Present Yourself to God – The Garrett Ashley Mullet Show
Still being home on quarantine last night, I did not have an opportunity to deliver the second sermon I prepared for the Preaching & Teaching class at Summitview Community Church, though I did prepare a sermon.
However, being home as we were yesterday morning, I did preach both the first and second sermons for class to my wife and children over breakfast, and it is a funny thing to realize that even preaching to your own family can induce feelings of nervousness.
To hear the first sermon, you can go back to the episode I recorded last week titled ‘The Breath of God’ concerning 2 Timothy 3:16-17. But in this episode, I would like to share with you the second sermon concerning 2 Timothy 2:14-15.
Here Paul tells Timothy,
“Remind them of these things, and charge them before God not to quarrel about words, which does no good, but only ruins the hearers. Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.”
Feeling convicted as I did after teaching my children and wife such yesterday morning, I went back and listened to my episode from yesterday with fresh ears, and I heard myself saying some things which I was not convinced could be called “rightly handling the word of truth.” So I went back and edited the audio to remove the offending part.
Irreverent Babble
If we are servants of God, we are not to be quarrelsome, about words or any other thing. Nor are we to embrace “irreverent babble” as Paul calls it in 2 Timothy 2:16. Rather, we are to avoid such, even as we strive to rightly handle truth and present ourselves to God as approved workers who have no need to be ashamed.
That said, some of us say things which are not good in other ways. And just because I sometimes offend in saying things which are true but delivered too harshly, and I need to get better at that, the mainstay issue confronting many American Christians today is an undue deference to claims and practices which God’s Word says are false and evil.
As Isaiah 5:20 puts it, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!”
Let it not be said of us that we do any such thing ever, whoever we might offend, and whatever temporary benefits or security we might desire by flattering.
We must not confuse flattery for gentleness, or ambiguity for humility. Rather, we must be bold in telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help us God.
“All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable,” therefore we must “do [our] best to present ourselves to God as workers who need not be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.”
See Also: Breath of God
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