CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES
1 Timothy 1:12. He counted me faithful.—For the very reason that he had been “a blasphemer and a persecutor and injurious,” the Jerusalem Christians looked askance at him when he was introduced as a brother; Ananias at Damascus thought his penitence a ruse, and Paul himself does not complain of the mistrust (Acts 22:19); but the grace of God that treats him as trustworthy fills him with thankfulness.
1 Timothy 1:13. A blasphemer.—In the general acceptation of the word. He was one who would say vehemently, “Jesus anathema!” (1 Corinthians 12:3). To revile the name of Christ—as the martyrs were asked to do—was to blaspheme. A persecutor.—Lit. one who pursues another. And injurious.—One who does not content himself with an anathema, but proceeds to personal violence. I did it ignorantly in unbelief.—The Saviour had intimated that blind rage would confuse the murder of men whose only crime was belief in Christ with a sacrifice to God. Our Lord does not regard ignorance as sufficient excuse, but asks that the ignorant be forgiven (Luke 23:34). So St. Paul says he obtained mercy—was dealt with leniently.
1 Timothy 1:14. And the grace … and love.—The full sense is: “[And not only was I pardoned,] but the grace of our Lord so superabounded [beyond my deserts] that I was also brought to believe in and love Jesus Christ whom I had blasphemed” (Blomfield).
1 Timothy 1:15. This is a faithful saying.—R.V. “Faithful is the word.” This expression, with variations, occurs five times in the Pastoral epistles, and probably was used in a liturgical manner. Compare 1 Kings 10:6; Revelation 21:5; Revelation 22:6. Of all acceptation.—An excellent translation (Ellicott). Came into the world to save sinners.—Not to be limited to the sense—His mission in life was to rescue sinners. Many scriptures remind us that the purpose was not formed when Christ found Himself surrounded by sinners, but before. Of whom I am chief.—To explain away the force of this expression is seriously to miss the strong current of feeling with which even in terms of seeming hyperbole the apostle ever alludes to his conversion and his state preceding it (Ellicott).
1 Timothy 1:16. Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy.—The “howbeit” is the same word as “but” in 1 Timothy 1:13, which the R.V. gives as here. It marks the contrast between the apostle’s own judgment on himself and the mercy which God was pleased to show him.
1 Timothy 1:17. Immortal.—R.V. “incorruptible”: an epithet only found in union with God in Romans 1:23, besides this place. The only wise God.—R.V. drops “wise,” on the overwhelming authority of the MSS.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— 1 Timothy 1:12-17
The Distinguished Honour of the Service of God—
I. Supplies a ground for devout thankfulness.—“I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that He counted me faithful, putting me into the ministry” (1 Timothy 1:12). So far from boasting of the honour conferred upon him in being a minister of the gospel, the apostle attributes it all to the goodness of God, and is full of devout gratitude. He would have been in the same position as the false teachers he exposes but for the grace of God. His fidelity in his apostleship he does not regard as of himself, but as the result of the imparted strength of God: if he was faithful in his stewardship, it was God who made him so, and for this he gives thanks.
1. Remembering the mercy shown to the most notorious of sinners. “Who was before a blasphemer, a persecutor, and injurious: but I obtained mercy” (1 Timothy 1:13). Paul not only himself blasphemed the sacred name of Jesus, but persecuted others, compelling them to do the same, and took a wanton and insolent delight in violence and in outraging the feelings of others. He does not refer to his past sins by way of boast—this is the most besotted form of self-glorying; nor to excuse himself for his ignorance and unbelief; but to exalt the mercy of God, which, notwithstanding his outrageous wickedness, found him out and pardoned him. “In John Bunyan,” writes Guthrie, “God calls the bold leader of village reprobates to preach the gospel—a blaspheming tinker to be one of England’s famous confessors. From the deck of a slave ship he summons John Newton to the pulpit, and by hands defiled with mammon’s foulest and most nefarious traffic brings them that were bound out of darkness, and smites adamantine fetters from the slaves of sin. In Paul, the apostle of the Gentiles, He converts Christ’s bitterest enemy into His warmest friend: to the man whom a trembling Church held most in dread she comes to owe, under God, the weightiest obligations. How much better for these three stars to be shining in heaven than quenched in the blackness of darkness—better for the good of mankind, better for the glory of God!”
2. Recognising the abundant outflow of Divine grace. “And the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus” (1 Timothy 1:14). The grace of God was so abundant that the remembrance of his past sins was effaced and their guilt forgiven: the unbelief which had blinded his mind was replaced with the bright vision of faith in Christ Jesus, and the hatred which prompted his cruelty towards the Church, with love. “Grace will not be confined, for God’s goodness cannot be exhausted. He is rich enough for all. God’s mercy is both free and rich, both bountiful and plentiful, bursting forth round about, round about all ages, round about all nations, round about all sorts, surrounding all those rounds, and with surplus and advantage overflowing all. Not only an abounding grace, abounding unto all, to the whole world, but a grace superabounding, that, if there were more worlds, grace would bring salvation unto them all” (R. Clerke).
3. Declaring the universal blessedness of Christ’s advent. “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners” (1 Timothy 1:15). The advent of Christ into the world means blessing to all in it; and the purpose of His advent to save sinners is so well authenticated by experience as to merit the unreserved acceptance of all. It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of either the advent or its purpose. “It is not without good reason,” says Bengel, “that the name Christ is sometimes put before Jesus. From the Old Testament point of view progress is made from the knowledge of Christ to the knowledge of Jesus: from the New Testament point of view the progress is from the knowledge of Jesus to the knowledge of Christ.” As the condemned man believes first the king’s favour to all humble suppliants before he believes it to himself, so the order is, not to look to God’s intention in a personal way, but to His complacency and tenderness to all repentant sinners. This was St. Paul’s method, embracing by all means that great and faithful saying “Jesus came to save sinners” before he ranked himself in front of those sinners.
II. Bestowed upon a notorious sinner as typical of the compassion extended to all.—“Of whom I am chief. Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy … for a pattern to them who should hereafter believe on Him to life everlasting” (1 Timothy 1:16). If Paul, the chief of sinners, obtained mercy, so may all others—from the same source and on the same terms. The worst need not despair: the most abandoned may be recovered. “You have heard of stereotype-printing. When the types are set up, they are cast, made a fixed thing, so that from one plate you can strike off hundreds of thousands of pages in succession, without the trouble of setting up the types again. Paul says, ‘That I may be a plate never worn out, never destroyed, from which proof-impressions may be taken to the very end of time.’ What a splendid thought that the apostle Paul, having portrayed himself as the chief of sinners, then portrays himself as having received forgiveness for a grand and specific end—that he might be a standing-plate from which impressions might be taken for ever, that no man might despair who had read his biography!” (Dr. Cumming).
III. Calls forth a fervent ascription of praise and adoration to the bountiful Giver of all good.—“Now unto the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only wise God, be honour and glory for ever and ever. Amen” (1 Timothy 1:17). A vehement exclamation of gratitude, of lofty admiration, of adoring awe. God is the King of all the ages, and in the process of time the typical significance of the conversion of a man like Paul can be fully realised. How different his conceptions of the duration of God from the fanciful and misleading æons of the Gnostic heresy, and of the character of God, who alone has immortality in and of Himself, underived from any, and in His very nature is invisible, in opposition to the intermediate deities of the Gnostic dreamer! The Divine wisdom renders foolish and condemns as vanity all the wisdom of men. The thought of eternity, terrible as it is to unbelievers, is delightful to those assured of grace. Calvin well says: “God alone is worthy of all glory; for while He scatters on His creatures in every direction the sparks of His glory, still all glory belongs truly and perfectly to Him alone. There is no glory but that which belongs to God.”
Lessons.—
1. It is an unspeakable honour to be a servant of God.
2. It is impossible to estimate the results of the conversion of one sinner.
3. Praise should be offered to God continually.
GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES
1 Timothy 1:12-14. Ministerial Responsibility—
I. Should be thankfully acknowledged as a proof of the Divine favour (1 Timothy 1:12).
II. Should be contrasted with a former life of disobedience and unbelief (1 Timothy 1:13).
III. Should be used to magnify the abundant grace of God (1 Timothy 1:14).
1 Timothy 1:15. The Grand Purpose of the Redeemer’s Advent.
I. A most stupendous fact.—“Christ Jesus came into the world.”
II. A most gracious design.—“To save sinners.”
III. A most appropriate estimation.—“A faithful saying … worthy of all acceptation.”—W. T.
The Essential Truth.
I. The saying.—Christ came not to teach, not as an example merely, but to die.
II. What is said of it.—
1. A faithful saying.
2. Worthy of all acceptation—Homiletic Monthly.
The Chief of Sinners.—“Of whom I am chief.” Every true Christian should feel that he is the chief of sinners—
I. Because he knows himself better than he knows any other man.
II. Because he judges himself by a different standard than other men.
III. Because conscience is more enlightened and more tender.
IV. Because he labours more earnestly to subdue his native depravity.
V. Because he lives in closer fellow-with God.—G. Brooks.
1 Timothy 1:16. St. Paul a Pattern of the Long-suffering of God.
I. The mercy Paul obtained.
II. The cause for which he obtained it.—E. Cooper.