Good morning my “Walking with Jesus” friends,
Have you ever returned to a place which held powerful, perhaps traumatic memories of events in your past? What about a close call with death memory? Come with me today as we walk with Paul and Silas on Paul’s second missionary journey to the town of Lystra.
As they approached this town, I have no doubt Paul gave Silas the frightening account of what happened the last time Paul was in this town and he was stoned, nearly to death, by angry people! You’ll find that story in Acts 14:8-20. Initially the people of Lystra had responded very well to Paul and Barnabas and their Gospel message, but when Paul had, by the power of Jesus, healed a crippled man, the great celebration which followed turned suddenly to an angry mob who tried to kill Paul!
I wonder if Silas suggested to Paul that perhaps it would be wise to walk around Lystra and go on to the next town, rather than risk trouble in Lystra? But if they had done that, oh my, history would be so different, for while Paul didn’t know it, he was about to meet a young man in Lystra who became one of his disciples and best friends.
The record says: “Paul came to Lystra, where a disciple named Timothy lived, whose mother was Jewish and a believer but whose father was a Greek. The believers at Lystra and Iconium spoke well of Timothy.” (Acts 16:1,2) While I don’t know for sure, I presume Timothy’s mother may have come to faith in Jesus Christ during Paul’s first visit to Lystra a few years before, the very same visit where some tried to stone Paul to death!
We don’t know if Paul had ever met Timothy’s family during that first visit, but clearly this encounter with Timothy and his family was very significant, in fact you could call it a defining moment in Christian history! Why? Because of the next verse which says: “Paul wanted to take Timothy along on the journey, so he circumcised him because of the Jews who lived in that area, for they all knew that his father was a Greek.” (Acts 16:3)
What? Paul circumcised Timothy as a man. Why? Does that seem both confusing and contradictory? Isn’t this the same Paul that was vehement, almost violent in refusing to require Gentiles to be circumcised as they become believers in and followers of Jesus Christ? Isn’t that what the Jerusalem council meeting in Acts 15 was all about? Yes! So why does Paul urge Timothy to be circumcised before joining Paul on his second missionary journey?
Do you notice Timothy was born and raised in a mixed religious family? Timothy evidently had a rich heritage of at least two generations of women of great faith in God, on his mother’s side! (2 Tim. 1:5) Timothy’s mother Eunice was a Jewish woman, both by birth and by religious faith. But Timothy’s father was a Greek and we presume an irreligious pagan.
It appears Timothy’s father had refused to allow his baby boy to be circumcised as a Jewish boy on the 8th day after he was born! That would have been a stigma, a shameful thing for Timothy. Likely the local Rabbi would not have wanted young Timothy in his Synagogue school studying the Torah with the other Jewish boys. There would have been no “Bar Mitzvah” for Timothy in his adolescent years. Timothy would have been viewed as something like a Samaritan young man and thus a ‘misfit’ in the Jewish community. It would have been a shameful thing both for Timothy and his mother Eunice.
Pause here a moment friends to consider how Eunice, Timothy’s mother, handled this problem. Nothing would have been more of a mockery of her Jewish heritage, and Jewish faith in God, than her husband refusing to have their son circumcised!
Yet we see no evidence Eunice divorced or left her husband nor that she was an angry woman living in constant conflict with her husband. To the contrary, when Paul writes his second letter to this Timothy, several years later, Paul writes: “I thank God, whom I serve as my ancestors did, with a clear conscience, as night and day I constantly remember you [Timothy] in my prayers… I am reminded of your sincere faith, which first lived in your grandmother Lois and in your mother Eunice and I am persuaded now lives in you also.” (2 Tim. 1:3,5) What does that tell you about the reputation of Eunice and her great influence in the life of her son Timothy?
This reminds me of what Peter wrote to such marriages: “Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands so that if any of them do not believe the Word [of God] they may be won over without words by the behavior of their wives, when they see the purity and reverence of your lives.” (1 Peter 3:1,2) This is exactly what Eunice evidently did as she lived with her pagan, unbelieving husband who refused Eunice and her son Timothy the privilege of living their Jewish heritage and faith! Ponder that my friends, it’s very powerful and very applicable to so many, many families in our world today, isn’t it?
When Paul began a friendship with Timothy, this problem would have likely been one of the first things they discussed, and I’m sure Paul would have taken Timothy to Joshua 5 to study together what God did with a similar situation in the history of the Jewish people. Perhaps you know the story, my friends. Moses, you’ll recall, had been chosen by God to lead nearly 1 million Hebrew slaves out of Egypt and that famous experience is celebrated each year by Jews worldwide in the Passover. They traveled first to Mount Sinai where they spent several months with Moses passing to them what God taught Moses about what it means to be a people of God. They built the Tabernacle and celebrated their heritage going all the way back to Abraham.
As each new Hebrew baby boy was born, of course, he was given the covenant circumcision mark of Abraham (Gen.17) and the baby would be named on the same 8th day after his birth. But in Joshua 5 we discover a serious problem. That whole generation Moses led out of Egyptian slavery had refused God’s offer to lead them into the promised land (Numbers 13,14) and they’d spent 40 years wandering in the desert until they all died. It was their children whom Joshua led across the Jordan river into the new land. (Joshua 4)
While this new generation was excited to be free of the shame of 40 years of God’s judgment upon their parents, they had no idea what God would require of their generation before entering into and settling this new land of Promise. According to Joshua 5 the first thing God commanded Joshua to tell the younger generation to do, after they crossed the Jordan, was to throw off the shame, the rebellion against God, which was evidenced by the fact that NONE of the generation of young men who had been born in the desert had been circumcised by their parents!
God wanted that problem resolved, the rich heritage covenant relationship restored, before He led them to begin their new life in the land of promise! It was very painful but a profound expression of self-sacrifice and renewal of the covenant with God as all the men submitted themselves to be circumcised as men! (Joshua 5)
As Paul explained that to Timothy, I have no doubt Timothy could see Joshua 5, 1400 years before, was a clear picture of Timothy in 49ad in Lystra, the Roman empire! His father had refused to give his son the mark, and in so doing, Timothy’s father had rejected the rich Jewish heritage of Timothy’s mother’s family. Now, sensing God calling Timothy to join Paul in his travels to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus the Messiah, it was important to Timothy, Timothy’s mother and to Paul that Timothy honor God by doing as those men had done in Joshua 5!
By submitting to circumcision as a man, Timothy was declaring his covenant relationship restored with Almighty God and his identity renewed as a member of God’s chosen people, and he was throwing off the shame of living so many years as an uncircumcised Jewish man!
But perhaps you are confused, my friends? Does this seem contradictory to what Paul so strongly declared and demanded in Acts 15, that circumcision NOT be required of Gentiles or anyone, in order for them to become a Christian and be saved from their sin condemnation?
We’re going to pause right here and tomorrow I’ll give you the answer to that powerful and very important question. For today, do you have any shameful stuff, either inherited or of your own doing, that needs to be thrown off and your relationship restored with God in purity today? Let’s talk to God about that as we listen to this powerful worship song…
Today’s Scripture is Acts 16:1-3.
Choose below to read or listen.
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Bible images provided with attribution to www.LumoProject.com.
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Pastor Doug Anderson 262.441.8785
“Let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us, with our eyes fixed on Jesus…” (Heb. 12:1,2)
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