Pleading for the Salvation of All People
We are continuing our series on the first letter of Paul to Timothy, and today we are covering chapter 2, verses 1-8.
This passage calls us to pray, plead for the salvation of all people, and that is the title of the message.
Please open your bibles in 1 Timothy, chapter 2. This is Paul writing:
First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all people, 2 for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. 3 This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, 4 who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. 5 For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave himself as a ransom for all, which is the testimony given at the proper time. 7 For this I was appointed a preacher and an apostle (I am telling the truth, I am not lying), a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth. 8 I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling
[Let’s pray]
In general, my messages in the past had 2 or 3 points. But this one is different in the sense that it has just one point. The main point is that we are called to pray, to plead for the salvation of all people. We will just walk together through the passage one verse at a time, sequentially, so we can see clearly from the passage our call to pray for the salvation of all people. Let’s start!
Verse 1: First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions and thanksgivings be made for all people
First of all, then
That is the way Paul starts this new section. When he says “then” he is connecting what he is about to say with the previous section. You may recall that in 1:19 he said “some have made shipwreck of their faith”. In fact, he started the chapter by saying that some teachers have been swerving away, wandering away. There are some who are not holding on to faith and therefore Paul says: “First of all, then, I urge”, I exhort, I admonish, I entreat…
“Pray that people will hear healthy, sound doctrine,” he says. Supplicate for people, that they will have a solid faith. Intercede for the ones who are confused and have been led astray. Give thanks for the ones who are holding fast. Supplicate, pray, intercede and give thanks for all people, for all men and women.
And now, in verse 2, among all people a specific group is singled out:
Verse 2: For kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life
We are called to pray for rulers, for leaders, for the authorities on this Earth. The equivalent of our day would be to pray for the president, for congressmen and senators, for the mayor of the city. Why? Why should we pray for them?
If they rule well, if they govern well, then we have a peaceful and quiet life, where godliness and dignity are able to flourish. If they don’t, difficulties arise, there is instability and violence, disorder and crime. Pray for the president! Intercede for the congressmen, supplicate for the senators, lift up in prayer the mayor and the governors.
“Well,” you may say, “I don’t really feel like praying for our president. Or I don’t want to pray for the congressmen. They say and do ungodly things”
I can imagine some people around the time Paul wrote this letter saying something similar: “Paul, do you want me to pray for the King, the Roman Emperor? You gotta be kidding me! Are you serious? How can I pray for him? He is corrupt, he is selfish, he is unjust and ungodly, he collects high amounts of taxes from us, his government is abusive and oppressive. I don’t want to pray for him, I want to organize a protest, I want to express my discontent”. But here Paul says: “Pray for him, intercede for him, cry out to God for him!”
Think about this for a moment. If the king does not act in a godly way, can you change him? Are you so influential that you can advise him, and the ones in authority? Do you have the power and the connections? No! But I know somebody that does: “The heart of the king is like a stream of water in the hand of the Lord; he turns it wherever he will” (Proverbs 21:1). God is able to turn the heart of the king wherever he wills! No wonder the secret weapon is prayer. You could try to change the king, but you will have little or no success. But if you ask the King of kings! He can turn the heart of the king however he wills.
In this time and age you can say the same thing. Our president is ungodly, our leaders are corrupt, the political landscape is dark and hopeless. Perhaps, but we gain little or nothing by protesting and complaining about it. If you want to do something that really works, if you want to invest your energy in the right place: PRAY to the Lord! Intercede for the president, ask God to give him wisdom, and intelligence, and capacity, and skill, and winsomeness.
Now, please understand, this message has no political agenda whatsoever. I want to be faithful to the text and to what the Bible calls us to do. If this message had been preached 5 years ago it would have been the same. And if I preach it in 5 years from now, it would be the same, because the Word of God does not change. Presidents and leaders will come and go, but the Word of God remains forever.
So pray, supplicate and intercede for the president and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way
Verse 3: This is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior
We pray for them because this is good. We intercede for the authorities and leaders because that is pleasing in the sight of God himself. In contrast, when we do not, we are neglecting what is good, we are not doing what is pleasing in the sight of God.
Now, when we pray for the leaders, we do not only pray for the sake of peace and quietness. We also pray for their salvation, we pray for the salvation of all men! That is our highest petition, our most important plea. That God will save the president and the authorities and ALL people.
Why? Because God…
Verse 4: [God] desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth
Did you get that? We supplicate, pray and intercede for all people, asking for their salvation because the almighty God himself “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth”!
Wow! Does God actually care about the salvation of the president, and the leaders, does he care about the salvation of my relatives and my neighbors, does he care about the salvation of Muslims, Buddhists, and atheists?
He desires ALL men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth!
So don’t say: “Oh how can this pagan neighbor reach salvation, he is so far off, he has no interest in knowing God. Or my coworker mocks all Christians, his language is so faulty, and his jokes so crude, he is too far from salvation. Oh these people, they are so wrong in their views, there is no way they can be saved, there is no hope for them”
Really?
Please understand, I am not endorsing their views or behavior at all. I do not need to compromise biblical moral standards. But I can tell you this with full certainty, because the Bible tells it so, not because it is my idea or even my inclination: “God our Savior desires all human beings to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth”. And that is why it is good and right to supplicate, pray and intercede for all of them, all people, all human beings, all men.
Pray for them! If you don’t, who is going to do it? We are the church of God and, among all, we are the ones who should know the desires of our God. And that is what he desires, for all people to be saved. He is pleased when we supplicate, pray and intercede for them. It is our duty, our privilege, our call to pray for the salvation of all people, who are in imminent danger of perishing.
[The Challenger Disaster]
On January 28, 1986, the Challenger Space Shuttle exploded 73 seconds into its flight, killing all seven crew members, including the first civilian school teacher present in a space mission. She was supposed to teach a class from space.
I recently watched a movie based on this event. It is the story of one of the engineers who had concerns about launching that day, because of the cold weather. His group was in charge of some sealing rings that were part of the rocket boosters. Those rings had not been tested under those cold conditions and he feared that the rubber rings may become too rigid because of the cold and unable to hold the stress. He communicated this to his coworkers and his manager, but they were hesitant to escalate the situation, arguing they did not have enough data to prove his hypothesis. But he firmly persisted, and after much back and forth, they were able to get on a call with the higher-ups and decision makers, who listened to his argument, but concluded the same thing, that he did not have concrete data, and because delaying the launch without a good reason would be costly, they decided to move forward and launch that day.
That morning, the engineer, with his whole team, was watching these images in real time. Can you imagine what he felt when he saw these images? After a few moments of shock, he started weeping and sobbing, and with him his coworkers as well. This was a disaster, a calamity, he believed would happen, but now it was too late… He eventually resigned from his job, and lived the rest of his life depressed and with the weight of guilt on his shoulders.
In the movie, his wife asks him: “why are you carrying this burden? You are the one who warned them and you did everything you could to stop the launch. They did not listen?” To which he responded: “I could have prevented this disaster. I should have been more aggressive. I knew about this, I should have pushed more, I should have cried out louder, I should have called the president, but now it’s too late, those men and women that have families, they are gone. They could have been saved, but now they are dead!”
This is my point. We know what is coming. There is a day when destruction and judgment and wrath are coming. I do not think about this too often, I do not weigh it with enough sobriety. Their eternity is at stake, and here the Word of God calls me to pray, and to plead, and to intercede for the salvation of people, because that is critical. Now is the time! Let us pray for them, and intercede for them, and supplicate that God would have mercy and save many by his grace.
This is our call and it is good, and pleasing before our God, because he is a saving God, he is God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
Now these two go together: salvation and knowledge of truth.
All people lack knowledge of the truth and they need to come to understand and know the truth in order to be saved. What is the truth that they need to know?
Verse 5: There is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.
This is what they need to know: that there is one God! Not many, just one, the true one.
So if the king, the Roman emperor, believes that there are many gods, he lacks knowledge and understanding, that is not true. If he considers himself a god, he is wrong, that is not true. The truth is that there is ONE GOD! We live in the age of so-called tolerance, where people believe that each can have their own god and that there are many religions and many gods and many truths. But this passage and verse explicitly denies those beliefs. There is one God!
The Greek god Zeus is not god, there is one God. The Roman god Jupiter is not god, for there is one God! Allah is not god, mother nature is not god, money is not god, science, success, fame, sex… they are not god! There is one, and only one, true God, who created the heavens and the earth, and everything in them. He is omnipotent and glorious, he is transcendent and majestic, he rules with power over all his creation and he is to be worshipped and honored by all people. For he is the only true and living God!
But not all people have knowledge of the truth, not all people recognize him as the one true God. And let us not forget that once we also lacked the knowledge of the truth.
Now this is a critical problem. This one God is holy and perfect and righteous and pure. We are not! He dwells in unapproachable light, we cannot get close to him
He is up there, we are down here, and the distance is insurmountable, too great to overcome. We are too far. We need a bridge, we need a way to reach the unreachable, and we cannot do it by just trying hard.
So God provided one mediator between him and us. There is one, and only one, God, and there is one, and only one, mediator between the one God and men, that is the man Christ Jesus, the man-Messiah, the man who was promised as King to rule and save his people: Jesus. There is no other way, Jesus is the only way, he is the only truth, and in him alone we find life!
He is our mediator, our bridge, our arbiter, conciliator, intercessor, peacemaker. The only possible link between a sinful, fallen humanity and an infinitely holy God.
He is a man and yet he is God. He has both flesh and bones and a divine nature, he was born from a virgin and was conceived by the Holy Ghost. He is God incarnate, God who took human form, and came down from heaven as mediator between God and us, he came to rescue and save us. How is this salvation accomplished?
Verse 6: [Jesus] gave himself as a ransom for all
Now, in order to grasp the full force of this sentence we have to understand the word ransom. Ransom is a payment demanded for the release of a prisoner. The modern use of this word implies that someone has been kidnapped and the captors demand a sum of money, a ransom, to release the prisoner, whose life may be in danger otherwise. However, in the context of Paul’s letter, the term ransom was also used as the payment given by a benevolent benefactor or government to rescue prisoners of war or slaves. In all these cases, the ransom is a payment, a price that is paid to release, to liberate, to rescue, to save someone who is captive, hostage, trapped.
Now, you may not see it this way, but we all are slaves, we all are trapped in our sin. Apart from Jesus, sin dominates us, and keeps us as prisoners, trapped, enslaved. Sexual immorality and pornography may keep you captive, the love for money and possessions may enslave you, anger and impatience may dominate your heart, pride and selfishness may be what rules over you. And ultimately, it is the innate inclination to live a life without God.
There is only one God, but we ignore him, and we create our own puny, feeble, little gods out of everything. We are idolaters and we are trapped, we are captive, we are prisoners of our own disordered passions and sins, and we need someone to save us, we need some benevolent benefactor willing to pay the price, willing to make the payment, willing to offer a ransom to deliver us from our miserable current state and a dreadful end.
You know what, this captivity is different from any other captivity, its end is horrifying! The consequences are frightening. If someone does not pay the ransom in time, we are doomed to a dreadful judgment. I so often forget about this. I so often ignore the fact that one day, the only true God, will judge the living and the dead, and every one of us will give an account of every single deed. What you watch in secret, the way you behave when nobody sees, how you use your time and your money, will all be exposed, and you would have to pay for every single ungodly deed for the rest of eternity.
Do you see the gravity of the situation? Can you feel the urgency, the desperate need of a Savior? Do you understand the serious necessity of a benevolent benefactor willing to pay the ransom to save your soul from eternal damnation? Would you cry out to God, and plead “save me, save me, please save me, pay the price, ransom me!”
That is exactly what Jesus offers to do for you. He is not only willing to pay the ransom to save you. He is willing to be the price himself. He is willing to pay it in full, he offers his life, he gives himself as a living sacrifice, as a ransom, so you can go free, so you can be with him forever.
And this is (v. 6b) the testimony given at the proper time. That is the undeniable proof that God desires all people to be saved. If you wonder whether God cares about a fallen, corrupt, self-destructive race, wonder no more! He provided the one mediator to save them, he sent his Son who was willing to give himself as a ransom for all, to pay with his own life. And this gift is freely and graciously offered to all people, for God our Savior desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.
Now the fact that this gift is offered to all does not mean that all will accept it and all will be saved. There will be many that, despite the offering of a freely given salvation, will reject it. They will choose to perish.
But, if you perish, do not blame God. He is offering you salvation even at the cost of the life of his precious Son. He desires for you to be saved from the just wrath and destruction and judgment that is to come. Today is the day of salvation! Come to him! Believe in the true God and his mediator who gave himself as a ransom for all.
That is the message of the good news of salvation and Paul now says:
Verse 7: For this I was appointed a preacher and an apostle… a teacher of the Gentiles
That was his passion and his purpose in life, he knew he was divinely appointed and called, he knew that he was an apostle sent with a singular mission by the command of God, he was sent with the goal of preaching and teaching to the Gentiles, that is to all ethnicities and peoples other than the Jews. He was called to tell all people about the gospel of salvation of the one true God, he was called to proclaim the mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus who gave himself as a ransom for all, for he knew that God’s desire is for all men to be saved, and therefore he made God’s desire the purpose of his life: to announce, proclaim, and herald this salvation to all people.
Now, Paul has a unique role in the plan of God. We are not apostles! And we do not write authoritative Scripture. But just as Paul had the burden for all people to hear the Gospel, we can learn from him and pray and long for the same burden, for the same passion, for the same desire, which is God’s desire: that all men be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth, by the proclamation, announcement, and heralding of the truth.
Finally, we conclude where we started, with a call to pray:
Verse 8: I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling
Paul wants to emphasize again, that because God desires all people to be saved, then in every place, in every neighborhood, in every city, in every country, the men should pray lifting holy hands. Not with anger or quarreling, but with a noble desire to supplicate, to pray, to intercede, and to plead for the salvation of all people. That is one of our highest calls as a church: to plead for the salvation of all people