I love reading different Bible translations. Gets me out of the ruts I often create in my Bible reading. I like looking how a verse takes on new meaning with a slightly different translation of certain words. 2 Timothy 4 begins with a command to preach the word. “Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season.” [vs 2 NKJV]
How often have we heard about the necessity to be ready “in season and out of season?” I decided to see how that verse is translated in the Holman Christian Standard Bible, which is now my favorite translation. “Proclaim the message; persist in it whether convenient or not.”
Persist in it, whether convenient or not. When has the Gospel ever been convenient? I have never known it to be such. The Gospel demands that we know its truth and that we live its truth. It demands that our conduct matches our words. It demands that we sacrifice, that we surrender. It commands us to praise during trials and to worship our God in spirit and truth. It tells us that His joy is the source of power and strength. It reminds us to pray always.
The immediately following verses in Timothy also give us pause. “…rebuke, correct, and encourage with great patience and teaching. For the time will come when they will not tolerate sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, will multiply teachers for themselves because they have an itch to hear something new. They will turn away from hearing the truth and will turn aside to myths.” [2 Timothy 4:3-4 HCSB]
Not only is proclaiming the Gospel not convenient, but it is also not easy. People really do not want to hear the old sound doctrine of the Scriptures. They want something “new.” New and improved is the motto of our day and age, but there is nothing new in the Scriptures. It is that old, old story that still changes lives and brings hope to a dying world.
So convenient or not – easy or not – we are to always be ready to bring that old, sweet message to others.
