“As I urged you when I was going to Macedonia, remain at Ephesus so that you may charge certain persons not to teach any different doctrine, nor to devote themselves to myths and endless genealogies, which promote speculations rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith. The aim of our charge is love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith. Certain persons, by swerving from these, have wandered away into vain discussion, desiring to be teachers of the law, without understanding either what they are saying or the things about which they make confident assertions” (1 Timothy 1:3-7; all Scripture quotations are from the English Standard Version).
Mission: Impossible was a popular television show when I was a child. Each week, Jim Phelps (played by Peter Graves) would receive a reel-to-reel tape recorder with a message, describing a crime ring or international espionage organization and their criminal or hostile activities that the members of Phelps’ Impossible Mission Force would foil. (To be honest, I rarely watched the entire show. I would watch the opening sequence, especially to see the tape recorder self-destruct after playing the message. It had one of the most iconic instrumental theme songs in television history, which was worth hearing every week.)
The apostle Paul had his own impossible mission: spreading the Gospel to Gentile communities and building the church. Fortunately, like Mr. Phelps, he had a team of experts to help him fulfill this agenda. His young protege, Timothy, was one of his specialists. Paul could trust him to go in his name and solve problems that required something more than a strongly-worded Holy-Spirit-inspired letter. First Timothy details Paul’s instructions that Timothy needed to pass on to the churches in and around Ephesus, which were being torn apart by false teachers. (Fortunately for us, unlike the tape players on Mission: Impossible, Paul’s letter to Timothy did not self-destruct right after he read it.)
Timothy’s mission, if he chose to accept it (which, apparently, he did), was to correct the false teachers and establish order within the Christian community in and around Ephesus. The region “was a hotbed of pagan religions, Jewish tradition, and bizarre philosophical teachings,”i all of which were blending with the Gospel to create a deviant form of Christianity. Similar errors continue to crop up in churches today.
Two false teachings were creating chaos in Ephesus. The first was what I will call “proto-Gnosticism.” By the second century, Christian churches were struggling with a group of false teachings known as Gnosticism. While they were fully formed in the second century, some of their basic teachings were cropping up while the apostles were alive. Paul’s reference to “endless genealogies” is probably an example of proto-Gnostic teaching. People who tried to mix Christian teaching with Greek philosophical metaphysics would believe there were numerous “aeons,” deities of varying degrees of perfection and imperfection who bridged the gap between the perfect creator and his imperfect material world. “Endless genealogies” probably refers to the detailed listing of these aeons and how they are related to each other.
When you try to combine ideas from one religion or philosophy with the Gospel, you might get some crazy ideas. That was the problem in Ephesus. Their ideas promoted “speculations rather than the stewardship from God that is by faith.”
The proto-Gnostics tried to mix pagan Greek philosophy with the Gospel. On the other end of the spectrum was another group who tried to keep Christianity as Jewish as possible. Paul said that this group tried to be teachers of the Law. Throughout his ministry, Paul wrestled with people who tried to preserve parts of the Old Testament that Christ had superseded on the cross. “If you want to get baptized and join the church, you must first get circumcised!” (No thanks, I’ll pass!) “Stop eating pork chops, you sinner!” (Some authors refer to these Jewish Christians as “Judaizers.”)
Similar spirits continue to haunt the church to this day. Like the Gnostics, some preachers claim to have “the whole truth” that the rest of the church has missed for the last 1900 (or maybe the last 1600) years. Others, like the Judaizers, add rules that the Bible does not teach. “Real Christians don’t smoke, listen to rock music, or dance!”
Such deviations from the Gospel bring division and confusion. They might feed a person’s ego by helping them pretend that they are better Christians whom God loves more than everybody else. However, they are not following God’s mission for men and women of God: “love that issues from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith” (1 Timothy 1:5). That should be the center of the church’s message and the goal of every sincere follower of Christ: follow Christ, develop a sincere faith in Him, allow His Holy Spirit to give you a good conscience and pure heart, and let it flow as love for God, other believers, and those you meet.
Your mission, as a child of God, is this: Live by simple devotion to Jesus Christ and follow Him. The people you meet will not be saved by your ego, clever ideas, or puritanical obsession with rules. They will be saved by the love of God that flows from you as you walk by faith in Christ.
iNew International Version: Disciple’s Study Bible (Nashville, TN: Cornerstone Bible Publishers, 1988), p. 1547 (note on 1 Timothy 1:3-7).
Darkened Glass Reflections 