This is part of the Classic Bible: Favorite Stories & Passages series. Read more from the series!
The third letter of John is short and encouraging. While most of John’s writings are encouraging, I find this little letter to be my favorite of his epistles.
John writes this letter to Gaius, encouraging him to stay strong in his faith. He also directly condemns a man named Diotrephes, who seems to be full of himself.
Here are a few of my favorite passages from 3 John.
This is part of the Classic Bible: Favorite Stories & Passages series. Read more from the series!
Some of the easiest parts of the New Testament to read are the writings of John. While in college at Ozark Christian College, I translated his Gospel and his first epistle in Greek class.
His style of writing is easy to read and understand. As a result, I usually encourage new Christians who want to know what parts of the Bible to read to start with John.
In my reading this week, I covered the epistles. Even though these letters are short, 2 and 3 John especially so, there is a lot of great stuff packed into them.
Here are a few of my favorite passages from the second of John’s letters.
I don’t know about you, but I can be pretty timid at times.
I don’t like confrontation, although I can do it when necessary. But sometimes, my natural inclination is to step back and not be directly involved.
Take a look at this week’s passage. It’s 2 Timothy 1:7:
In order to get a better handle on this, I looked up the words timidity and timid in the dictionary. Here’s what I found:
God tells us pretty explicitly that he didn’t give us a spirit of timidity. You’d think that the opposite of that is that he gave us a spirit of boldness.
While that may be true, that isn’t what the text says. Paul writes that God gives us “a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.”
Wait. What?
Timidity is lacking in self-assurance, courage or bravery. But Paul says that the opposite virtues are power, love and self-discipline.
Maybe we need to rethink our definition of timidity. Because I’ve never really associated it in the way Paul does.
So this week, I’ll be looking at my life and see where I need to apply more power, love and self-discipline.
And I might even do it boldly!
What areas of your life need to see this new opposite of timidity? You can leave your thoughts in the comments section below.
Today was my final opportunity to meet with the other youth ministers from the south-central area of Missouri where I’ve been serving for the past few years. It was definitely a sad moment for me.
Today, we celebrated our time of ministry together by eating at a great little Thai restaurant in Mountain Home, Arkansas.
These guys have been a great network of peers during my ministry here. In fact, they’ve been great friends. I’ve enjoyed our time together.
We’ve shared resources with each other. We’ve suggested books to read. We’ve encouraged each other through times of great joy, like when one of the guys lost over 100 pounds, and when another got married last year. And we’ve been there for one another through tough times, like when my dad and step-dad passed away last June.
With these guys, I’ve always known exactly where I stand, and if I needed something, I had but to ask. And many times, they would see my need and stretch to meet it before I could even speak out.
And they are all different, in tremendous ways. I can have great discussions centered around favorite authors, like Timothy Keller or C. S. Lewis, with a couple of these men. And with a couple of others, we could stay up till the wee hours of the morning playing Phase 10 and laughing our heads off.
We’ve planned summer camps, and winter retreats. Some of us floated the Jack’s Fork River for three days, in January. And once, four of us loaded up in my car and drove to Colorado for CIY’s Wilderness, camping out downwind of a cattle slaughter house on the way.
Today is Easter Sunday.
And so, this week’s passage is from Matthew 28:6:
Enough said.
Enjoy celebrating the Resurrection today!
