Drawing Encouragement from the Faith of the Saints

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Ray Ortlund
Welcome back to your not crazy gospel sanity for young pastors. I’m Ray ortlund. And I’m with my dear friend, Sam alberi. Here, hey, right. And we are going to think through in this episode, your personal backstory, how you got to be where you are now in your pastoral ministry, and how God has located you to your advantage in this moment in time, right where you are. And please stay tuned for the very end of our conversation where we’re going to talk about one of our very favorite books we have ever read, published by crossway.

Sam Allberry
Welcome to this episode of you’re not crazy. I’m Sam, Aubrey. And Ray, here’s my question for you. What is the scariest thing you’ve ever done for fun?

Ray Ortlund
Well, I suppose the answer would be going out for high school football. I was a young man lacking in confidence. And I kind of walked around through the school hallways and so forth on the defensive, feeling small and so forth. And so I went out for spring football. Our coach had to be away one day occupied elsewhere. And so the athletic director of the school, this Greek man named Pete Pappas, with his booming voice and barrel chest, and we all feared him when we all loved him. He was very affectionate and sort of compelling. He substituted himself as our coach for one day. And I remember Sam, this was the spring of 1965. In the course of about three or four minutes in a one on one drill. Coach Pappas helped me break my fear barrier. He so encouraged me and gave me just that inner wherewithal, something clicked in that three to five minutes. And I learned to hurl myself into the the physical challenge of American football. I crossed the barrier from timidity and fear to enjoying

Unknown Speaker
hitting the guy on the other side of the line as hard as I could.

Ray Ortlund
Which is the game. And so that was, it was scary to me. But you know, Sam, I know this sounds crazy. But I actually feel the Lord was in that moment, preparing me in that somewhat ridiculous human scene preparing me for future challenges. So I’m grateful.

Sam Allberry
That’s really cool. That’s really cool. And that just, I mean, we hadn’t planned for that to tie into what we’re talking about in the text. But it does, doesn’t it because Paul is trying to help Timothy to get through some of that fear barrier and to throw himself into into this ministry. Wow. That would terrify me. Me playing American football.

Ray Ortlund
You know, I’m just struck. The Lord knew I needed a middle aged man named Pete Pappas, as the athletic director of blair high school in Pasadena, California to help me take a big step forward. Yeah. And I think that’s some I hadn’t thought of it that way, Sam, but that’s something like that is happening here in this book. Paul is not intimidating Timothy. He’s not threatening him or berating him or belittling him. He’s lifting him up. And right now we’re in chapter one, verses three through seven. And in this series, he is season three of of you’re not crazy. We’re just thinking our way through the book of Second Timothy as gospel sanity for young pastors. Yeah,

Sam Allberry
it’s a field manual. Paul has a shape structure to his letters. It’s his convention that he will begin the letter with a with a note of thanksgiving. But there’s nothing perfunctory or formulaic about it. It always strikes me that Paul’s instinct, his reflex, as he thinks of the people he’s writing to is first of all, Thanksgiving, even if it’s a problematic situation he’s writing into but his his thankfulness for Timnath for Timothy is, is particularly heartfelt here, isn’t it? We talked last episode a little bit about Paul’s language of affection. He’s not embarrassed to share his heart for Timothy he wants some with you to know how he feels about him. That seems to be amplified in this in this section because he he talks about remembering you constantly. I long to see you that I may be filled with joy. I think some of us would shrink back from saying that because it might sound needy or you know, I think Again, part of the worldly messaging we get is if we’re in the position of being in the person with the authority. We’re supposed to be a bit aloof and above it all. And, you know, there’s a sort of, you know, a client, professional relationship or something. But this is so familiar. And so heartfelt.

Ray Ortlund
I’m really struck by that because as we said in our last episode, Paul is emotionally relationally. vulnerable and upfront, without being self indulgent. Yeah, he’s not making it about himself. But he is there’s this strength of emotion and feeling and affection and concern, pouring out of the apostle Paul, upon this young man, Timothy, Paul is all in with Timothy. He’s not holding back. He’s not standing aloof. Sam, what if that kind of abandon went viral among us pastors in this generation? Yeah. That would be compelling. That would be prophetic. Yeah. In this generation here in a world of self protection, and standing behind facades, and you will never get through to me, I will never let you hurt me and so forth. And Paul, just that is the part of the dividing wall that the cross breaks down. And out flows the heart of the apostle for this young man who feels outclassed by the challenge he’s facing. And Paul does not scold him for feeling that way. But fills in those blanks with fatherly and heartfelt real affection.

Sam Allberry
Yeah. Timothy is not a task football. You know, I long to see that I may be filled with joy. I mean, there’s you know, it’s not just he sees Timothy and thinks, Okay, Timothy is I’ve got a teacher nurse. I’ve got to teach them this. I’ve got to teach him this that you know, the he Timothy is not his project.

Ray Ortlund
That’s really good.

Sam Allberry
Yeah, there is it it is. So it is so fatherly, isn’t it?

Ray Ortlund
This is a healthy Christian environment. Yeah. This is what the gospel creates in our churches. Yeah. And not only has Paul stuck his neck out and is sticking his neck out with Timothy. He reminds Timothy of all the other people whose commitment and sacrifice and faith have built him up and gotten him to where he is today. Four times. Paul says, I remember. And then I remember and then I remember in the actually the fourth time is, I remind you, and so Paul looks at Timothy’s backstory, his parentage, his family, upbringing, and so forth.

Sam Allberry
Just Versary Paul remembers his own as well, as did my ancestors. Say he takes a sort of a quick glance over his own shoulder as well.

Ray Ortlund
Sam, every single one of us got here, because somebody cared. Yeah. Now was the Lord in it. Oh, yes, very much in it. But the Lord acted through people, pastors, parents, friends and others, and through other people invested in us, prepared us moved us through life. You and I right now it’s true of every young pastor listening. We are where we are right now because God got us here. And he did it through people. Yeah, there is a story every single one of us represents Yeah.

Sam Allberry
That the gospel slinky as I like to think of it is kind of come down the generations

Speaker 3
but hilarious is me that I’ve never thought of that before. The Gospel slinky i

Sam Allberry
Yeah, I’m constantly persuading Emanuel Nashville to produce a Emanuel Nashville slinky just as a bit of church merchandise are ridiculous. I press on with that battle, but I love this. You know, Paul has things he needs to talk to Timothy about, but it’s not irrelevant to pause. And to remember, and to name Lois and Eunice and Paul would have other names I’m sure he could he could have added to that list. There’s that human story is not is not a distraction from the task at hand.

Ray Ortlund
Oh, my. Sam, I think about my own dad. And how much my dad was the finest man I’ve ever known. So many of us, our dads let us down. Okay, I was unusually for Favorite I think my dad did not let me down. And I grew up in mid 20th century, American evangelicalism, I think at its best, and the the human figures that sort of occupied my world were not only my dad, but people like Billy Graham, and Carl Henry, and Francis Schaeffer and EV Hill and, and other thinkers, preachers, scholars, J. I packer and so forth. And John Stott, and, and I feel personally indebted to them. They stuck their necks out, they laid their lives down for Christ in their time. Which all of which faith and repentance and effort and courage poured into me directly and indirectly got me to where I am. Now. It’s my turn to pour out my life for the next generation, and it will soon be their turn. It’s the Gospels lanky, you’re moving forward in history, how? What a privilege to be part of something larger than ourselves.

Sam Allberry
Yeah. And I think one of the reasons Paul is saying this is because not only is he honoring Lois and Eunice, but it’s strengthening to Timothy, to be reminded of these things, he says to him, I’m reminded of your sincere faith. In other words, just in case, there’s a chance Timothy’s doubting his own legitimacy. You know, he’s facing headwinds and challenges. You may be thinking, Am I Am I even I shouldn’t even be a pastor. Why am I even trusting God in the right way? And Paul is saying, you will you’re legit, you have sincere faith. And I can tell you where that faith humility has come from. Oh, my, because you know, I can think of your your mother and your grandmother and you’ve inherited from them. real honest to goodness, faith in Jesus Christ.

Ray Ortlund
Wow. self doubt, can be paralyzing.

Sam Allberry
Yeah. Well, the devil is the father of lies, that’s his currency. And we all absorb and live in lies, that he just keeps. There’s this. He’s got his own sort of, you know, iTunes shuffle of lies, that they keep going round and round our heads. It’s great. And stuff like this. Correct. Sounds like No, no, no. Timothy, you have sincere faith. Yeah. You have, actually all the faith you need. Because it’s sincere faith in Christ, you have come from people who genuinely taught you the gospel. It’s interesting, isn’t he that there are no men mentioned here? We don’t know anything about Tim’s dad or grandfather. But I think I’m sure it’s not incidental that Paul names these two ladies, because strong men are formed in part by Godly he has women.

Ray Ortlund
Yes. When a pastor is alone in his study, they’d be working on sermon prep or administration, whatever it might be. It can be tempting to feel isolated. We’re alone there in the room. Maybe for for hours on end. And thoughts of isolation feelings of even of abandonment. Yeah, I’ve known that can enter in and cripple us. And in those moments, I think what Paul is talking about here, to use the language of the Apostles Creed is the communion of saints. And young pastor, when you’re in your study, working diligently and you feel alone, you feel isolated, you feel cut off, and maybe even abandoned. I think you have every right in Christ to embrace, receive and experience, the communion of saints. You know who else is in that room with you? The person who led you to Christ is right there cheering you on, in the communion of saints, and for crying out loud, the apostle Paul is there cheering you on? And, you know, I think in my own categories, Sam, my dad, I think, maybe this sounds ridiculous. Thomas Cranmer is a hero to me. His death was one of the most dramatic declarations of repentance and faith in Christ that I’m aware of in Christian history. I cannot think of Thomas Thomas Cranmer without emotion. He’s one of my forefathers in the Lord. And, and that awareness locates Thomas Cranmer. In my reality so I’m sitting there at my desk, but I’m not alone.

Sam Allberry
Now. And part of Paul’s message here is the people that you do look back and look up to the people that you use sat under the teaching of whether, in the case of grammar with a gap of several centuries or your father, part of what Timothy is part of what Paul is saying here is the faith that dwelt in them dwells in you as well, verse five, we often use the phrase I’m sure to mean, I’m hopeful, optimistic that Paul is meaning it literally, that faith now, I am sure dwells in you also. In other words, whoever your spiritual hero is, whoever, whoever you receive the gospel from whoever you feel that spiritual debt is owed to, you have the same faith that they had. You have everything they had spiritually. You reminded me this once ray from John one where from his fullness we have all received Yes, grace upon grace, whoever your biggest spiritual hero isn’t all of church history, you have the same amount of Holy Spirit as they had you have the same, the same spiritual resources to draw from. So it is strengthening for Timothy facing into the challenge is the the opposition’s that the things that would naturally intimidate him. And what are comforted is to know that Paul was expecting Timothy, to need strengthening because we feel our lack of strength as well. But whoever we look back on as Wow, they were they were really faithful, amazing Christian. Part of what Paul is saying here is yeah, you have the same faith that they had. Yes.

Ray Ortlund
So I think on the basis of Second Timothy, chapter one, we can say to every young pastor who is faithfully pressing forward, you are a heroic figure. Your circumstances are unique to yourself. But the faith that’s energizing you deep within is the same faith that the prophets had the martyrs had the most fruitful missionaries, the people you most admire? What was stirring them and energize it, carrying them? Helping them? It’s in you, too? Yeah. And because God is just as committed to you as he is to any of them? Yeah.

Sam Allberry
The other thing I’m taking from this ray is that it is good for us, even in our public ministry, to name and honor people that we have, we have received from you do that wonderfully with your dad, by the way, I have not had a chance to meet your dad, he passed away before you and I got to know each other, but I feel like I know him, and have learned from him because of how much you’ve shared about him. But one of the glorious things that that public recognition does is it reminds everyone that not least the pastor himself that we’re not spiritual islands. We’re not meant to be the self sufficient self contained repository of spiritual resourcing for everybody else. We we are we only have things to share, because we have received and we’ve learned from others who are standing on the shoulders of others. Yes. One of the people I think who does that, unusually well is is Tim Keller, because he he will always let you know, where he’s learned a particular idea from. He will honor the people he has drawn things from he doesn’t want people to think he’s just sort of arrived and come up with all of this stuff himself. So there’s lots of ways in which it’s a healthy thing to do just to show the dependencies we have been part of over the years.

Ray Ortlund
And that inheritance that’s coming our way from from the past, is not fading away. We are not a dead end we are not a lost cause. He says here I remind you to fan into flame, the gift of God which is in you through the laying on my hands. So as generation one hands off the ministry to generation to generation two can burst into flame just as brightly as generation one did. And and Timothy is responsible to fan into flame. The gift of God which is in him. John Stott says, If we ask the question, well, what is the gift of God that Timothy received Start says it has both the office and the spiritual equipment needed to fulfill it. So the the ministry opportunity, the ministry position and the inner wherewithal to fulfill and live well in that ministry position, which he then describes in the in the next verse as a spirit, an intangible, an energy, not a fear, but a power and love and self control,

Sam Allberry
which is striking because that way with all and equipping isn’t merely skills. He didn’t give you a spirit of exegetical progress. Although we we, you know, we need to handle the word rightly, as Paul himself says, but it’s so bound up with character, isn’t it? Power, love, self control. You can be very, very, you can be the most skilled person in the room and yet not be spiritually equipped for the task if you’re not manifesting that. That power, love and self control.

Ray Ortlund
The apostle Paul is soon to die. He has no time to waste on secondary issues. Yeah, everything he’s talking about in Second Timothy matters as and is an urgent consideration to him. And so I’m really struck Sam, that he talks about the intangibles of ministry. Now, he also talks about the doctrine, the good deposit, we’ll talk about that in due course. But the intangibles the the personal characteristics of power, and love and self control as opposed to self pity. Retreat. Face saving, and so forth. Timothy, go ahead. stick your neck out. Go to the next right thing. Yeah, the Lord is with you. You’ve been called to this. And the the power of the Holy Spirit that was given to you that was located in you that faith that dwells in you, I’m so struck by that word dwells. Yes, this is not marginal. This is not a Sunday, Only Christianity, that faith that dwells in you fannett into flame, let it burn. Let other people see you, burning for Christ.

Sam Allberry
I’m also struck by that that Triad of Power, love self control, any two of those without the third would be very incomplete. Can you imagine someone who has power and self control but not love? I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t want to sit under their ministry.

Ray Ortlund
We you have seen that kind of ministry, I presume, yeah.

Sam Allberry
Or love and self control that has no power. And that the spirit is not saying God is not saying pick, pick two of the following items from from this this menu. Actually, these three things go together because love and power and self control are all other piece. When it comes to the work of the Spirit in someone’s life.

Ray Ortlund
You know, Sam, it is such a privilege to be a pastor. It’s so dignifying that God is He’s not asking us to settle for something. This is an upward call. Yeah of God in Christ Jesus. This is something to reach for by faith and repentance. And every single pastor listening to this can realize, oh my goodness, God is giving me that a whole lifetime to grow. Yeah, and these wonderful ways and to reach by faith. And a year from now, five years from now. 10 years from now I’m going to be richer, deeper, more fruitful in all these ways. Hallelujah. Here we go. Yeah. Now, amen. Sam crossway is republishing J i Packer’s classic. That word is overused today, but this is a classic, knowing God and it’s coming out I think in being rereleased in March springtime

Sam Allberry
Yes. Sounds like they already be out by the time people hear this. Why Does

Ray Ortlund
knowing God by J i Packer matter to you?

Sam Allberry
Yes, it’s it’s one of those. One of those I remember as I was finding my feet as a new disciple of Jesus. The books that I kept being told to read were the cross of Christ by John Stott and knowing God by J i Packer. And it is it’s just Packer at his finest he is helping us understand who God is. And I think one of the things I’ve that’s really helped me in ministry is I’m now not that interested whether or not someone believes in God because it’s not whether or not they they believe in a deity is do they know the God who is there? Do they know this God? Do they know what he’s like? The God revealed to us in Jesus Christ. So it’s been, it’s been a very defining book.

Ray Ortlund
I’m so struck by it for many reasons. Here’s one in the section, the chapter on the wisdom of God. He actually has a section on the book of Ecclesiastes Sam main who writes a book about knowing God, and includes a section on Ecclesiastes. Yeah. So Packer was making connections. Yeah, that often surprised me. Because he sees he sees things with more profound depth than I do.

Sam Allberry
The chapter that most shaped me was the chapter. I think it’s entitled The jealous God, which was an aspect of God’s care character that I had never, never thought about before, but has stayed with me ever since. I don’t think I’ve read that chapter since the late 90s. But I still remember it vividly.

Ray Ortlund
That’s a sign of a great book. Yeah. So

Sam Allberry
be glad to see it coming out again, this time without the kind of cheesy sunset on the front cover.

Ray Ortlund
Okay, Sam, thank you so much. And we thank our listeners and it’s a privilege to serve you, and we’ll see you soon.