Good thoughts on Fresh Dirt.

I have two posts that I’m working on right now, but things are pretty hectic for me in life and ministry at the moment so you’ll have to settle for this awesome blog by my friend Justin.

2 Timothy 2:25: The Call to be Gentle and Bold

Time and time again in scripture I find things that pull on both ends of a spectrum.  God’s word seems to be filled with concepts and characteristics that pull in opposing directions.  For example: Grace and truth; mercy and wrath; victory and humility; prosperity and poverty; gentleness and boldness;royalty and servitude.  I consider these points and others to be invitations toward harmonic tension in the Christian life.  We who believe get to experience both extremes in our faith by allowing God to tune us to resonance with His heart and will.  Although the nature of harmonic tension is a constant tightening and loosening to find the right tone, there are times when I am so off key, so far pulled to one side or the other, that I become disquieted within myself as I read scripture. The encouragements to be bold and gentle is one of those hard to tune strings within me.  It seems like I am either sharp (overly bold) or flat (overly gentle) but never quite hitting the right note which I believe to be “not quarrelsome” but “correcting with gentleness” (2 Tim. 2:25).

It is the phrase “correcting with gentleness” that brings out the false note in me.  The implications of boldness in the first word of that phrase hit me pretty hard.  You only correct when someone is wrong (shocker, I know).  So even if tamed with gentleness, at it’s core any correction is based on the assumption that there is a right way and the person being corrected is not following it.  That is a bold thing to say.  So in that short phrase I am forced to wrestle with the idea that there is a standard, and absolute that people need correction to realize, and that in bringing that correction to them I must do so in gentleness.  I fear that too often I refuse to correct towards right relationship with God because that in its very nature is saying that relationship with God is not right.  It is a weighty judgment, and even with the error revealed in scripture I tremble at being the one who lays those scriptures before a stumbling brother or sister.  So here’s my sticking point – is it still gentleness if the person corrected doesn’t receive it in that way?  If I, striving for humility, call someone forward in godliness and they receive those words as judgment and take offense have I appropriately answered to the calling in 2 Timothy 2:25?  What if, in desiring to show love, I hold my tongue even though a truth is burning in my heart?  I try to trust that I am being faithful in the times of boldness and silence but it doesn’t stop me from questioning myself.  I want harmonic tension in this area of my life, so I continue to allow God to tune me – and I am extremely grateful that in His grace He can still use me as an instrument for His glory.