T
T
Thomas
William Barclay called Thomas “the man who became certain by doubting.”
Barclay, The Master’s Men, p. 47
The more of doubt, the stronger faith, I say
If faith overcomes doubt.
Robert Browning, “Bishop Blougram’s Apology”
There lives more faith in honest doubt, believe me, than in half the creeds.
Tennyson, “In Memoriam,” sec. 96, lines 11–12
If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.
Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning, 1.5.8
Doubt is a problem in the mind (“I don’t understand”) and the heart (“I feel …”), while unbelief is a sin of the will (“I will not believe!”). Thomas was willing to go to Judea and die with Christ (John 11:16), so he was not a coward; but the events involving Christ’s trial and death were too much for him. Jesus had told his disciples about these events and promised that he would rise from the dead (Matt.16:21; 17:22–23; 20:17–19), but the Word did not sink into the heart of the disciples. Thomas was not afraid to ask a question in the upper room (John 14:5) and apparently accepted the Lord’s answer.
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Barclay sees two main lessons in the incidents involving Thomas: (1) Jesus blames no man for wanting to be sure, and (2) certainty is most likely to come to a man in the fellowship of believers.
Barclay, The Master’s Men, p. 50.
Whatever it was that kept Thomas away, he was terribly punished for his absence. For he thereby lost the first and best sight of his risen Master, and His first and best benediction of peace. He not only lost that benediction, but the joy of the other disciples who had received it filled the cup of Thomas’s misery full.
AW-BC, p. 536
Faith is always easy where love and hope are strong. What we live for and hope to see, what we love with our whole heart, what we pray for night and day, what our whole future is anchored upon, that we easily believe, that we are ready to welcome.
AW-BC, p. 538
Let us act upon the faith we have. Let us frequent the places where He is said to manifest Himself. Let us feed our faith on the strong meat of His word. And, since here also acts produce habits, and habits character; let us act faith continually on faith’s great objects and operations. And, especially, on our glorified Redeemer. To Thomas He was crucified yesterday. But to us He is risen, and exalted, and is soon to come again.
AW-BC, pp. 538–39
It is a sad day for any congregation when its own membership begin to absent themselves from its services…. Believe me, no community ever loses respect for a congregation till that congregation loses respect for itself.
Chappell, Sermons on Biblical Characters, p. 10
Why was Thomas missing? He was missing because he had lost hope. He believed that Christ was dead. He believed that the cause for which he had stood was lost and lost forever more.
Chappell, Sermons on Biblical Characters, p. 12
And just see what this man Thomas missed by not being in the little meeting among the ten. First, he missed the privilege of seeing Jesus…. Thomas missed also the gift of peace. Jesus said to those present, “Peace be unto you.” … The disciples who were there were re-commissioned…. “He breathed on them and said, Receive ye the Holy Ghost.” And poor Thomas missed also this benediction because he was not with them when Jesus came.
Chappell, Sermons on Biblical Characters, pp. 14–16
[Thomas] would have been a mere name but for John. But John preserves for us three incidents in which Thomas figured prominently [John 11:16; 14:5; 20:19–29] with the result that we have as vivid a mental picture of him as of any one of the Twelve…. [H]e was a man of great and unshrinking devotion. … The other disciples were hesitating. The dangers of Judea were frightening them. Even Peter and John were hanging back. But Thomas never wavered in his mind.
J. D. Jones, The Lord of Life and Death, pp. 120, 122–23
He [Thomas] was a man at once cautious and courageous. We speak of Thomas as a skeptic. Yes, but let the word be redeemed from our abuse of it. He was a skeptic. He was a man who was compelled to investigate, to inquire, a man who “would not make his judgment blind,” a man who would “face the specters of the mind,” and would make no confession of faith, of hope, of confidence, unless it were a confession absolutely honest, true to the profoundest convictions of his mind.
GCM, 5:129
Thomas said, “Unless I see what you saw, I will not believe.” He did not ask for something other than they had received. He did not ask for some special revelation, denied to the rest. He asked for the same proof, and for that alone.
GCM, 5:130
The chief thing to remember about Thomas is not that he doubted, that he asked for unusual evidence, but that he was convinced, that he believed so thoroughly and enthusiastically as to give expression to the greatest confession in Christian history, “My Lord and my God!”
CEM, Chariots of Fire, p. 57
The difference between the rationalist and Thomas is this: the rationalist wants to disbelieve; Thomas wanted to believe…. This is the deepest doubt of all, the doubt born of sorrow; that is, the doubt which rises out of the experience of our lives.
CEM, Chariots of Fire, p. 59
He was no more skeptical than his colleagues who, when the women reported earlier that day what they saw at the tomb in the rolled-back stone and the undisturbed grave clothes and the angel visitors, said these were “idle tales, and they believed them not.”
Roy L. Laurin, Meet Yourself in the Bible, p. 204
Notice how Jesus treated Thomas. He was not angry with him. He did not scold him or condemn him. He did not humiliate him before his fellow disciples. He gently and calmly said, “Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side: and be not faithless but believing.” All Thomas needed was the sight of his Master. He did not need the evidence he had demanded.
Laurin, Meet Yourself, p. 207
We owe a debt of gratitude to Thomas, for his inquiry has furnished us with indisputable evidence concerning the resurrection. His experience teaches us a great lesson of faith and as it has been said, “Thomas doubted that we might have no reason to doubt.” Let us go away believing.
Laurin, Meet Yourself, p. 208
Timothy
When Paul and Barnabas split up because of their disagreement over John Mark, Barnabas took Mark and sailed to Cyprus and Paul took Silas and embarked on his second missionary journey. But he no longer had Mark “as his minister” and he needed somebody to handle the details that can elude even the greatest apostle. Paul found Timothy (Acts 16:1–5) and made him not only his minister but even as his own son in the faith. The Lord is never at a loss to provide laborers if his people pray (Luke 10:2), and Paul had prayed. Timothy was probably converted as a teenager during Paul’s first visit to Lystra (Acts 14:6ff) and thus was Paul’s beloved son in the faith. It’s likely that Timothy saw Paul stoned there and dragged out of the city (Acts 14:19–20; 2 Tim. 3:10–12). Some suggest that Paul may have been taken into the home of Eunice and Lois where they washed his wounds. The name Timothy means “honoring God.”
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Timothy was the son of a racially and apparently also a religiously mixed marriage. His mother was “a Jewess that believed” while his father was “a Greek.” Such marriages were quite unthinkable by the exclusive standards of Palestine, but in the dispersion they occurred more or less frequently, especially if the husband became a proselyte. If Timothy’s father did accept the Jewish God, he must have remained “a proselyte of the gate,” refusing to accept circumcision for himself as well as his son. Otherwise Timothy certainly would have been circumcised. The fact that Luke twice called the father “a Greek” (16:1, 3) without any qualifying adjective, as in the case of the mother, strongly implies that he was a pagan.
Hiebert, Personalities Around Paul, pp. 99–100
During a gathering of the local assembly, the Spirit of prophecy, speaking through His prophets, pointed out Timothy for special service, thus sanctioning Paul’s desire to have Timothy “go forth with him” (Acts 16:3; 1 Tim. 1:18).
Hiebert, Personalities Around Paul, p. 102
Timothy was probably between twenty and twenty-two years old at this time. Fifteen years later Paul called him “a youth,” a “term applied to men until the age of forty.”
Hiebert, Personalities Around Paul, p. 103
Timothy was not an apostle; that is made clear in Colossians 1:1. He was never looked upon as a successor to Paul, and he was never portrayed as having the authority of an apostle. Read the letters to Timothy and Titus and notice that such authority remained in the apostolic office and was not conferred on younger ministers. Yet there is authority (cf. 1 Timothy 4:11, 14): it is the authority of the gospel.
William Sanford LaSor, Great Personalities of the New Testament, p. 153
Our first responsibility, as was Timothy’s, is to guard the faith that is in us (2 Tim. 2:1)…. The second responsibility that Paul laid upon Timothy was to train up faithful successors (2 Tim. 2:2)…. The third responsibility was to trust God (2 Tim. 2:19)…. The fourth responsibility, and by no means the least important, was to stay out of arguments (2 Tim. 2:23–25)…. All these responsibilities can be summarized in one charge: “Preach the word, be urgent in season and out of season, convince, rebuke, and exhort, be unfailing in patience and in teaching” (2 Tim. 4:2 RSV).
La Sor, Great Personalities of the New Testament, p. 155
[2 Timothy 1:1–7] It is not for nothing, you may depend upon it, that Paul gives Lois and Eunice such a first-class certificate for their first-rate methods, and for their signal success in teaching Timothy to read, and so far to understand the Holy Scriptures.
AW-BC, p. 735
“Give attention to reading” (1 Tim. 4:13). This is one of Paul’s outstanding exhortations to Timothy…. “Reading” in Timothy’s day … would mean to him very much what is nowadays called expository preaching or “lecturing” as we say in Scotland. [This can also apply to the public reading of the Word of God.]
AW-BC, p. 739
“Rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Tim. 2:15); this is another of Paul’s masterstrokes in these masterly Epistles. And that masterstroke of the Apostle serves to set forth another of the many advantages of the consecutive and comprehensive exposition of Holy Scripture.
AW-BC, p. 740
And “take heed to thyself” (1 Tim. 4:16)…. Take heed to thy doctrine indeed, but, first and last, take most heed to thyself. Fix thy very best and thy very closest attention on thyself. This is thy main duty as a pastor…. For that minister who constantly and increasingly takes heed to himself in his walk and conversation; in preaching better and better every returning Sabbath; in discharging all the endless duties of his pastorate in season and out of season; in holding his peace in controversy; and in a life of secret faith and secret prayer; God Himself will see to it that such an apostolic minister will be imitated and celebrated both as a pattern minister and a pattern man; both before his people and before all his fellow ministers. All that, by the grace of God, may be attained by any minister who sets himself to attain it.
AW-BC, pp. 743–44
“Stir up the gift that is within thee” (2 Tim. 1:16). The word here translated “stir up” really means rekindle…. You can see that Paul is not accusing Timothy of having put out his own fire…. Paul is not accusing Timothy of misusing his gifts…. Nor is Paul urging Timothy to acquire new gifts. He is not urging him to use gifts that he does not possess. He simply presses home upon him the sane and practical duty of using what he actually has…. Use the gift that God has committed to you. That is your duty and your whole duty.
Clovis Chappell, Sermons on New Testament Characters, pp. 178–79
Why did Timothy need this exhortation from Paul? (1) He needed it because he was in a hard situation…. (2) He needed this message because of his youth. (3) Timothy needed this exhortation because he was timid. [See 1 Cor. 16:10.] … (4) Timothy needed this exhortation because he was physically weak. What reason does Paul urge upon Timothy for stirring up his gift? … There is great need on account of great opposition…. “The days are evil.”
Chappell, New Testament Characters, pp. 184–86
In spite of weakness and timidity he dared put himself in the hands of his Lord. For his sake he ventured to stir up his gifts. And as he thus obeyed God a new power came into his life, even the power of the Holy Spirit.
Chappell, New Testament Characters, pp. 188–89
Of all members of Paul’s circle, there was none with whom he formed a closer mutual attachment than Timothy. In six of Paul’s letters Timothy’s name is associated with his own in the superscription; in four of these Timothy’s name is the only one to be associated with Paul in this way…. Timothy’s name is associated with his own because Timothy shared his ministry on a permanent footing.
F. F. Bruce, The Pauline Circle, pp. 30–31
[Timothy] was one of the large party that accompanied Paul on his last voyage to Judea (Acts 20:4). After Paul’s arrest in Jerusalem we lose sight of Timothy. But he reappears with Paul in Rome, if the captivity epistles were composed there (Phil. 1:1; Col. 1:1; Philem. 1)…. [Paul] gives Timothy a quite remarkable encomium: “I have no one like him, who will be genuinely anxious for your welfare. They all look after their own interests, not those of Jesus Christ. But Timothy’s worth you know, how as a son with a father he has served with me in the gospel” (Phil. 2:20–22).
Bruce, Pauline Circle, p. 33
Much misunderstanding has often obscured Timothy’s position at Ephesus. He was not the pastor of the Ephesian church, for that church was organized under the leadership of its own elders long before Timothy was stationed there (Acts 20:17–35). Nor was Timothy a bishop with ecclesiastical jurisdiction over the churches in that area. Such a position became a later ecclesiastical development. Rather, Timothy was stationed at Ephesus as the personal representative of the Apostle Paul during his absence. As the apostolic representative, his work did not affect the local organization of the churches. We may liken his work to that of a modern missionary superintendent, commissioned to exercise supervision over a group of national churches.
Hiebert, Personalities Around Paul, p. 111
Certain interpreters, seizing upon some expressions in the letters to Timothy, especially the second, have attributed certain weaknesses of character and even definite failings to Timothy…. While no one would claim exceptional strength of character for Timothy, surely such a view misreads the purpose of Paul’s fatherly admonitions to his beloved son. Paul’s appeals were meant to be preventive rather than corrective measures. They were timely and pertinent in view of the dark future.
Hiebert, Personalities Around Paul, p. 113
Nowhere in the whole range of Biography do we find friendship and companionship employed, on so large a scale, for the highest ends, without the alloy of selfishness or ambition.
John S. Howson, The Companions of St. Paul, p. 289