It would be nice to know that no one can find fault with me. God and I certainly know my faults, but I value the good opinion of the people I know. So I need to pay attention to this advice. Paul is telling Timothy how to be blameless in the eyes of others.
It sounds simple. Pursue righteousness – and faith, love, perseverance, and gentleness.
That really is my desire. I want to be righteous. God wants me to be righteous. Thankfully, Paul’s advice includes a way to actually pursue it.
First, I need to hold tightly to the life that God gave me through Jesus. In other words, I need to live in the Kingdom of God. When God gave me eternal life, He brought me into His Kingdom where Jesus rules. This is the truth I live by.
As a citizen of God’s Kingdom, I live to please God who is the source of my being - the creator of the universe. This means trying to be righteous – trying not to sin. Well, that’s not easy. No matter how hard I try, I end up sinning. Thank God for His grace.
But I need to keep trying. I need to pursue righteousness without wavering. It’s kind of like dieting. I don’t lose weight easily, but I have to keep trying because when I give up, I gain weight for sure. It’s scary to think about how badly I might sin if I don’t keep trying to be godly.
Kingdom citizens consciously fight to live a godly life and hold tight to the eternal life God has given us.
Paul also told Timothy to pursue faith, love, perseverance, and gentleness. Perseverance is being unwavering and gentleness is not being harsh. So, the way I see this, if I try to live a godly life, people will see how much I believe in Jesus and how much I love Him and them. They will see these as the foundational principles of my life because I don’t waver. It will be attractive to them because I’ll be gentle, not judgmental, in how I present it to them.
And then, because of what God does in me, no one will find fault with me.
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