2 Timothy 1:1-18 (NLT)
1 This letter is from Paul, chosen by the will of God to be an apostle of Christ Jesus. I have been sent out to tell others about the life he has promised through faith in Christ Jesus.
2 I am writing to Timothy, my dear son. May God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord give you grace, mercy, and peace.
3 Timothy, I thank God for you—the God I serve with a clear conscience, just as my ancestors did. Night and day I constantly remember you in my prayers.
4 I long to see you again, for I remember your tears as we parted. And I will be filled with joy when we are together again.
5 I remember your genuine faith, for you share the faith that first filled your grandmother Lois and your mother, Eunice. And I know that same faith continues strong in you.
6 This is why I remind you to fan into flames the spiritual gift God gave you when I laid my hands on you.
7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear and timidity, but of power, love, and self-discipline.
8 So never be ashamed to tell others about our Lord. And don’t be ashamed of me, either, even though I’m in prison for him. With the strength God gives you, be ready to suffer with me for the sake of the Good News.
9 For God saved us and called us to live a holy life. He did this, not because we deserved it, but because that was his plan from before the beginning of time—to show us his grace through Christ Jesus.
10 And now he has made all of this plain to us by the appearing of Christ Jesus, our Savior. He broke the power of death and illuminated the way to life and immortality through the Good News.
11 And God chose me to be a preacher, an apostle, and a teacher of this Good News.
12 That is why I am suffering here in prison. But I am not ashamed of it, for I know the one in whom I trust, and I am sure that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until the day of his return.
13 Hold on to the pattern of wholesome teaching you learned from me—a pattern shaped by the faith and love that you have in Christ Jesus.
14 Through the power of the Holy Spirit who lives within us, carefully guard the precious truth that has been entrusted to you.
15 As you know, everyone from the province of Asia has deserted me—even Phygelus and Hermogenes.
16 May the Lord show special kindness to Onesiphorus and all his family because he often visited and encouraged me. He was never ashamed of me because I was in chains.
17 When he came to Rome, he searched everywhere until he found me.
18 May the Lord show him special kindness on the day of Christ’s return. And you know very well how helpful he was in Ephesus.
The world would clothe us with a spirit of timidity and fear. Rejection, separation, and shame. In that spirit is a constriction of the mouth and inability to go anywhere with confidence. What we’ve received in Christ, though, is another kind of Spirit. It’s a Spirit that emboldens and empowers in the face of circumstances that could otherwise be daunting. Paul had followed his calling by that Spirit to a place that would appear to be a sentence of defeat and failure. Even there in prison, though, the Spirit in him didn’t recede of diminish in the least. Communication of the Gospel continued without fear from preaching and writing, while influence and guidance for those who could yet go to the world was powerful and essential.
Where there is fear or reticence brought on by experience and regard for worldly perspectives, this isn’t something that came from God. In His presence is complete displacement of them wth a Spirit that projects victory and triumph in the face of the most daunting circumstances. The body will be mobilized and the mouth will boldly proclaim the works for the Lord without restraint or hesitancy.