What is the good confession in 1 Timothy 6:12?

Again the Roman (whose characteristic common sense saw through the envy and malice of the Jews, and repudiated all anxiety as to the honour or security of Caesar) entered into the praetorium, called the Lord, and said, Art Thou the King of the Jews? He Who was silent before the high-priest till adjured by the living God answered Pilate by the question, Of thyself sayest thou this; or did others say it to thee about Me? (verses 33, 34). This was the turning-point. If the governor were uneasy as to the rights and interests of Caesar, the Lord could have pointed to His uniform life as in John 6:15, and to His invariable teaching as in Luke 20:25, for a perfect disproof and reassurance. But if the question originated, as it really did, with the Jews (Luke 23:2), the Lord had nothing to say but the truth in the face of Israel's unbelief and gainsaying, nothing to do but witness the "good confession" before Pontius Pilate; (1 Tim. 6:13) and this He does with all simplicity.

The "good confession" before Pilate covered at least four great points. First, the Lord boldly confessed that He was a King. The context shows that in saying this He referred not merely to the fact that He was the true Son of David according to the flesh, but that He held the place as Son of God, just as Psalm 2 predicted.

But there were two testimonies; the Lord's own upon which He was condemned (He was not condemned on the testimony brought against Him, for the two false witnesses did not agree), and which before Pilate was that He was a King - "Thou sayest that I am," that was the "good confession" that He witnessed; and the other testimony was that God was setting up a kingdom.

"And the governor asked him, saying, Art thou the King of the Jews? And Jesus said unto him, Thou sayest." Here is His good confession before Pilate. Before the high priest He confesses that He is "the Son of God." Before, Pilate that He is "the King of the Jews."

And the answer of the Lord to Pilate intimated this final recovery of His Kingdom. For while from the thus witnessed unbelief of His nation, Jesus perceived and allowed His present loss of it, yet He allows this in such terms as fully expresses His title to a kingdom, leading Pilate at once to say, "Art Thou a King then?" And to this His "good confession" is witnessed. For Pilate would have had no cause to dread either the displeasure of his master, or the tumult of the people; he might have fearlessly followed his will and delivered his prisoner, if the blessed Confessor would now alter the word that had gone out of His lips, and withdraw His claim to be a King. But Jesus answered, "Thou sayest that I am a King." From this His claim there could be no retiring. Here was His "good confession before Pontius Pilate." Though His own received Him not, yet He was theirs; though the world knew Him not, yet was it made by Him. Though the husbandmen were casting Him out, yet was He the Heir of the vineyard. He was anointed to the throne in Zion, though His citizens were saying, that they would not have Him to reign over them; and He must by His "good confession" fully verify His claim to it, and stand by that claim before Pontius Pilate, and in him before all the power of the world. It might arm all that power against Him, but it must be made. Herod and all Jerusalem had once been moved at hearing that He was born Who was King of the Jews, and sought to slay the child; but let the whole world be now moved and arm its power against Him, yet He must declare God's decree, "I have set My King upon My holy hill of Zion." His right must be witnessed, though in the presence of the usurper, and in the very hour of his power.

Before Pilate the Lord Jesus confessed the good confession, saying, “Thou sayest that I am a king,” then He added, “and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth” (John 18:37). John Baptist, in bearing witness to the Son, bore witness to the truth, but the Son had come to bear witness to the truth in making God known, and in telling out the Father’s grace. Jesus then said, “Every one that is of the truth hears my voice.” Those who heard the voice of the Son of God had divine life in them, communicated by Him who is the truth, and so were constituted as being of the truth. These wonderful words were lost on Pilate. He had not the divine capacity to receive them, so in his confusion, and as seeking to cover it, he answered the Lord with the words that manifest the ignorance of the most learned, and the greatest of this world, “What is truth?”

But if we are first to "flee," then to "follow," it is also necessary to "fight." We are given no path of ease, and no room for indolence. Indifference is really shameful defeat. Faith will stand up to the battle. Not that this is mere fighting against people, least of all against the saints of God. But the fight must be against every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God (2 Cor. 10:4, 5). Ephesians 6 shows this to be against spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places (v. 12), that is, every kind of Satanic influence that would drive one off the ground of faith, down to an earthly level, a level of rationalism and present self­-interest, a level of personal pride and earthly advantage. Let us fight resolutely against all such wretched tendencies in our own hearts and rather make a living faith the ruling principle of our lives. This is worth fighting for. It is the only way to "lay hold on eternal life." For though every redeemed soul possesses this matchless gift of eternal life, yet to lay hold of it is another matter, a matter of making it a practical reality in daily life. Timothy had been called to this, as is every believer; but of him also it could be said that he had confessed a good confession before many witnesses: let him remain true to this honorable stand.

In verse 13 another charge, peculiarly solemn, is given to Timothy: it is "before God, who preserves all things in life,, (Darby Trans.), not only creating life, but continually sustain­ing it in all His creation. How needful a reminder to impress upon us the fact of our continual dependence, moment by moment, upon Himself, and that those to whom one bears witness are also as fully dependent upon the same life ­sustaining God. But also the charge is "before Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession." Here was God's true Representative in the world, standing before the man who represents the world. How precious and clear His witness, though His words were few. He bore witness to the truth: His kingdom was not of this world; but He was a King indeed, God's King, high above all that was merely temporal: He sought no prominence in this world, but the glory of His Father (Jn. 18:33-37). This gives precious character to the commandment Timothy is told to keep "without spot, unrebukeable." There is to be no lapse, no tarnishing of this testimony, so as to leave him open to rebuke; for it is in view of the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ.

"Lay hold on eternal life whereunto thou wast called and didst confess the good confession before many witnesses." As in "fleeing" and "pursuing," the work is regarded as expressly continuous: not so in "laying hold" of the eternal life. It is a single act, and duration is excluded from the thought, all being summed up in its completion, like the waking up righteously once for all in 1 Cor. 15:34 compared with the habit of not sinning. It is the prize at the end of which faith could have laid hold now, as the good confession is a thing done, not of course done with, nor on the other hand in process of doing. It is the simple act in itself, which is expressed in the aorist, as ought to be well-known. The Authorized Version is doubly wrong in "hast" professed, and "a" good confession. The Vulgate may be supposed to have influenced all from Wiclif downwards. The endeavour to bring in the whole ministry of Timothy as covered by a good confession, as Calvin contends, seems as unfounded as, and only less objectionable than, the strange "oblation" imputed to the phrase by the author of the "Unbloody Sacrifice" (i. 223, ed. of Anglo-Cath. Library). Into what vagaries men wander who slight the truth of Christ for objects of their own!

The apostle rises next to a solemn admonition in this connection, as he does towards the close of his Second Epistle. "Quickening," or creating however, is not the thought, but "keeping alive." Here all the older English versions like most others have followed the received reading; not that which suits the context, which has also the better authorities. How Dean Alford could adopt the right reading but give a rendering which suits the wrong, seems unaccountable; but so it is. The usage in the New Testament as in the LXX distinctly points to saving alive or preserving; and here "all things", not persons, are in question, though some go so far as to teach the contrary. God, Who is the source of life, is also the preserver of all things: on this he who espouses His cause in a hostile scene can reckon and needs to reckon.

Besides, there is One no longer seen, to Whom faith looks with assurance, for not consolation only but also for unfailing support: "Christ Jesus that witnessed before Pontius Pilate the good confession." He is on high to succour His servants, but He was here as none else "the faithful Witness," the good Confessor. What cheer to the spirit of him who might flag through timorous counsels or the demoralization of compromise, that dire and corrupting pest for the mouth and heart when evil thickens among the faithful on earth! He has to follow His steps in this as in all things; and if he knows his weakness, as surely he will increasingly in the arduous combat, he has but to spread it before His sight Whose grace suffices and Whose strength is made perfect in weakness. What a joy and honour consciously to witness the "good confession" where our Lord did so before us, He without what we have so abundantly, and with such aggravation as none ever had or can have again!

To have the truth is of capital moment; and this can only be by faith of God's word. "By the word of Thy lips I have kept me from the paths of the destroyer" (Ps. 17:4). Thus only can we escape the lie of the enemy who deceives the whole world. But another thing there is, only second — that confession or witness which our lips and lives owe to Him Whose grace has given us the truth; and this not only though chiefly to His honour, but in love according to His will for those that lie as the world does in the wicked one, that they may be sanctified and saved. Before Pontius Pilate, the overwhelming fact came out that (not only did the Gentiles know not the truth, but) the Jews would not have it when before their eyes and ears livingly in Him Who, while the Messiah, was infinitely more. The chosen nation was as unbelieving as the nations generally, and hence as more guilty, so also more unrelentingly cruel unto blood, though it were the blood of Him Who was Jehovah's Fellow. Jesus confessed Himself not only King of a kingdom not of this world, but born and come to bear witness of the truth that every one who is of the truth might hear His voice. As the Jews alleged, He made Himself equal with God; He was, He is, the Only-Begotten Son of the Father. No wonder even hard-hearted Pilate was afraid, till Caesar's, the world's, friendship was seen to be at stake: and so, like the Jews who tempted him, he perished in enmity to God. Such is the end of all indeed, who, as they believe not with the heart to righteousness, confess not with the mouth to salvation, though in this passage no doubt "good confession" is more precise.

This matter of confession can be examined in 1 Timothy 6, where Paul exhorts Timothy to confess a good confession, but which was first of all demonstrated perfectly in the Lord Jesus Himself "who before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession" (v.13). What an exhibition of dignity the Lord Jesus gave in the presence of His enemies, humble subject Man that He was, and what grace and dignified demeanour He expressed. This is the kind of thing that Paul desired for Timothy, he said, 'You follow that example, you be like the Lord', and of course, no-one could say about the Lord that He was not convinced that what He was doing was right. He knew that He was doing the will of God, and nothing would turn Him aside. 'Now', says Paul to Timothy, 'You have that kind of conviction, and you have that kind of life, you witness a good confession too'. This is the first thing about Ehud; he was a man of conviction.

Paul exhorts his son Timothy "to fight the good fight of faith, and to lay hold on eternal life," in remembrance of this faith that was in the blessed Saviour Himself. "Fight," says he, "the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses. I give thee charge in the sight of God, Who quickeneth all things, and before Christ Jesus, Who before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession, that thou keep this commandment without spot, unrebukable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ" (1 Tim. 6:12-14). Eternal life was to be laid hold on by Timothy, and nothing was to be allowed, as it were, to shake off his prey. As the brightness of "the joy set before Him" was never dimmed in the perfect faith of Jesus, though the cross tried His tenure of it to the uttermost; so was Timothy to keep his grasp of eternal life, let him forego what else he might. God in promise had set that before him; and that He would bring out in all its promised blessing and glory at the appearing of Jesus; and to that Timothy was to cling in spite of all the world. The world around him were contentedly getting their portion in this life; and many through the love of it had erred from the faith (ver. 10); but Timothy was to flee this in his pursuit of eternal life. Faith knew its object from the word of promise; and Timothy was to embrace it at every cost.

But there is ever to be confession as well as faith. "With the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation" (Rom. 10:10). For God is to be confessed in a world that has disowned Him, as well as believed on in a heart that has departed from Him. This is His present glory in His saints, and this their service unto Him — service, which (it is true) may try them here. Their faith, like gold, may be cast into the furnace now, but it shall come forth hereafter stamped with the King's own image; for it shall "be found unto praise and honour, and glory, at the appearing of Jesus Christ" (1 Peter 1:7).