A Letter for Those Who Were Timothys, For Those Who Remain, and For Those Who Are Rising
There are seasons in the life of the Church when God calls His people to remember where they came from and to consider where they are going. The generations shift. New voices rise. Older ones steady the foundation. And yet the Spirit of God, working through Scripture, continues the work He began long before any of us arrived.
This letter is written for those who were shaped in the Word, for those who have carried it faithfully, and for those who are just beginning to discover their place in it.
A Heritage of Faith
Paul wrote to Timothy:
“Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ by the commandment of God our Saviour, and Lord Jesus Christ, which is our hope;
Unto Timothy, my own son in the faith: Grace, mercy, and peace, from God our Father and Jesus Christ our Lord.”
1 Timothy 1:1–2
Timothy was not Paul’s student alone. He was a son in the faith, part of a lineage that stretched through his grandmother Lois and his mother Eunice. Paul recognized the thread that ran through their lives, knitting together the generations.
“When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee,
which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice;
and I am persuaded that in thee also.”
2 Timothy 1:5
Faith rarely begins with us. It reaches us.
1977: The Beginning of Our Family’s Story
My own story begins in 1977. At that time, a year-long Christian outreach program sent small teams of young volunteers across the country. They lived in local communities, served where they were needed, taught the Scriptures, and held simple home-based Bible fellowship meetings.
One of those teams came to Quincy, Illinois.
One afternoon, while they were getting their utilities arranged, one of the volunteers, a former football player named Russ Pollard, stepped into the sheriff’s department. My father worked there as the jailer. He immediately noticed Russ, and, being the competitive and good-natured giant he was, he approached him and asked if he’d join his Knights of Columbus tug-of-war team.
Russ smiled and replied with a gentle challenge of his own: “I’ll join your team if you’ll take our foundational Bible course.”
It was the sort of offer that only my father would accept. They shook on it. The rope pull came. They won. And my dad, true to his word, attended the class.
He was the only student in the room, but those young volunteers taught him with sincerity and care. They prayed with him. And in that small, quiet moment, God healed his back completely. The change was immediate and undeniable. That single moment opened his heart to the Scriptures, set my mother on a parallel path, and altered the direction of our family for generations to come.
I grew up in that environment. Not surrounded by slogans or branding, but by Scripture, fellowship, and a genuine hunger for understanding how the world of the Bible intersected with the world we live in now.
A Timothy Moment of My Own
My journey continued into 1988, at a large Christian summer gathering that drew thousands of believers. It was part campmeeting, part youth conference, part worship festival. I found myself helping run one of the largest youth fellowships held that year.
I didn’t know it then, but I was surrounded by young believers who would later choose very different paths. Some remained inside the ministry structure we all knew at the time. Others, including myself, eventually found ourselves outside of it. But in that moment, we were united. We were young. We were serving with full hearts. We were discovering who we were in Christ, even if we could not yet see the fractures that were coming.
Those days left an imprint on me. The friendships. The unity. The fire. It was one of the last great gatherings before an era of division, and I still carry the memory of that unity with deep affection.
Honoring the Generation Who Built Before Us
Many who served in earlier decades carried enormous responsibility. They taught, they traveled, they ministered in living rooms, they supported families while serving the Church, and they did it all with a faith that often grew in the shadows, unnoticed by most.
Scripture speaks to their work:
“And let us not be weary in well doing:
for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.”
Galatians 6:9
And again:
“Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmoveable,
always abounding in the work of the Lord,
forasmuch as ye know that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.”
1 Corinthians 15:58
Much of what we now enjoy began with them. Their steadiness is still needed. Their wisdom still matters. The younger generation needs their voice, even if the world has changed around us.
A Word to the Rising Timothys
To the younger generation who is discovering the Scriptures for the first time, or returning to them with renewed curiosity, Paul’s words still carry weight:
“Let no man despise thy youth; but be thou an example of the believers,
in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity.”
1 Timothy 4:12
Your youth is an asset, not a liability. Your example becomes a doorway for others.
Paul continues:
“Till I come, give attendance to reading, to exhortation, to doctrine.
Neglect not the gift that is in thee…
Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them;
that thy profiting may appear to all.”
1 Timothy 4:13–15
Spiritual growth is intentional. It unfolds through Scripture, through fellowship, and through the quiet work God performs in the heart.
And he adds:
“For God hath not given us the spirit of fear;
but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.”
2 Timothy 1:7
These are the qualities that shape the next generation of leaders.
The True Source of Our Calling
Paul described the heart of the Christian life in terms simple enough to grasp and profound enough to spend a lifetime exploring:
“Even the mystery which hath been hid from ages and from generations,
but now is made manifest to his saints…
which is Christ in you, the hope of glory.”
Colossians 1:26–27
This is the center of our identity. Christ lives within us, strengthens us, teaches us, and empowers what we do in His name.
Paul wrote:
“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly…”
Colossians 3:16
And again:
“For the love of Christ constraineth us…”
2 Corinthians 5:14
The work we do in service is possible because of what He is doing within.
Holding to the First-Century Pattern
The early Church set a pattern that remains both timeless and instructive:
“And they continued stedfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship,
and in breaking of bread, and in prayers…
And all that believed were together…
And the Lord added to the church daily…”
Acts 2:42–47
This picture of shared life, spiritual simplicity, and unity rooted in Scripture is still one worth recovering. It shows what happens when Christ is truly the center and when love for God and for one another shapes the life of a community.
But Christ also offered a sober reminder to another congregation:
“Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee,
because thou hast left thy first love.
Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen,
and repent, and do the first works.”
Revelation 2:4–5
The drift from first love is seldom dramatic. It often happens quietly, as structure replaces relationship or as activity replaces devotion. Yet Christ’s call to return is always merciful. He invites us back to the love that animated those first works, the covenant love at the heart of the New Covenant itself.
First Works
The “first works” Christ speaks of in Revelation 2 are not ministries, positions, or programs. They are the natural fruits of first love, the visible expressions of a heart transformed by the New Covenant. These are the works Paul described in Corinthians and the fruit he outlined in Galatians: meekness, kindness, patience, generosity, humility, unity, and the simple, joyful fellowship of believers who love God and one another. These are the works of Acts 2, the spontaneous life that flows from genuine devotion to Christ as Head. When love cools, these works disappear. When love is replaced by hierarchy or performance, these works become mechanical. Christ’s call to “do the first works” is therefore a call to return to the relational, covenantal love that produces the life of the Church.
Letting the Scriptures Breathe Again
As we teach the next generation, we cannot rely on polish or presentation. The Scriptures do not need to be modernized. They need to be experienced. They become real when they are handled, explored, studied, questioned, embraced, and lived.
The faith that shaped the first century was not corporate or polished. It was personal. It was shared. It was rooted in homes, in conversations, in meals, and in the daily work of believers who carried Christ in their hearts.
That same pattern can be rediscovered today.
Pauls Final Charge
Paul’s last words to Timothy still echo across generations:
“But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions,
do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry…
I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.”
2 Timothy 4:5–7
This is the charge laid before all of us, regardless of age or generation.
May we carry the Word with sincerity.
May we honor those who taught us.
May we strengthen those who are rising.
And may Christ be seen in everything we do.
The chain continues.
The Word prevails.
Christ is with us.
Addendum: What “First Love” Really Means
When Jesus said to the church at Ephesus, “You have left your first love,” He was not reproving them for losing emotion or enthusiasm. He was confronting something far more foundational. In the New Covenant, love is not a feeling. It is a commandment. It is the governing ethic of the Body of Christ.
Jesus expressed it plainly:
“Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
This is the first and great commandment.
And the second is like unto it,
“Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.”
Matthew 22:37–39
And again:
“A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another; as I have loved you.”
John 13:34
This is the first love.
It is a covenantal love directed toward God through Christ and expressed toward one another. It is the love born of gratitude for the free gift of salvation, the love awakened by the reality that God gave His Son and that the Son freely laid down His life. It is the love that makes obedience a joy, fellowship a family, and ministry a service rather than a system.
What Ephesus lost was not doctrine.
They lost devotion.
They kept their labor.
They kept their discernment.
They kept their orthodoxy.
They kept their ability to expose false apostles.
But they drifted from the covenant love that gave all those things life.
And they drifted toward something else. Desiring God captured it as “zeal for orthodoxy,” but without the love for Jesus that once fueled it. Ephesus became experts in correctness and protectors of form, yet loosened their grasp on the relational center of the gospel.
This is the danger of every generation.
It is the danger of the Reformation.
It is the danger of modern Protestantism.
It is the danger of the apostolic movements.
It is the danger of the American church.
And it is the danger of any ministry that looks everywhere except to Christ as the living Head.
It is the danger of replacing covenant love with structure.
This is where the Nicolaitan shadow becomes significant. The Nicolaitan error is the love of hierarchy, the love of position, the love of spiritual identity, and the elevation of system over fellowship. It is the shift from brethren to ranks, from family to organization, from Christ-centeredness to ministry-centeredness. It is the moment believers begin to navigate around Jesus Christ, keeping Him present, but not enthroned as King and Head.
My children recognized this long before I articulated it. They saw that Jesus Christ was mentioned often, but seldom exalted. He was placed beside people, not above them. He was treated as a companion, not as Lord. And when that shift happens, the Body ceases to function as a Body. We become disconnected from the life that only flows from our Head, who is Christ.
This is the first love that Ephesus abandoned.
Not truth, but love.
Not doctrine, but devotion.
Not labor, but the covenant.
Not earnest activity, but the relationship that animates it.
And this is why Christ’s warning carries weight for us today. Revelation 2 was given in a vision for future believers, but the principle applies to the church in America, to the post-Reformation landscape, and to any movement that has drifted from relational love into structural identity.
The mantle that was torn in our own history was not merely organizational. It was covenantal. The generational transmission of Christ-centered love was interrupted. What should have been passed from Timothy to Timothy was diverted into systems, titles, and identities that Christ never commissioned.
Yet Christ’s words to Ephesus are not condemnation.
They are restoration.
“Remember from whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works.”
Revelation 2:5
What was torn can be mended.
What drifted can return.
What was scattered can be gathered.
What was lost can be restored.
Part Two will speak to this restoration, the meaning of the mantle, the fracture that divided a generation, and the way Christ is calling the Timothy generations back to the covenant love that defined the early church and still defines His Body today.
The story that began in the first century is not finished.
And neither is ours.
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