Book of 1 Timothy - Ch. 1, vv. 12-13

Well, good morning everybody We will jump right in with the time that we have and we are still in 1st

Timothy chapter 1 We have this Sunday and I believe next

Sunday as well before we our next swap and so we're making decent headway for our first little stint here

Chapter 1 we'll pick it up just right at verse 12. So verse 12 begins a new section

You have kind of these natural sections broken up as you go through it

And of course, there's the salutation, but then from verses 3 through 11

Paul is really just straight out of the gate diving deep into one aspect and a very important aspect at that but one aspect of Kind of the role of the elder in the church

Of course having to do with rebuking False doctrine Having to do with showing

Timothy reminding Timothy as well as the church. This letter would be read to the difference the contrast between true

Saving faith and the things that false teaching brings about and so these are all things that we have talked about and were covered again through verses for verses 3 through 11 there and so beginning in verse 12 all the way through about the 17th verse of this chapter

Paul is about to use himself as an example kind of a prime example even of what transformation really looks like the transformation of a person after salvation not a perceived transformation like one might try to Kind of exhibit or manifest by some other religion

We see again the pursuit of transformation we talked a little bit last week about the pursuit of spiritual health so -called and Yet Paul in verse 5 gives us what spiritual health looks like and yet lo and behold

It's what is neglected because it's actually not what people are pursuing. They're pursuing an external look again a perceived transformation and so Paul here is about to show us what a true transformation looks like the kind that turns murderers into humble

Saints as was the case for Paul himself So picking it up at verse 12

And I'll read through verse 13. He says and I think 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 that last phrase there is fascinating We'll take a look at that shortly, but briefly before really getting into these verses here.

I want to note something that Paul is doing Between the last section that we finished up last week and this one between verses 8 and 10 of this

Opening chapter here. He's talking about the false teachers and he's specifically talking about their

Misunderstanding of the law. This is we talked about this in detail last week, but he talked about their misunderstanding of the law, of course believing that the law is the gospel a grave error and a heretical error that cannot be made and he reminded

Timothy and he even equipped Timothy with Reminding him what the proper use of the law is and if you guys recall last week's lesson, you know, remember

Paul sets the stage with showing Remember, I believe is it in verse 8?

He says we know that the law is good if a man uses it lawfully in what in that context was the main use the proper use

Out of all the things we talked about last week. It reveals something it reveals

That we need a Savior it reveals our sin And of course in revealing our sin and showing us that we are sinners that will violate the law left and right

You know front and center. We cannot keep it in any way shape or form in and of ourselves perfectly, we have to have a

Savior and so that's right. We he reminds Timothy this he equips

Timothy with this knowledge the great revealer of sin is this law that the false teachers believe?

Is actually the gospel they they totally mess it up Instead it reveals our sin.

It shows us a need for a Savior like Jenny just said and so Paul Just finished all that up in the previous section.

We looked at last week But now beginning in verses 12 all the way through 17, we won't go up We can't get that far this week

But as we progress here he begins laying out what the actual gospel looks like it gives us once again contrast between The false gospel of these false teachers and what the true saving gospel looks like and what does he do?

To really just make it stick out. What does he do to color it all in to make it as vivid and Personal as he can what he does is he uses himself as the sinner that is in view

So he says I'm gonna show you what the gospel looks like. I'm gonna show you how powerful it is I'm gonna show you what true transformation looks like let me give you a sinner

That was so far from grace. You wouldn't even believe it and yet even he Received mercy in grace in that sinner was me

That's what he's about to do from verses 12 through 17 with a few kind of interesting things thrown in there as well

The whole section ends with what you might call a doxology the praise and the glory of God just Recognizing his attributes.

So Paul does some really amazing things in this section of the letter here But the thrust of it is what does the gospel actually look like?

so let's take a look at verse 12 and just wanted y 'all to keep that in mind as we look at this because Remember we go slowly meticulously verse by verse and that's a great thing

Obviously we should do that, but sometimes we want to be careful We don't forget the preceding context and how what we're reading now comes into play

And so as we read through this just remember what he just finished talking about verses 3 through 11

What the false teaching looks like the way they're messing things up Okay, so verse 12 Paul begins with what he says and I think

Christ Jesus our Lord He begins with gratitude. He begins with thankfulness, of course in God's providence

We're talking about this the week of Thanksgiving But this is this is massive. This is a huge part of Paul's teaching

This is something that actually as you go throughout the New Testament Gratitude and thankfulness something that Paul You know came back to often.

It was something he was consumed with as It related to his concern for his brothers and sisters thankfulness and gratitude was something he did not want to ever escape the attention of his fellow

Christians making sure that they understood the importance of thankfulness and here as I mentioned a second ago.

He uses himself as the prime example of what that should look like He's gonna use himself as a prime example of a sinner in need of a

Savior But right here at the beginning of verse 12 He's showing himself to be a great example of what thankfulness and gratitude should look like now.

It's interesting because elsewhere Paul will kind of put this idea in the negative

Placing an emphasis on what happens when an image bearer of God is not thankful in other words you know there are times he shows the positive results of being a thankful person and then times he chooses to show the negative results of Not being thankful to God for anything and I want to show you that really quick if you want to turn to Romans 1

This is a passage. We all know super well But it's worth looking at here As we move throughout first Timothy, especially with him at the very beginning of this section

Talking about his thankfulness to Christ. So his thankfulness In contrast to what?

Take a look at Romans chapter 1 and I'll start in I'll start in verse 18

Paul there says And knowest his will and approvest the things that are more.

Oh, is that chapter? Yeah, that's chapter 2 Sorry Chapter 1 verse 18 for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men

Who hold the truth in unrighteousness? Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them or For God hath showed it to them for the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen

Being understood by the things that are made even his eternal power in Godhead so that they are without excuse and look at verse 21

Because that when they knew God they glorified him not as God Neither were thankful you see ingratitude you see unthankfulness

But they became vain in their imaginations and their foolish heart was darkened

It's very very interesting. We see a prime cause of the later effects of sin egregious in some of the worst sins that mankind could commit a

Primary cause of that was initial unthankfulness to the creator of the creature

Recognizing his power is Godhead even in the creation itself Not having a desire to seek him out

Even though the heavens themselves declare his glory and so Paul again is is there putting an emphasis on thankfulness?

But in the negative he's saying if you are not thankful, this is what that looks like but all throughout his letters

Paul is always bringing the Christian endeavor back to thankfulness and I believe he's doing that here as well

Thankfulness to God for the grace and the mercy that he has shown for no reason whatsoever that we have earned ourselves

Paul says that he thanks Jesus again verse 12 I thank Christ Jesus our

Lord and look at the next phrase he uses who hath enabled me Who hath enabled me in other words?

Jesus is the one who has strengthened Paul Any amount of strength that Paul has ever exhibited in his ministry in his writings in his church planting in his mission work in any way that he has been able to be a comfort or a guide or a

Discipler of of all of the vast amounts of people that relied on him. None of it came from himself

He says Christ Jesus was my enabler. He is the one that strengthened me.

He enabled me to do this work Christ is the source of Paul's strength and that's saying something because Paul was a formidable guy

He was authoritative. He was well -educated. He could debate with the best of them whether they be

Kind of heretical monotheists like the Pharisees or the polytheists like the Athenians he again he was a very

A very well -rounded guy across the board and yet he tells us here just right on the nose

It's not me that was able to do all of this. It was Christ Who enabled me and he's giving him thanks for that Strength that he received and I think

Christ Jesus our Lord who hath enabled me and this is again important for Paul to mention here because when he says

I Thank Christ our Lord who has enabled me There's something that's already assumed underneath that and that of course is

Saving grace the fact that Paul has already been saved that he's already been justified that the Lord has already opened his blind eyes deaf ears

And awakened him to who Christ really is that's assumed Otherwise Paul wouldn't even be writing this letter in the first place as as we know

And so what is he doing here because that's already assumed. He's emphasizing something different He's bringing it all back to grace.

That is not different. But what is different is Based upon the reality of saving grace with that as the foundation with that as the basis in other words

Something that has already happened in Paul's life He then makes a point to mention that grace also comes in the form of enabling the

Christian to keep going I've said it before but Salvation isn't something that's in the rearview mirror

It's not something that happened at a point in time and then it just stays back there and we're just kind of waiting things out until Jesus comes back and In reality, yes grace justifies at a point in time and then it continues to sanctify through the rest of the life of that of that believer and Part of the sanctification process part of all of that is the fact that we have

Christ's strength to get through all of it He enables us he gives us strength

He is giving us what we need to keep going after the point of salvation because in all in all reality

That's when the goings get really tough We don't enter our paradise at the moment of justification.

That's out in our future We have to we have to fight the battle. We have to run the race We have to exert energy all of these things that Paul tells us elsewhere.

And so we began the Christian walk like Paul by grace justifying us in the sight of the

Father as if we had never sinned and Now that same grace enables us to continue in the faith.

You see what he's saying here He is putting an emphasis on the fact that even after the road of Damascus he needed

Christ's strength He wouldn't have been able to do anything any of his work without that and remember

Paul's words in Titus in our last study He said for the grace of God teaches and he teaches us that denying and godliness and worldly lusts

We should live soberly righteously and godly in this present world That's Titus 2 11 through 12.

And so the same grace that saved us in the first place It's teaching us in real time in the present tense.

So it's the same thing just worded a little bit differently here again with a very very important emphasis as well

About the words of Peter in last last week's sermon giving all diligence add to your faith virtue

That's 2nd Peter 1 5 so if it weren't for this reality that Christ's grace

Continues to strengthen continues to enable us as we progress in the Christian walk

We would be essentially spiritual vegetables We would just be again laying around waiting for something else to happen

Waiting for Jesus to come back and just sweep us away in the rapture or something like that but there's actually a great deal of things that take place in between justification and our glorification and In fact because that is the moment that we live in actively right now it's very important for us to keep that to keep our sights on it because It's just where the

Lord has us at the moment This is again One of Paul's Paul's great emphases throughout his letters and things like that Listen to this in 2nd

Timothy the next epistle to Timothy 4 17. He says notwithstanding the Lord stood with me and Strengthened me same thing here in 1st

Timothy chapter 1 verse 12 He's giving thanks to Jesus for enabling him putting him in the ministry in 2nd

Timothy He says notwithstanding the Lord stood with me. Just think about that for a second The Lord stood with me and strengthened me that by me the preaching might be fully known and that all

Gentiles might hear and I was delivered out of the mouth of the lion and Who is that?

That's the devil and so through Christ standing with Paul side -by -side and Strengthening him enabling him.

He was able to accomplish the great things that he did in his life and in his ministry

Another thing that Paul is thankful for Continuing in verse 12 here. Is that he counted me faithful putting me into the ministry

That's how that's the latter part of verse 12 there. He counted me faithful Putting me into the ministry now

This little phrase this kind of sentiment from Paul is Something that any genuine

Minister of the gospel knows about knows the feeling that is coming from Paul's heart at this point

Because what it is is it's the utter amazement that God could use such an imperfect

Instrument to bring his word to bear for God's people Paul was just again

Amazed he was stunned at the reality that someone that was a sinner to the degree that he was and Still had the capacity to be as we know from the the amazing chapter of Romans chapter 7

He was amazed by the fact that God counted him faithful and that he used him To be such an instrument in the ministry of God Again ministering to his people

How is it that God could trust a sinner and in Paul's case as he tells us later the chief of sinners

With handling his word with any kind of faithfulness with any kind of accuracy with any kind of authority

How where does something like that come from? And I don't know if Paul even understood that fully in his life

But it's certainly hard for me to understand and I imagine it'd be hard for again any genuine

Minister to really understand How is it? How could it work this way? How can can

God be glorified in in such imperfect instruments? And while we may not be able to understand it fully in this life a good place to start is knowing as Paul Again is is highlighting here is knowing that even that can only be possible

By his grace. So how can he use perfect instruments? How is is one?

Pastor I enjoy listed to says how is it that he can draw straight with crooked lines with crooked instruments with crooked sticks?

How is it that he can do that? Well the Beginning of it, of course is his grace the fact that the fact that he would again

Undeservingly show us the favor talking about in the context of ministers here show the favor towards some to Preach his word and to be trusted with it to be interested with it

We learn this in Titus as well and right here He says it again that he counted me faithful putting me into the ministry

It's really an amazing an amazing thing and even Paul the great apostle Was struck by the amazement of it now

Why was the grace of God so particularly vivid in the mind of Paul?

Why you know, we we hear Paul talking about this in using different word formulas different illustrations different doctrinal teachings using himself as an example, we see

Paul talking about grace so much and Just making such a point to ensure that it isn't impressed upon our minds

And of course that all flowed from the fact that it was so vivid in Paul's mind himself again

This is the great apostle arguably the greatest Christian that ever lived Why was it that grace was so vivid in his mind?

And he tells us here in verse 13 and let's look at this This is just incredible. What does true transformation look like?

It looks like this He says who was before talking about himself a blasphemer and a persecutor and injurious

This is why grace was so vivid in the mind of Paul. This is why we received some of the Most detailed teachings we have on the doctrines of grace being from Paul because This was a night and day transformation

This was a guy again on the road to persecute those whom he would become one of He would become a namesake of the very one.

He was trying to persecute How you know, how could he not express? grace in the terms that he did

Coming from a place like this who was before a blasphemer a persecutor and injurious and like I mentioned before This is what genuine transformation looks like Everyone wants to pursue transformation

We use the word a lot and really the only reason I'm using it here isn't because I like the word all that much because again

It's just overused now. It's overused in context where it's just it's just silly You know man -made pursuits for man -made transformation and things like that but I use it on purpose because Just because there's so many, you know, silly versions of this pursuit of transformation

Doesn't mean that true transformation. Is it there it does it doesn't negate the reality of transformation by grace and This is what it looks like.

This is what it genuinely looks like it looks like the Apostle Paul and We know that because there's nothing superficial about it

Paul Talks about the positions that he was put in in his ministry 2nd

Corinthians. I can't remember the chapter Maybe I think it's chapter 10 He just goes point for point for point and all the terrible things that happened to him all the tribulations he went through Specifically for the people he was ministering to there's no there's no

You know glory in that from man's point of view That's not the glorious external religious

Sanctimonious all of these things that that people want to pursue So passionately didn't have any of that.

We're talking about being shipwrecked. We're talking about being mocked We're talking about being anathematized by your own kinsmen and all of these things.

That is what the Apostle Paul Experienced we're talking about being chained to prison walls. We're talking about a basing being a based

In in multiple contexts your ministry funding drying up from the people that want to give it to you

But they just don't have it themselves. These are the kinds of things Paul dealt with so there's nothing superficial here

This is genuine. This is what it all really looks like it's not superficial it cuts incredibly deep to the point of making very scary people a

Trusted instrument in the hand of God remember Ananias in his reaction when he heard that Paul was coming to be

Ministered to by him, you know, he would have removed the scales from his eyes. He prayed over him He baptized him those types of things

Ananias was like are you talking about the same guy? I think you're talking about Paul was a very scary person and yet even he could be used as a great instrument of God In a bringing a little more closer to home for some of us

We know we just recently listened to brother Rocky's testimony pretty scary guy.

He came from a background that You know by no means was

Your your Hallmark Christmas movie and in lo and behold, here's this guy ministering to some of the most vulnerable

Christians in the country Of course those dealing with acute spiritual warfare and things like that Evangelizing doing revival meetings all of the amazing things that he did.

So pretty scary guy totally transformed into a humble and Very Successful servant of the

Lord and so that's why I wanted to Really highlight. What does this really look like?

What does transformation really look like? It looks like Paul here now He mentions three specific sins that he was, you know

Shoulder deep in at the time of his conversion. The first one is that he was a blasphemer

Now the the Greek term is blaspheme blasphemous, of course where we get our word blasphemy from and it quite literally means to speak evil and to speak slanderously against God and So that's what

Paul was doing prior to his conversion. He was blaspheming God and What's amazing about it?

Is that that went so deep for Paul that we find out at the very end of Acts because he's the one that tells us

That he wasn't only a blasphemer himself, but in his persecutions of the church

He was threatening Christians to also blaspheme in Acts chapter 26 verse 11

He says and I punished them oft in every synagogue and compelled them to blaspheme

So imagine the Apostle Paul prior to conversion Forcing or at least attempting to force by threats

Genuine Christians to blaspheme their God and when they wouldn't do it. What would he do?

he would either turn them in to the Sanhedrin or perhaps Persecute them physically himself.

And so this is what he was doing He was a blasphemer blasphemer himself as he says at first Timothy He compelled others to blaspheme as he tells us in Acts 26

This again was Night and day this is midnight black With regard to Paul's heart at this point at that point in his life.

And this is what he was saved from This is what grace looks like. This is what mercy looks like He's using himself to demonstrate what what the gospel actually looks like Contrasting with the false teachers of verses 11 through excuse me 3 through 11

That is false. This is what the gospel really looks like. I was a blasphemer I was speaking evil and slanderously against the very

God that pulled me out of all of that Then he says that he was a persecutor and injurious after that Now this is really interesting because what was

Paul before he was saved? He was a part of a particular religious sect.

What was it? The Pharisees and who were the Pharisees they were the Heidi the highest and mightiest of all religious types at that time

That Really drove home the fact that you know, they were the heralds of Moses That they were the heralds of God's law and that they were able to keep it impeccably and Paul himself

Believed that he tells us as much in Philippians chapter 3 Hebrew Hebrews Circumcised the eighth day of the tribe of Benjamin of a

Pharisee blameless And so the Apostle Paul checked all the boxes as well as all the other

Pharisees At least they believe they checked all of the boxes But here's what's fascinating about the three sins

That Paul mentions here being a blasphemer being a persecutor being injurious if there was anything that a

Pharisee Wanted to keep perfectly and believed with all of his heart that he could keep perfectly to the point of justifying himself

It would be the Ten Commandments, right? And so the Apostle Paul here enlisting these three particular sins

We learn that by Paul's own Profession his own admission that he violated and was violating

Continuously the whole of the Ten Commandments during his life as a Pharisee at the point where he was believing

He was again at the the pinnacle at the apex of religious sanctimony at the religion at the at the pinnacle of religious fulfillment and Self -justification all of these types of things when he believed he was at the peak.

He was in reality Violating the Ten Commandments wholesale because number one is a blasphemer

That would be violating all of what you might call the first table of the Ten Commandments Thou shalt have no other gods before me don't make into the any graven images.

Don't use my name in vain Keep the Sabbath all of those those are all related toward God They are all about the person in his relationship toward God and what they are to look like in the eyes of a holy

God He says you want to know what my holy standards are here They are so by being a blasphemer of God speaking evil against him slandering him compelling others to do the same

He was in violation of the whole first table. And then what does he do after that? He says

I was a persecutor in an insolent man toward all of the others Well, what is the second table of the

Ten Commandments for it's our relationship toward our fellow man. Don't steal from them Don't murder them.

Don't commit adultery with their wives don't bear a false witness against them don't covet against them and the

Apostle Paul was violating the He was literally violating the rights of his fellow man he was by he was persecuting them and he was

Intentionally trying to hurt them and do anything he could to bring down this gospel message that they were trying to proclaim

And that he was trying to thwart and so there's just some irony there Because at the height of his

Pharisee ism He was violating the whole law of God thinking actually that he was the preeminent example of someone that could keep it perfectly in Romans 7

We learned that it was the Tenth Commandment Specifically thou shalt not covet that magnified

Paul's sin in his eyes It helped open his eyes to his need for a

Savior What is the the law for to reveal our sin to let us know it's it's literally what defines in 1st

John 3 4 we looked at it last week Sin is defined as transgressing the law of God.

So that like that's the standard That's how you know that we're that we're human beings that are fallen in the need of Savior And it was the

Tenth Commandment that made that apparent to Paul But even though it was the

Tenth Commandment that made him real helped make him realize oh my goodness Oh, I can't actually do this.

I actually do need a Savior all along in His passion for persecuting these

Christians. He was explicitly violating the whole thing. It wasn't really just the 10th

That's just the only one he realized at that point in time. He was violating the whole thing the whole time

So in his blaspheming against God and his persecution and aggression against Christians Paul became the self -proclaimed chief of sinners and we'll get to that eventually where he makes that proclamation and yet How does verse 13 conclude?

It concludes with but I obtained mercy because I did it ignorantly in an unbelief

So all that we just talked about just a brief survey of the deep mire that Paul was in in his life prior to Conversion and the egregious sins that he was putting on full display the whole time from blaspheming his

Creator Persecuting those who would become his brothers and sisters Being aggressive and just being insolent all of the time

Regardless of all of that and in fact with all of that as the backdrop He obtained mercy and then he goes on and says because I did it ignorantly in unbelief now first Just with regard to mercy for a second remember in our study of Titus that mercy is the basis for everything

In Titus 3 5 he says not by works of righteousness, which we have done again, think about Paul coming out of the

Pharisaical order making that statement. It's it's a night and day transformation It's what genuine transformation looks like he now realizes the salvation

It comes not by works of righteousness, which we have done and then what's the basis but according to his mercy he saved us so Mercy is is the basis for everything and so right here.

He says I obtained this mercy myself Just like with every other

Christian that's ever been saved This mercy is shown in large part because of how dumb we were prior to conversion because of how clueless we were prior to conversion we were damned we were under the judgment of God's immutable law and Yet we're somehow ignorant of that very important fact that we were on a warpath

To damnation and we were totally ignoring that and totally fine with where we were At that particular time

Now I say somehow but really the reason why we were ignorant of all of these things ourselves is because We were actually having pleasure in our unrighteousness as Paul says in 2nd

Thessalonians chapter 2 when he's Pointing out those that will be damned are those that continually take pleasure in their unrighteousness

So they're not being forced against their will to just kind of stay in this state of rebellion Even though they they really want to get out of it.

They are taking pleasure in it It's what they want to do and it's what we wanted to do as well. It's what Paul wanted to do as well prior to his conversion

And so prior to that mercy being shown to us and our our eyes being opened.

We were ignorant. We were dumb We did not realize Though you have the entire creation pointing to this reality that we were once more on a warpath to our own damnation in need of a

Savior and so Paul obtains this mercy Now here's what's interesting that last phrase.

He says because I did it ignorantly in unbelief now, that's interesting He did it ignorantly in unbelief

You know at a very quick glance of that you might think oh well, you know, it's an ignorance That's that's why he did earn his mercy.

He did earn the grace because he did it in ignorance That's not that's not the connotation that he is actually bringing out of it

It wasn't that the ignorance was something that earned the mercy later What he's doing is he's really distinguishing himself from what we might call an apostate which is a person

Jesus talked about these people that the Apostles talked about these people we're actually going to learn about one of them very specifically at the end of 2nd

Timothy Many years from now and in Hebrews chapter 6, it's all broken down there as well

Well again what we now talk about or refer to as an apostate he's saying He's making a distinction between people like that in himself an apostate is someone who had the light in other words

They were in the presence of the preaching of God's Word they were partaking in all of the means of grace that all of us do whether that be being a part of a local congregation hearing the word preached maybe even receiving baptism and Living in a community of like -minded believers and things like that and yet They turn their backs on all of that.

That's what an apostate is It's someone that that repudiates the faith after they proclaimed the faith

That's what an apostate is and so What Paul is saying here is me on the other hand

I was in pitch darkness when I was doing all of the evil deeds that I was doing

It was within that cast it was within a a total unbelief. And I mean he says as much right there,

I mean he says I did it in ignorance in unbelief and So there's a little distinction there that Paul is bringing out but what happened

He did he did his deeds in the darkness meaning, you know living in a life that was specifically and intentionally divorced from Everything that these

Christians over here were immersing themselves in Within all of that then the light was revealed on the road to Damascus And then that is when

Paul as he says here at the end of verse 13 when he obtained mercy

So we'll probably end it there. Yeah, we only have a few minutes left Anyway, we'll pick it up in verse 14 next week because Paul is going to continue to build off of this and again use himself as just a quick display of What the gospel looks like the true saving gospel in contrast with what all of these false teachers

Timothy You're gonna be dealing with you're gonna be hearing these things from Here's what it actually looks like.

I'm gonna use myself as the example of it So you will never forget it and so that you know that this is real and that it is personal.

It's not academic It's not intellectual. This is transformative literally and Again, this is what it looks like.

Look at my life. So Again, it keeps going. It's a really really beautiful section of this letter, but we'll pick it up more next week

Does anyone have any thoughts or anything? They'd like to share? Yeah, go ahead of the blessed

God He counted me faithful, yeah

Mm -hmm. I Would say it works like that all the time. I mean Yeah, no,

I that is a good illustration of it. You know, this is this is the Lord Brick I mean he he's entering into his own creation is what he's doing

Of course that peaked in the incarnation itself when he literally entered it in the form of a man

But really he has always entered into his creation It's all in the Old Testament to where he'll he'll just pop up.

There are these things we call theophanies Which is like it's an appearance of Jesus pre -incarnate.

So before he even had the name Jesus. He was still the Eternal Son we would see him pop up at times with Abraham with Joshua with a number in a number of instances and so Jesus has always loved entering into his creation and Interfacing with it so to speak and Working in time.

And so here's an example of him in time Walking along with Paul and remember what does

Paul say in 2nd Timothy? He stood by me. He's standing with Paul. Well Paul's in time He is constrained by time and space and in yet Christ stands beside him in that Rather than just staying in a transcendent lofty place, which he could in does to a degree

It's it's not too much for him to work shoulder -to -shoulder With his people and of course, here's a great example of it

So yeah, we could talk about that more next week dad as we continue to flesh this this out

But good stuff everybody. I'll go ahead and dismiss in prayer and then we will move on to the next service Heavenly Father Thank you for this wonderful day for bringing us all together once more and giving us yet another opportunity to Dive into your scriptures and to learn from them and to grow in them and To allow them just to enter our minds

Enter our hearts in such a way that as we live our lives we can constantly recall recall them to mind and use them as our rule of faith as our instructions as our way of knowing how to continue moving forward as Paul says

You enabled him and we know that you also enable us in like manner you give us strength you

Allow us to continue in the faith In such a way that we are growing stronger and being becoming more sanctified all the time

We thank you for that reality. We ask that you continue to to strengthen us and comfort us and guide us

Throughout all of it We ask you to be with the service to come and just the remainder of our fellowship time together today