In a former life, I was an engineer and when I was living and working in that former life, I was busy designing, manufacturing, project managing in a special field called air conditioning. The first secret about air conditioning I’d like to share with you is whether it’s for a hospital, a school, a huge mega shopping centre or a small office space, the essential thing I had to know was how to blow air into that area. It’s not rocket science. All I needed was air as my essential ingredient and if air didn’t blow where I wanted it to, then I wasn’t doing my job properly. My job was to basically make people feel comfortable. It was my job to make sure people were able to work, shop, operate, study, dissect, read, swim, exercise, get their hair done, eat, cook and many other things in a comfortable environment. Which is quite ironic I reckon cause now I’ve moved into a career that now makes people more or less uncomfortable in their lives. Going from the comfortable to the uncomfortable.
The second secret I’ll let you in on is when I walked around an office building, there would always be someone who will complain that their office is either too cold or too hot. It’s a sure fire guarantee when I walk into an office block that there’s always someone who will complain about not being comfortable. So how did I fix this? I would go with them, stand on their chair or desk and take off the grill in the ceiling, I would stick my hand up the grill and fiddle around for a second and say, “Ah, I think I’ve found your problem!” I’d put the grille back, hop back down and say, “How does that feel now?” And they’d say perfect when in actual fact I did nothing but stick my hand up into the grille and give them peace of mind that I actually did something.
I want you to think about how comfortable you are in your life now? Financially, mentally, physically, emotionally. If your electricity got cut off tonite, would you cope? If your car breaks down on your way home, will you cope? If your stove goes on the blink just before dinner time, could you handle the inconvenience? Whatabout if you had no bible to read at all or had no church to go to anymore. How would these things affect you?
It’s not the job of a minister to tell you just what you want to hear. Would you be happier if the pastor or priest stood up in church every week telling you how to live a good life, love Jesus and don’t worry about the problem of sin or judgment. As long as your brain’s telling you your comfortable, you will feel comfortable. It works you know – I’ve done the study. I’ve seen how people’s brains work if they are comforted by the fact that someone’s come along and attended to their problem.
The apostle Paul had no time in his later life to get comfortable. He knew he had to keep on working hard knowing his time will soon be up. He knows people like Timothy can be trusted because of his good Christian heritage. What Paul wants us to do is to pass on the baton. To pass on the gospel message from generation to generation.
We’re told to stand up for the gospel because of who Christ is (vs9) and then Paul goes on to tell us what Christ did by destroying death and bringing life and lite thru the gospel (vs10).
You see, Paul reminds Timothy and us as well that we’re saved not thru anything we’ve done but we’re saved because of God’s own purpose and grace. We’ve been granted access into a heavenly kingdom, which we would never be able to access thru our own doing. It’s all Christ’s doing. Therefore Paul says to Timothy, why would you ever be ashamed or get too comfortable about a message, which has grace as its central message and theme? Why would you ever want to forsake a ticket into heaven with our eternal father for a temporary life of being comfortable? Why would you ever be ashamed of a Saviour who did that for you? Who gave his life as a ransom for your life and died a death we deserved to die. Is this the kind of thing we should be ashamed about? Is this something we should be encouraged to get out of our comfort zone and share with those around us?
“So do not be ashamed to testify about our Lord, or ashamed of me his prisoner. But join with me in suffering for the gospel, by the power of God.”
(1 Timothy 1:8)
If you had the cure for cancer, you’d want to share it with the world wouldn’t you? Yet we have in our grasp the words of eternal life, and all many Christians want to do is keep it to themselves. Now that’s something to be ashamed of don’t you think?