1 Timothy 6:11

The desire to be rich was the path of snares and temptation, of foolish and hurtful lusts. Timothy was to flee these things, as a man of God. This is always the thought here. He was in the world on God's behalf. He represented Him in his part of the work. So he was to follow after something other than earthly riches. He was to follow the character of a man of God: righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness. These were the things which, in a man, presented God to the world and glorified Him.

"Man of God" is a phrase that occurs often, from the five books of Moses right through the history books of the Old Testament. It is used again and again of a prophet. It marks him out as a man identified with the interests and character of God in deed and in truth. He can still fail, of course, and then suffer chastening. In the New Testament the phrase appears only in the two letters to Timothy. Here Paul uses it of the man he writes to, to stir him up and warn him. In the second letter it is open to all who, in an evil day, make good in faithful and holy devotedness to God what the title implies.

Paul's words "O man of God" are an urgent and very personal appeal. Urgent, because of the need of the hour; and personal, because of the individual responsibility to meet this need. The Greek word for "man" above is without distinction of sex. It should be the character of men and women who are devoted to the Lord Jesus. They love the great truth of the house of God (1 Tim. 3:15).

It is not enough to avoid evil. There must be the pursuit of good… However others may act, the man of God will seek to walk in a way that fits his relationships to others as brothers and sisters. This is righteousness… The man of God will also pursue faith that has Christ for its Object. And he will pursue love that goes out to his brothers and sisters. That love bears evil and insults with quiet endurance and meekness, instead of impatience and resentment.

Six lovely features hang together like a cluster of fruit. The list begins with righteousness, which always has to be to the front in a world of unrighteousness and sin. It ends with meekness, the very opposite of what we are by nature. Meekness concerns our spirit, as righteousness concerns our acts.

Piety is confidence in the known and living God. That confidence leads the believer to walk in the holy fear of God through all the circumstances of life. It recognises and honours God. So it is the very opposite of a show of holiness that seeks to exalt self.

Confusion was growing. So the apostle gives the moral features which should mark the "man of God." These features would fit him for the conflict with the power of evil that he cannot avoid. No servant of Christ can hold up the standard of the truth unless the truth has first formed him. If he tries, he will only invite a disastrous defeat. In life, as well as in word, he must be a representative of the Master whom he serves.

If we are to be men of God, we must flee what draws the men of this world. We must follow what was seen in Jesus here on earth. All these precious moral features shone in their fulness and perfection in the Son of God.