The Cost of Gospel Freedom | Disruptive Presence 79

David: 0:04

Well, John, it would always be appropriate for us to comment briefly on the weather, but I think this time I'm not certain whether we've had the worst weather or you've had the worst weather over your side of the world, but none of us have been on our holiday.

John: 0:17

No, no, a few storms, the named storms. We have named storms and after proper storms they get a name. So by the time this recording goes out, it's probably a bit later, but we've just had Aisha and Jocelyn blow through, but it's all calm now. I'm looking at my study window and it's marvellous, it's calm and it's good. It's all good, david. So yeah.

David: 0:41

And while you were dealing with wind trying to take your roof off, we were in the midst of a deep freeze. So we were hitting overnight temperatures with wind chills of minus 48 and stuff like that. And the people always say to me at that point is that Fahrenheit or Celsius? And the joke out here is at minus 40, it doesn't matter, they're both the same, that's where they meet.

John: 1:04

Oh wow, Minus 40. It's hard to even imagine those sorts of temperatures.

David: 1:11

Even when you're in it, it's hard to imagine it. Except all you're aware of is that your face hurts a lot. So we crack through into a new chapter in today's episode Come on. We're in the next chapter 16 of Acts.

David: 1:30

So I'm kind of excited about that and we're going to see, over the next few episodes, an increase in pace perhaps, and that's not a guarantee of increase in our pace. I mean, we're the pace of the narrative. The Jerusalem Council that we spent a few episodes on generates movement, doesn't it? And we see things start to happen differently as a result of that and, in fact, the story that we'll read today. You see the change happening almost straight away, don't?

John: 1:59

you. Yeah, it is quite staggering. It's one of those wonderful occasions where because we've talked about chapter divisions before sometimes a division happens just feels like it's the wrong place. But this is one place where you do feel, oh, there is a definite gear shift here. It does feel like right, ok, something has moved and we are, we are on and actually chapters. I think chapter 16 is one of the most exciting and dynamic chapters in the whole of the book. Facts, I mean, it's all pretty amazing, but there is something sensational about this chapter and the variety of story sort of within it. So it's amazing, absolutely amazing.

David: 2:38

So I'm going to read verses one to five for us and then we'll dive in. It says this is chapter 16, verse one. It says Paul went on also to Darby and to Lystra where there was a disciple named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman who is a believer, but his father was a Greek. He was well spoken of by the believers in Lystra and Econium. Paul wanted Timothy to accompany him and he took him and had him circumcised because of the Jews who were in those places, for they all knew that his father was a Greek. As they went from town to town, they delivered to them, for observance, the decisions that had been reached by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem. So the churches were strengthened in the faith and increased in numbers. Daily Love that.

John: 3:29

Love that, do you know? Do you know, david? The first thing that sort of jumped out at me as I was thinking about this, this passage, was the incredible Lystra connection. There's almost a gorgeous redemptive idea here because, if our listeners can remember back, I know it's a while ago, but we thought about and talked about Paul being stoned at Lystra and we had this conversation about almost a resurrection sense moment, whether literal or metaphorical. Yes, it rises up and goes back into the city and, of course, here you are, we're introduced to this wonderful, becomes an incredible helper and son of Paul, this young man, timothy, at this very place in Lystra. And I love the sort of redemptive nuance in that. I know it's not like directly there, but you're going, oh, lystra, where Paul nearly died. And now here he's back in Lystra and he's picking up this incredible, well, what will become essentially an incredible young man in the ministry and he's well spoken of in that space as well.

David: 4:44

So it's not just that he's like, it's not like, it's not just that he's able to be in Lystra, it's that now he's well spoken of, which is quite, which is quite, exciting, isn't it?

John: 4:54

It is. So it does demonstrate that in the midst of all that pain and difficulty and almost having his life taken, something was deposited dynamically into that place. You've got, you've got clearly some form of vibrant Christian community here, followers of Jesus, and, and it must have encouraged Paul tremendously to to know when he went back to pick that up and see that that all that suffering and pain and I suppose, difficulty was not in vain. But you're now seeing this gorgeous and again just thinking off the top of my head, I sort of thought was was sort of Timothy. We know something about his background His mother was a woman of faith and even his grandmother Paul talks about that in other parts of the scripture. But was was Timothy sort of, and the family impacted in that original visit and seeds, so on, that now, a couple of years later, paul is picking up on. So I love, I love the whole idea of that sort of redemptive picture in Lystra.

David: 6:06

Yeah, it's, it's gorgeous, isn't it? But there's double layers to the redemptiveness of Lystra as well, and this, this text, has real complexity to it because, on one hand, timothy's appearance is is so obvious, right, in terms of the narrative, if we think about this story that Luke is telling, we've just had this huge council about what do we do with the connection between Jews and Gentiles, right. And then the very next story is of the ultimate connection between Jews and Gentiles, a Gentile father and a Jewish mother, right. So it's like it's so interesting that this is the first story we encounter.

David: 6:53

But then the layer complexity of if you were to read Acts 15, which our listeners have heard us work our way through it over the last few episodes, I think if you read Acts 15, I don't think you would guess how this story went in any amount of guesses that you had right, if we said right, okay, here's a story about big counsel, about Jews and Gentiles and how they connect together, how they're all welcomed into the faith.

David: 7:21

We've got Peter with Cornelius in the background reminding us, and then here we're now presented with the obvious thing that is gonna happen if Jews and Gentiles are hanging out together Eventually they're gonna start being married and these sort of things. So Timothy fits all that part of the narrative, and then Paul had him circumcised. I just don't think you see that coming. I think this is actually a bit of a twist and it needs some wrestling with that. You've got he's well spoken of, we've got this amazing connection from the previous text, but so in our episode today this is probably on our agenda, but it's amazing how this text it hits us at multiple levels, doesn't it?

John: 8:01

Indeed, absolutely, and I think it's a beautiful way in which Dr Luke now weaves the story of all the stories he could have picked up.

John: 8:12

But this is an important one and of course it's reminding ourselves that by the time these words are in play, this story is written down in some form or another. Timothy will probably be fairly well known in certain parts of that particular world. So again there's this lovely sort of background conversation about him and you get this incredible sense of he becomes an embodiment not only of the challenge but an embodiment of what can potentially happen and take place, and I think that really is lovely. I love what Paul says about him in the context of his. When he writes to him later on in Second Timothy, he says I am reminded, speaking to Timothy, of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother, lois, and in your mother, eunice, and, I am persuaded, now lives in you also. Isn't that beautiful? It's like a gorgeous generational idea and, paul, it's quite tender. I think that language is sincere faith that lived in them and, he's persuaded, also lives in you. And of course, by the time Paul is writing Second Timothy, he's writing to Timothy when Timothy is probably well positioned in what we would call church ministry, maybe church leadership, shepherd in an overseeing. So the relationship has long developed.

John: 9:48

But I love that echo back to this list for a moment, this sense of meeting this young man and immediately understanding both the dynamics of a multi-generational idea that's come down, it seems, through the Jewish line to him, and then the fact that he also carries a Gentile jacket as well, with his father being Greek. So it's beautiful, beautiful and I love this little comment. Just one more little comment from Second Timothy three further on in Second Timothy he says I'm speaking of Timothy and how, from infancy you have known the Holy Scriptures which are able to make you wise, and again you're seeing something there that perhaps his mother and grandmother find a way to ensure that Timothy, even though he is a Greek father, is exposed to the Holy Scriptures and all of those things sort of mature, if you like, or come to harvest in this moment of conversion and when Paul enters into his world. So it feels like a whole bunch of things have all conspired to this moment that we're now about to lean into and enjoy.

David: 11:04

I mean, while you're thinking about Timothy, it's perhaps us worth us saying that I mean, this is a seminal moment for the church, this little encounter here, because it's a throwaway line at some level. There was a disciple there named Timothy, the son of a Jewish woman, but his father was a Greek right. But I mean, I was just doing a study with some other friends just recently and like, if you have a pastor right which may be true of many of our leader listeners here on our podcast If you have a pastor, they have been undoubtedly shaped by this moment of encounter that's happened right here. Because of this moment encounter, paul writes first and second Timothy, and a huge amount of what the church has known a pastor to look like comes from those two letters. Right, if we don't have Timothy and I mean the Holy Spirit would work, maybe it would just be Phineas or something like that instead.

David: 12:02

But I just think I love that little connection that you've drawn to us there and I just wanted to highlight that even more, john that if you have a pastor and that pastor is good at being your pastor, this moment here will have shaped them, whether we because outside of Timothy we're not given a lot of definition of what is a pastor, but Paul's two letters to Timothy are almost lists of here's things that pastors need to do. So I love the fact that this little moment, as Paul taken this little trip, is shaping all of us 20 odd centuries later in ways that we're not even aware of that have happened in this. So there's almost a thankfulness. Comes to us in this passage right.

John: 12:45

Absolutely, no, no, totally agree. In fact, in my own devotions at the moment I am meditating on 1st Timothy and just walking through that very, very, very, very slowly and it is when you read it, understanding the relationship at the heart of it, this X-16 moment and then other things that Paul says about him. There is an intimacy in the writing of Paul to Timothy. There's a tenderness, there's an urgency. It's like and I'll use this deliberately it's like a father directing a child, a father directing a son, and you really do get the sense of that as that comes across. So it's not just Paul writing coldly, clinically to a young man and saying, okay, do ABC and D sort of thing, but there is a tenderness throughout the writing and that's fun.

John: 13:41

And of course we suspect that if that second Timothy is like amongst Paul's last written recorded words to anybody, so of all the people Paul could have written to last he writes the Timothy.

John: 13:55

And the thing is spotted in our lovely reading that David was that Timothy is introduced as a disciple In our reading. So you get that that there's a sense of which he's already come to faith where a disciple named Timothy lived. And yet, as as we read Paul more and more in connection with Timothy he's he's called a son, and so you know, what starts off as a discipleship relationship actually becomes a sort of father and son relationship, and and that sort of idea of sonship with Paul's thinking is rare there's not many people he calls sons in the faith. I think Onisimus gets mentioned as a son and I think the other one is Titus. So you got Titus and Onisimus and maybe Timothy in very rare company, who Paul describes as sons in the faith. So you've got a very tender, dynamic relationship as well as one that clearly has practical and ministerial and spiritual application. There's a lot going on in this lovely relationship between the shaman and Paul ultimately that it seems to begin so normally here and controversially in X 16.

David: 15:18

Yeah, I love, I love that actually, that we're seeing, just tying into what I was saying a moment ago, that we're seeing this, this conversation conversation, that's the wrong term. I'm looking for this connection between the great apostle and and the pastor and and then the connection is familial, it's a father and son relationship which of course, creates this beautiful connection to then, at some level, to all pastors, because Timothy becomes the prototype pastor At some level. It's not lost on me that so many pastors read so much of Paul and listen to so much of Paul's theology, which is exactly what Timothy the prototype pastor would have done as well. So we really are seeing the shaping of the New Testament happening here and therefore the shaping of the church, like these are. These are.

David: 16:09

It's like those episodes when you, when you know, when you're watching the Lord of the Rings or reading the Lord of the Rings, and all of a sudden a big character walks in for the first time and you're watching it for the second time. So it's a big character and there's always that sort of slight kind of lack of fanfare. They just sort of sneak in and then you realize, oh, this is a big person, but someone who's watching for the first time would miss that. They're a significant character arriving. That's what this feels like to me. It's like, oh wow, it's, it's Timothy.

John: 16:40

Yeah indeed Indeed. And again, in my reflections, I just, I just allowed my imaginations to run wild and sort of follow the, follow the trails. And you know when, when Paul writes to the church at Philippi I mean in describing Timothy he says I have no one else like him. That's quite an amazing statement from Paul. You think of all the people that Paul worked with, led, discipled, impacted. And Paul says I have no one else like him. And he goes on to say, in that lovely passage, he says that Timothy has proved himself because, as a son with his father, he has served me in the work of the Gospel. And you see it, you see it again, my goodness.

John: 17:29

We've we've had this conversation in the past about John Mark, and and I thought your observations around Paul and John Mark were fantastic in terms of maybe Paul is concerned that that sort of he can't be trusted, rather than he's against him in any way.

John: 17:47

And and you can see then in this language what Paul looks for in Sons of the Faith or fellow workers, he's, he's looking for people like this, and maybe that also explains, then, why he's very committed to those who who somehow minister in this way, but he's also also maybe hesitant about those who are struggling to sort of come into this, and Timothy seems to be somebody almost at this stage of the journey that Paul connects to. And this young man grows to such an extent that Paul says I have no one like him, which is just a staggering, staggering idea. So so again, it's saying something about Timothy, that, but I also think it's saying something about Paul. Paul is valuing deeply the ultimate loyalty and love and service and commitment that Timothy gives to him over many years. Of course, in X 16, this is just. This is just completely potential or embryonic, but but it is. It is amazing to hear Paul's words of tenderness around this young man and and the impact that Timothy clearly had on the great apostle and how he served him and minister to him.

David: 19:03

And, of course, this is the Timothy who is actually the co-author of Philippians, right? So? So look at what we're being introduced to here and look at the level of which that we talk about Paul's letter to the Philippians, but, but when Paul writes the letter, he says this is Paul and Timothy's letter to the Philippines, like this is this is this is huge, which which probably draws our attention then to this moment in verse three, where Paul takes this time for Timothy because he wants him to accompany him. I want you to come with me, but, but we got to go and get you circumcised before we go there. I mean, it's a shocking moment of the story at some level.

John: 19:44

It is, it is. It is as you say. Especially after the hard won concessions of X-15 in the council, this feels like, oh, hold on a minute. Isn't this the sort of thing that Paul stood up against? Or isn't this the sort of thing that Paul said we don't need? So why is he doing that?

John: 20:06

And of course, I can't help but read that and hear the echo of the council when James says it's my judgment that we should not make it difficult for Gentiles who are turning to God. And, of course, circumcision and the implication of keeping Moses, keeping Torah as a gateway into Christ, is the very thing that Paul is contending. He's saying actually, no, we can come to Christ by faith without, as it were, having to come through Moses and circumcision. And yet here he is. The first thing he does with this young disciple is circumcise him. So I don't think we can bypass it. I think we've got to transcribe the circle and ask the question what's going on here? And why would Paul do that? Is Paul double-minded? Is he, is he confused? Or is there a strategic significance to this act of circumcision?

David: 21:05

It's not lost on me that and I hadn't thought about us taking the conversation in the direction we have before we arrived at this point. But it interests me that the little detour we took there to think about the letter to Timothy actually make the point that I think is what's going on here is. I'm almost tempted to say this is what the gospel looks like. Right, if I could say it like that. And this is uncomfortable, I think, the way I want to say this. It's especially uncomfortable, I think, for modernists, because we're convinced that the gospel brings us freedom, and freedom means I get to do whatever I want. And I think what we're seeing in this verse three here, if we're allowed to have its theological weight, I think we're seeing the spirit showing us what freedom in the gospel actually looks like. Right, and I've got echoes in my head. Let me try and kind of unpack the thinking.

David: 22:12

Paul in Galatians saying I bear the scars of Jesus on my body, right, but it's the same letter in which he said mere verses before. It is for freedom that Christ set us free, it's for freedom he set us free, but I bear scars for this. Christ himself bears scars for us. This idea that you can serve the gospel without scars is, I think, a false one. Right, but this notion that Timothy has absolute freedom to be uncircumcised but chooses, for the sake of others, to make his body unoffensive to others is, I think, it's stunning theology. I mean it's painful. I mean and I don't mean that cheekily it's painful to think about. But bear in mind the conversation we've just had. Paul, this is the pastor, like Timothy is the pastor, and look at what the pastor is doing in order to be the gospel to people. I mean, if this isn't the way of the spirit and if we then don't need the spirit in order to be this way, I'm not really sure what else to do with this passage.

John: 23:29

John, if I'm being totally honest, no, no, no, it was that little phrase absolutely jumped out at me. For the sake of the gospel, I think that's bang on there and I think you've got at a strategic level. If we're thinking about what Paul's about to do and where they're about to go, and if Timothy's going to travel with them, that actually having Timothy circumcised is, on an inclusive level, a much better thing to do than leave him uncircumcised. So to the Gentile world. Let me not explain myself very well. To the Gentile world, it doesn't make any difference whether he's circumcised or not. To the Jewish world, it really makes a difference.

John: 24:16

So if Timothy remains uncircumcised, gentiles in Corinth, gentiles in Galatia, gentiles in Philippi, they're not bothered like because they're not circumcised either. But the one group that it might be a stumbling block to, that they are desperate to keep included in the story of the gospel, because they are the very root of this gospel, is the Jewish world. So the act of circumcision is to make sure that. Actually, I think Paul is saying, I think Timothy understands we want to ensure that we give no reason for the Jewish world to be excluded from Messiah and we want that. So being circumcised is a cost worth paying for the greater good of the kingdom of God. And when you mentioned that, I couldn't help but go to another part of Paul's writing in 1 Corinthians 9.

David: 25:22

I was literally just loaded to ask in the background.

John: 25:24

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. He says and it was your phrase about freedom that grabbed me. He says in the NIV translation, though I am free and belong to no one. He says listen to this, I have made myself a slave to everyone to win as many as possible. Now I think if we're trying to score the circle of why did Timothy get circumcised? And that's be really open, why Timothy submits to circumcision, he's not a child, he's not an eight year old baby, an eight day old baby, he's a man and he's submitting to circumcision. I think that's the line there I have made myself a slave to everyone to win as many as possible. And of course, that passage here on Paxler is monster. It's absolutely. That 1 Corinthians 9 passage is awesome in terms of his language. Would you concur with that as a strategic decision?

David: 26:26

I think the notion this may be where I lose friends and maybe even lose myself, because I'm not sure if I even like the sound of it. I think the notion that we can do the gospel without cost, I think is a false one, right. I think that the I think we've overplayed the hand of grace being free, right, and now I want to caveat that carefully because I don't want to be misquoted on that but our freedom of welcome in Christ has led some of us to assume that the gospel will make no demands of us. And this is, I think, what Bonhoeffer talks about. When Dietrich Bonhoeffer talks about cheap grace, this idea that we can take the free gift of God and it not cost us, I mean there's paradox in it. Of course there is, but there's, my goodness. We're talking about Jesus, both God and human. We're talking about the Holy Spirit. Who's it? We've got to learn as Christians to live with paradox. But this is the paradox of the gospel, this is the paradox of the Christian ministry that you will have absolute freedom to not care. I think that Jesus can say to Peter on the boat come, follow me. And Peter can say no, and Jesus still loves him and God still loves him and Jesus will still die for him. But if Peter really wants to experience the gift of God and wants to see God's kingdom come, he's going to have to leave some nets behind.

David: 28:02

I think this is exactly what we're seeing happening here in this text as well that the quicker we as Christians appreciate that the gospel will cost us something but give us everything. And this is what Paul talks about. He talks about it earlier in Corinthians. He's like all things are ours, we have all of it. But if you try and live out the gospel, assuming that it will ask nothing off you, I think you'll always end up with a pale shadow of the gospel, and I think I just I mean, my goodness, it feels horrible to say that, but I don't think there's a contradiction in this.

David: 28:38

This story looks complex, but I don't think it is complex. I think if you really understand what Acts is doing, this makes perfect sense, because this is not a story about people trying to find their inclusion at on their own terms. This is a group of people trying to find Jesus and aware of the fact that Jesus is calling them to something beyond themselves. So for Timothy, it seems and I love the fact that you pointed that out. He's not a baby. Paul says let's go, start get circumcised. Timothy can go. I thought I was on board with this project, paul, but I'm not. But Timothy says yes because something of the spirit has captured him and disrupted him to a level that he's willing to say, yeah, let's do this, let's do this, paul.

John: 29:29

Absolutely, absolutely, and do something that clearly in his upbringing wasn't pressed on him. So, even though he's Jewish mother and a Greek father, he clearly hasn't been circumcised at this stage. But again, I think, david, it's that lovely idea of the cost, for the sake of the gospel, it's not just cost per se, it's for the sake of the cost of the gospel, meant the God, who was rich, became poor so that we, through his poverty, maybe made rich, that he became flesh for us and, of course, ultimately literally gave his life, became obedient to death, even death on a cross, as Paul would tell us. But actually it's that for the sake of the gospel. So, timothy, it's not just we want to make you suffer, it's not just that Christianity is about suffering, it's about suffering for the sake of the gospel.

John: 30:28

Paul says to the Jews I became like a Jew to win the Jews. I think that's exactly what's happening here. And to those under the law I became like one under the law. He says, though, I'm not under the law so as to win those under it. And and to those not having the law I became like one not having the law. And he says I'm not free from God's law so as to win those not having the law. It's beautiful language to the weak. I became weak to win the week.

John: 30:55

And then he climaxes it with this amazing, amazing sentence. He says I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. And then he, the banging end. He says I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings. It's just sensational piece of missiology, sensational piece of ecclesiology and it's something that brings, I think, frame and context to our suffering that that are, whatever our sacrifices, whatever are, are laying down or becoming whatever, whatever circumcision means to us as followers of Jesus in the context of Timothy and Paul here, if we keep in mind for the sake of the gospel, so that we may share in its blessings, I think it makes all decisions of sacrifice and service completely understandable and, I believe, also possible.

David: 32:03

My goodness, john, yes, I mean as you were saying that there. It struck me as well that so often how we do mission work, right, you said you used the term missiology and it immediately I thought, my goodness, you're so right. Our missiological strategies, particularly amongst Western peoples, have been so deeply entrenched in ideas of colonialism, where we'll go and be missionaries but we take our cultural preferences and impose them on the other person, whereas here what we see the gospel doing is saying how do we ensure that our cultural preferences don't get in the way of the gospel? So, like I've grown up in a context I mean some of our listeners know I grew up in missionary context and I remember my parents often being shocked by the way some people did missionary work, like to the extent of there were some churches that were handing out Western clothes in the villages of Africa so that people could come to church dressed appropriately, right, and you're thinking like this is the opposite of what we're seeing happen here. But the gospel has always demanded that the cost be borne by the missionary. The missionary figure out how to adapt and how to fit in. And I was thinking as you were saying that, john, like I'd encourage your listeners just to go and grab these three verses, right? So the church was strengthened in the faith and increased in numbers daily.

David: 33:35

There's verse five right, as they went from town to town, they delivered to them the observance the decisions had been reached by the apostles and elders in Jerusalem. That's verse four. And then verse three. Paul wanted Timothy to accompany him and he took him in, had him circumcised because of the Jews who were in those places. All of our misceological strategies have to make sense of those three verses and the fact that Luke gives us them all together. Right, that they think of the irony.

David: 34:01

If you don't understand this, this sounds insane. Timothy, let's go get you circumcised. Why? Because we have to go from town to town telling everybody they don't need to be circumcised, right, in order to follow Jesus. I mean, that's insane sounding at some level.

David: 34:18

But because, Timothy if I can be a little cause and effect here, john, and tell me if you disagree, please but because Timothy is circumcised, when they go to town to town, they're able to talk to everybody, including the Jewish people, to say, hey, listen, you stop putting this on Gentile Christians, right, but you're going to listen to us because of how we've turned up and, as a result of that, the church is strengthened in the faith right. So Timothy's sacrifice allows him to proclaim the freedom which strengthens the church, and I love the fact that Dr Luke sees these three things. As these are three good sentences, I'm going to put them in a row together and, as I said, if you're, as a modern westerner, convinced that the gospel means you get to do whatever you want, three, four and five will be so difficult to interpret. I mean, does that make sense? How am I explaining that?

John: 35:07

Oh, total sense, and I think it's totally compatible with the other parts of Paul's writings and also the behaviours within that. This is not a contradiction, this is not a compromise. This is surrender to a greater cause and it's a render that makes sense. It's a surrender that positions the gospel effectively and contextualizes the gospel in such a way that it has maximum inclusivity to those who will hear it.

David: 35:40

Well, that's it for today. Thank you so much for listening and we hope that you enjoyed it. If you want to get in touch with either of us about something we said, you can reach out to us on podcast at twotextcom or by liking and following the Two Text Podcast on Facebook, instagram and Twitter. If you really did enjoy the episode, then we'd love it if you left a review or a comment where you're listening from, and if you really enjoyed this episode, why not share it with a friend? Don't forget that you can listen to all of our podcasts from this season and others at wwwtwotextcom. But that is it for now, so until next time, goodbye.