Chapter 1

Unashamed When the Weather Worsens

(2 Timothy 1:8–14)

Matt Chandler

The idea of being unashamed in evangelism, for me, is an extremely personal thing. I remember walking off my high school football field into the locker room. A wide receiver on our team walked up to me and said, “Hey, I need to tell you about Jesus. When do you want to do that?”

To this day, I like that approach. He didn’t say, “Would you like to hear about Jesus?” He basically said, “I’m gonna let you decide when this conversation about Jesus occurs, but this conversation is going to happen.”

Through the unashamed boldness of this passionate, Bible-believing man of God, God brought me forth.

The Christianity I had seen before that point was hardly compelling. My father was not interested in Christ at all. In fact, he was a terrible, abusive man before Jesus saved him. And my mom thought the Pharisees were a bit too loose in how they applied the law. So I wanted nothing to do with my mother’s Jesus, but I also didn’t want the licentiousness represented by my abusive, bitter, dried-up father. Jeff Faircloth, the man who approached me in the football locker room, was the first person I saw who really loved the gospel.

Jeff began taking me to his Baptist church and their Wednesday night youth gathering entitled JAM, which stood for “Jesus And Me.” I learned very quickly that Christians liked acronyms in a way that the rest of the world doesn’t. I also discovered the most kitschy, ridiculous thing in the history of the Christian church. We would sing songs about having joy down in our hearts—deep, deep down in our hearts. And then: “Now spell it!” To my horror as an unbelieving, unchurched young man, they would spell the word joy with their bodies while singing. The entire thing reeked of a bad Saturday Night Live sketch.

Jeff would then drive me home, and I would mock what I just heard and saw the whole way. He would lovingly and patiently endure the mocking. It’s funny now to look back on those days with theological lenses. I didn’t have a category for the effectual call of God. So I would mock the entire way home: “This is so ridiculous. How can you even believe that?” Jeff would drop me off at my house and ask if I wanted to come back, to which I’d respond, “Yeah. Can you pick me up? I don’t have a ride.”

I now know what God was doing. He was wooing. He was drawing. I had no clue: “You want me to go this way, God? Okay.”

About a year later, the Lord opened my heart to belief and wrecked me. I actually remember thinking, “Oh no, he got me.” And from there I loved him so much that I lost my mind for a bit—in a good way. I bought a T-shirt that said “I ♥ Jesus” and wore it all the time. I would tell anyone who would listen about Jesus. My evangelistic tactics were terrible, yet as goofy as they were, God drew people with them.

The first guy I tried to share my faith with was a friend with whom I had been running around doing terrible things, Jimmy Hereford. Jimmy saw what was happening to me and started asking, “What in the world! I ‘heart’ Jesus?! What did they do to you, bro?”

I didn’t know much theology at this point. I knew there was hell, and you didn’t want to go there. I knew you needed to love Jesus. And I knew he died on the cross to forgive sin—and that his forgiveness somehow worked in between hell and love. So I would lean on Jimmy with the threat of hell. My first shot at explaining the gospel of Jesus Christ to Jimmy focused on how Jesus saves us from hell and what hell was.

Almost all of our discussions revolved around fire and hell. A couple of weeks later, I was sitting in the stands watching a junior varsity game. Jimmy was next to me when another guy walked into the gym whom Jimmy hated. He said he wanted to fight the guy. I told him to be careful because the guy might kill him. Jimmy replied, “I ain’t afraid to die.”

I went right back to the issue of hell: “Jimmy, do you remember that hell thing we talked about? You better get that cleaned up first.”

About a week later I was eating a piece of candy. Jimmy asked me if I had any more. I pulled them out of my pocket, and said, “Yeah, but the only ones I have are fire.” He replied that he didn’t care for fire. So I said, “Remember when we talked? If you don’t like fire, you need to consider the things that I’ve been telling you about Jesus.”

Then Jimmy came to JAM with me. I started thinking, Oh man, I’m that guy now. I’m bringing someone to JAM. I know what I’m going to hear on the car ride home.

That night at JAM there was no preaching. Instead, we watched a terrible video called Hell’s Bells about secular music. The video said that if you listened to secular music, you’d end up doing methamphetamines and maybe kill one of your parents. Of course the movie was dated with bands we weren’t listening to, like Journey. I don’t think Jimmy even knew who Journey was.

Halfway through the movie, Jimmy leaned over to me and said, “Hey man, I want to do it.” I was like, “Bro, you can’t kill your parents. If you kill your folks, you’re going to jail.”

Somehow from there, Jimmy trusted in Christ. He believed from Hell’s Bells. It was an evangelistic train wreck, and he believed.

Jimmy is thirty-something now with a wife and children. He’s a man of God helping a church plant in Dallas get off the ground and he’s the best evangelist I’ve been around.

In fact, I’ll put an exclamation point on God’s faithfulness in this story. Jimmy got a job at a Mexican food restaurant and began to share the gospel with some of the waiters there, including one man by the name of Carl Brower. After six months of hearing the good news of the gospel from Jimmy, Carl gave his life to Jesus Christ. Carl fell in love with Jesus, and we happened to hire Carl Brower several years ago at The Village Church to run our preschool ministry. In the Lord’s sweet mercy on my life, Carl Brower has held two of my children and prayed that Christ would save their souls.

So when we talk about being unashamed in evangelism, I can feel it. I feel it because somebody came and got me. God sent someone to boldly walk up to me and say, “I need to tell you about Jesus. When do you want to do this?”

Most of us already feel a bit guilty about evangelism because we know we’re not doing it like we should. And now, how many news reports and sermons keep telling us that our culture is getting darker? That the environment is growing more hostile? That it’s getting harder to be a Christian?

My great fear for Christians in America is that, in an area where we already perceive ourselves to be weak, all the talk about how acidic the air has become might cause us to shrink back even more, instead of letting the Bible encourage us to enter more boldly into what God will do to save the lost. What we are experiencing is not new under the sun. Yes, there might be growing hostility toward believers in Christ. No, we should not respond as if we are the first generation that will have to weather this. That simply is not true.

A Turn for the Worse in the Ephesian Weather

The birth of the church in Ephesus is one of the most spectacular things to witness in the Bible. Paul shows up right after Apollos, who was a good preacher, but had to be corrected. Then Paul rolls in, finds some disciples, and begins to preach. He moves from the synagogue into the Hall of Tyrannus and reasons with the people for a couple of years. There, the Bible tells us, all the residents of Asia heard the Word of the Lord, both Jews and Greeks (Acts 19:10).

The gospel then begins to take root in Ephesus in a profound way. A number of Jewish exorcists get beat up by a demon-possessed man. Fear falls on everyone, and the name of Jesus is extolled (Acts 19:17). Then we read,

Also many of those who were now believers came, confessing and divulging their practices. And a number of those who had practiced magic arts brought their books together and burned them in the sight of all. And they counted the value of them and found it came to fifty thousand pieces of silver. So the word of the Lord continued to increase and prevail mightily. (vv. 18–19)

How mightily did the Word of God prevail in Ephesus? So mightily that a group of men who made money selling idols could no longer sell them because of gospel belief, and they started a riot.

Can you get your head around the idea of the gospel making such headway in a city that no more dollars can be made from sinful gain? On the freeways of Dallas I constantly pass strip clubs. I wonder what it would be like if no one spent money at Dallas strip clubs because the gospel had permeated our culture so thoroughly, forcing the owners to riot. When I see those clubs, I pray, “Let the money dry up. Let the money dry up because of gospel belief.”

That’s what happens in Ephesus in Acts 19. That’s how the church begins.

But then Paul promises a change in the weather will come. In chapter 20, Paul warns the Ephesian elders, “I know that after my departure fierce wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock” (v. 29). And by the time we get to 2 Timothy, Paul says, “all who are in Asia turned away from me” (1:15). That’s a change in the weather, for sure.

We started with, “All in Asia heard the word of the Lord and the idol-makers were pitching a fit.” And we arrived at, “I’m in chains in Rome, and everyone has deserted me.” The temperature has dropped.

And yet.

It is in this environment that Paul writes to Timothy concerning what to do when the weather worsens.

Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began, and which now has been manifested through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, for which I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher, which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that Day what has been entrusted to me. Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you. (2 Tim. 1:8–14)

Don’t Be Ashamed, But Share in the Suffering

Verse 8 sets the context. Paul tells Timothy, “Do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord,” but instead, “share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God.”

That is not the type of encouragement most pastors are looking for when the air is growing acidic. “You once had a lot of support. Now your support is drying up. But I still want you to step into the suffering, Timothy. Don’t step around it. Step into it, and know you’re going to suffer. Don’t be surprised by this. Share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God.”

There is so much material in the New Testament like this. It almost confuses me when Christians are surprised by suffering. How can you read the Bible and then be surprised when suffering shows up in your life—regardless of the form?

James says to “count it all joy . . . when you meet trials of various kinds” (1:2). Do you mean cancer, James? Yes, that’s a “various kind.” Do you mean people lying to me? Yeah, that’s in there too. And persecution? Of course.

Jesus himself says, “Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray” (Matt. 24:9–11).

Pastor, if you knew that suffering was going to be on your job description, the only reason you would do it is because you are called. Don’t talk to me about any of this Christian celebrity, Hollywood nonsense. Put “share in suffering” on the job description, and let’s see who is left. Everybody loves Pauline theology. But few of us want Pauline pain.

So many guys want to stand on the stage. But do you want Moses’ stage? He enjoyed forty years in the desert with grumbling, complaining people and then doesn’t get to go into the Promised Land. He dies on the mountain!

Or how about Jeremiah’s stage? God lets him go into exile with everyone else. Jeremiah wonders if God has seduced him. Deceived him. Tricked him.

The idea of suffering should not surprise us when we think about the words used in the New Testament: tribulation and death, hated by all nations, people falling away, people betraying and hating one another, and false prophets arising from within the church.

The same thing is present in the book of Acts, a constant cycle of persecution and praise. A group hears the gospel, responds, and praises God. Then another group persecutes, marginalizes, and tries to destroy the first group. Think of Peter’s sermons at Pentecost or Solomon’s portico. Neither is seeker-friendly. Yet thousands come to know Christ. Peter also heals a man, and he’s arrested for it.

It’s always been like this. We may be in a day and age where the air is getting more acidic. We will suffer. But there is nowhere to run. You will be hated in all nations for Jesus’ Name’s sake.

Sitting in prison, abandoned by former associates, Paul knows this. And he knows bad days are coming for Timothy if they have not begun already (2 Tim. 3:1). False teachers and corrupt men will rise up who will lead people astray. He promises Timothy, “all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived” (3:12–13).

If you are a pastor, you know that few things are more devastating than to watch people fall away from the faith. Or to watch hate begin to fester in the hearts of people whom we thought were the children of God. And how exhausting false teachers are!

So Paul is looking into Timothy’s spiritual soul, knowing how timid and reserved Timothy can be. Paul’s message is, “Prepare to suffer. You’re not going to get around it. Prepare to suffer.” But then Paul helps Timothy know how to suffer by the power of God. He gives him four things that would enable Timothy—and us—to walk in unashamed, emboldened passion for the name and renown of Jesus Christ in evangelism, even in an acidic culture.

Remember that God Saved and Called Us

First, we should be unashamed in our evangelism because we know that God has saved and called us. Listen to verses 8 and 9 again in chapter 1: “Therefore do not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but share in suffering for the gospel by the power of God, who saved us and called us to a holy calling” (emphasis added).

Paul never got over his conversion. How could he? He was kicking open doors, dragging men and women into the street, and taking them to prison.

Paul was not a seeker. On the road to Damascus, he was not reading Tim Keller’s latest book. He was not considering presuppositional apologetics. In fact, he describes himself as an “insolent opponent” (1 Tim. 1:13). Do you know what an insolent opponent is? It is someone who doesn’t care about the facts or what’s true. If you’re married, here’s what that looks like: You’re deep into an argument with your spouse and you realize you are wrong, but it’s too late. You aren’t retracting or pulling back. You’re in too deep. This was Paul.

But now his word to Timothy is, remember who called and saved us. Let’s not get over the miracle of rebirth. Let’s not forget that we were in the domain of darkness before God transferred us into the kingdom of his beloved Son. He saved us!

I have often wondered why I cared when Jeff shared the gospel with me and took me to JAM. Why did I keep going? I had all the reason in the world to doubt the goodness of God: an alcoholic and abusive father, a hyper-religious mother. I had a thousand reasons to think Christianity was nonsense. Yet the Lord kept wooing. Kept calling. Relentlessly pursuing. Now, therefore, I can be unashamed, knowing that what God did with me he will do with others.

You need to remember the same thing. You were saved and called.

Remember You Weren’t Awesome to Begin With

Second, Paul reminds us in verse 9 that we were not awesome to begin with. We should not be ashamed but should share in suffering by the power of God, “who saved us and called us to a holy calling, not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace” (emphasis added).

You and I were not saved because of our brilliance and savvy and good works. If God could only accomplish his purposes through the best and brightest, he would not be God. And the glory would not belong to him.

The more you think evangelism is about you, the less you will evangelize. You will always feel inadequate. You will never feel sharp enough. You will always get in the way of God saving and rescuing when you make it about you and your ability.

So I plead with you: Get over yourself. God is awesome. He doesn’t need you to be awesome. He needs you to be obedient.

Good apologetics may remove hurdles. They are helpful. But I have never checkmated a brother in an argument and then had him start weeping, “I’m a sinner. I need a Savior!” God does that. The Spirit of God opens up hearts to belief. Our job is to tell and tell and tell and tell.

You were not saved because you are awesome. You were saved because God is. If you don’t understand this, you will never be bold in evangelism. You will treat rejection as a rejection of you, which you cannot stand, when it’s really a rejection of God. Clearly, there is still too much of you in the exchange. You are like the guy who runs his mouth about how good he is on the basketball court until he gets on the court.

The only One who is amazing in salvation is God. He is unreal. He is unbelievable. He is able—not you. I know you might fantasize about being intellectually clever. But it’s God who saves.

Remember that Death Is Dead

The third thing to remember in order to be unashamed in evangelism is that death is dead, which we find in 2 Timothy 1:10. Don’t be ashamed but share in suffering by the power of God because grace has been shown to us “through the appearing of our Savior Christ Jesus, who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel” (emphasis added).

Do you want to be emboldened in an acidic environment? Remember this: Your persecutors can’t really do anything to you. What are they going to do—laugh at you? Put you in prison? Paul says in Philippians 1:21 that living is Christ and dying is gain. The most free you will ever be is when you get your mind around the fact that dying is gain. What then can they take from you?

The apostle Paul must have been so frustrating for the enemies of Christianity. You couldn’t shut him down. Put him in prison? He converts all your guards and sings hymns while you torture him. Try to kill him? He looks forward to that. Let him live? He just keeps preaching. He knew Christ had overcome death and the grave.

I once heard Ravi Zacharias ask what a person could say to Lazarus to frighten him.

A persecutor: “We will kill you.”

Lazarus: “Been there.”

If Christ has conquered death, what can our persecutors do to us?

Remember Who Guards You—A Big God

I love Paul’s last argument for why we can be unashamed in ministry and suffering: “I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher, which is why I suffer as I do. But I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed, and I am convinced that he is able to guard until that Day what has been entrusted to me” (2 Tim. 1:11–12).

The bigger God gets, the smaller we get and the more confidence we will have in boldly doing what God commands us to do. But the bigger we are, the smaller God is and the less confidence we will have to walk in obedience.

The tendency to think too highly of myself manifests itself too often in evangelism. Why wouldn’t I share the gospel with the guy sitting next to me on the plane? Why don’t I want to go across the street to my neighbor’s house? The answer is, I’m too full of myself. I don’t want to enter into this conversation because I think I might get rejected. There is still too much of me.

What do I do in response? I like to go to Job 38. I go here when I’m sick, feel inadequate, feel scared, or am full of myself.

Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind and said:

“Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge? Dress for action like a man; I will question you, you make it known to me. Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me, if you have understanding. Who determined its measurements—surely you know! Or who stretched the line upon it? On what were its bases sunk, or who laid its cornerstone, when the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy?

“Or who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb, when I made clouds its garment and thick darkness its swaddling band, and prescribed limits for it and set bars and doors, and said, ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stayed’?

“Have you commanded the morning since your days began, and caused the dawn to know its place, that it might take hold of the skirt of the earth, and the wicked be shaken out of it? It is changed like clay under the seal, and its features stand out like a garment. From the wicked their light is withheld, and their uplifted arm is broken.

“Have you entered the springs of the sea, or walked in the recesses of the deep? Have the gates of death been revealed to you, or have you seen the gates of deep darkness? Have you comprehended the expanse of the earth? Declare, if you know all of this.

“Where is the way to the dwelling of the light, and where is the place of darkness, that you may take it to its territory and that you may discern the paths to its home? You know, for you were born then, and the number of your days is great!

“Have you entered the storehouses of the snow, or have you seen the storehouses of hail, which I have reserved for the time of trouble, for the day of battle and war? What is the way to the place where the light is distributed, or where the east wind is scattered upon the earth?

“Who has cleft a channel for the torrents of rain and a way for the thunderbolt, to bring rain on a land where man is, on the desert in which there is no man, to satisfy the waste of desolate land, and to make the ground sprout with grass?

“Has the rain a father, or who has begotten the drops of dew? From whose womb did the ice come forth, and who has given birth to the frost of heaven? The waters become hard like stone, and the face of the deep is frozen.

“Can you bind the chains of the Pleiades or loose the cords of Orion? Can you lead forth the Mazzaroth in their season, or can you guide the Bear with its children? Do you know the ordinances of the heavens? And can you establish their rule on the earth?

“Can you lift up your voice to the clouds, that a flood of waters may cover you? Can you send forth lightnings, that they may go and say to you, ‘Here we are’? Who has put wisdom in the inward parts or given understanding to the mind? Who can number the clouds by wisdom? Or who can tilt the waterskins of heavens, when the dust runs into a mass and the clods stick fast together?

“Can you hunt the prey for the lion, or satisfy the appetite of young lions, when they crouch in their dens or lie in wait in the thicket? Who provides for the raven its prey, when its young ones cry to God for help, and wander about for food?”

We could keep reading. The subsequent chapters continue to declare the bigness of God.

I go here because it reminds me that I cannot do anything. I have no good ideas. The passage is a warm blanket to my soul. It shakes me out of myself and reminds me that God saves. God draws. It’s not my expertise. It’s not my abilities or inabilities that matter. God and God alone saves. I need to remember him whom I have believed in, lest I start believing in me.

Our temptation is to narrow evangelism and conversion to a process. We even train our people in a system. Systems are appropriate and good at times. But no program or training system will ever produce a zeal for evangelism like knowing whom we have believed in.

Hold Fast to These Words

After providing Timothy with these four reasons for why he can be unashamed, Paul tells him to hold onto these instructions: “Follow the pattern of the sound words that you have heard from me, in the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus. By the Holy Spirit who dwells within us, guard the good deposit entrusted to you” (2 Tim. 1:13–14).

Paul has just told Timothy not to sidestep suffering, but to enter into it. Those words make me think of the members of my church in Dallas. I have members who put their jobs on the line by sharing the gospel. Five years ago sharing the gospel meant they might not be invited to the Christmas party, but now they can lose their jobs. And what’s Paul saying? Be willing to suffer and follow this pattern of sound words. Don’t drift from what’s true.

Paul knows there is going to be a strong pull away from sound words. We pastors will probably feel this more and more in the days ahead. We will feel it from our members. We will feel it from the ones who are zealous for evangelism. They will ask questions like, “Is that teaching really necessary? Do we really have to land on this side of that ethical issue? I mean, surely more people will get saved if we don’t. Isn’t that an open-handed issue where good Christians can disagree?”

In a place where the weather has changed, Paul responds to questions like these with, “You have to hold fast to sound doctrine!”

But he also tells us how to hold it: in faith and love. And holding it in faith and love brings us back to the big God. God is able and God has you. After all, in our present day, do we have any reason from history or Scripture to think that God will fail us? Or to think that God can be stopped?

Consider ancient Rome. It covered India to England for something like fifteen hundred years. They would have chuckled at America: “You guys have been around for what, a couple hundred years? You think you’re something?” And there was a season when the Romans tried to destroy us Christians. They sawed us in two, boiled us alive, and threw us in front of lions. There was no Bill of Rights in Rome. Yet I read in one history book that by AD 351 some 50 percent of the Roman Empire called Jesus “Lord.”

So the acidic air might smell new to us, but it does not surprise God. He is not huddled up right now, nervous. He’s not thinking, Oh no! I’m losing North America! What are we going to do?

Hold this sound word. Hold this truth. God will prevail. You know whom you have believed in. God is big, and we are not. He knows what he’s doing. And he has laid it out for us in his Word. We know that eventually he will punch through the darkness, tear open the sky, and return. Until then, we put one foot in front of the next, not avoiding suffering, confident of the gospel message that we preach. We share it with our neighbors, our friends, and our coworkers.

Pastor, Lead Out in Evangelism

If you are a pastor, let me help you with this. Next time you are on a plane, here’s an easy script to follow with the person next to you:

You: “Are you on your way to work or are you on your way home?”

Them: “On my way home.”

You: “So you were here on work?”

Them: “Yeah.”

You: “What do you do?”

Them: “I’m in software sales. . . . What do you do?”

You: “I’m a pastor. So you know we have to have a conversation about Jesus, right? I mean, what kind of pastor would I be if I didn’t talk to you about him?”

You know it’s true. What kind of pastor would you be?

What if he puts on his headphones? Then he puts on his headphones. I’m not telling you to pull them off and say, “We’re doing this!” Don’t get tased by an air marshal. I’m just saying, have the courage to enter into the conversation.

Be a model for your people. It makes no sense to think of yourself as a beast in the pulpit if you are scared to death of your neighbor. And it doesn’t help your church members for you to plead with them to evangelize but refuse to do it yourself.

I sometimes hear pastors say, “My primary means of evangelism is in the pulpit.” Well, that might be true. But I am telling you that God gave you a neighbor. And if you are telling your people to go to their neighbors and their coworkers, you should be doing the same.

Brother pastors, we must lead out on evangelism. We must be faithful.

Conclusion

Right now, they’re out there. Wherever you’re from, in your city or town or neighborhood, blood-bought sons and daughters of God are out there. Jesus did not die for those who might believe. He died for those who will. So go! They will believe. Let’s herald it. Let’s tell them.

How will they believe without a preacher? I know it’s scary. I know we can get rejected. I know there are ever-increasing, serious repercussions. But we must be bold. We won’t regret it. There might be a cost. But ten thousand years from now, nobody will care about those costs. For we know whom we have believed in.