¹³But evil men and impostors will proceed from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. ¹⁴You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them, ¹⁵and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.

The choice of which trajectory to take belongs to each of us individually. Paul waxes black and white here. We must avoid the altogether too easy application of this passage as pertaining only to Timothy and to Christians in clearly defined leadership roles in the church. Paul calls Timothy to model the Christian life for all believers (see 1 Tim. 4:12). Part of the modeling is to follow Paul’s example, which is to teach others who will, in turn, teach others (2 Tim. 2:2). Eventually, this comes down to those who read this passage: you and me. So all Christians should follow this practice of Paul and Timothy. Therefore, to argue that this teaching is only for Timothy is specious, superficial. All Christians should aspire to godliness as exemplified herein.

So Timothy’s choice is our choice. On the one hand, the temptation is toward the path of false, inauthentic Christian living—the path of hypocrisy that everyone is quick to point out in others and which gives the church a bad reputation. This situation will only get worse because of the inauthentic “Christianity” in which many garb themselves to look and feel spiritual. In the worst-case scenario, Paul certainly can describe false teachers as “evil men and impostors.” But false teachers themselves are models who produce replicates of the same kind. We can surely extend this description to all who live inauthentic Christian lives, for they deceive themselves and others into thinking they are spiritual when they are in truth “lovers of self” (2 Tim. 3:2).

The better choice, of course, is to continue walking in wisdom and knowledge of the Word of God. In Timothy’s case, this began with his maternal teaching from his childhood and continued through learning from the apostle Paul, culminating in the teaching of the gospel of salvation. It all comes back to grace; the salvation that Scripture teaches comes through faith. And since it comes through faith, it must be sourced in God’s grace (Eph. 2:8–9), and therefore cannot come through merit-producing works. We trust God that His salvation is freely given. This trust is the beginning of wisdom, for it hits at the very core of God’s truth. And it is found at the cross. We are reminded of Paul’s comments to the Corinthians, “I determined to know nothing . . . except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2).

Lord, I continue to choose the path of grace and faith that brought me to salvation through Jesus Christ on the cross. I choose authenticity.