love has to come from pure motives and what we do under the banner of love can not violate our consciences (Romans 14 and 15.) This love also can't be feigned or pretended, it has to be genuine.

Lord, purify my heart and my motives, for I, like everyone who names Your name, have done things not out of pure motives but for selfish desires. In Jesus name, amen.

v6: These Judaizers, on the other hand, have turned away from love and are babbling on about Jewish traditions, that which would eventually become the Talmud.

v7: This is because they want the prestige that comes from being a teacher of the law. The problem is, they don't understand the law is about love and can be summed up in the two great commandments of loving God and loving your neighbour (see Romans 13 passage above.) They just plain don't know what they're talking about.

v8-11: Now, the moral law of God is not by any means a bad thing. However, its purpose is to punish the wicked as well as to try to make the wicked see the error of their ways and bring them to Christ (Galatians 3 24.) The thing is, Christians don't need the law harshly and rigidly given to them as these people Timothy was sent to Ephesus to contend with were doing because Christians have the Holy Spirit sanctifying them and have the law of God written on their hearts (Hebrews 10 16.)

v12-17: Paul, the man who was formerly intent on singlehandedly wiping Christianity off the planet before it could grow, provides further evidence that keeping a set of rules, even as good a thing as God's law, does not, by itself and without Jesus Christ indwelling the believer, save a man by giving a shorthand version of his own testimony and how his mission as a child of Jesus Christ differs from his mission as Saul the persecuter. Galatians 1 9

v18-20: Of course, talking about what the authentic, nonlegalistic Christian life is supposed to be like is not enough: Timothy has to live it out.

Chapter 2

v1-4: Are we supposed to pray, cry out for, intercede, and give thanks for our leaders in general or only when it comes to believers being allowed to worship, spread the Gospel and live the Christian life?

v5: Hebrews 9 15

v6-8: Jesus sacrificed Himself for everyone. Therefore, Christians should act like Christians. Therefore, Christian men shouldn't quarrel with each otheror (what does doubting mean here?)

v9-10: Likewise, women should not dress too fancy and should instead be known for their humility, seriousness about the things of God, and good works.

These verses have been used legalistically to dictate what women should wear. However, Paul here is simply saying don't let your outward adorning be more important than your inner beauty given to you by God through His process of sanctification, that is, making you more and more like Jesus all the time.

v12-15: I used to hold the complementarian view when it comes to interpretation of this passage. In short, there ain't no such creature as a woman preacher. Now, though, I hold the egalitarian view, which is that women can be preachers. Here's why.

First of all, verse 11 tells us that what Paul is about to instruct Timothy about is an issue of subjection, not of the general place of females within the church. (Besides, if women not teaching was so important, why didn't Paul tell Timothy this stuff before Timothy set out on his assignment?)

v12: Paul speaks of "a woman", not women.

To usurp essentially denotes storming into the king's palace, killing him and taking the throne for yourself. Neither women nor men should be usurping godly authority.

The issue here, much like in 1 Corinthians, was that the woman in question was using the customary opportunities that women had for speaking in the early church to teach gnosticism, or in other words, mother goddess worship or the divine feminin. Ephesus was known, as we see plainly in Acts, for the worship of Diana. We must guard against these teachings infiltrating the church today, whether brought by women or men.

v13-15: These Ephesian gnostics taught that Eve was formed first, then Adam. In their version of events, Adam then listened to the serpent and ate the fruit and therefore Eve, or womankind, were now the soul possessors of wisdom since the men were all corrupted. Therefore, women should be worshipped as gods (the divine feminin again), run everything, and be heeded due to their sole and superior wisdom. Gee, we don't see any of that teaching in the world or the church world today, do we?

This gnostic sect also believed that sex was evil (it may seem hard to believe but that teaching will be revived in the near future) and that women should thus not have children. Paul corrects this and says this particular woman has not yet lost her salvation but will join the other believers in Heaven for eternity if she gives up this ancient pagan feminist foolishness and acts like a proper Christian woman as described in verses 9 and 10 of this chapter.

Additionally, teachers, or pastors as we have misnomered them, were not teachers or preachers in the sense we think of today when we envision a pastor running a church, up in the pulpit preaching a sermon. As depicted in 1 Corinthians 14, those who had the gift of teaching would get up and give mini-sermons, with space for other believers gathered in someone's house to ask questions and make comments. Mark 10 42

Chapter 3

v1: Again, in New Testament times bishop did not mean what it does now, where we think of, say, an Anglican bishop or a cock of the walk elder as some translations put this word. They were more like guides, pastors in the true sense, shepherding the flock.

v2: Blameless doesn't mean perfect.

I'm not sure that "the husband of one wife" disqualifies a divorced man. These days, if mama wants out of the marriage, she's getting out of it.

"Given to hospitality" indicates elders were responsible for putting visiting evangelists and such up at their houses.

You need to be able to teach if you're going to counsel people or speak with them one on one about the things of God.

v3: Not given to wine doesn't mean they can't drink; it just means they can't drink to excess.

"not greedy of filthy lucre" A lot of pastors today could stand to look at this.

"not covetous" Again, not greedy.

v8: Again, deacons weren't like we think of them today, Deacon Jones sitting proudly on the deacon's bench. In Acts, the job of the first deacons was to make sure food was evenly distributed to the Greek widows as well as to the Hebrew ones. The idea behind this and all other Christian leadership is that of servant leadership. Mark 10 42    

v14-15: Hebrews 12 2

v16: Paul says what he says here because being an elder or a deacon is not about serving yourself. However, it is also not truly about serving others. Rather, holding these offices is ultimately about serving God, as was what Paul and Timothy were doing, as is what any Christian does in service of the Lord.

Chapter 4

v1-6: I have heard interpretations of this passage that suggest Paul is specifically prophesying about the Catholic church, which of course forbids its clergy to marry and commanded meatless days for the longest time, or alternatively the Seventh-day Adventists who command abstinence from "unclean meat", meat in general and, if truth be known, all kinds of other foods. Really, though, I think Paul is talking about the gnostics who were prominent at that time.

The gnostics believed that the material and spiritual worlds were alien to each other and one of the main sects believed that, therefore, as many material things as possible, such as marriage and meat, or probably any sumptuous food, should be avoided for the express purpose of making a person more spiritual.

This thinking has continued down through the centuries and persists in the church today in the forms of moralism and legalism. So many Christians teach a doctrine that avoiding things such as alcohol, secular entertainment and other stuff will, by default, make a Christian more spiritual. The truth is, only doing what Paul instructs Timothy in verses 12-16 of this chapter makes one more spiritual.

v2: The more rules you place on yourself and others, the harder it is to keep them. Thus, you inevitably end up breaking said rules but have to keep up appearances while continuing preaching obedience of those rules. This makes you a hypocrite. You can even get so hypocritical that it is as if your conscience has been burned and scarred with a hot iron, where you don't even realize you're being a hypocrite anymore.

v4-5: Contrary to gnosticism and what a lot of Christians think, nothing is evil in itself. Granted, we don't want to go the opposite way and think we can just live and overindulge however and as much as we want because the Bible clearly forbids this, too. However, as long as we are enjoying the things of life less than we are loving God (2 Timothy 3 4), being thankful for these things as indicated here and not putting those things before obeying the will of God as the first of the ten commandments says and Jesus commanded us to do, then there's no problem.

v7-9: As Paul also talks about in his second epistle to Timothy, profane and old wives' fables are teachings and other similar things that would blaspheme God and His character.

As possibly another dig at gnosticism, Paul says that physical exercise is not all that important when compared to being spiritually healthy.

v10-11: Christians work for God and suffer persecution as Paul talks about throughout 2 Corinthians and this suffering builds character as Paul talks about in Romans. As stated above in the commentary on chapter 3, we aren't working for ourselves; we are servants and sons of the living God.

Jesus Christ died for all but only those who accept the gift of salvation will be saved.

As Paul reiterates at the beginning of his second letter to Timothy, the things Paul teaches him Timothy is to pass on to others, just as all Christians are to pass along the truths they get from Scripture.

v12: This verse is often used to support the involvement of youth in church, especially in roles of teaching and preaching, but the thing is, those youths have to be examples of Jesus Christ in what they say, how they live, in their love for God and others, in their attitude, in how they exercise their faith, and with regard to their lives being pure in heart, mind, motivation, and action. This of course also applies to every other member of the body of Christ.

v13: Public reading of the Word was important in the days when barely anyone had a copy of the Bible.

To exhort or preach is to encourage fellowbelievers to live for Jesus.

Teaching involves more the instruction in the Word of God, including the construction of the Bible and specific passages within it, giving context and background, making it relevant to the hearers and the times in which they live, and outlining what living it out looks like. In the early church as shown in 1 Corinthians 14, teaching as well as I believe preaching was interactive with room for the audience to ask questions and make comments throughout.

v14: Timothy was given his gift by prophecy and the laying on of hands but this does not necessarily mean all spiritual gifts are given this way.

v15: Here again we go back to Timothy's being an example as Paul instructs in verse 12.

v16: Christians grow through studying the Bible and applying what it says. This grows them in Christ, grows others in Christ through its encouraging effect and even saves unbelievers when they see how different Christians and Christianity are from whatever hopeless falsehood they've been following.

Chapter 5

v1-2: Paul here tells Timothy that those who have been saved by Jesus are a family and, as such, Timothy should treat those to whom he is ministering like one. If he has to correct somebody, he is to do it gently. Timothy is also to exercise the purity mentioned above at the end of the previous chapter.

The reason why I do not attend a particular institutional church is I get a lot more satisfaction from either fellowshipping with brothers and sisters one on one or by attending Bible studies and other such events that are more interactive than a traditional church service. Family gatherings don't follow a strictly set program; why should the get-togethers of God's family?

v3-16: First of all, let me say that our modern welfare state creates helplessness. I, as well as other blind and disabled people were basically subtly conditioned throughout our childhoods to live on social assistance. Little to nothing was done to encourage a lot of us to get out there and work and be useful to society. If these things were still controlled by the church, or if the government's system functioned somewhat along the guidelines laid out in this passage, I think those of us dependent upon said welfare state would be a lot better off.

Basically, Paul tells Timothy that if your husband has died and left you with little or nothing to live on, you're too old to realistically expect to remarry, you have no family to support you, and, most importantly, you are a true follower of Jesus, then you qualify for what seems to be a list of widows to support that the church at Ephesus was compiling.

We also know from Lydia, the dealer in purple cloth mentioned in Acts, that there were working women in ancient Rome, so excluded from the list were all women who, by virtue of the fact they had the skills and abilities to make their living somewhere other than on their back, could support themselves through gainful employment.

It is hard for me to believe the early church offered no support whatsoever to younger Christian widows or even unbelieving ones, but this probably took the form of one-time gifts or short-term relief. Long-term relief is more the focus here.

The age of 60 is mentioned I believe because Paul is factoring in then current life expectancies and health levels. Today, many people far beyond the age of 60 are still capable of and do go out to work every day, so therefore we must utilize the wisdom of the Holy Spirit when applying this passage to our society nowadays. (Not to mention you do have older folks who get married again well into advanced age.)

v4: Families should take care of their relatives in need because this is practicing the true religion that James talks about, it's only fair since those relatives took care of them, and it pleases God.

v6: I believe Paul is saying in this verse that rich widows who've come down in income bracket after the death of their husbands should not take advantage of the charity the church offers for the purpose of maintaining their former standard of living. These ladies should be taken off the list, the same as would widows who died.

v8: A lot of Christians won't work at any job where they would have to work on either Sunday or the Saturday sabbath. However, this verse says he who doesn't provide for his family is worse than an infidel. This is the only time this word is used, I believe, and, from my studies, I think it either means the most pagan unbeliever you can think of or someone who once believed but has left the faith. I know this verse is talking about providing for widowed relatives as part of the whole of this passage, but the principle is the same.

v10: To have raised children as a godly woman is a good work to Jesus, despite our modern world where having children is so often put down and spat upon.

v11-12: These verses seems to carry the idea of signing some long-term contract.

v14-15: The Ephesians had failed to properly organize and implement this program, as it were, and thus problems had already arisen. It seems as if women were coming to the believers professing Christ, then living however they wanted, even remarrying without telling the church they no longer needed their generosity.

v16: If people are taking charity who don't need it, that prevents those who really need it from getting help, or at least getting help as quickly and efficiently as they otherwise could.

The general principles outlined in this passage seem to be what the church should follow when conducting its charitable work toward whatever group of needy people is involved.

I would like to take this opportunity to say afew words about MAiD. There are people in favour of this policy because they don't want to be a burden to their children who'll have to take care of them. Have these people ever thought their children may very well want to care for them, even performing the unpleasant tasks and as frustrating and challenging a thing as it will be to take on, having the desire to requite their parents as Paul puts it in these verses?

v17-18: I didn't think elders in the early church got paid. How much did they get?

v19: Repetition of a sound principle found throughout the Bible.

v20: 1 Corinthians 5

v21: God sends angels to watch what people are doing.

See James' words about partiality, as the King James calls it.

v22: See verses 8 and 10 of chapter 3.

The end of this verse echoes the end of chapter 4 and verse 2 of this chapter.

v23: Christians who minister, which is really all of us due to the priesthood of all believers, need to keep themselves healthy.

v24: Some people are obvious sinners whereas other people's sins eventually find them out or are found out.

v25: Likewise, some people's good works are obvious, but other people perform good works that don't get found out for years. A guy in a Bible study group I was in in college mentioned that the people of the church he was attending had recently found out a woman in the congregation made clothes for orphans in Romania. No one would have even guessed this.

Chapter 6

v1-2: See Paul's words in Ephesians and Peter's words in 1 Peter.

Here and throughout 1 Timothy, things such as reproach and the name of God being blasphemed are spoken of. As I've said in previous commentaries, when Christians sin it makes Jesus look bad.

v3-4: Lots of people want to teach false doctrine. Professing themselves, they became fools as Paul says in the first chapter of Romans. They want to dispute meaningless theological and doctrinal questions such as "How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?" and Paul plainly lists the fruit this produces.

A lot of the descriptors in this and the following verses put me in mind of progressive and liberal Christianity.

v5: In the same camp as above are those who preach the prosperity gospel, having the same mindset as the church of Laodicea found in Revelation.

We are not even to associate with those that preach the prosperity gospel. See the latter part of 2 Corinthians 6.

v6-9: This puts me in mind of the true and Biblical saying, "Be content with such things as you have."

v9-10: Placing the desire for money above everything else has all kinds of terrible consequences: physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually.

In modern English, "all evil" reads as many different kinds of evil.

v11-12: Eternal life in Jesus Christ is really the thing human beings should be after.

v13-16: Echoing the end of chapter 3, Timothy isn't in this living in and ministering for Christ thing for himself anyway; he's in it for Jesus, his Saviour.

No man has seen God except in the form of Jesus.

v17-19: Being wealthy and enjoying it, even as a Christian, isn't wrong. (See chapter 4 1-6.) The sinful part comes in when rich people are arrogant and trusting in their largess to see them through rather than their Lord. Rich people ought to use their money to further God's kingdom on Earth, thus filling up their heavenly treasure chest like Jesus spoke about in the Sermon on the Mount.

v20-21: Even in Paul's day, there was pseudoscience out there that called into question fundamental elements of the Christian faith, the same as we, in our day, have evolution.