2 Timothy 1:7-8 “God has not given us a spirit of fear, but one of power, love, and sound judgment. So don’t be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, or of me his prisoner. Instead, share in suffering for the gospel, relying on the power of God” (CSB).

Preaching the gospel landed the Apostle Paul in prison. Jail cells were nothing new to him. He had lived in them for a time in Jerusalem, Philippi, Caesarea, and Rome. But this time was different. This time he wasn’t in prison because someone had made false accusations. This time the government itself wanted to get rid of him. Leaders at the very top had begun to see Christian teachings as a threat to the Roman way of life. They didn’t fit the kind of society they were trying to build. Christians refused to participate in state-sponsored religion. That was seen as divisive. Christians were breaking down traditional beliefs and practices about class and social position. The authorities worried that it would be hard to govern people who didn’t know or accept their place. To the Romans, Christian beliefs weren’t just wrong. They were dangerous. People like Paul who spread them had to go.

The beliefs judged unacceptable have changed. The consequences for promoting them are less severe. But similarities remain in the dynamic between faithful Christian teaching and our broader culture today. You are certainly aware that June is pride month. Biblical Christians don’t want gay people to be hurt or mistreated. But they also insist that marriage, by definition, will always be limited to a man and a woman (see Matthew 19:4-6). Sexual activity belongs only inside the married relationship (see Hebrews 13:4). Leaders in many industries, judges in courtrooms, teachers and administrators in the universities, and a large percentage of the general population find such historic Christian beliefs not just mistaken, not just ignorant, not just a quirky old-fashioned way of looking at it, but dangerous, mean, and immoral. Christianity’s consistent, two-thousand-year-old teaching on matters of sex and marriage should not be tolerated, to their way of thinking. Christians should be shamed into giving it up, if necessary. This may mean denying them positions of leadership, maybe the opportunity to work at all. Some of those who resist should be made public examples of. This has been especially true in the entertainment industry.

Note that the teachings that landed Paul in prison were not the death and resurrection of Jesus per se. I don’t know that the Romans cared what the Christians believed happened to Jesus or who he was. It was the Christian way of life that gave them grief. But the Christian teaching all hangs together as a unit. It’s not as though we get to pick and choose which things Jesus’ taught we want to follow. Paul understood the temptation for Timothy to be shamed out of his Christian beliefs.  

We need to understand the temptation and the pressure to be shamed out of ours. “So don’t be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, or of me his prisoner.” Following Jesus may mean taking some grief for what we believe, for any number of unpopular teachings. Paul is saying to us here, “Don’t give in to the shame others try to impose. Lay it aside.”