Sincere Faith

2 Timothy 1:3-8

May 12, 2024 (Mother’s Day) • Mount Pleasant UMC

Well, good morning, friends. As you are in worship here in Terre Haute, we are finishing up a day of touring in Bristol, England and headed to London for the night. We have been on this Wesley Heritage Tour now for almost a week, and we appreciate your continued prayers for safety as we travel.

I am thankful for the blessings of technology to be able to be in two places at once this morning! When I get back from this trip, we’re going to spend a few weeks studying our heritage and the Methodist Christian faith that we share by looking at the life of our founder, John Wesley, and more importantly at the work God did through him, the revival that broke out that changed a nation. And as we look at what happened then we’re going to be asking if it could happen again. What if God might use us to renew and change our land? I think it’s possible that if God did it once before through the people called Methodist, he just might do it again. But that’s in a couple of weeks.

This morning, on this Mother’s Day, I want to back up in the Methodist story and share a little bit about a woman who is often called the “Mother of Methodism.” She gets that name for a couple of reasons. One, she was the mother of the brothers John and Charles Wesley who were at the forefront of the Methodist movement. So, quite literally, she is the mother of Methodism. But she also gets that name because of the deep and profound influence she had on the life and faith of those two boys. Her name was Susanna, and I think this morning she might have something to say to us across the centuries about the power of sincere faith.

Susanna Annesley was born on January 20, 1669, the youngest of twenty-five children. Let that sink in—twenty-five children! She married Samuel Wesley when she was nineteen years old and together they had 19 children, ten of whom survived past infancy. Samuel was a pastor in the Church of England, and they were assigned to a parish called Epworth, a place you will hear more about in the weeks to come. But Samuel wasn’t always liked as a pastor; at one point, when little John was only five years old, the parsonage they lived in burned down. It was suspected (but never proven) that some of the church members set fire to the house. But even though Samuel was disliked, he was still more popular than the assistant pastor, Mr. Inman, he asked to preach during the time he had to be in London. Mr. Inman apparently only spoke on the topic of repaying debts, week after week, and Susanna was not pleased with that. In order to better educate her children in the ways of the faith, she started having Sunday afternoon services in their home. She would read a psalm, then read a sermon that had been written either by her husband or her father, and then read another psalm. When word got out about this service, some of the local people began to ask if they could attend as well. At one point, there were 200 people attending Susanna’s service, far more than were attending Mr. Inman’s Sunday morning service.

As you might imagine, Mr. Inman got upset and he wrote to Samuel, suggesting he should tell Susanna to stop her services. It simply wasn’t proper in those days for a woman to teach others. So Samuel wrote to his wife, and she in turn wrote back to him. Here’s what she wrote: “If you do, after all, think fit to dissolve this assembly, do not tell me you desire me to do it, for that will not satisfy my conscience; but send me your positive command, in such full and express terms as may absolve me from all guilt and punishment, for neglecting this opportunity of doing good, when you and I shall appear before the great and awful tribunal of our Lord Jesus Christ” (qtd. in Hamilton, Revival, pg. 23). In other words, “I’ll stop if you tell me to, but you and I will both have to answer to Jesus one day! So, if you want to take that risk, sure, go ahead, tell me to quit.” After receiving her letter, Samuel never said another word to her about the Sunday afternoon services.

Susanna was deeply committed to educating her children. Starting at age five, her children would receive instruction from her for six hours every day. On the very first day of their education, they were expected to learn the entire alphabet. All of her children but two achieved this. She taught them Latin and Greek and everything that was common in English education at the time. Daughters were included, which was very progressive for the culture; Susanna was, without a doubt, ahead of her time. But she didn’t only teach them the skills they needed to get along in the world. She also brought them up in the faith. She set aside an hour each week for each child to individually talk to them about faith, about their hopes and fears, their dreams and the state of their soul. Is it any wonder that one of the central questions the early Methodists asked of each other was this: “How is it with your soul?”?

Susanna Wesley took seriously the call of the Scriptures to pass the faith along to the next generation. I can’t help but wonder what would have happened if she hadn’t done that. We would most likely not have the great Methodist tradition sparked by the revival that came from John Wesley’s preaching, and we wouldn’t have the thousands of songs written by Charles Wesley. Can you imagine Christmas without singing “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing”? Or Easter without “Christ the Lord is Risen Today”? In many ways, we can trace that all back to Susanna Wesley, sitting with her children in her kitchen, sharing the faith that meant so much to her.

It reminds me of the story of Timothy, which was touched upon in our Scripture reading today. Timothy was a disciple and friend and “true son in the faith” (1 Timothy 1:2) to the Apostle Paul. Paul had first met Timothy in the town of Lystra which is in modern-day Turkey. Lystra had no synagogue, so it appears the Jewish population was sparse at best, but Timothy’s mother Lois was a Jew who had come to believe in Jesus as the savior. However, she was married to a Greek man who was not a believer, which may explain how she got to Lystra. It may have been a relocation related to her marriage. But however they got to Lystra, Lois and her husband had a son named Timothy and Lois took it upon herself to teach him the Scriptures. Apparently, at least according to Paul, her mother Eunice also had a hand in Timothy’s education. And, it seems from the account in the book of Acts, that Timothy also became a believer in Jesus. Luke tells us in Acts that “The believers at Lystra and Iconium spoke well of” Timothy (Acts 16:2) and so during his time in Lystra, Paul decided that he would be helpful in their missionary work. So he asked Timothy to come with him on his journeys. Eventually, Timothy became what we would call today a pastor and he settled down in the seaport town of Ephesus, one of Paul’s beloved congregations. And it is to Timothy, in Ephesus, that Paul writes not one but two letters that have been collected in our Bibles (Acts 16:1-5; McKnight, 1 & 2 Timothy, Titus and Philemon, pg. 101).

Most scholars agree that what we call 2 Timothy may very well have been the final letter Paul wrote. He seems to know the end of his life is near. He tells Timothy, “I am already being poured out like a drink offering, and the time for my departure is near. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith” (4:6-7). I often wonder if people who use those phrases today know where they come from. But anyway. In the first letter, Paul calls Timothy his “true son,” but in this one, Timothy is Paul’s “dear son” (1:2), and in this letter Paul seems to be reminding Timothy of his calling and encouraging him to remain true to the Gospel. He warns him about false teachers and advises him that a time is coming when people will not put up with sound doctrine. It’s a letter packed full of pastoral advice, all framed by Paul’s acknowledgement that Timothy’s faith has been handed down from his grandmother and his mother. And it’s not just a passing faith; Paul calls Timothy’s faith “sincere.”

So what is a sincere faith? What kind of faith did Timothy’s mother and grandmother pass along to him? The word Paul uses indicates there’s not a hint of falsehood in the way Timothy is living and in what he is speaking. There is no hypocrisy and he’s not faking it. It’s the kind of faith people talk about when they say, “You’ll know it when you see it.” It’s the faith of someone who walks the walk. Just a few verses down in this chapter, Paul contrasts two different kinds of people that he’s been associated with. He says that a lot of people who once were part of the church have “deserted” him; he says “everyone,” but Paul also tended to exaggerate because in the next verse we find out it’s not “everyone.” A mutual friend named Onesiphorus searched for Paul and found him in the Roman prison just so that he would help take care of him. That’s the kind of sincere faith Paul says also lives in Timothy—the kind that doesn’t just talk the talk but walks the walk. Eunice had it, and she passed it to Lois, and Lois passed it to Timothy. And Susanna’s father had it, and he passed it to Susanna, and she passed it to her children including John and Charles.

Well, all of this has gotten me to thinking about the people in my own life who were instrumental in passing the faith along to me, people who have in many ways helped make me who I am. And since it’s Mother’s Day, I’m especially mindful of the women in my life who have blessed me. If there is any sincere faith in me, it’s because of these people and so many others like them. And of course on this Mother’s Day I think of my mom. Some of the earliest memories I have are of coming downstairs early in the morning, knowing mom would already be up. She would have the coffee ready (not for me, for her) and usually be reading her Bible or listening to a Christian broadcast of some sort. She was the first one I told when I gave my life to Jesus. My parents set an example early on in my life of what it meant to be faithful to Jesus. They took us to church and I know they prayed for me and my brother regularly. Mom constantly reminds me, too, that she knew I was going to be a pastor long before I knew that. She asked me once if I had ever thought about becoming a pastor and I remember saying, “Why would I want to do that? It sounds so boring!” Well, as always, mothers know best.

My grandma Esther was also a significant person in developing sincere faith in me. When I was young, Grandma lived about 2 blocks from us and my brother and I were there frequently. We always knew we were welcome, any time. Grandma also taught Sunday School for many, many years. At Rossville Church, Sunday School was first, followed by worship, and I still remember when we would come into the sanctuary, where the older adults met for Sunday School, Grandma would be there, teaching her class. I cling to those memories and try to forget the way she was after her series of strokes because those took away so much of who she was.

When I made it to high school, I had another significant Esther in my life. Esther Beard taught the high school Sunday School class and she was, for all of us, just another grandmother. She had those perfect attendance Sunday School pins that Cokesbury used to sell and if she had connected them all I think it would have reached the floor. Every week she showed up with her lesson book but I’m not sure she ever really used it. She didn’t know all the latest techniques of teaching and reaching young people. She never went to a youth ministry conference. She just loved us unconditionally and we loved her because of it. I don’t know that I can tell you a single lesson Esther taught in Sunday School, because all I remember is how she loved us and told us over and over again that Jesus loved us. Most of the teenagers who were in the class when I was are still serving Jesus in some way, and I believe that’s a direct result of Jesus working through Esther.

And as I’ve served in ministry, I’ve met so many people whose love for Jesus and love for the church has inspired and impacted me. There was Flossie Grigsby—isn’t that a great name?—who came up to me on my first Sunday, rubbed my face and said, “I was just checking to see if you were old enough to shave.” And Flossie went on to be a great encouragement and support during my time at Harrodsburg. At Brushwood there was Dorothy Torbet, a pillar in the church and community, whose Bible was so well-worn and yet she felt like she was so small in her faith. Dorothy didn’t always understand or even like the ways the church and the culture were changing, but she was willing to support this young pastor as we tried to reach the community. In many ways, I felt like I met another Dorothy when I came to Mount Pleasant and got to know Mary Catherine Couchman. A lot of you knew her, of course, much better than I did, but I always knew two things about Mary Catherine. She wasn’t afraid to speak her mind, and her faith ran deep. She once told me she was old enough to have seen this church sanctuary turn in every different direction—south, north, east and finally west. And I have to tell you one of the most inspiring times in my life was the last visit Pastor Rick and I had with her just days before she died. We laughed and prayed and as we left she looked us both in the eye and encouraged us to keep on. Those are moments that will inspire sincere faith in just about anyone, and it sure did in me.

I could sit here and tell you stories all afternoon, but you have things to do and so do I. These stories are just the tip of the iceberg of where my faith has come from, but maybe they are sufficient to remind us that none of us arrive at our faith in Jesus on our own. If we have any kind of sincere faith, it has come because others have poured into us. So I want to encourage you with two things this morning. First of all, think about the people who have poured into you. Who are your Loises, your Eunices, your Susannas? Who has taken the time to invest in seeing your faith develop and grow? Give thanks for each one of them, and if they are still living, maybe write them a note of appreciation. I can almost guarantee they have no idea what an impact they have made in your life and a note would mean the world. But then out of gratitude for them, move to the next step. Who are you pouring into? Who are the people you are investing in to move them toward sincere faith? Who are you praying for, sharing with, encouraging and modeling faith for? For whom are you a Eunice, a Lois, a Susanna, a Paul or a Barnabas? Someone in your life needs you to help them draw close to Jesus. Don’t be afraid to be that person for them.

None of these people are perfect. None of them get it right every single time. Today we would probably consider some of Susanna’s parenting techniques harsh. For instance, she believed it was important to break a child’s spirit by not letting her children cry (cf. Hamilton 24). That was “good parenting” in her day; today she would probably be arrested for abuse. Regardless, both John and Charles attributed their faith to their mother’s prayers, and when she was on her deathbed, she asked her children to sing a psalm of praise to God when she was “released.” Her son, John, preached her funeral and a tremendous crowd showed up to honor this woman without whom there would likely not have been a Methodist movement. So this Mother’s Day, I’m giving thanks for the prayers and the sincere faith of Susanna Wesley and all who, like her, continue to invest in the next generation yet today. Thanks be to God.