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9.2 Timothy -- Pastoral Principles

Paul covers several topics in the letters to Timothy:

           a. warning about false teachers and falling away
           b. church order (women, bishops, deacons, widows)
           c. Timothy's personal conduct
           d. warning about the end-times
           e. twice, he refers to a unique calling on Timothy's life (1 Tim 1:18,  2 Tim 1:6)
           f. his over-riding concern for unity and peace in the life of the local church:

           I want men everywhere to lift up holy hands in prayer, without anger or disputing (1 Tim 2:8).

             See also 1 Tim 2:2.


           g. warning against legalists (1 Tim 4:1-5)
 

There were at least two varieties of legalism that might have been present in Ephesus:  the Judaizers, and the proto-Gnostics.  Paul's antidote to their teaching is concise and as applicable today as in 65 AD:

 

           For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer (1 Tim 4:4-5).

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