II Timothy 4:17a Notwithstanding the Lord stood with me, and strengthened me
I was skimming the news this morning and I saw an article on something called the Power Slap League. It wasn’t boxing or jujitsu; it was power slapping. The pictures they used to depict this league were absolutely brutal with big, huge guys slapping the living daylights out of their opponents. They reminded me of photos of Muhammad Ali landing a punch back in the day with blood and sweat like an explosion off the face. I’m not exactly sure how this slapping league works, but maybe you remember saying something like this to a sibling, “Hey, you want to see who can hit the hardest?” Wasn’t that just a piece of brilliance, passing the time by seeing who could slap or hit the hardest?
It is indeed amazing what the human body and the human spirit can endure. A lot of that is psychological if not physiological. A lot of that endurance depends on whether a person is by themselves or if they have company, and if they have company, whom they are with. All of us have situations where we can endure things if we are with the right people.
II Timothy is largely about a contrast, a choice. Will I be ashamed of God or will I be ashamed of sin? Will I be judged by God or will I be judged by the world? Will I endure the truth or will I endure the opposition that comes because I embrace the truth? In II Timothy 3 Paul is talking about people who are “ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” They are dumb, smart people. They know a lot, but they never quite understand life because they don’t understand the God Who designed life.
Paul basically says in contrast, “You have known my doctrine and you have known the truth, Timothy, and the persecutions and afflictions that came because of that. Everyone who lives the truth, who lives godly in Christ Jesus, will suffer persecution. But there are people who are going to go after falsehood, but you know what you have learned from a child from your grandmother, mother, and me, in order that such a person can be perfect and completely furnished unto all good works.” That is the context.
Then, II Timothy 4:1 says, “I charge thee therefore because God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom.” In other words, he is saying, “There is coming a day when you will stand before God, and God is with you even now. So, you have a choice. Will you endure the truth, or will you endure the opposition that comes from the truth? Will you object to the truth, or will you endure those who object to you because you embrace the truth?”
Second Timothy 4:3 says, “For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine.” They aren’t going to put up with it. They want to be entertained. In contrast, verse 5 says, “But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions.” So, I’m either going to put up with the truth, as something to be resisted, or I’m going to endure the affliction that comes because I embrace the truth. Paul says, “For I am now ready to be offered…I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith…henceforth there is laid up for me a crown…”
The bottom line is, what are you willing to endure? Are you willing to embrace the truth and endure hardship that may come from that? Or are you willing to embrace falsehood and endure facing a God Who is truth? What you are willing and able to endure depends on whom you are standing with and who is standing with you.
If it is peers and people that you are standing with, they are here and then they are gone. In verse 9 and following Paul talks about all those who have forsaken him. He goes on to say in verse 16, “At my first answer no man stood with me, but all men forsook me: I pray God that it may be not laid to their charge. Notwithstanding the Lord stood with me, and strengthened me… I was delivered…the Lord shall deliver.” So, what you are willing and able to endure, whether it is the truth or the opposition that comes from embracing the truth, depends on whom you are standing with and who is standing with you.
At some point, you need to realize that God is with you. You may not always have a person with you because people come and go either because they drop by the wayside or because none of us live forever. Timothy would not always have his grandmother, mother, or Paul with him. He would have to realize that God stood with him.
The second option is that if the Lord stands with you and you stand with him, He is here now and forever. “Notwithstanding the Lord stood with me.” In Psalm 46 it says, “God is a very present help in trouble.” He is present, here as opposed to there. He is present, right now as opposed to then. He is here and now. The Bible says that He will never leave nor forsake you. He is with you. That ought to be a reason for contentment in our life.
So, what are you able to endure? It begins with the question of what are you enduring. Are you enduring or resisting the truth? Or are you enduring the hardship that may blow back on you because you do embrace the truth? What you are willing to endure and what you are able to endure depends on whom you are standing with and who is standing with you.