“Cling to your faith in Christ, and keep your conscience clear. For some people have deliberately violated their consciences; as a result, their faith has been shipwrecked.”
As I read this it kept speaking to me and challenging me to share so here I go. "Cling to your faith in Christ..." we must realize how important our faith is, that is what makes us shine in this dark world. When we hear about Jesus and we start to believe we must cling to Him because He is our strength. Look at Philippians chapter 4 verse 13 which says, “For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength.” When we cling to this we are not tossed by every thing that happens in life, we step through all situations with hope and people see Christ in us.
When our conscience is clear we can hear the Holy Spirit guiding us to all truth and we don't think of ways to live for ourselves. Faith can grow and as it does we transform into His image, the way we are suppose to be, in surrender to His will. When we don't fully surrender we want things to matter that don't matter and we deliberately try and push our agenda instead of Jesus as Lord. Paul's letter to Timothy is stating, and it is good for us to remember as well, don't stray off the Good News about Christ. If we let other things cloud our knowledge about Jesus then those things become our focus, and that's not what it is about. Look at what Paul says in 1 Timothy chapter 1 verse 4 it says, "Don’t let them waste their time in endless discussion of myths and spiritual pedigrees. These things only lead to meaningless speculations, which don’t help people live a life of faith in God.” It is better when we seek Jesus and share who He is.
I love what it says in Colossians chapter 2 verse 7, “Let your roots grow down into Him, and let your lives be built on Him. Then your faith will grow strong in the truth you were taught, and you will overflow with thankfulness.” Our roots will grow into Him and our faith will grow and all the things we want to debate will not be essentials that keep us fighting. We will see Jesus and what He did, and that will drive us to be like Him. Then our love will grow as well and we can truly make an impact in this world. Let's keep our conscience clear and love like Jesus loved and truly be fully devoted followers of Jesus. Amen