Sermon or Lesson:  1 Timothy 4:12-13 (NIV based)
[Lesson Questions included]

TITLE:  The Necessities of Godliness And Exhortative Expository Teaching
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READ:  1 Timothy 4:12-13, with vv.6-11 for context

BACKGROUND:
- - A main and beneficial objective is for believers to learn and follow "the truths of the faith", which lead to godliness - a quality that produces value and benefits for its possessor both "in the present life and the life to come".  (from vv.6-8)
- - Every true believer can accumulate extra benefits and blessings to be received and enjoyed in the eternal future if they earn them by implementing godliness in their life now, in this life.
- - Believers are motivated to pursue godliness because God lives eternally, and He provides salvation for those who believe in His Son, Jesus Christ.  (v.10)
- - Good ministers are to regularly teach these truths of the faith to their audience people.  (v.11)
- - Next, let's study what else God has to say about what good ministers are to do.

v.12 - READ

[Lesson Question:  The mandate in this verse, to "set an example" - why and how is it important for a teacher of God's Word?]

SECTION POINT:  To elicit and establish necessary credibility and respect from the audience people, a teacher of God's Word must be living an exemplary life of godliness.

"Don't let anyone look down on you because you are young"
- - When a person is teaching the Word of God, there is a distinct expectation by the audience people that the teacher is to have sufficient credibility and credentials to be teaching this material.
- - In the eyes of the audience people, the teaching person must be qualified to teach on this subject in order to teach from a basis of knowledge, confidence, experience, and authority that is worthy of eliciting their belief.
- - Furthermore, if the teaching person is additionally exhorting that the audience people are to change their lifestyle to conform to the biblical teachings, then there is an additional and heightened expectation that the teaching person must already be successfully conforming to what he or she is teaching.
- - And it stands to reason then that from God's perspective, similarly, if a person is to "command and teach" the Word of God with authority, as instructed in previous verse 11, then that person must already be successfully conforming to principles he or she is teaching.
- - So, a teaching person deserves and elicits respect from the audience people, as authorized by God, if he or she is successfully conforming to what he or she is teaching, regardless if he or she is young.
- - And conversely, a teaching person will elicit "contempt, scorn, hostility, dislike, loathing, disinterest", and "despising" if he or she is not conforming to what he or she is teaching because he or she will be viewed as a hypocrite, regardless if he or she is young.  (from Strong's #2706 and AHD - 'despise')

"but set an example for the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith and in purity"
- - The remedy, then, is for the teaching person to set a good example for the audience people, especially because the audience people naturally watch and internally scrutinize the life of their teaching person very closely, as if with a magnifying glass and binoculars.  (cf. Titus 2:7-8)
- - The teaching person will therefore need to be living what he or she is teaching in all areas, both comprehensively and to the fullest.  (cf. Titus 2:7-8)
- - Not just when teaching, but in every aspect of daily "life", the teaching person needs to be modeling godliness.  (cf. Titus 2:7)
- - Reactions, regard, "speaking", conversations, and treatment of others will always need to be appropriate and dominated by "love".
- - Difficulties, crises, hardships, conflicts, setbacks, and challenges will always need to be dominated by "faith".
- - Motives, inner thinking, and behaviors conducted in private will always need to be dominated by "purity".

- - This is a tall standard to meet, and it disqualifies many persons who teach or preach God's Word.
- - This failure to adequately meet this required exemplary standard also explains a reason why deficient teaching persons have a spiritually inferior, stagnant, or declining ministry, with a prevailing spiritually-apathetic attitude and response from their audience persons.
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v.13 - READ

[Lesson Question:  Explore and then describe the relationship between the reading, and the exhorting (preaching), and the teaching of Scriptures.  What results can be achieved when these three activities are combined?]

SECTION POINT:  By God's design, His Word needs to be compositely read, exhorted, and taught to the people.

- - For a minister of Christ Jesus (like Timothy was (v.6)), another proper function of that job occupation is to be devoted "to the" reading, "to the" preaching, and "to the" teaching - which emphasizes their relating to the function for that job occupation of teaching God's Word.  (Strong's #3588 - demonstrative 'the')
- - So as a minister of Christ Jesus, fulfilling the job functions described in previous verses, such as teaching the truths of the faith (v.6), teaching training in godliness (vv.7,11), and teaching salvation (v.10,11), requires that the Word of God be read, preached, and taught to the audience people (v.5).
- - The Scriptures need to be "read" to people, so that the audience people can hear with their own ears directly what God has to say.
- - The Scriptures also need to be "preached" or "exhorted and implored" "with encouraging and comforting", so that motivation and urgency are extended to the audience people.  (Strong's #3874; Zodhiates #3874, p.1106)
- - Additionally, the Scriptures need to be "taught", to provide knowledge of, to facilitate the learning of, to build understanding about, and to transfer familiarity with, so that a foundation of knowledge and enlightenment is constructed in the lives of the audience people.  (from AHD - 'teach')
- - The grammatical structure of this verse indicates that all three of these activities need to be presented in conjunction with each other - as a composite or unified whole.
- - God is saying in this verse that by His design, the Scriptures need to be compositely directly read, and explained, and taught, and exhorted, and applied to the audience people.
- - By definition then, this type of direct reading, exhorting, and teaching of the Scriptures is called being 'expository', essentially exposing in detail the meaning, ramifications, and applications of the contents of each key word and each phrase in each verse in a selected Scripture section.
- - A good minister of Christ Jesus closely "adheres to" and "devotedly" utilizes expository compositely reading, and teaching, and exhorting of Scriptures because through this approach God's messages to the people get through to them clearly, understandably, directly, and thoroughly.  (Strong's #4337)

- - Sadly, most preachers and teachers, who perhaps intend to be expository, in reality wander from and fall far short of being expository in their presentations.
- - Typically, they start their sermon or lesson by reading a Scripture passage, but then they essentially ignore that passage and go on to talk about what they want to say and not what the passage says.
- - Or they 'surf' a Scripture passage, gliding across the top of the waves of a passage by only briefly touching upon or slightly highlighting a few thoughts that are derived from distorting or manipulating the passage to support where they want to go in their sermon or lesson.
- - Or they 'smother' the content, meaning, and impact of a Scripture passage by flooding their sermon or lesson with distracting, cluttering, or superficially embellishing discourses.
- - As would be expected then, these inadequate attempts at expository preaching and teaching typically contribute significantly to the stagnation or dying of their ministries.
- - God's Word needs to be directly taught to the people in order to impact and transform them.  (cf. 2 Timothy 3:16-17)
- - And deviating from this direct and exposing approach only serves to dilute what God wants to say from His Word, thereby diluting the impact and ability to bring transformation.
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BIG IDEA:  A teacher of God's Word must be living a godly life and utilizing an expository presentation approach in order to facilitate God's transforming impact upon the audience people.

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APPLICATIONS:

- - What style of teaching or preaching do you prefer?  Why?
- - Do you prefer to be entertained, with comedy, or interesting stories, or video clips, or trivia facts?
- - Or do you prefer animated or excited sermons and lessons, in which wild claims, declarations, or promises are abundantly spewed out, which tickle your ears and make you feel good?  (2 Timothy 4:3-4)
- - Or do you prefer rambling, incoherent sermons and lessons?
- - Or do you prefer to be lulled or bored so you can catch up on your sleep?
- - Or do you prefer to hear essentially the same sermon or lesson content over and over, every week?
- - Or do you prefer to briefly hear just a few high points of a Scripture passage so that you can go on to the next passage?

- - In this 'entertain me' era today, there are very few people in churches who truly desire and seek to hear the meaning of Scripture passages, fully and in depth.
- - Inwardly, and in all honesty, are you genuinely wanting to hear what God has to say, directly from His Scriptures?

- - And for those of you who teach or preach God's Word, are you setting a good example for your audience people, modeling godliness in all of your speech and your conduct and your life?
- - Furthermore, are you teaching God's Word raw, or are you actually sugar-coating it, diluting it, or merely hinting at it in your sermons or lessons, adding just a little bit for flavor?
- - As a teacher or preacher of God's Word, do you have the guts, and the determination, and the work ethic to present expository sermons or lessons, even at the risk of losing some of your audience people?
- - If not, then how are you expecting for your audience people to be significantly impacted spiritually and substantially grow in godliness?
- - In verse 13, God instructs that His Word is to be read, exhorted, and taught.  Are you doing that?  Or are you doing something less than that or different than that?
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[Additional Lesson Questions to ponder (optional, if time allows):
- - For those of you who have been a true believer for many years or decades, over that time, what teaching style most impacted you spiritually?  And what preaching style?  Why?
- - Contrarily, without disclosing identities, have you ever encountered good teaching or preaching but the presenting person had serious or major deficiencies with personal godliness?  What impact did that person's teaching or preaching have on you?
- - Assignment: During the next three sermons or Bible lessons you hear, closely observe, identify, and analyze whether or not, or how the presenting person handled the main Scripture passage within the contents of his or her sermon or lesson.  Then, without disclosing identities of the presenting persons, share your findings in this Bible study class.]
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Works Cited:
The American Heritage Dictionary (AHD). 3rd ed., ver. 3.6a (CD-ROM). Cambridge, MA: SoftKey International Inc., 1994.

Bible. “The Holy Bible: New International Version.” The Bible Library CD-ROM. Oklahoma City, OK: Ellis Enterprises, 1988.

“Strong's Greek Dictionary.” The Bible Library CD-ROM. Oklahoma City, OK: Ellis Enterprises, 1988.

Zodhiates, Spiros. The Complete Word Study Dictionary: New Testament. Chattanooga: AMG Publishers, 1992.
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Updated: December 9, 2016