⁶ But (a widow) who indulges herself in luxury is dead, even while she lives. ⁷Give these instructions as well, so that they may be above reproach. ⁸ But if anyone does not provide for his own, and especially for those of his household, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever (1Tim5:6-8)

⁶ Godliness actually is a means of great gain when accompanied by contentment. ⁷ For we have brought nothing into the world, so we cannot take anything out of it, either. ⁸ If we have food and ^[g]covering, with these we should be content. ⁹ But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap, and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge people into ruin and destruction. ¹⁰ For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs (1Tim6:6-10)

Context

1 Timothy 5 concerns respectful interactions within the church, especially regarding elders and  widows. The final chapter (6) provides instruction and advice to leaders such as Timothy as to how they should minister to their flock.

Unlike Paul’s comment in the previous chapter/post concerning God being the Saviour of all humanity, there is nothing in these final two chapters of the apostle’s first letter to Timothy that directly impacts upon the broader benign providence I am explicating. Having said that I have quoted a couple of short passages from each chapter which do have a bearing on the subject. That is because they indicate the nature of true saving faith as opposed to  what many (including myself in the past) understand by “getting saved”. The all-of-grace, faith-alone, once-saved-always-saved portrayal is  challenged by so much that Paul has written – the above two excerpts from these two chapters are just examples.

God is good

And this is wonderful news for humanity – Evangelicals (in particular) have it wrong. Luther and Calvin were wrong: God is good, even from a human perspective. He is fair to all; we are to be judged by what we do and in light of what we know, not by whether or not we have confidence that Christ died FOR ME, or are “resting in the Saviour’s merits” or “looking to the finished work of Christ and appropriating it to myself” or suchlike. Likewise, Augustine’s assertion that the vast swathe of humanity is to be damned is a travesty. As his Church now acknowledge, all people of good will may “go to heaven when they die”, regardless of their religion. But only those God calls into the true Church  shall receive the divine teaching and sacramental provision such that if they are faithful to the Way they shall be fitted to rule and reign with Christ as His corporate Spouse. The truly evil  will not be pardoned  but shall be punished in  Hell, fairly and proportionately. Of these, the totally unsalvable who have lost any semblance to the divine image (i.e. they’re no longer truly human, so unsaltable) shall be punished and then eradicated. And so, as per the previous post re 1Tim4, God is indeed the Saviour of all true humanity, but especially to those who believe.

Not faith alone

But as just indicated, gospel salvation does not pertain to faith alone. Paul warns in chapter five that the rich widow who lives merely to indulge herself in luxury “is dead whilst she lives” (5:6). That is regardless of whether she believes Christ has died for her sins, or else Paul would be misrepresenting the truth. The man who neglects his own household (still more the needs of others), can “believe” what he likes, but he has denied the Faith (5:8). It is crucial to recognize (many commentaries do not) that Paul is not saying these people are merely ungrateful or set bad examples, they are “dead” and rejectors of the Faith. That indicates that “the Faith” cannot consist merely of believing, but of acting and living out one’s life as a saint (i.e. one set apart to be holy).

Whilst Luther acknowledged that it was appropriate, respectful and an act of gratitude for a Christian to be holy and do good works, he believed these did not in any sense contribute to their salvation. On the contrary, said he,  “if men only believe enough in Christ they can commit adultery and murder a thousand times a day without periling their salvation”. Ok, this was intentional hyperbole, but the point is it totally misrepresents Paul’s writing and turns Christ’s teaching on its head. “The Faith” is not about believing alone, but doing and being, such that men and women who entirely fail to live in accordance with Christ’s teaching have departed from the Faith. Luther’s serial killing adulterer had seemingly not departed as long as he “believed strongly enough in Christ” or was convinced Christ had died for His sins. This, as I have been showing, is a travesty.

Good News for the poor

Moving on to the quote from chapter 6, any version of Christianity that infers that financial prosperity is systemic to Christian discipleship is at best suspect, at worst apostate. Godliness with contentment is the attitude of the true Faith (6:6). If Christians who are rich use their resources well, that is a good thing, but the idea of becoming a disciple of Christ to attain prosperity diametrically opposes Christ’s own teaching – the desire for material wealth in this life being a form of idolatry (Col3:5).

Worthy of praise

I write these things, not deliberately to disturb or annoy people of my former ilk, but because the all-of-grace theology I grew up with results in eschatological outcomes that debauch God’s munificent providence in terms of His dealings and designs for those He has created in His own image. My apologies to any I have offended, but the Psalmist was right: the God of the bible is intelligibly good and worthy of everybody’s praise: “O praise the Lord, all you nations: praise Him, all you people” (Ps117:1).

The LITTLE BOOK OF PROVIDENCE: a seven-part synopsis of the bible: – available as a paperback from Amazon or FREELY as a PDF file https://richard-777.blog/free-download-of-pdf/

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