II Timothy 1:7 “For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline (sound judgment).”  Paul’s letter of II Timothy was a personal letter of encouragement and instruction to Timothy himself and not to a church.  Paul wrote fourteen books or letters of the New Testament and only three of them were to individual spiritual leaders.  Two of them were to Timothy and one was to Titus.  Timothy was a third generation Christian having been led to Christ by the teaching of Scripture by his mother, Eunice, and his grandmother, Lois.  He was being mentored and disciple by Paul as he served as the pastor of the church at Ephesus.  Timothy was still young in his 40’s and from Paul’s writings to him, he seemed to be timid and somewhat passive.  Paul wanted him to be a strong leader and admonished him in our Scripture today to not be timid, but to be realized and use the power, love and sound judgment God had given him. 

There is a real message on spiritual leadership to us from this letter of personal instruction.  We are not to be timid.  We are to be strong and decisive and think through our decisions (sound judgment).  The easiest way to mishandle decisions and issues for a leader is to ignore facing up to them.  This is passive leadership which is doomed to fail in any walk of our lives.  When God reveals to us through His Spirit and His Word what we ought to do, we must lead with boldness, power, love and sound judgment.  Paul clearly states that our power, love and sound judgment is give to us by God Himself.  This means that we must do three things to receive it:  1) Pray to seek guidance, 2) Listen to the Holy Spirit and 3) Search God’s Word for the answer.  If we do this, we will not be timid and will lead as God leads us.