Christian Living

Contend Earnestly for the Faith

Author Greg Koukl Published on 09/01/2022

Years ago, I sat on a short bench in a small stone church on the outskirts of Oxford. In a tiny graveyard outside was a flat tombstone with the name “Clive Staples Lewis” etched into the granite.

The pew my wife and I were sitting in was the same place C.S. Lewis occupied with his brother Warnie every Sunday morning for decades as they worshiped together at Trinity Church.

This man, C.S. Lewis, probably more than anyone else in the 20th century, lived out the admonition of a passage I want you to think about. Here it is:

Beloved, while I was making every effort to write you about our common salvation, I felt the necessity to write to you appealing that you contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all handed down to the saints. (Jude 3)

Never before in my lifetime has this verse been more important for Christians to hear, consider, and heed.

Note three elements in this verse that are essential to Jude’s entreaty.

First, Jude refers to a specific message with specific content, the “faith once for all handed down”—the foundation of “our common salvation.” Second is the admonition to “contend earnestly” for that faith—to proclaim it, guard it, and defend it. Finally, Jude reminds us that it has been “handed down” to the saints—passed on from the disciples to the next generation in the church.

Here is why those three elements of Jude’s admonition are critical for you and me right now. We are engaged in the cultural and theological fight of our lives. The attack is coming from many directions, but we are facing serious challenges on two broad fronts. Simply put, we have trouble in the world and trouble in the church.

Trouble in the World

Currently, the Christian worldview is facing assault on multiple fronts.

Our story starts, “In the beginning, God,” yet a host of dedicated atheists have been doing their best to ensure our story never gets off the ground[1]—and they are having a massive impact on our young people. There are also attacks on the integrity of our authority base, the Bible,[2] and a myriad of assaults on the historicity of the central player in our drama—Jesus of Nazareth.

In the midst of this academic attack, there is an increasingly pervasive godlessness and a militant relativism in the culture. The 21st century began as an era of radical skepticism, especially in the area of morality and religion. As a result, the moral rulebook is being rewritten. Right has become wrong and wrong right.

In addition, there is an increasing hostility towards those who take Jesus seriously regarding the Great Commission. Jesus said he came “to seek and to save that which was lost” (Lk. 19:10), “to give his life as a ransom for many” (Matt. 20:28), and “to call sinners to repentance” (Lk. 5:32). That was the way he described his own mission.

Yet, when we proclaim this message—Jesus’ central message—we court conflict. Indeed, to be faithful to Jesus’ claim that he is the only Savior is increasingly considered an example of “spreading hate.”

For example, a number of years ago the Southern Baptists planned to evangelize Jews during a summer outreach in Chicago. A consortium of religious groups in that city—including Christian denominations, amazingly—demanded that the Baptists stay home. They warned that evangelism in their city would encourage hate crimes. In fact, a Jewish group claimed it invited “theological hatred.”[3]

This tendency to see the gospel as a message of hate gained momentum after 9/11. As the smoke still billowed from the wreckage of World Trade I and II, Thomas Friedman wrote a column in the New York Times titled “The Real War” warning of what he termed “religious totalitarianism”:

If 9/11 was indeed the onset of World War III, we have to understand what this war is about. We’re not fighting to eradicate “terrorism.” Terrorism is just a tool. We’re fighting to defeat an ideology: religious totalitarianism….a view of the world that my faith must reign supreme and can be affirmed and held passionately only if all others are negated. That’s bin Ladenism. But unlike Nazism, religious totalitarianism can’t be fought by armies alone. It has to be fought in schools, mosques, churches and synagogues, and can be defeated only with the help of imams, rabbis and priests.[4] [Emphasis added.]

Friedman then applauded a rabbi who “set up his own schools in Israel to compete with fundamentalist Jews, Muslims, and Christians, who used their schools to preach exclusivist religious visions.”[5]

This same theme keeps popping up everywhere I go. Christians are dangerous. Christians are the enemy. This puts any church committed to fulfilling the Great Commission directly in the crosshairs of an increasingly anti-Christian culture.

Trouble in the Church

There’s not only trouble in the world—trouble from the outside—but there is serious trouble on the inside. Sadly, in spite of the plethora of materials available to believers, there is still profound spiritual confusion in Christian circles.

In 2005, researchers Christian Smith and Melinda Denton conducted a “National Study of Youth and Religion” and recorded their findings in their book, Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers. Here’s what they discovered.

First, they learned there is no generation gap with young people when it comes to religion. Teens were not “spiritual seekers,” but rather were at home in church circles, with 75% identifying with some form of Christianity.

The second thing they discovered, however, was not comforting. When these same committed Christian teenagers were interviewed one-on-one about the specifics of their convictions, almost none from any denominational background could articulate the most basic beliefs of the faith.

Smith and Denton summed up their theology as “moralistic, therapeutic deism” (MTD). To these teens, religion was about being nice and enjoying a relationship with a God who mostly wanted them to be happy and feel good about themselves—which was, as it turned out, the very same religious view of their parents.

Now, nearly 20 years later, things have gotten worse for the church, according to George Barna’s American Worldview Inventory 2021. Barna’s summary:

It is rare to find MTD proponents who consistently accept biblical principles related to truth, morality, lifestyle, and personal relationships. Less than 1% of adults in the MTD segment typically endorse biblical teaching and follow through on those matters.[6]

Several years ago, I was a guest of Dennis Prager at an interfaith dialogue in Los Angeles with Roman Catholic priest Gregory Coiro before a large Jewish audience on Rosh Hashanah.

When Dennis asked why I believed Jesus was the only way of salvation, I offered a carefully worded account of the gospel. When I was finished, Father Coiro affirmed the importance of Jesus but assured the audience that their honest and sincere pursuit of Judaism counted as saving faith in God’s eyes. These Jews were safe, beneficiaries of the cross even though they rejected Jesus.

Surprisingly, large numbers of Protestants agree. God doesn’t really care what faith you follow since they all teach basically the same life lessons. In the midst of this theological confusion, Christians of all stripes are falling away from the truth en masse, becoming casualties of a culture that celebrates pluralism, relativism, and sex without boundaries or restraint.

Everywhere I look, I see the results of spiritual deception—twisted views of human sexuality, radically narcissistic individualism, denial of intrinsic human value, theological illiteracy, deconversions, the relentless spread of totalitarianism—banging away at our Christian foundations. Meanwhile, the number of “Don’ts” regarding God—don’t believe, don’t know, or don’t care—has skyrocketed (43% of all millennials).[7]

With trouble in the world and trouble in the church, what do we do to fulfill Jude’s exhortation? Paul’s last letter gives the answer.

Paul’s Swan Song

If you visit Rome and take the right tour, you will be shown an ancient cistern northwest of the city. Originally meant to hold water, it later served as a dungeon. Mamertine Prison is a circular, low-ceilinged, underground room of rock where prisoners were lowered in on a rope.

I’ve seen pictures of the dank, dismal interior. Against one wall there is a low, protruding rock shelf of sorts. It’s the only elevated flat place in the cell, the only surface someone could write on. This is likely the very spot—this small ledge of rock—where the apostle Paul wrote his spiritual last will and testament. We know it as 2 Timothy.

Among New Testament books, 2 Timothy is one of my favorites. It was Paul’s final message, his swan song, the last thing he ever wrote. It is clear, uncomplicated, and to the point, speaking forcefully and practically to the challenges we all face today.

Second Timothy gives the answer to our question about guarding the gospel, because that is the book’s theme, found explicitly in 1:14: “Guard, through the Holy Spirit who dwells in us, the treasure which has been entrusted to you.” Paul’s message is absolutely vital to each one of us today because he tells us exactly what it looks like in any century to contend earnestly for the faith.

You see, the early church was also facing trouble on two fronts.

There was trouble for Christians in the world. They were under tremendous attack in that culture. In A.D. 64, a fire broke out in Rome that raged for six days and seven nights, destroying a great part of the city. Emperor Nero falsely charged the Christians and punished them with “the most exquisite tortures,” as the historian Tacitus records in his Annals:

Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burnt, to serve as a nightly illumination when daylight had expired. Nero offered his own gardens for that spectacle.[8]

In the midst of this extreme physical persecution of the church, Paul warned of a pervasive godlessness coming in the culture:

But realize this, that in the last days difficult times will come. For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers, disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy, unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good, treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. (2 Tim. 3:1–4)

Timothy would also be facing trouble in the church:

The time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth, and will turn aside to myths. (2 Tim. 4:3–4)

Paul’s Simple Solution

What is Paul’s answer to Timothy’s challenge, which is the same challenge we face? It’s refreshingly simple, and the heart of it can be captured in three words: “You, however, continue…” (3:14).

Paul does not tell Timothy to look forward to any new movements of the Spirit, any fresh word from God, or any insider’s spiritual fad. He points not to the future, but rather to the past. “Timothy, don’t look forward,” he says. “Look backward.” Here is the full citation, part of which I’m sure is familiar to you:

You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them, and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work. (2 Tim. 3:14–17)

Then Paul amps it up another notch. At the beginning of chapter four, he challenges Timothy with the most sober language he can muster:

I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing and his kingdom: preach the word; be ready in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with great patience and instruction…. Be sober in all things, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry. (2 Tim. 4:1–2, 5).

Simply put, Paul tells Timothy to guard the gospel by continuing in the truth already revealed. In other words, when all else fails, read—and follow—the directions.

But that is not enough.

Passing the Baton

I want you to notice something about 2 Timothy. Paul wrote his final letter to a person, not a group. He passed the baton of the gospel to a faithful individual, a young man named Timothy, and then told him to do the same: “The things which you have heard from me in the presence of many witnesses, entrust these to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” (2 Tim. 2:2).

Note the four generations in this passage: Paul, Timothy, faithful disciples, and “others”—the baton being handed down from one individual to the next. Paul knew it would not be enough for any Christian to continue in the truth. It also needed to be handed down. Indeed, guarding the gospel is not complete until it has been passed on effectively.

When I became a follower of Christ at UCLA in 1973, I was a loud, opinionated, obnoxious, long-haired hippie. Now, almost 49 years later, I am no longer a long-haired hippie. I’m also not nearly as obnoxious as I used to be. I owe that transformation largely to one man: Craig Englert.

For two years, Craig took me under his wing. I’ve had other mentors since then, but I know with certainty that without Craig I would not be in the position I’m in today.

Craig Englert and others who followed him in my life were not content to guard the truth. They needed to entrust it to others—even me, as unlikely as it seemed at the time—in order for the gospel to go forward. They passed the baton to me, as Paul had done with Timothy. Indeed, they were passing the same baton Paul passed to Timothy that was then passed down for two thousand years—from one, to another, to another until it was mine to carry.

In the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, American runners suffered a humiliating defeat in the 4 X 100 relay. In the anchor leg, Darvis Patton handed the baton to Tyson Gay, but Gay never got it. In the middle of the handoff, they dropped the baton.

Tyson Gay was our best sprinter. We had the fastest team. It didn’t matter. They dropped the baton, so we lost the race. In fact, we never even finished that race.

Paul told Timothy, “If anyone competes as an athlete, he does not win the prize unless he competes according to the rules” (2:5). In other words, Paul said, “Timothy, you cannot drop the baton.”

And we cannot drop the baton, either. If we do, we lose.

No Surprises

So how do we guard the gospel? Two ways. First, we continue in the things already handed down to us. Second, we pass the baton. Those are the rules.

If we disregard Paul’s solution, we should not be surprised when we remain children, tossed here and there by waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, by craftiness in deceitful scheming (Eph. 4:14).

If we don’t guard the gospel, we should not be surprised when we are taken captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ (Col. 2:8).

If we don’t pass the baton, we should not be surprised when we will not endure sound doctrine, but wanting to have our ears tickled, we accumulate for ourselves teachers in accordance with our own desires, and turn away our ears from the truth, and turn aside to myths (2 Tim. 4:3–4).

I asked Father Coiro at that meeting on Rosh Hashanah if there was any New Testament evidence for the assurances he offered our Jewish audience. He cited Jesus’ comment, “For he who is not against us is for us” (Mk. 9:40). The Jews in our company, he pointed out, were not against Jesus. They must then, by default, be for him, the priest reasoned.

Yet Jesus also said, “He who is not with me is against me; and he who does not gather with me scatters” (Matt. 12:30). So what do we make of this apparent contradiction in Jesus’ teaching? Check the context. When we do, we discover that Jesus was referring to entirely different groups.

In the first case, Jesus was speaking of those who had been performing miracles in his name but were not part of his core group of disciples—Christians, in other words, not unbelieving Jews. In the second instance, though, Jesus was speaking to Jews who had rejected his messianic claim.

The question for us, then, is, What kind of group were Father Coiro and I talking to at our event? People who were working miracles in the name of Jesus, or people who were rejecting Jesus’ messianic claim? The latter, certainly. Father Coiro had applied the wrong passage to our Jewish listeners.

When Jesus was speaking to a group like we had been that day, he said, “Unless you believe that I am he, you will die in your sins” (Jn. 8:24). When Peter was speaking to a group like we had been that day, he said, “And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved” (Acts 4:12). When Paul was writing about a group like we had been speaking to that day, he wrote:

I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge. For not knowing about God’s righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. (Rom. 10:2–4)

Finishing the Race

The key to contending for the faith—to surviving the spiritual onslaught of the 21st century—is to guard the gospel. The key to that is found in two simple phrases. One, “Continue in the things you have learned.” Back to the basics. Back to the Word as it has been entrusted to us. And two, entrust it to faithful disciples who will be able to teach others also.

That’s it. Guard the gospel by continuing in the truth already revealed then passing the baton. Proclaim the truth faithfully, guard it diligently, and pass it on carefully. That is how we contend earnestly for the faith once for all handed down to the saints. That is how we guard the gospel Paul entrusted to Timothy, now entrusted to us.

And not until we do that can we say what Paul said at the end of his magnificent letter: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith.”[9]

 


[1] E.g., Christopher Hitchens, God Is Not Great—How Religion Poisons Everything; Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion; Daniel Dennett, Breaking the Spell; and Sam Harris, The End of Faith, etc., etc.

[2] E.g., authors like Bart Ehrman with his best seller, Misquoting Jesus.

[3] Jeffery L. Sheler, “Unwelcome Prayers,” U.S. News & World Report, 9/20/99.

[4] Thomas Friedman, “The Real War,” New York Times, 11/27/01.

[5] Ibid.

[6] American Worldview Inventory 2021, Release #2, https://www.arizonachristian.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/CRC_AWVI2021_Release02_Digital_01_20210427.pdf.

[7] American Worldview Inventory 2021, Release #3, https://www.arizonachristian.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/CRC_AWVI2021_Release03_Digital_01_20210512.pdf.

[8] Tacitus, Annals, xv. 44.

[9] 2 Timothy 4:7.