1 Timothy 2

Some of the church teachers in Ephesus, self-appointed or otherwise, have gotten off track into speculative doctrines, teachings that do not produce anything like a solid life of faith and obedience. Paul has reminded Timothy that part of his task there is to address that situation. Correct teaching and living are not only about what one does not say or do, but also about the positive message and life that is lived out and taught to others who want to worship the Lord.

One of the most important aspects of a life of godliness is prayer. Those who desire to teach ought to first give themselves over to the breadth of this life of communion with God, bringing our requests before Him, both for ourselves and for others, with hearts that are filled with thanksgiving to God for the gift of His Son. This life of prayer is part of a larger way of living respectfully and quietly as a member of a larger society where there is an honest recognition that not everyone embraces the doctrines of the Christian faith. That was certainly the case in first century Ephesus, but it is probably true in every age and in nearly every place where the church seeks to peacefully proclaim the message of the cross to those all around us.

Our agenda must not be the overthrow of existing structures of governance, which may vary significantly in different times and places. That is not the way of peace. Is there a supreme human ruler to whom God has given authority in some land? We are those who want to live as peacefully as we can under that provision as much as conscience will allow. This does not mean that we agree with all the determinations of those who are in offices of power. It does mean that we are happy to be praying for them, for they hold important positions of divine trust.

We do not wish to be rightly accused of lawlessness and insurrection. This requires self-control and discretion in speech. Not everything that can be said should be said. We should begin by speaking to God on behalf of those who rule our lands. Is there a way to serve the Lord and follow normal social conventions, showing appropriate deference to those in positions of honor? Let us discover that good way and pursue it without trying to attract a lot of notice. We do not need to draw unnecessary attention to ourselves in order to represent Jesus Christ well.

The systems of governance throughout the world and throughout the history of this current age are very diverse. Our first priority as a church is not civil revolution, but the honest communication, in word and deed, of the message of our Savior. God desires the salvation of all kinds of people everywhere. No longer is the communion of the redeemed significantly limited to one race or people group. We want all sorts of people to be able to give a fair and calm hearing to the Word of the cross without the slightest hint of our undue coercion. Our Lord Jesus gave His life to be the one Mediator between God and man. Through His cross, God has been reconciled to man. Through our proclamation as a church we urge all kinds of people everywhere to give up their unjust fight against God.

The price that was paid for our ransom was the blood of that one Lamb. This is our testimony, and as the Lord opens up doors for a nation to hear and receive that good Word, He allows His church to discover that the time for some within that place to embrace the Son of God has now come. This is what Paul experienced as he traveled throughout the Mediterranean provinces of the Roman Empire, and it is what missionaries have discovered in far-off lands throughout all the centuries of church history.

Therefore, the church that wants to teach the truth, should pray in accord with that truth. Do we want to teach people that God has sovereignly kept them and saved them? Then is it too much for us to pray earnestly to God for all things, knowing that He really is sovereign? This life of prayer and an appropriate and quiet respectability must not be unnecessarily discarded in favor of some disgraceful distraction. In every culture there are habits of dress, speech, and conduct that cannot be ignored without creating scandal. If we imagine that this kind of unbounded expressiveness is part of our freedom in the Lord, we miss an opportunity to speak in meekness to those around us, taking our place within the standards of decorum of the place where we live as bearers of the message of the Lord of heaven who came to earth to save people.

One of the ways of upsetting the peace of a society is through insisting on rights that may be against not only local standards of propriety, but even those patterns of order that are from the Lord's work of creation more generally. Insisting that women have governing rule within the teaching function of the church is something that Paul simply would not allow, and he understood this to be a matter of family and societal order that should be respected everywhere.

In all of these considerations, our goal is not to make a scene, but to try to fit peacefully within the time and place that God has given to us. It is here and now where we have the privilege to represent the Husband of the church. He is the Head over His body, and we are to be His holy bride. It is a wonderful privilege, and not an unwarranted constraint, to respect the order that He has seen fit to establish in His world. When we understand this, like Eve so long ago, we can reject the suggestion of some inappropriate affront to good order, and embrace the privilege of quietly and patiently bearing the promised seed for yet another generation, with faith, love, holiness, and self-control. This should be easier for us than it was for her, since the Seed of the woman has already come to earth for us, securing our redemption with His own blood.