Remembering Your Leaders

"The fear of man lays a snare" (Prov. 9:25). The third unspoken evil preventing acceptable service of worship is withdrawing from Christ through fear and intimidation. The apostle seeks to encourage his faltering readers from pulling away from the Christian faith by pointing them to the faithful leaders that God placed over them. These men were ordinary believers whom God called to the task of teaching them the Word of God. These men faithfully pursued their calling and graduated to glory in the manner Paul describes in 2 Timothy 4:6-8. The reader should hold in memory such persons, imitating their faithfulness and contemplating their departure.