SERVING THE LORD FAITHFULLY

A synopsis of sermon delivered at the 7th Anniversary Thanksgiving Service of Brisbane BPC,
16 March 2014

I am sure every believer desires to hear the Lord Jesus say to him one day, “Well done, thou good and faithful servant: thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee ruler over many things: enter thou into the joy of thy lord” (Matt 25:21). How can we make sure that we will hear these words of commendation from the Lord? Paul tells us how in 2 Timothy 1:11-2:2. He tells us how we must be careful to build upon the foundation that God has already laid, ie the Truth, the Holy Scriptures (John 17:17). Faithful service is Truthful service. What we do with our life and what we do for the Lord must be based on His Truth. And if we serve the Lord according to His Truth, we will not go wrong.

How to be faithful in service? We can be faithful in our service to God by making sure we do these two things:

Protect God’s Truth

2 Timothy 1:13-14 says, “Hold fast the form of sound words, which thou hast heard of me, in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. That good thing which was committed unto thee keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelleth in us.”

Paul enjoins Timothy to hold firmly without wavering “the form of sound words.” What does this mean? It means sticking to the pattern of the infallible and inerrant words of the Holy Scriptures. The “sound words” here refer to the words of God as preached by the Apostle Paul—“which thou hast heard of me.” The “sound words” are not just the preached words of the Apostles but also the written words of the Scriptures. Paul wrote in 2 Thessalonians 2:15, “Therefore, brethren, stand fast, and hold the traditions which ye have been taught, whether by word, or our epistle.” The Apostles were infallible in their preaching and in their writing of the Holy Scriptures (1 Thess 2:13, 2 Pet 1:21). As God’s specially appointed spokesmen and penmen, they spoke and wrote the words of God perfectly, without any mistake.

Note that we are commanded to hold fast to “sound words” and not simply sound “truths” or “doctrines.” Many today who do not believe in the verbal perfection of Scriptures speak of the “truths,” or the “doctrines” of Scriptures being “inspired” or “preserved,” but not the “words.” But the Lord speaks of His written words as being “inspired” (2 Tim 3:16) and “preserved” (Matt 5:18, 24:35). 2 Timothy 3:16 says, “All scripture (ie written Word) is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine.” Psalm 12:6-7 says, “The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.” “Sound words” means “sound words,” and not just “sound doctrines.” Which comes first, the chicken or the egg? Genesis chapter one will give you the answer. Without the chicken, where the egg? Similarly, without the words, where the doctrines? Doctrines are expressed and explained by words. Words first before doctrines is theologically correct.

The holding fast to the sound words of Scripture must be done “in faith” and “in love.” The keeping of God’s words must be done faithfully and lovingly, not intellectually or academically. Now, I am not saying that our intellect or our mind is not important in our study of the Scriptures. I am not saying that we abandon the “line upon line, precept upon precept” study of the Scriptures. What I am saying is that our intellect must not be over but under God’s authoritative Word.

But today, many schools take the intellectual and scholastic approach to the Bible. Instead of teaching their students to believe and love the Bible, they teach them to judge and criticise the Bible through historical criticism and textual criticism which deny the divine inspiration and divine preservation of the Bible.

Timothy was told not only to “hold fast” but also to “keep” or “guard” the gospel of Christ and the sound words of God (2 Tim 1:14). The word “keep” in the original has the idea of putting money into a bank for safekeeping. Timothy was commanded to protect the precious Word of God with which he has been entrusted, and to guard it from every attack.

Today, the Word of God is attacked like never before. The fiercest attack against God’s Word today concerns the divine preservation of the Scriptures. The falsehood is spread that Christians no longer possess a totally infallible and inerrant Bible. The perfect Bible is a relic of the past; the Bible today is just not the same as before. Our Bible today contains some mistakes but they are small ones that will not affect the overall message of the Gospel so we are told. How should we respond? We must defend the Bible against every insidious and subtle attack and never allow it to be changed or modified in the slightest degree.

Know that it is not easy to fight this good fight of faith for the Word of God and the testimony of Jesus Christ, and that is why Paul charged Timothy to do this good work in the power of the Holy Spirit—keep the faith “by the Holy Ghost.” It is a spiritual battle. We need to pray! Pray that we will always remain faithful to God and His Word—never to waver, never to doubt, but to trust and obey the Lord always. Others may fall away from the faith, but let us be found sure and steadfast in the Lord and in His Word no matter what.

Propagate God’s Truth

In order to be faithful in God’s service, we must not only protect God’s Truth, we must also propagate His Truth. Paul tells Timothy in 2 Timothy 2:2, “And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also.” The Truth of God’s Word is preserved by propagating it to others who will do likewise. The sound words of God from the Bible must be passed on to “faithful” men (ie, men who are characterised by faith, men who are filled with faith, men who believe the words of Christ their Saviour without question). The sound words of God must never be entrusted to “heady” and “highminded” men (2 Tim 3:4). Paul described such men as “having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof” (2 Tim 3:5). They are “ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth” (2 Tim 3:7). They are men who “resist the truth: men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith” (2 Tim 3:8).

Take note that the Apostle Paul told young Timothy to propagate not something different but the very same words he had learned from him. The Bible says in Deuteronomy 8:3, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” Man is commanded not only to live by God’s “every word,” he is also commanded to teach His “every word.” Timothy was the pastor of the Ephesian Church. As pastor, he needed to know that it was vital for him to teach the whole counsel of God. Paul had set the example. In Acts 20, Paul told the Ephesian elders: “I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you, but have shewed you, and have taught you publickly, and from house to house, Testifying both to the Jews, and also to the Greeks, repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ … Wherefore I take you to record this day, that I am pure from the blood of all men. For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God” (Acts 20:20, 27). If we want to be pure from the blood of all men, we better declare the whole counsel of God as Paul did.

Dr Paul Contento who laid the foundation stone of the Far Eastern Bible College (FEBC) said, “Without the Bible College, the Church would die.” That is true. But it is also true that “With a Bible College, the Church might die faster.” Why? Because of unbelief! Apostate colleges and seminaries today are filling churches with pastors who deny the fundamentals of the Christian faith and the absolute perfection of the Holy Scriptures. The great Chinese revivalist Dr John Sung went to such an apostate seminary, namely, Union Theological Seminary in New York City. At that time, the President of the Seminary was Dr Henry Sloane Coffin. John Sung testified, “I was enrolled in a seminary that taught a ‘God-is-dead’ theology, under the caretaking of a principal surnamed Coffin. But this seminary became a cemetery to my troubled soul.” The Lord by His grace delivered him from this deadly Seminary.

Thank God for the late Rev Dr Timothy Tow, our beloved founding pastor and founding principal of FEBC, who instituted the Dean Burgon Oath and required every director and lecturer of FEBC to swear absolute allegiance to God and His Perfect Word. I do not know of any other Bible College that does this. At the annual convocation, the Board and Faculty swear allegiance to God and His Word: “I swear in the name of the Triune God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, that I believe the Bible is none other than the voice of Him that sitteth upon the Throne. Every Book of it, every chapter of it, every verse of it, every word of it, every syllable of it, every letter of it, is the direct utterance of the Most High. The Bible is none other than the Word of God: not some part of it more, some part of it less; but all alike, the utterance of Him that sitteth upon the Throne; faultless, unerring, supreme. So help me God, Amen.”

We believe that God’s Word is 100% perfect without any mistake, and we have the 100% perfect Word of God today. The same perfect Word that Jesus and Paul and Timothy had is the same Word we have today. Without an infallible and an inerrant Bible, we Christians have no gospel to preach. Let us remain faithful to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We are faithful to Him when we (1) protect His Truth from all kinds of attacks to undermine its perfection and authority, and (2) propagate His Truth to faithful men who will pass it on faithfully to others as well. May the Lord help us. Amen. JK