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Scripture Reading: 1 Tim. 1:3-4; 3:15-16; 4:7-8; 6:11; 5, 2 Tim. 3:12; 4:22; 2:22
I. God’s economy — 1 Tim. 1:3-4.
II. The mystery of godliness — 3:15-16:
А. God manifested in the flesh.
B. The church of the living God.
III. Exercising ourselves unto godliness — 4:7-8:
А. Bodily exercise profiting for a little.
B. Godliness being profitable for all things:
1. Of the present life.
2. Of the coming life.
IV. Pursuing godliness to be a man of God — 6:11.
V. Living godly in Christ — 2 Tim. 3:12.
VI. Having the power of godliness — v. 5.
VII. The Lord being with our spirit — 4:22:
А. Contacting the Lord by exercising our spirit.
B. Thus receiving grace.
VIII. Calling on the Lord — 2:22:
А. Out of a pure heart.
B. With the Lord’s callers.
In this lesson we want to see the exercise of our spirit for godliness. All the verses in the Scripture Reading are from 1 and 2 Timothy. Strictly speaking, the word exercise, in the sense of the exercise of our spirit for godliness, is used in the New Testament only in 1 Timothy. First Timothy 4:7-8 says, “The profane and old-womanish myths refuse, and exercise yourself unto godliness. For bodily exercise is profitable for a little, but godliness is profitable for all things, having promise of the present life and of that which is to come.” The exercise unto godliness is profitable for all the things of this present life and the coming life.
In the New Testament there are a number of seeming contradictions. Actually, of course, they are not contradictions. On the one hand, the New Testament reveals that we should not have our own works. We should not do things in ourselves either to participate in God’s blessing or to accomplish something for God’s purpose. But on the other hand, the New Testament uses a strong word such as exercise. In Colossians Paul says that he labored, toiled, fought, and struggled in an agonizing way (1:29; 2:1). These words are stronger words showing something that is very difficult to do. We all need to see these two aspects. Our not doing anything means that we should not do anything by our flesh, by ourselves, or by our natural life. But on the positive side we have to labor, to travail, and to struggle in our spirit. Actually, the exercise of our spirit comprises and implies all these words: labor, toil, struggle, wrestle, and fight.
Today whatever we do positively in our spirit is a kind of exercise. The word in Greek for exercise is the basis of the English word gymnastics. To participate in gymnastics, one must use all his energy to exercise his whole physical being. We must exercise our spirit in the same way. The whole environment around us does not help us to exercise. It has an intention to keep us down. The whole situation does not help us to go on to labor. It helps us to be lazy; it helps us to be backsliding. It is a downhill current. The downhill current helps us go down. Actually, the current carries you. But if you go uphill, you have to exercise, and you have to struggle.
In this lesson we have extracted the life essence from 1 and 2 Timothy. These two books actually deal with godliness as the issue of the divine dispensing for the divine economy. In this lesson I did my best to pick up all the necessary verses to show us the life of godliness.
First Timothy 1:3 and 4 say, “Even as I exhorted you, when I was going into Macedonia, to remain in Ephesus in order that you might charge certain ones not to teach different things nor to give heed to myths and unending genealogies, which produce questionings rather than God’s economy, which is in faith.” These two verses indicate that 1 Timothy is dealing with God’s economy. At Paul’s time some were teaching different things other than God’s economy. Paul told us that we have to put all these different teachings aside and come back to the economy of God. God’s economy is His household administration, His plan, to dispense Himself into us. His dispensing produces a life of godliness. Actually, godliness is the issue of the divine dispensing.
Such a godly life issuing from God’s dispensing depends upon the exercise of our spirit. The whole book of 1 Timothy shows us this. A godly life comes out of God’s dispensing, but God is not dispensing Himself into lifeless vessels. In England they call a drugstore a dispensary. In the dispensary, drugs are dispensed into lifeless bottles, and because they are lifeless, their cooperation is not required. God, however, is dispensing Himself into us, the living vessels, who already have our own taste, choice, preference, feeling, thinking, mentality, will, etc. If we do not exercise our spirit strongly to cooperate with the Lord, God cannot dispense Himself into us. Our spirit is not only the receiving organ, the retaining organ, but also the opening for God’s dispensing. When our spirit opens wide, our whole being opens. Then God has a way to impart Himself into us. God’s dispensing depends upon our coordination, and our coordination is the exercise of our spirit.
This is why we have to pray. Just as walking exercises our feet and legs, only prayer exercises our spirit. When we pray, we should not be concerned so much for material things and for our personal affairs as the goal. We should pray in the spirit in order to touch God, to contact God, and to worship God. This kind of prayer exercises our spirit and opens our spirit, and in our spirit we meet God. Then the divine dispensing immediately flows into our spirit. Today our Christian life is a life of godliness, which comes out of God’s dispensing of Himself into us. This depends upon our spirit being fully exercised.
The mystery of godliness is God manifested in the flesh (3:15-16). Today we are the flesh in which God can be manifested. God is manifested in the flesh, but you have to realize that God can never be manifested by the flesh. The flesh is just the earthen vessel. It is not the key to carry out God’s manifestation. The key of God’s manifestation in us is our spirit.
The church of the living God is the ultimate mystery of godliness because the proper church life is the corporate manifestation of God in the flesh. In order to usher all the saints into the proper exercise of our spirit, we have to point out all these basic points. We have to develop these points and impress the saints with them.
First Timothy charges us to exercise ourselves unto godliness (4:7-8). Godliness is a Christian life, a godly life, that expresses God as the issue of God’s dispensing, and this is a mystery. This godly life needs our exercise.
Paul says that bodily exercise is profitable for a little. Bodily exercise profits for a few things and only for a small part of our being. Furthermore, this implies that it profits temporarily, for a little while. The word bodily indicates that the exercise unto godliness must be the exercise of our spirit. Paul points out that the exercise to which he is referring is not the exercise of the body. Surely he would not exhort us to exercise our soul. The exercise to which he is referring must be the exercise of our spirit. Even he says that you need to exercise yourself. “Yourself” is not the self in the body or in the soul; it must be the being in your spirit.
Paul says that “godliness is profitable for all things” (v. 8). Godliness here is actually the exercise of our spirit. This is not an apparent revelation but an implied revelation. Paul says that bodily exercise profits for a little, but godliness profits for all things. This godliness must be the exercise of our spirit, which, in contrast to bodily exercise, is profitable for all things. For all things refers to things that are not only of one part of our being but of all parts — physical, psychological, and spiritual, both temporal and eternal.
The promise of the present life, a life that is in this age, is like the promises in Matthew 6:33, John 16:33, Philippians 4:6-7, and 1 Peter 5:8-10. The present life in 1 Timothy 4:8 does not mean our physical life, because the word here is zoe, referring to the divine, uncreated life of God. We have zoe in this present age. The exercise of our spirit, which carries out godliness, is profitable for all things, carrying with it the promise of the present divine life, which we have received and which we are enjoying.
The promise of the coming life, a life that is in the next age and in eternity, is like the promises in 2 Peter 1:10-11; 2 Timothy 2:12; Revelation 2:7, 17; 21:6-7, etc. Godliness is profitable for all things of the present life and also of the coming life, referring to our spiritual life, not our physical life or soulish life.
Paul told Timothy, “You, O man of God, flee these things, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, meekness” (1 Tim. 6:11). Among these many items that Timothy was to pursue, the central item is godliness. We need to pursue godliness to be a man of God. Actually, godliness is just “God-likeness.” To be godly means to be like God, to express God. In other words, godliness is to live God out. Someone who lives God out is a man of God. Because he lives God out, he is like God. He bears God’s likeness, so he is a man of God. A man of God has to pursue, to seek after, God-likeness.
Second Timothy 3:12 speaks of those who “desire to live godly in Christ Jesus.” To live godly means that our life must be a godly life. Godliness must be our living, and this again depends upon the exercise of our spirit.
Second Timothy 3:5 speaks of the power of godliness. Paul says that in the degradation of the church, some only have the outward form of godliness, but they do not have the power. The power must be by the exercise of our spirit. Some religious people may have ordinances about how to dress in an outward form of godliness, but there is no inward power with them. We have to exercise our spirit in all the things in our daily life so that we have the power of godliness. When we exercise our spirit, what we do is not a mere outward performance or form but a display of the genuine godliness with the inward power. This power, which comes from the inner exercise of our spirit, is the real and practical virtue with a living influence to express God.
At the end of 2 Timothy, Paul says, “The Lord be with your spirit” (4:22). The conclusion of this book emphasizes the Lord’s being with our spirit.
The Lord is with our spirit, but we have to respond, to cooperate, by exercising our spirit. The air is with us, but we have to breathe in the air to enjoy it. The air can be enjoyed by us continuously because we have a breathing organ to get the benefit of the air. In the same way, the Lord, the Spirit, is with us, but we need to exercise our spirit, our breathing organ, to breathe in the Lord as our spiritual air (John 20:22). If our spirit is not exercised, we cannot receive His benefit. The Lord being with our spirit surely implies the exercise of our spirit.
In 2 Timothy 4:22 there are two sentences. First, Paul says, “The Lord be with your spirit.” Then he says, “Grace be with you.” If we exercise our spirit to contact the Lord, to breathe Him in, we receive grace to stand against the downward current of the church’s decline and carry out God’s economy. Grace is the Lord received, enjoyed, and experienced by us. Second Timothy 4:22 speaks of a subjective matter, not of an objective benediction. The Lord’s being with our spirit is something for us to experience by the exercise of our spirit.
In 2 Timothy 2:22 Paul charged Timothy to flee youthful lusts and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart. This indicates that the Lord’s seekers must be His callers.
We call on the name of the Lord by our spirit, yet it must be out of a pure heart. Our heart must be pure. A pure heart is a heart with a pure motive, a pure intention, a pure purpose, a pure will, a pure decision, a pure sensation, a pure feeling, and a pure thought. If these things are not pure, our heart is not pure. Thus, we cannot call on the Lord out of a pure heart. A pure heart is a heart seeking only God. The only goal of a pure heart is God Himself (Matt. 5:8). If we seek after anything other than God, our motive is not pure, and thus our heart is not pure. We must call on the Lord with an exercised spirit out of a pure heart. Our heart must be purified, and the heart includes all these things: motive, intention, purpose, will, decision, sensation, feeling, and thought. The heart must be pure in all its constituents. Then we can call on the Lord purely.
Second Timothy 2:22 implies that we need to call on the Lord with the Lord’s callers. Sometimes we call on the Lord just by ourselves. This exercises our spirit, and we receive more of the Lord but not as much as when we call with some others. To have a corporate calling on the Lord helps a lot. In order to exercise our spirit, we have to recover the practice of calling on the name of the Lord. We need to exercise our spirit so that we may receive the Lord more. Then we can live a godly life to manifest God.
