“But you, Timothy, are a man of God; so run from all these evil things. Pursue righteousness and a godly life, along with faith, love, perseverance, and gentleness. Fight the good fight for the true faith. Hold tightly to the eternal life to which God has called you, which you have declared so well before many witnesses. And I charge you before God, who gives life to all, and before Christ Jesus, who gave a good testimony before Pontius Pilate, that you obey this command without wavering. Then no one can find fault with you from now until our Lord Jesus Christ comes again.”
I remember the first time I got Poison Ivy. I was nine years old, and I was helping my dad clear brush at my grandmother’s house. There was this big hill on one side of her yard, and it was overgrown so thickly that you couldn’t even walk into it. So, for hours in the hot sun, we cut down and dragged away vines and brush and weeds. The next day, my fingers were uncomfortably itchy. Soon the skin began to swell and bubble. It got worse when I scratched it, but somehow I couldn’t help it. For days, it drove me crazy. My case of Poison Ivy was so bad that I still have a scar on my left hand from it. From that day on, I made such to avoid Poison Ivy no matter what.
Paul here is challenging Timothy and us to treat sin and evil like Poison Ivy. No person who has had Poison Ivy will ever pick it up to examine it. Rather, he would go out of his way to avoid it, staying on paths that are sure to be clear of the stuff. Sin and evil are far more destructive than Poison Ivy. They harm our relationships, our finances, our self-image, our bodies. They harm those we love and those we want most to care for. Paul challenges us to keep in mind the inevitable consequences of sin. So even if it starts off looking harmless (much like a Poison Ivy plant might look harmless), keep clear of it.
Here’s your freedom for today: avoiding sin always costs less than exposing yourself to it. But how do we avoid sin? Paul gives us this direction: “Pursue righteousness and a godly life, along with faith, love, perseverance and gentleness.” If we seek to retrain our character towards these virtues we will eventually find ourselves losing our appetite for sin. Then we will really begin to understand what freedom is all about.