“How To Become An Effective Christian”
LET GOD BE YOUR STRENGTH!
II Timothy 4:9-22
Introduction
This past summer during the baseball season, Ken Caminiti, a former All Star and National League MVP, came out publicly to admit that he used steroids during his playing career. Steroid use has been long suspected in baseball but people were shocked and outraged that Caminiti had cheated the game by using this illegal drug to give himself more strength. It’s been said that steroids can make an average player a good player, a good player a great player and a great player a Hall of Fame player.
Just like Ken Caminiti, we continually seek out ways to increase our strength. Weaknesses are to be hidden and ashamed of. We live in a world where only the strong survive. But the Bible tells us that God works through our weaknesses. II Corinthians 12:9-10, “But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me…For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
Tonight, we conclude our message series out of II Timothy on “How To Become An Effective Christian” as we study II Timothy 4:9-22, “Do your best to come to me quickly, for Demas, because he loved this world, has deserted me and has gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, and Titus to Dalmatia. Only Luke is with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, because he is helpful to me in my ministry. I sent Tychicus to Ephesus. When you come, bring the cloak that I left with Carpus at Troas, and my scrolls, especially my parchments. Alexander the metalworker did me a great deal of harm. The Lord will repay him for what he as done. You too should be on your guard against him, because he strongly opposed our message. At my first defense, no one came to my support, but everyone deserted me. May it not be held against them. But the Lord stood by my side and gave me strength, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it. And I was delivered from the lion’s mouth. The Lord will rescue me from every evil attack and will bring me safely to his heavenly kingdom. To him be glory for ever and ever, Amen. Greet Priscilla and Aquilla and the household of Onesiphorus. Erastus stayed in Corinth, and I left Trophimus sick in Miletus. Do your best to get here before winter. Eubulus greets you, and so do Pudens, Linus, Claudia and all the brothers. The Lord be with you spirit. Grace be with you.”
This final section of Paul’s letter to Timothy offers some specific instructions as well as some final pieces of advice that Paul is passing on to Timothy. Paul’s main objective is for Timothy to learn that he must allow God to be his strength. His effectiveness as a Christian leader depended on it as does your effectiveness as a Christian. We must allow God to strengthen us if we are to effective in His service.
Let’s begin by seeing the reasons Paul gives for...
I. THE NEED FOR STRENGTH.
There are many different occasions when we will have a need for strength, whether it be physical, mental or emotional. We need strength to accomplish a specific task. We need strength to overcome an addiction. We need strength to cope with the death of a loved one. Paul mentions two occasions:
A. Friends desert you.
Friends play a vital role in making up our lives. They make our lives more enjoyable and exciting. The wealthy, eccentric Howard Hughes, at the time had a wealth amassed of over four billion dollars said, “I’d give it all for one good friend.”
Because of deeply personal our friendships become, it is excruciating when our friends turn their backs on us and become no longer our friends. This is what has happened to Paul. II Timothy 4:9-10, “Do your best to come to me quickly, for Demas, because he loved this world, has deserted me and has gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, and Titus to Dalmatia.” He goes on further to write in II Timothy 4:16, “At my first defense, no one came to my support, but everyone deserted me.”
As his UCLA football team suffered through a poor season in the early 1970’s, head coach Pepper Rodgers came under intense criticism and pressure from alumni and fans. Things got so bad, he remembers that friends became hard to find. “My dog was my only true friend,” Rodgers said of that year. “I told my wife that every man needs at least two good friends- and she bought me another dog.”
David Letterman is infamous for his top ten lists that are a staple of his late night show. On one of his shows, the top ten list for the night was the “Top 10 Signs You Have No Friends”. We’ve trimmed his list down a little and now present the “Top 5 Signs You Have No Friends”.
5. James Taylor sings the first bars of “You’ve Got A Friend,” notices you in the audience and stops.
4. At your funeral, the entire eulogy is , “Yep, he’s dead.”
3. You are one of the five best solitaire players in the world.
2. You go to a video store and say out loud to yourself, “Well, what do you want to rent tonight?”
1. No calls from salespeople pushing MCI’s “Friends and Family” plan.
It is extremely disheartening to have your friends desert you and feel like you don’t have a friend in the world. Those are times in which you need strength to continue. Paul wasn’t the only one that experienced such a situation. Jesus himself knows what it’s like firsthand to have his friends desert him. Jesus is arrested, set up by one of his own disciples Judas. As Jesus is being taken away, we read in Matthew 26:56b, “Then all the disciples deserted him and fled.”
It’s bad enough when your own friends turn on you and desert you, but what makes things even worse and what makes your need for strength even greater is the situation Paul describes secondly:
B. Foes oppose you.
Listen to how Paul describes what has happened to him in II Timothy 4:14-15, “Alexander the metalworker did me a great deal of harm. The Lord will repay him for what he has done. You too should be on your guard against him, because he strongly opposed our message.”
Not only were Paul’s friends deserting him, but his enemies were rising up against him. We are not immune from having enemies. Each of us may have certain people that we would consider enemies. But we all share a common enemy, the devil, who is opposing you in every breath you take. You need strength to overcome your enemies and the Enemy.
Again, we look at the life of Jesus to see that even the Son of God himself had enemies. Matthew 12:14, “But the Pharisees went out and plotted how they might kill Jesus.” Jesus had just healed a man with a shriveled hand on the Sabbath. The Pharisees as always were looking for a way to trap Jesus in his own teachings or actions. Jesus’ healing of this man and his rebuke of the Pharisees only added to their fierceness in opposing him.
It’s a foregone conclusion that there are times when we need strength. Paul gives two specific occasions of when friends desert you and foes oppose you. Paul then turns to…
II. THE SOURCE OF STRENGTH.
Paul’s argument is that the source of our strength is not from exercise, food or drug; but from the Lord himself. Paul details three different ways in which the Lord is our source of strength.
A. The Lord stands with you.
Paul writes in II Timothy 4:17a, “But the Lord stood at my side…” Others may desert us. Others may not believe in us. Others may cease to love us, but the Lord stands by us. God loves you and will stand by you. You are His child. He will not leave you. As Moses was preparing to die and turn over leadership to Joshua, he gave Joshua a promise from God that is applicable to us as well. Deuteronomy 31:8, “The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.” Some of you tonight may be discouraged and weak. Do not be discouraged. The Lord is standing with you and is your source of strength.
B. The Lord gives you strength.
The Lord is our source of strength not only as He stands with us, but as He gives strength to us. II Timothy 4:17b, “…and gave me strength, so that through me the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it.”
The Lord gives us strength is many different ways. I don’t like to be away from my family overnight very often. This past Sunday after church, David VanderHamm and I left to go to Illinois so that David could visit my alma mater Lincoln Christian College. It came time for me to say goodbye to Holly and Hope and I was sad. Holly had tears in her eyes. I buckled Hope in her car seat and leaned in to tell her goodbye and that I’d see her in a couple of days. Hope is a affectionate child. She put her little hands on my face and looked me right in the eye. I told her, “I love you. Be a good girl for Mommy while I’m gone.” Hope replied to me, “Daddy- tell me when you need to go potty, go pee pee in the potty. OK?” That kept me going for two days. Everytime I thought about that it brought a smile to my face helped me cope with being away from my family.
The Lord gives you strength. He is your source of strength.
C. The Lord rescues you.
God dispenses His strength to us by rescuing us from dangers and bad situations. II Timothy 4:18, “The Lord will rescue me from every evil attack and will bring me safely to his heavenly kingdom.”
A newspaper ran this story several years ago. One evening a woman was driving home when she noticed a huge truck behind her that was driving so close behind her that it made her uncomfortable. She tried to speed up, but the truck sped up. She got off the freeway and turned onto main streets trying to lose the truck. But the truck ran a red light to stay behind her. Finally, the woman whipped her car into a service station and bolted out of the car screaming for help. The truck driver also sprung out of his truck and ran toward the woman’s car. He yanked the back door open and pulled out a man hidden in the back seat. From his higher vantage point in his truck, the truck driver had spotted a would be rapist in the woman’s car. The truck driver was not chasing the woman to harm her but to rescue her.
God is able and willing to rescue you and make you strong in your time of weakness. He alone is our source of strength.
Conclusion
When life is tough, we need to know where to look to find strength. Carol Schuller, daughter of evangelist Robert Schuller was involved in a serious motorcycle accident when she was a teenager that left her with only one leg. When she was eighteen, she went on a cruise with her parents. She made no effort to conceal her artificial leg wearing shorts and going swimming. She noticed people staring and could see the curiosity in people’s eyes. In response to the looks she had been getting, she decided to volunteer for the ship’s talent show. When she walked up to the microphone she said this: “If I have one talent, it is this: I can tell you that during that time (after her accident) my faith became very real to me. I look at you girls who walk without a limp, and I whish I could walk that way. I can’t but this is what I’ve learned, and I want to leave it with you: It’s not how you walk that counts, but who walks with you and whom you walk with.”
Are you walking with Christ tonight? Is He your strength? Or are you trying to walk it alone? I challenge you tonight to let God be your strength. Let Him take over the load in your life. Trust Him with your life.
