Be bold - Devotion for 10/28/08

Be bold – Devotion for 10/28/08

If you are the fan of any sports team, you have no problem letting that be known. Even if you are in the midst of fans of different teams, once again, you still don’t have a difficult time showing your support. About the only time that we become a little quiet about the teams that we root for is when our team is doing horribly. Well, there may be another time – such as when we actually at an away game for our team, and we are completely surrounded by the threatening home fans. In that type of situation it may be best for our own personal safety to be a bit quiet. It is in such a context that Paul wrote to Timothy, “For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline.”(2 Timothy 1:7)

The author of 2 Timothy is imprisoned and it is not a good time to be a follower of the Way. Greatly outnumbered by every other religion of the day, followers of Christ were being persecuted and imprisoned, much in the way that Paul had done earlier in his life. And now the author is writing a letter of encouragement to Timothy, and instead of telling Timothy “lay low and keep quiet,” he instead tells him to be bold, and as he continues in verse 8, to “not be afraid of the testimony of our Lord.”

We all have moments when it would be much easier for us to just “lay low and keep quiet” about our faith. We all have those moments where we are almost “afraid of the testimony of our Lord.” I honestly don’t think I need to spell those out, because I truly believe you can easily think of one or two of those moments right now. I do believe that today we have an opportunity to be bold with our faith, and that when those moments arise that instead of being timid, fearful, or quiet, we will instead be bold.