All that Will Live Godly

Paul's epistles to Timothy were very poignant to me. Often my reading for class ends up going by without a thought, and I come to the end, having read every word, but having no clue what I had read. Not every time--but since in my head it is homework, it sort of fuzzes out sometimes.

But as I was reading through 1 and 2 Timothy, I found myself pausing several times to re-read a verse, mark it, make notes. I got stuck like this pretty quickly: the first verse that arrested me was 1 Tim 1:5 - "Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned." Normally, when I think of feigning faith, I have typically thought of the enlarging-their-phylacteries type of hypocrite, whose goal is to show others how faithful they are. But as I read this verse the thought struck me that perhaps even more harmful than convincing other people is feigning to yourself that you are more faithful than you are.

Another verse that made me pause was 2 Timothy 3:12 - "Yea, and all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution." The beautiful thing about studying with the guidance of the Spirit is that you can see the scriptures in a whole different context, or in ways you hadn't ever thought of before. In this case, I realized that persecution doesn't only mean people being intolerant of your beliefs--in fact, here in Provo I rarely feel "persecuted" by other people. But what is hostile to my beliefs and my testimony is the fact that I live in a world of temptations, constantly wearing at my desire and resolve to keep the commandments and follow in the Savior's path.

So then the question quietly surfaced, If I live in a world full of temptations, with so much spiritual persecution all around me constantly, how can I consistently remain faithful? Fortunately I kept reading, and I found Titus 1:15 - "unto the pure all things are pure." As I look for good things in the world and focus on those instead of only avoiding the bad, I will see and recognize the good things more. Perhaps, I thought, even though temptations may surround me constantly, if I am pure and faithful, all things will be pure unto me.