Paul again warns young Timothy about others that have wandered from the faith, as a caution not to repeat the same error:
"Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to your care. Turn away from godless chatter and the opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge, which some have professed and in so doing have wandered from the faith. Grace be with you."
He gives him some hard teaching to pass on, as well, when he gives him instructions on what to teach those who are under the yoke of slavery. While the instruction to not treat believing masters worse, but actually better, it is common sense and good stuff; but I can imagine that the audience of slaves doesn't want to hear that kind of thing. That is a tough row to hoe, and it seems even tougher (or easier?) to tell someone else to deliver that message. Sometimes I feel a little uneasy when my wife tells me to spank one of our girls for being disobedient, when I know nothing of the offense. It seems odd to enforce someone else's discipline, but we are a team, so my doing is acting as one. So it was with Paul and Timothy. I'm sure Paul wasn't dishing out instructions he wasn't willing to follow if he were there.
"If anyone teaches false doctrines and does not agree to the sound instruction of our Lord Jesus Christ and to godly teaching, he is conceited and understands nothing."
That's a bad place to be.
Well, it's not a Wednesday, but today will likely be a "Website day," as both new issues of our "brother publications" are now out. Lord willing, I'll post a few photos on this blog, too. I've taken some that I've wanted to post for awhile, but it seems I've been too danged busy to edit them and post 'em. Here's hoping I can get to that today.
It's cool: right now our dog (Biscuit) is just laying down at my feet. Dogs are wonderful.
Posted by Doug Van Pelt at February 21, 2006 08:58 AM