Leadership Lesson #9

 

"Here is a statement you can trust:

If we have died with him,
    we will also live with him.
If we persevere,
    we will also rule with him
If we disown him,
    he will also disown us.
If we are faithless,
    he remains faithful,
    for he cannot disown himself.

Keep reminding people of this, and charge them solemnly before the Lord not to engage in word-battles. They accomplish nothing useful and are a catastrophe for the hearers! Do all you can to present yourself to God as someone worthy of his approval, as a worker with no need to be ashamed, because he deals straightforwardly with the Word of the Truth. But keep away from godless babbling, for those who engage in it will only become more ungodly, and their teaching will eat away at people like gangrene. Hymenaeus and Philetus are among these; they have missed the mark, as far as the truth is concerned, by saying that our resurrection has already taken place; and they are overturning some people’s faith. Nevertheless, God’s firm foundation stands, stamped with these words:

“The Lord knows his own,”

and,

“Let everyone who claims he belongs to the Lord
stand apart from wrongdoing.”

In a large house there are dishes and pots not only of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay. That is, some are meant for honorable use and some for dishonorable. If a person keeps himself free of defilement by the latter, he will be a vessel set aside for honorable use by the master of the house and ready for every kind of good work. So, flee the passions of youth; and, along with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart, pursue righteousness, faithfulness, love and peace. But stay away from stupid and ignorant controversies — you know that they lead to fights, and a slave of the Lord shouldn’t fight. On the contrary, he should be kind to everyone, a good teacher, and not resentful when mistreated." 2 Timothy 2:11-24

We will continue this series on leadership with Apostle Paul's letter to Timothy when Paul was near his death.

There are a ton of advice that Paul wanted to pass on before, shall we say, he passes away from this world and it is a blessing that we can still read and learn from them.

The following are at least five points we should take away from the excerpt above.

1. Jesus will remain faithful (to us) even if we (sometimes) falter on our faith (to Him).

2. Teaching or preaching is not debating, we are not to engage in elocution or linguistic arguments to see who is more skilled with word play. Why? Because these more often than not call attention to the individual than towards the Lord or the Lord's Message.

3. Paul again named two indiividuals who we shouldn't imitate (their names are hard to pronounce and remember like the previous two).

4. So instead of being like these individuals who we shouldn't be like and we shouldn't mention anymore, we should be like empty vessels ready and worthy to carry God's truth and God's message to those who are starving for the way, the truth and the light.

5. Our intentions should be pure, our motives aligning with God's and our words and our actions declaring God's message of hope, forgiveness, grace and love which Christ so unselfishly shown to those He was with and who in turn shared the same message so we in every succeeding generation who did not get to see Jesus, the Christ in the flesh would be able to see it with our eyes through those who are worthy to carry and pass on this message to us.