We're looking over in the first
book of Timothy, 1 Timothy chapter 1. And Paul begins this epistle
to Timothy in a very similar fashion to which he began the
second epistle. to Timothy. He speaks of his
apostleship. He says, Paul, an apostle of
Jesus Christ by the commandment of God our Savior and Lord Jesus
Christ, which is our hope. Unto Timothy, my own son in the
faith, grace, mercy, and peace from God our Father and Jesus
Christ our Lord. As I besought thee to abide still
at Ephesus when I went into Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some
that they teach no other doctrine. Neither give heed to fables and
endless genealogies which minister questions rather than godly edifying
which is in faith. So do. Now the end of the commandment
is charity out of a pure heart and of a good conscience and
of faith unfeigned. from which some, having swerved,
have turned aside into vain jangling, desiring to be teachers of the
law, understanding neither what they say nor whereof they affirm. But we know that the law is good
if a man use it lawfully, knowing this, that the law is not made
for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient,
for the ungodly and for sinners. for unholy and profane, for murderers
of fathers and murderers of mothers, for manslayers, for whoremongers,
for them that defile themselves with mankind, for men-stealers,
for liars, for perjured persons, and if there be any other thing
that is contrary to sound doctrine, according to the glorious gospel
of the blessed God which was committed to my trust, And I
thank Christ Jesus our Lord who hath enabled me, for that he
counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry, who was
before a blasphemer and a persecutor and injurious. But I obtained
mercy because I did it ignorantly in unbelief. And the grace of
our Lord was exceeding abundant with faith and love which is
in Christ Jesus. This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world
to save sinners of whom I am chief. Howbeit for this cause
I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might show
forth all longsuffering for a pattern to them which should hereafter
believe on him to life everlasting. Now unto the King eternal, immortal,
invisible, the only wise God, be honor and glory forever and
ever. Amen. This charge I commit unto
thee, son Timothy, according to the prophecies which went
before on thee, that thou mightest war a good warfare, holding faith
and a good conscience, which some, having put away concerning
faith, have made shipwrecked. of whom is Hymenaeus and Alexander,
whom I have delivered unto Satan, that they may learn not to blaspheme."
Now, I read the whole chapter to get a picture of what it is
Paul is writing to Timothy concerning, and in much the same vein in
which we thought about this last week, There was, very early on,
those that opposed the gospel that Paul preached. As Brother
Al's ably pointed out, that the gospel that Paul preached was
the gospel of grace, free grace. Now there is no other kind of
grace than free grace. It's kind of like saying sovereign
grace. But there is no other kind of grace than sovereign
grace because grace is the gift of God. It is that which God
does without any reason insofar as the ones He bestows the grace
upon. If a man has any notion whatsoever
that there is something within him or something he has performed
that has caused the grace of God to come upon him, then he
does not know what grace is, because grace is totally unmerited
favor which is bestowed on those whom God is pleased to bestow
it on. Now the thing that makes grace
to be grace is the fact that all men are not its recipients.
Now that is the place right there where men get a little antsy,
and they don't like that notion because they want to have a God
that they can influence. I mean, what good is it to have
a God that you can't do anything with? I mean, if God's just going
to do what God's going to do, why do we want to have a God
like that? We'd rather have one that, if
we get to needing something, we just dial up the phone and
pick it up and say, we need this, and, buddy, he delivers. That's
a very popular idea. And it hasn't been invented in
our day. It's the natural religion that
all men are born with. It's just that there are men
who have capitalized on the love of men for that sort of religion.
And when I say capitalized, I mean that in more than one way they
have gained much capital by doing that. If you preach a message
that is pleasing to men, you can make a lot of money doing
that. And a lot of men have figured that out, and they keep the cards
and letters coming having theirselves broadcast out into the world
in a broad fashion. Now, I'm not saying that everyone
that's broadcasting their preaching is doing it for the money, but
you can be sure of this, that the vast majority of those who
are doing it have a mind towards how much money they can get to
come in. Now, they say, oh, we're doing all these great things,
and most of the great things that they're doing are the things
that benefit them. Now, they may do some other stuff.
Now, you notice it's kind of like these gum machines that
you see around in various places, and they usually have a sticker
on them that says, help the blind. And so people look at that and
they say, well, here's somebody that's got a gum machine in here
that they're going to give this money to help the blind. Well,
I think I'll be influenced to buy a piece of gum from that
machine rather than this one over here. Well, they probably
give a dollar to the blind every year, so they can say that. But
you can be sure of this, the majority of the money is going
into their pocket. And they understand that they
can play upon the emotions of people. and that they can make
money. Now religion is a powerful force
for making money. It's a powerful force for getting
people to like you and to follow you and to sell you books and
all of those type things. It's a very powerful force. And
it is a thing that men are attracted to. Because after all, wouldn't
you rather be around somebody that's a religious person than
you would be around an old grump or somebody that, you know, he
just has no concern for anybody else? I mean, most anybody would
pick the morally upright people. That's the people you want to
be around, isn't it? The religious folks. I mean, let's go to church
instead of... We don't want to hang out with
a bunch of old lowlifes and stuff like that. So that's just the
way men are. That's the way men think. And
just like you said, that fits into the pattern and thought
process that men have about how they can somehow or other improve
themselves and make themselves pleasing unto the Lord. But Paul, in this first verse
here, He sums up really the place of all of God's children, those
who are true believers. Now, if you ask most people, do they
believe or do they consider themselves to be a believer, they would
tell you, oh yes. I believe in God. I believe in
this side or the other. And I have no doubt that most
people do believe in God. I mean, a man's a total idiot,
in my estimation, that wouldn't believe in God. I mean, the Scripture
says, look around you. I mean, the invisible things
that are made, the things that are set before us, that were
made by the hand of God. How else did they get here if
they were not made? The Lord has sent that as a testimony
unto men. So it's no great thing if men
should believe in God. The preaching of Jesus Christ
as the Savior and the one who hung on a cross on Calvary between
two thieves, that's a pretty common message, is it not? I
mean you would really have to hide your head in the sand to
say, I never heard anybody talk about that before. Because there
are all sorts of holidays and stuff that come around where
these things are mentioned even though they may be not emphasized
as much in our day and time as they have been in other times
and all of that sort of thing. Yet a man would have to be pretty
much hidden away under a pillow somewhere and not listening to
anything if he never heard that Jesus Christ died on a cross
in Jerusalem or outside of Jerusalem and that He died as a Savior. Wouldn't you say most all people
would have heard that? And most people would probably
say, yeah, I believe that's true. And a lot of people think, well,
that constitutes what the Scripture speaks about, about believing
in Him. It doesn't have anything at all
to do with it. Those are facts. And anybody
can believe facts. I mean, if you don't believe
facts, then you're the one that's on the outside looking in. But
that's not what it is to believe. That's not what Paul is speaking
about here. He says, Paul an apostle of Jesus
Christ by the commandment of God our Savior. Now, we talked
about that a little bit last week, about the fact that Paul
was an apostle by the commandment of God. He says in II Timothy,
he said, according to the purpose of God, which he purposed. This
is that which God made plain in the Declaration that he called
Paul to be an apostle. It cannot be controverted by
the commandment of God our Savior and Lord Jesus Christ, which
is our hope. Now, usually when somebody uses
the term hope, they use it not in a scriptural fashion. Because
I might say, well, I sure hope it doesn't rain tomorrow. Now, what am I expressing? I'm
just expressing a desire that I have for something to occur. I'm saying I hope that it doesn't. I don't have any reliance on
it. I have no understanding of whether
it will reign or not. But whenever Paul says, Christ
who is or which is our hope, he's not talking about we're
hoping Christ is the Savior. Well, I sure hope that He went
to the cross and died. I sure hope that I'm saved. That's not what he's talking
about at all. But he said Christ is our hope. Now, the hope that he's speaking
of here is an absolute place of reliance. He is our hope. Now, when, back years ago, There was a boxer. Well, of course, as you know,
the boxing and, of course, all sports professionally were all
basically done by white people because they had the upper hand. But there came a time when a
guy came on the scene named Jack Johnson. who was a black guy. And he whipped everybody that
there was and became the champion. And so they came up with a guy,
I forget what his name was, but that was primed up and able,
they figured, to beat Jack Johnson. Not to say that there was any
racial animosity or anything going on, but they called him
the great white hope. Now he was the one that they
had put their hope in. They were expecting something. And I use that illustration just
for this point, that that is the picture of the hope. You
see, it is that which they are relying upon. It is that which
they expect is going to cause that which they desire. Now Christ
who is our hope, we say, Paul uses this terminology again over
in Romans in chapter 8 and verse 24. He says, for we are saved
by hope. We are saved by hope. Wow, that doesn't make any sense
in the way that most people use the term hope, does it? But if
you understand what the Scripture means by hope, it makes perfect
sense. He says we are saved by hope.
That is, we have a hope in someone else outside of ourselves. We are saved by hope, but look
what he says. But hope that is seen is not
hope. Now if you can see it with your
hand, that's not hope. If you're expecting somehow or
other with something you do say, think or feel that you are going
to make yourself acceptable with God, that is a hope that is seen,
is it not? But a hope that is not seen is
that which is outside of you. And so we're saved by hope, but
that which is seen is not hope. So if you can see that wherein
you hope, then it's not a hope, because our hope is in Him whom
we do not see. For those things he goes on to
say, he says, but hope that is seen is not
hope for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? But if
we hope for that which we see not, then we do with patience
wait for it. Now you see, this is the place
that God has called His children to be, is in a place of waiting
for Him. Now, we don't have at all times
a clear picture. We don't always see those things
that we desire to see as clearly as we would like to see them.
We see through a glass darkly. But what is it that keeps us
ever looking? Because that's our hope. You
see, even when we don't see, even when we don't have those
feelings of assurance perhaps that are within us, even when
we don't know if we have believed or not, you ever get in that
shape? You wonder, well, I don't know if I've believed or not.
The Lord said, To believe, but I don't know if I believe or
not. What did Paul say? We read it last week. He says,
I know whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that he is
able to keep that which I have committed. He is our hope. Even
though we don't know if we believe in Him or not, we know that He
is that One, do we not? If God has given a man grace
to believe, does he not know who the object of his hope is?
Of course he does. And hope is not necessarily seen,
but hope is still hope. Even when a man has been stripped
of all else, he still has that one hope. If we hope for that which we
see not, then we do with patience wait for it. Likewise the Spirit
also helpeth our infirmities, for we know not what we should
pray for as we ought, but the Spirit Himself maketh intercession
for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. And he that searcheth
the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he
maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God. Now, how much do you think that
your prayers change things? You've heard that
term, prayer changes things. Well, how many things do you
think prayer changes? Prayer doesn't change things.
Prayer changes men. The Lord uses prayer to change
me to work. And when I say change, I mean
He causes us to do what? To hope in Him in whom we cast
our care. So we hope for that that we see
not. Prayer is not a thing. Prayer
is not where you bring a laundry list to the Lord and say, Lord,
meet these needs and we'll come back next week and get some more.
But rather, he said there that the Spirit helpeth our infirmities. Well, what is our infirmity?
Lord, we want to believe, but we can't help our unbelief. He
helps those infirmities. You see, we know not what we
should pray for as we ought, but the Spirit helpeth our infirmities,
and He works in His people, both the will and the do of His good
pleasure, and He causes them to hope in Jesus Christ. Just like Job said, though he
slay me, yet will I trust in him. Why? Because he was Job's
hope. Job's wife said, Job, curse God
and die. I mean, go ahead and get it out
of your system. I mean, just go ahead and tell him off and
be done with it. But no, he said, How can I do
that? He's my hope. He's that one in
whom my soul relies. He's that one in whom my soul
delights. I'm not interested in something
else. I'm interested in Him. Now that's
what it is to have a hope in Christ. And Paul said, the Lord
Jesus Christ which is our hope. Now what is your hope today?
What is it? Is it that you joined the church
or that you were baptized or that you were circumcised or
that you was any kind of thing? I mean, what is your hope? Now,
I was told as a young man that my hope was that I had made a
decision to follow Jesus Christ. That was my hope. I don't know
if that, but see, that was something I could see. I could go back
and I could say, well, I remember when I walked down the church
aisle, shook the preacher's hand. I remember when I was baptized.
Yes, I am a child of God. I have a hope. But that was no
hope at all because the Lord stripped me of that. And He showed
me that I couldn't believe, that I didn't believe. that which
was necessary to believe. I found myself as that man whom
the Lord said, does thou believe? He said, Lord, I believe, but
help thou my unbelief. Lord, I want to believe. I find
myself... I mean, you see, there are many
people, if they're confronted with the choice of going to hell
or going to heaven, if they thought that that was within their power
to do, how many people would rather go to hell? Not many. There again, they'd have to be
an idiot if they had any understanding of what it was. So men would
say, well, I'm going to choose to follow the Lord. So they have
that expectation. They say, that's where my hope
is. But you see, the man who is brought by the Spirit of God
to see himself as he is, he finds that there is no hope
within himself. He can't find any comfort in
those things that other men take comfort in. But he is stirred
within his soul. And he says, my hope has got
to be something other than what I'm seeing. It's got to be something
other than what I'm holding on to. It's got to be something
outside of me. My hope. It's like Top Lady wrote
in his song. Or not top lady, but Edwin Moat
says, my hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest
frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. He didn't say I wholly
lean on my decision. He said, I don't wholly lean
on what the preacher told me, but it's Christ. You see, the
man who has a hope in Christ, he rejects all other hopes. Some people like to cover all
the bases. I've had people tell me, well, I'm kind of believing
this religion a little bit and that one, you know, because I
don't want to be, I want to have some of all of them. Well, you
can't have some of all of them. You can have all of the rest
of the religion of the world, or by the grace of God, if He
gives you a hope in Christ, then all that other stuff is not worth
a plug nickel to you. See, there is no partnership. involved in that faith which
is given by the Lord. It is a hope in Christ and nothing
else. That's it. We've put all our
eggs in one basket. He is our hope. He is that one. Our only hope. Absolutely right. And of course,
as he goes on then to say to Timothy, Now, why do we emphasize
that? Because of this reason, all other
things that men would come preaching, as he describes here to Timothy,
and he says, neither give heed to fables, endless genealogies,
which minister question rather than godly edifying. You see,
there is a multitude of messages that are preached. I had some
guys come in the store just this week, and he wanted to know if
I was interested in some of his magazines. And you know what
the magazines were. You've probably showed them before. I didn't have any interest in
the magazines. He had an interest in the magazines. I didn't have an interest in
his magazines because, you see, my hope is built on Jesus Christ. If I said, well, yeah, let me
see those. I might find something in there
that I need. Would my hope be in Christ? Or
would it be in my ability to figure out what it is that I
need? But he says to Timothy, don't
pay heed to these fables and endless genealogies. Now why
do we emphasize that our hope is in Christ, because all false
gospels seek to undermine that. Every false gospel, it doesn't
make any difference what it is. It will seek to undermine what
Paul is speaking about here of Christ being our hope. He'll say, oh yes, you need that,
but you also need this over here. Anything plus Christ is too much. He said Christ is our hope. It's not our morality. It's not our obedience. It's not our church attendance.
It's not our whatever. It's not our doctrine. Oh, we've
got sound doctrine here. But you can learn the five points
of Calvinism and you've got it down pat then. You've got it.
No, our hope is Christ. It's not with any doctrinal place. It's not with any place where
we like one another. Now, I think I like all of y'all.
Some of y'all get on my nerves from time to time, but by Lord,
you know, I like everybody here. I hope to say that I love everybody
here. But my hope is not in y'all. As much as I hope you share my
hope, my hope doesn't have anything to do with you except that by
the grace of God we share the same one. But our hope is in
Christ. And there is no church on earth
that can give you that hope. There's no doctrine on earth
that can give you that hope. There's no preacher on earth
that can give you that hope. Now, there's plenty of them that
they tell you they can put their hands on you and cause you to
get all kinds of stuff. Now, I don't know what you can
get, but I know one thing you can't get, which is the only
thing that God's people need, according to what Paul says,
and that's a hope in Christ. There's only one place that a
hope in Christ comes from, and that's from the Lord Himself.
He alone can give a man a reason to hope in Him. Oh, that we might be able to
say with Paul, the Lord Jesus Christ which is our hope. He is that one in whom we hope.
We have not seen Him with these eyes. And you can't explain the
gospel to men in such fashion as they will embrace it. Now, you can tell men the facts
of the gospel and they may say, oh, yeah, that's good. But it's
only according as God, who is rich in mercy just like he did
to the apostle Paul, he said, he called me. by His grace in
such times it pleased Him, and He gave me a good hope through
grace. May the Lord be pleased to show
us a hope in Christ, because I tell you there is no hope outside
of Him. There are many things that the
multitudes of the world trust in. Most all of them are religious-based
stuff. Religion is a powerful force.
Religion will cloud the minds of men. But there is one message
that is a message of hope, and that is that Jesus Christ, remember
what He said there, this is a message worthy of all acceptation, that
Jesus Christ came into the world to do what? To save sinners of
whom I am chief. And upon that is all my hope
that Christ did indeed pay the price for sin. And having paid
the price for sin did include me in that number. He alone is
all the hope of God's people.