Proclaimer Blog
Godliness
We have just begun my 10th year at PT Cornhill. This year we are intentionally and emphatically headlining two emphases, right at the start of the course. The first is godliness. In the first main chunk of teaching, we spent the whole time considering why godliness matters in preachers and bible teachers, what godliness looks like, and how we can encourage one another in godliness. It was a good morning, and a challenge to me as much as to our new students. I love that word “progress” in 1 Timothy 4:15. I would love people to be able to say of me, “He’s far from perfect, but I can see he is making progress; at least he seems to be battling and struggling with God’s help, and is moving in the right direction”.
I set the students a provocative question: “If someone’s teaching is faithful to the gospel, why does it matter that their life should be godly? Why isn’t it ok just to make sure we teach the truth?” We found all sorts of answers from scripture, but here is one I hadn’t seen clearly before: it matters because words come from hearts. So if our work is a word-work (as it is), it arises as the overflow and outflow of a heart-work: “For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of” (Luke 6:45).
That’s not obvious, though. After all, deception is precisely making a mismatch between the heart and the mouth. So why can’t I have a rotten heart and speak gospel words? Would that not be a kind of ‘good deception’, since the result would do good to those who hear me? I think the answer is that in the end the truth will out; in the long run my words will necessarily reveal my heart. It is “the tongue of the wise” that brings healing, and wisdom is a matter of the heart (Proverbs 12:18). That got me thinking.
Oh, and I’ll tell you the other headline emphasis next week.