Lectionary Commentaries for October 5, 2025
Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost

The mission of Jesus in Luke’s Gospel brings the reigning activity of God up close. It’s not just about some future setting things right; it also concerns household life and social relations, for these too are arenas where the saving impact of God’s reign can be felt.

In the passage that precedes today’s lection, Luke 17:1–4 gives a more compact version of Jesus’ teaching on accountability and mercy in Matthew 18.¹ The disciple community is responsible for its treatment of the vulnerable (“these little ones,” Luke 17:2).

What’s more, Jesus insists that when a community member engages in misconduct, both repentance—a prominent motif to this point in Luke’s Gospel (for example, 5:32; 10:13; 11:32; 13:1–5; 15:7, 10; 16:27–31)—and forgiveness are essential (17:3–4). As long as the wrongdoer repents, the offended party is urged to extend mercy—as many as seven times in a single day!² Of course, it is scarcely imaginable that repentance, if repeated over and over again, would be genuine and therefore would justify the offer of forgiveness.

When harm is done, forgiveness may not come easily. The disciples apparently recognize their need for help if they are to fulfill this expectation. So, with one voice, the apostles petition for increased faith (verse 5).

Mustard-seed faith, take two

Enlarge our faith? Jesus answers the request of his apostles with hyperbole, with an exaggerated assertion of the sufficiency of even a small amount of faith: “If you had faith the size of a mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it would obey you” (verse 6). Luke’s readers have already encountered the mustard seed as a parabolic image of God’s reign (8:18–19), although in that parable Jesus does not mention the seed’s diminutive size (in contrast to Mark 4:30–32; Matthew 13:31–32).

In the 21st century, we may have less interest in replanting trees in the ocean than in even more improbable feats like ending international conflicts, or poverty and hunger, or racism and xenophobia, or—perhaps most urgent of all—reversing global warming. Would faith of mustard-seed scale move us to bold action, even when the prospects of success seem so slight?

We need faith that, despite the evidence of sight and sound, what we do matters; that we can make a difference for good; that God isn’t done with this world just yet. Perhaps the key is not the size of faith but its tenacity and durability (see also Luke 18:8b). We might do well to join the apostles’ plea for more robust faith, and add to it a resolve to embody our faith in persistent, courageous action.

It’s your job!

Speaking of action, the mini-discourse now pivots to duties within the household. Here Jesus assumes existing social structures within the Roman Empire, in which slavery was basic to social and economic relations.³ The passage graphically displays the imbalance in power relations within first-century households:

Who among you would say to your slave who has just come in from plowing or tending sheep in the field, “Come here at once and take your place at the table?” Would you not rather say to him, “Prepare supper for me; put on your apron and serve me while I eat and drink; later you may eat and drink”? Do you thank the slave for doing what was commanded? So you also, when you have done all that you were ordered to do, say, “We are worthless slaves; we have done only what we ought to have done!” (verses 7–10)

These verses assume that enslaved persons owe their enslavers obedient performance of their assigned duties. Verses 7–9 draw on this social reality by posing a rhetorical question: “Who among you … ?” That is, which person of superior status and privilege would dare to flip the script, serving rather than demanding loyal service?

The distorted power relations depicted in this passage were commonplace in Luke’s world; though familiar, they are, however, disturbing. This is an exploitative system that people and communities of faith must not replicate or sanction today. It remains a pressing concern, in light of the sobering realities of human trafficking and the trampling of human rights of so many marginalized and vulnerable persons on a global scale. Jesus’ call to protect the vulnerable, earlier in chapter 17, already presses against such an oppressive system (verses 1–2).

Indeed, which person of superior status would flip the script? Reading ahead in Luke’s Gospel, we learn the answer: Jesus himself! He later presents a radically different picture of what it means to have power and what it means to serve. In his farewell speech to the disciples (22:14–38), he offers himself—as a person of superior status who is entitled to be served—as the very one doing the serving. His followers are to emulate that model, rather than conform to the usual quest for superior position and power (22:24–27). Persons and communities of faith are called to obedience of a different kind, serving the One who alone is sovereign.

Notes

1. These verses in Luke also rework Mark 11:22–25, which pictures faith as able to relocate mountains (rather than trees as in Luke 17) and, as in Mark, adds a call to forgive. Mark places the teaching within the scene featuring a fruitless fig tree, an episode Luke omits.
2. Matthew’s version of this teaching embeds it in an exchange between Peter and Jesus, in which Jesus calls for forgiveness as many as 77 times (or 70 times seven), without mention of repentance (Matthew 18:21–22).
3. On slavery in the Greco-Roman world and in early Christianity, see Jennifer A. Glancy, Slavery in Early Christianity, Expanded Edition (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2024).

Habakkuk provides honest lament about violence and God’s response regarding a vision.

How can we access today the truthfulness and vulnerability required of prophetic lament? How might we seek to write a new vision with God for our destructive moment?

These questions lie at the heart of the book of Habakkuk, perhaps not the most popular piece of prophetic literature. It is easy to overlook and ignore the prophets we call minor. It may be tempting this week to focus on the Gospel lesson and ignore this obscure prophetic word.

Yet, the book’s profound questioning of God in the face of injustice makes it relevant still in our contemporary moment. We need true lament in response to current injustices and harm. This is the prophetic way: to face reality and envision a new way forward. And, for Habakkuk, the work begins in lament. Only then do we hear more clearly God’s language of a vision.

The reading for this Sunday contains two snippets from the book: Habakkuk 1:1–4 includes the first portion of the prophet’s complaint, while 2:1–4 provides the first part of God’s response to the complaint. Together, these two passages offer a new summary of the book’s primary message.

Habakkuk 1:1–4: The prophet’s complaint

The prophet’s vision is in the form of a biblical complaint or lament. The people are crying out to God for help but not receiving a response. So, the prophet asks, “How long, O LORD?” The phrase is echoed in Psalm 13, a lament psalm. In fact, it may be helpful to read Habakkuk 1 as a psalm of lament.^[1] These types of psalms generally begin with a direct address to God before turning to a complaint. Thus, the opening questions in Habakkuk 1:2–3 are sincere queries directed to God. The declarations in verses 3 and 4 constitute the complaint.

Consider the way Psalm 13:1–2 opens, with similar emotionally raw questions:

How long, O LORD? Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
How long must I bear pain in my soul
and have sorrow in my heart all day long?
How long shall my enemy be exalted over me?

The language of lament is the language of honesty.

Prophetic lament offers an assessment of the prophet’s current feelings about life. He sees violence all around him and wonders how God relates to such destruction. The prophet notes that he has been crying for help without an answer. This language can be unsettling because of its authenticity and because many of us have been taught not to question God. Yet, here, the prophet boldly questions God’s response and presence.

The questions move to statements of complaint. Justice is not possible in a world of strife. The wicked overwhelm the systems at play and pervert judgments.

And distorted justice is not justice.

The prophet’s concerns likely involve the looming threat of violence from the Babylonian Empire. The book of Habakkuk is typically dated to the late seventh century BCE, only a few decades before the Babylonian exile. The Chaldeans, also known as Babylonians, are mentioned as a menacing presence outside of today’s reading in Habakkuk 1:6. However, dating this biblical book is difficult, and the lack of explicit historical references within the book complicates the effort.

Habakkuk 2:1–4: God’s response

How does God respond to these prophetic accusations and to Habakkuk’s questioning of divine presence?

God says, “There is still a vision.”

Indeed, this vision needs to be clearly written!

The present moment may appear destructive and violent to the prophet, but a new moment is coming. This is not the whole story. The wicked will not get the final word. Violence is not the only option.

But we may need to wait for the vision to unfold. God’s response implicitly acknowledges that the current, unacceptable reality is not easily or quickly transformed. It will require some waiting.

God’s response in the first three verses of Habakkuk 2 may seem fairly general and not entirely satisfying. God speaks of a forthcoming vision, with few details. Yet, it is a response to the prophet’s concerns. It is not silence. God has heard the cry of this prophet.

The passage concludes with a phrase we might recognize from another biblical context: “The righteous live by their faithfulness” (New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition). The apostle Paul, in Romans 1:17 and Galatians 3:11, uses this phrase in support of his concept of justification. In Habakkuk, the phrase points to the fact that the righteous trust God. They live their lives in faith, trusting God’s presence.

The righteous realize that God indeed has a vision—a dream—for the world. They wait and work for this dream’s arrival among us all.

Notes

1. For more information on lament psalms, see https://yalebiblestudy.org/courses/psalms/lessons/psalms-of-complaint-study-guide/.

The book of Lamentations emerges from the disorienting aftermath of a pivotal moment in ancient Israelite history: namely, the Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem in 587 BCE.

Over a decade, the Judahites’ entire world fell apart. The final catastrophic event of Jerusalem’s destruction—including the temple, the Davidic monarch’s palace, and the sacred walls of the city—shattered the foundations of Judahite culture, society, and theology. Judahites lost their national sovereignty, long-lasting and stable monarchy, and large, impressive capital city; their temple, where they claimed that their God, YHWH, lived; and the fortifications believed to be divinely and miraculously impregnable (see also Psalm 48).

After the destruction of the symbolic anchors by which people stabilized their faith and understood the purpose of their corporate life, a vacuum of meaning emerged. Many around the world are experiencing a similar vacuum of meaning today; for some individuals, the death of a loved one renders the world unrecognizable, and for some communities, unending strife and oppression saps the dominant ideologies of their power to make sense of life’s non-sense. Lamentations’ disorientation and multiple layers of meaning mirror this situation.¹

The simultaneous collapse of this cultural, political, and theological structure was felt as the loss of meaning itself. Judaeans like Jeremiah asked pointed questions (Jeremiah 14:19–22): Was YHWH defeated by the gods of Babylon?² Did YHWH reject Judah? Was it even possible to mend this relationship, if YHWH—or Judah—ever wanted to do so?

To grasp the magnitude of the crisis, we need to understand the importance of Jerusalem and the Davidic monarchy in the symbolic world of ancient Judahites. They repeatedly emphasized a promise God had made to David (2 Samuel 7, 23; Psalms 2, 89, 110, 132), that Jerusalem would be safe and the Davidic line would reign forever. Prophets such as Isaiah reminded the people that faith in YHWH was simultaneously faith in the security of Jerusalem (Isaiah 7) and in the Davidic line, even though it faltered at times (Isaiah 9; 11).

It is important to remember that, outside of Israel and Judah, “covenant” was not a theological or religious concept in the ancient world. In fact, we know of no god in recorded history besides YHWH who makes a covenant with a people. “Covenant,” in the ancient sense, refers to a contract or a deal. Covenants covered various realms of life, including marriage and adoption. Other ancient cultures would have thought a contract with a god demeaning and strangely limiting for any god who claimed to be powerful. But in Israel and Judah, the covenant meant God could hold Judah (and even the Davidic king) accountable.

It also meant the people could hold YHWH accountable. The concept of a covenant as a symbolic marital bond between the people and YHWH led to metaphors of marriage in Judahite prophetic discourse, as found in the ethically problematic texts of Hosea 1–3 and Ezekiel 16. One must tread carefully and sensitively in these theological texts: they can be, and have often been, understood to promote and condone the abuse of women.³ Language in Lamentations 1, particularly in verses 8–9, alludes to sexual assault.⁴

In the ancient Middle East, many cultures personified cities as women (see also Isaiah 47:1), and in many of the prophets of ancient Judah, Jerusalem was imagined as the character “Daughter Zion” (Isaiah 1:8; Jeremiah 6:23; Micah 4:13; Zechariah 2:10). Paired with the covenant metaphor that imaged God as the spouse of the capital city, which was unique in the ancient context, this explains why the demise of the covenant—the destruction of Jerusalem, the desecration of the temple, and the end of the Davidic line (see also 2 Kings 25)––was nothing less than devastating to Judahites. To conceive of this incomprehensible situation, Judahite authors reimagined the devastation as a drama in which Daughter Zion was physically and emotionally abused.

In Lamentations, we hear the voice of a narrator who observes and describes Daughter Zion, and then we hear from Daughter Zion herself. In this way, Lamentations is a dialogue designed to help readers process and heal from these traumatic experiences.

The anonymous narrator tends to affirm traditional theological explanations for the disaster, frequently attributing it to the sins of the people, and seems to give voice to God’s perspective as a way of instructing us, the audience, about what happened—and why.⁵ Daughter Zion, on the other hand, gives voice to the raw pain and anguish of the trauma; she often questions, and sometimes challenges, the traditional theological framework.

The opening word of Lamentations, ’eka, typically asks a question, but here it expresses overwhelming shock and dismay: “How?!” In the Jewish tradition, this statement of shock (How) in Hebrew (‘Eka) is the very name of the biblical book. The speaker of verses 1–6 is the anonymous narrator, and it appears as if the narrator is engaging us in conversation about the suffering Zion as she weeps.

According to the narrator, Daughter Zion’s overwhelming sense is loneliness (1:1). Those who suffer from traumatic experiences often report a sense of detachment and isolation from others who do not understand, and at times simply ignore, the effects the trauma has on them. Daughter Zion explains that she feels like a widow (1:1), not only vulnerable (Exodus 22:21) but also having lost the social fabric of those she once relied upon and whose relationships gave sense and order to the world. In terms of the covenant analogy, Zion’s husband was YHWH. But YHWH is gone and she is abandoned, unsure whether restoration will ever be possible (5:22).

While YHWH was presumed to be the vigorous champion of orphans, widows, and aliens (Deuteronomy 24:19–21)—representing all vulnerable people who lack significant social bonds that ensure their well-being—the destruction of Jerusalem, and YHWH’s apparent absence or perhaps death, has thrown everything into question. The widow Daughter Zion cannot count on YHWH’s presence or aid. In the ancient world, vulnerable people were often taken advantage of and forced to work (mas, verse 1; ‘abodah, verse 3) for the powerful, as happened to the Hebrews in Egypt (Exodus 1:10–11).

Because of her suffering, Zion weeps (verse 2). Mention of her “lovers”  and “friends” by the narrator (verse 2) refers to the foreign nations with which Judah made alliances and foreign gods that some of the kings and inhabitants served—a violation of the exclusive marriage-like covenant with YHWH (see also Hosea 2). They have now abandoned her, and so has YHWH. The former city of Jerusalem, reduced to a pile of rubble, attracts no visitors now, in distinction to its previously popular pilgrimage festivals (verse 4). Ultimately, the narrator argues, YHWH has done this because of the “breach of contract” (verse 5).

Starting at the end of verse 9, Daughter Zion herself speaks, which offers an important perspective and a counterbalance to the theological claims of the narrator. A repeated refrain, especially in chapter 1, is that there is “no one to comfort her” (1:2, 16, 21). Zion asks God to look at her (1:9, 11, 20) and asks the passersby to stop and notice her (1:12), but no one does—except for us, the readers, and the anonymous narrator: We see, and feel, her pain. We witness her suffering, and by witnessing it, we might help her know that her experiences are not only real—they matter. Kathleen O’Connor argues that a major theological contribution of Lamentations is its theology of witnessing to the existence and persistence of suffering.⁶

Many recent scholars have argued that the conversational structure of Lamentations is designed to help people process trauma.⁷ Daughter Zion’s passionate laments provide a cathartic outlet for the pain and anger felt by the ancient residents of the devastated Judah—and by those who have lived through similarly devastating experiences ever since. Verbalizing and legitimizing these emotions are important aspects of the healing process.

The dialogue between these voices creates a form of witnessing to the trauma—which is crucial in trauma recovery. The back-and-forth conversation also reflects the non-linear nature of grappling with traumatic experiences, moving in cycles of grief, anger, acceptance, and questioning. By not fully resolving the tension between these voices, and ending the book with an open question about the unknown future (5:22), Lamentations creates space for readers to hold the ambiguity and uncertainty that often accompany trauma.

For preachers, it is important to understand Lamentations as a difficult and painful conversation that nevertheless offers a space for healing. As a biblical book, it presents complex, but potentially rich, homiletical possibilities.

For those who are suffering, it may guide a process of reflecting on harmful experiences and modeling ways to voice anger, confusion, and guilt. For those who are not suffering in ways similar to Daughter Zion, Lamentations can create space in community to witness to diverse voices, perspectives, and experiences. A ministry of witness can be a powerful tool for collective healing, especially amid a culture that often tries to hide uncomfortable experiences and feelings under a façade of cheeriness and optimism.

Notes

1. See Elizabeth Boase, The Fulfillment of Doom? The Dialogic Interaction between the Book of Lamentations and the Pre-Exilic/Early Exilic Prophetic Literature, LHBOTS 437 (New York: T&T Clark, 2006), 17; F. W. Dobbs-Allsopp, Lamentations: A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching (Louisville: John Knox, 2002), 61.
2. Nancy C. Lee, The Singers of Lamentations: Cities under Siege, from Ur to Jerusalem to Sarajevo (Leiden: Brill, 2002), 69–130.
3. See Renita Weems, Battered Love: Marriage, Sex, and Violence in the Hebrew Prophets (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1995), 1–51.
4. See Deryn Guest, “Hiding Behind the Naked Women in Lamentations: A Recriminative Response,” BibInt 7 (1999): 413–48
5. Carleen Mandolfo, “Dialogic Form Criticism: An Intertextual Reading of Lamentations and Psalms of Lament,” in Bakhtin and Genre Theory in Biblical Studies, ed. Roland Boer (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2007), 85.
6. Kathleen O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2002), 3.
7. See O’Connor, Lamentations; Mandolfo, “Dialogic Form Criticism.”

I had a seminary professor who insisted that when we wrote about someone else’s point of view, even someone whose words and actions we found problematic, reprehensible, or “wicked” (verse 1), we should write in such a way that they would say, “You have represented me fairly. This is what I think, and this is why I think this way.” If we are not sure they would respond this way as the judges of whether they were represented fairly (just as we would surely want to be the judges of whether we were represented fairly), we still had work to do. It was not uncommon for this professor to hand papers back and tell her students to try again because they had not stepped out of their own convictions, biases, and judgments enough to “refrain from anger, and forsake wrath,” and the result led “only to evil” (verse 8). This professor taught in the spirit of Psalm 37.

The verb in the phrase “do not fret,” which opens this psalm and is repeated three times (verses 1, 7, 8), can be variously translated as to burn, be kindled, rival, try to outdo, or become indignant. It speaks of a hot, competitive, “envious” (verse 1) anger that cannot see clearly because of a singular focus on those labeled “wrongdoers” (verse 1). This is the kind of “steam coming out the ears” anger that can result in mirroring the behavior that the fretting one finds so upsetting. The psalmist, looking back on his long life (verse 25), knows well the cycles of violence and evil that are perpetuated when people respond to situations out of fiery fretting and do not patiently “trust in the LORD” for a just and secure future (verses 3–6).

In this season of unceasing breaking news in the United States, the phrase “do not fret” may feel impossible for many. This wisdom may sound idealistic or even problematic, like a naïve call to toxic positivity or to a complacent passivity that ignores the plight of the “poor and needy” (verse 14).

The preacher will want to preach with empathy and pastoral care. This psalm is intended as a comforting assurance for hearers of the Lord’s trustworthiness precisely at a time when there is clear reason to fret—the psalmist acknowledges that people are plotting against his hearers, drawing their swords, and even killing “those who walk uprightly” (verses 13–14). Thus, this psalm is not starry-eyed advice from one who is out of touch with the realities of the world. It is not meant to deny the validity of people’s emotions or their good desire to do something about the wickedness they see.

Fretting doesn’t just happen. Fretting is a signal that the fretter’s values have been crossed; it is a vital alarm that something is wrong. One who has never fretted has never taken in the depth of humanity’s sinfulness and capacity to harm one another and the planet we live on. As the famous Viktor Frankl saying goes, however, “Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”

For Christians, the space of which Frankl speaks is filled with many things. It is filled with the command to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18; Matthew 19:19; Mark 12:31; Luke 10:27); the command not to judge, lest you set yourself up as a god, “knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:5, 22; Matthew 7:1–5); and the command not to “bear false witness against your neighbor” (Exodus 20:16; Deuteronomy 5:20). Martin Luther extends the latter to coming to our neighbor’s defense, speaking well of them, and interpreting “everything they do in the best possible light.”¹ Try doing that in this quick-to-judge, “us and them” world when what the person or people do has you fuming with anger!

Beyond these commandments, of which even we who think of ourselves as the faithful and righteous ones cannot be trusted to fulfill even one (see also Romans 7:14–25), the space between the stimulus of fretting and our response to what we see is filled with trust in the one who is faithful to act: the Lord our God. This is who the psalmist points us to over and over again (verses 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9). He doesn’t say more than he knows. He doesn’t try to give the specifics of exactly when and how wrongdoers will “fade like the grass and wither like the green herb” (verse 1), but he proclaims that God’s promises are sure, that God is our “refuge,” “help,” and “salvation” (verses 39–40), and that trust in the Lord leads to life (verses 3–4).

Ultimately, in the space between the stimulus of our fretting and our response stands the cross of Christ. The trustworthiness of God to which the psalmist points is embodied in the One who was plotted against and had the sword drawn against him (verses 12–14), but who responded from a place not of fretfulness but of mercy, saying from the cross, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34).

Through the Holy Spirit, this One even now knocks on the doors of your people’s hearts as you preach, saying, “Peace be with you” (John 20:19), putting their old; fretting, fixating selves to death; and raising their new selves with new hearts (Ezekiel 36:26) to freedom and “delight in the LORD” (verse 4) who upholds them (verse 17).

Imagine what is possible now. How might it differ to respond from a place of trust rather than fretting?

Notes

1. Robert Kolb and Timothy J. Wengert, eds., The Book of Concord: The Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, trans. Charles P. Arand et al. (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2000), 353.

“There are two questions that we have to ask ourselves. The first is ‘Where am I going?’ and the second is ‘Who will go with me?’ If you ever get these questions in the wrong order, you are in trouble.” —Howard Thurman

In our lives of faith, we may be surrounded by a large crowd or a small group of trusted companions. Whatever the size of our community, we are born with a need to walk this road of life with fellow travelers. We need to “go with” others on the path we have been set upon by discipleship. God has placed this need in our hearts, minds, and spirits. The support of community bolsters us. The guidance of community heartens us. This resource of communal inspiration reminds us of where we are going and gives us the strength to continue walking in every season. We are empowered by those who walk with us.  

Empowered by heritage

In chapter 1, the author of 2 Timothy subtly, yet profoundly, points us toward the resource of ancestry. We walk in the path of those who have come before. Whether we are connected to them by blood or by faith, they are with us in tangible ways. Verses 3 and 5 remind us that we have an ancestral heritage that is not merely nostalgic.  

This heritage may go back generations, and as we recall how our ancestors walked out their faith, we are reminded of God’s faithfulness. They were not perfect. Yet, God was with them. Your cloud of witnesses (Hebrews 12:1) may include literal family, like Timothy’s mother and grandmother, Eunice and Lois. Or you may have been adopted by aunts or uncles who, though not blood-related, walked with you in love and faith. What do you recall of your heritage of faith? What did those who came before model for you, and how did their faith plant seeds of faith in your life? We find ourselves returning to our ancestors’ witness and are empowered. Their lives testify to the faithfulness of God. This testimony bears good fruit.

For those who may not know about or who are not able to recall a lineage of faith in their heritage, there is a blessed reminder that through Christ, we are connected to all who have come before us. We do not only look to our family of origin but also to our family of discipleship. We look to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. We look to Miriam, Mary, and Joanna.  Those whose names we do not know, like the Samaritan woman at the well and the Ethiopian eunuch, are our ancestors. Look to them, and be empowered to continue on the road, following Jesus.

Empowered by the Holy Spirit

Our text illuminates another source of empowerment that is even more deeply rooted than our ancestral heritage. Second Timothy is contextualized as a letter written to one who is ministering to those who have received the Holy Spirit as counsel and comforter holistically. They are living out their faith in a post-Pentecost reality, as are we. Second Timothy  1:6–14 explicitly shares ways the Holy Spirit empowers the body of Christ. 

6 For this reason I remind you to rekindle the gift of God that is within you through the laying on of my hands, 7 for God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather a spirit of power and of love and of self-discipline. … 14 Guard the good deposit entrusted to you, with the help of the Holy Spirit living in us.

Overwhelmingly and awesomely, the same Spirit of God that rested upon Jesus in his ministry rests upon us. The ancient power that hovered over the water as creation came into focus is with us, empowering our life and ministry. We have gifting through the Spirit (verse 6), and this gifting is to be used to serve. We are reminded of our Spirit-given identity, which is formed as courage, love, and wisdom by the Spirit (verse 7). We are assured that the charge of carrying the Gospel within us and sharing it through our lives of faith will be aided by the power of the Holy Spirit. Moreover, we will not need to search outside ourselves for this power, for it lives in us (verse 14).  

Therefore, when we feel helpless and even useless, we look to the gifts of the Spirit that have been imparted to us, and we are re-centered. We are not without resources when we are scared, hard-hearted, and out of control. We have a fount of strength, grace, mercy, and love to re-form us as the Christ-one we have been created to be. When we lose sight of where we are going, we have an internal compass and an ever-abiding companion recalling our ministry and mission bound up in the Gospel.  

Conclusion

Our lineage of ancestral faith and Holy Spirit formation means we are never alone on the journey of discipleship. We have chosen our path, and God’s provision has given us companions on the road. Second Timothy 1:1–14 is a powerful, pastoral word that unites us through what connects us to our calling. We are gathered by our heritage and the formation of the Holy Spirit. 

As we come together, we return to our call as the body of Christ. We are equipped for this calling with courage, love, and wisdom. Yes, we will face hardships. Yet, as we look to our cloud of witnesses—the ones who have come before us and those who walk alongside us—we are empowered. As we grow in our Holy Spirit formation, we can fulfill the work of guarding and sharing the “good deposit” with which we have been entrusted. 

May we hold to our heritage and the Holy Spirit. May we trust the witness of those who have come before. May we trust the power of the One who lives within.