Encore Post: Timothy was one of the very first Christians to grow up in a Christian family. His grandmother Lois and mother Eunice had faith in Christ before Timothy was born. His father was a gentile, so he was not circumcised. He always had faith in Christ and grew up to be a strong, young Christian leader.
Paul met him in his home town of Lystra, probably on his first missionary trip. The apostle saw the gifts God had given to the young man and immediately took him along on his journeys. Before traveling with Paul, Timothy was circumcised so as not to offend Jews.
Timothy would be sent on increasingly important missions, including delivering some of Paul’s letters to churches. Paul would eventually leave him in Ephesus as a pastor, to deal with heresies and misunderstandings that had arisen there. Paul would call for him when imprisoned, perhaps for the last time. Later, Timothy was himself in prison and released. He would accompany the author of the letter to the Hebrews on a journey. According to church tradition, Timothy was bishop of Ephesus and died on 22 January 97 as a martyr.
Timothy has become one of the favorite fathers of the early church to seminaries and students studying to be pastors. Paul gives him advice that is very practical, even today. He was one of the important second generation leaders, who passed on the teaching of God’s word to a new generation — and us!
Rev. Robert E. Smith
Concordia Theological Seminary
Fort Wayne, Indiana
©2021 Robert E. Smith. All rights reserved. Permission granted to copy, share and display freely for non-commercial purposes. Direct all other rights and permissions inquiries to cosmithb@gmail.com
Hi Robert. Off topic question:
No two Gospels describe the same resurrection appearance. Therefore, there is no corroboration of any specific sighting of a walking, talking resurrected corpse. As a believer, doesn’t that bother you? If three book authors today each claim that the deceased Elvis Presley appeared to different individuals and groups of people 30 years ago, but never describe the same Elvis appearance, wouldn’t you be dubious? There is no corroboration of any specific appearance claim. (That means these claims could all be made up/fiction.)
Not at all. Have listened to reports of verified eyewitnesses? They almost never report the same details. If they did, then you would expect it was rehearsed. So that the four gospels differ goes to authenticity. Among many more things a comment thread cannot cover.
I agree with you 100%, Robert. If multiple people witness an auto accident, there will be minor discrepancies in their eyewitness testimonies. They may disagree on the color of the autos involved or the model of the autos. But they won’t disagree on which city and state in which the accident occurred, will they? Not if they are truly eyewitnesses.
The Gospels tell us about multiple appearances of the resurrected Jesus but no two Gospels describe the same appearance, the same “auto accident”. One author describes an appearance on a mountain in Galilee, another author describes an appearance on the road to Emmaus, another author describes an appearance on the Sea of Tiberius. All these resurrection appearances may well have occurred but since no two Gospel authors describe the SAME appearance, there is no corroboration. It is no different than multiple authors claiming that the deceased Elvis Presley has appeared to multiple individuals and groups, but none of their stories corroborate any specific appearance of The King. Without corroboration, these stories about Elvis may well be the inventions of the authors, right?
We could go on at length here, but I expect you and I will not agree on this. Such exchanges really do not work online. So, let’s let this go with my prior answer. I also will refer you to the podcast below. I agree, more or less, with what is said there. Have a nice day.
If you’re interested, the evidence for the physical resurrection of Jesus from the dead is considered on this podcase episode: https://issuesetc.org/2023/09/03/objections-overruled-chapter-two-jesus-didnt-physically-rise-from-the-dead/