The National Director of the Australian Fellowship of Evangelical Students (AFES), Richard Chin, has begun preaching through 2 Timothy at our church. When he covered chapter 2, we received a couple of questions. I ended up answering them as the pastor here.

Question: 2 Timothy 2:13-14 says, “if we are faithless, he [Christ] remains faithful—for he cannot deny himself”. Can you explain to whom is God faithful?

Sometimes people have taken verse 13 as saying that even when we sin and let God down (which we all do), God will stick with us. He won't ever let us down. Instead, they suggest that (as verse 13 says) he will remain faithful to us. We might be unreliable, but God won't give up on us.

These thoughts can be comforting, and you can probably find other passages of the Bible to underwrite them (e.g. Rom 5:8-10; 1 John 1:9). Yes, even when we fail again and again, God is willing to forgive us if we repent!

However, I am certain that this is not what 2 Timothy 2:13 is talking about!

Rather than offering assurance despite our continuing struggle with sin, this verse is offering a solemn warning about the dangers of apostasy. (The Macquarie Dictionary defines apostasy as “a total desertion of, or departure from, one's religion, principles, party, cause”.) I'll see if I can explain. It becomes more obvious when you print the verse in its context (using the NIV):

2:11	Here is a trustworthy saying:
	If we died with him,
	we will also live with him;
2:12	if we endure,
	we will also reign with him.
	If we disown him,
	he will also disown us;
2:13	if we are faithless,
	he will remain faithful,
	for he cannot disown himself.

You'll notice from the layout that this section of Paul's letter to Timothy seems to be quoting a common Christian saying, or perhaps an early Christian hymn. You can tell this by the indented layout in the English translations. But you can also tell it has a poetic style by noticing the so-called parallelism.

In English, basic poetry most often uses rhyme. But poetry from biblical times often uses parallelism. The most basic form of parallelism is where the same thing is said in two slightly different ways. The ideas run in parallel! That's exactly what's going on in verses 11-13.

Let's see if we can outline the pattern.

v. 11B	If we died with him (i.e. Christ)	something good by us, then
v. 11C	we will also live with him	something good for us from Christ
v. 12A	If we endure	something good by us, then
v. 12B	we will also reign with him	something good for us from Christ
v. 12C	If we disown him	something bad by us, then
v. 12D	he will also disown us	something bad for us from Christ
v. 13A	If we are faithless,	something bad by us, then
v. 13B	he will remain faithful ...

The pattern should be pretty clear. There are two positive actions by Christians followed by two positive outcomes for us. Then there are two negative actions by us. The pattern suggests that if the first of these is followed by a bad outcome for us, then the second should also be followed by a bad outcome for us.

By the parallel between verse 12D and verse 13B, we ought to understand “he [i.e. Christ] will remain faithful” as meaning something bad for us—that is, Jesus disowning us. Verse 13C confirms this when it gives the reason for the prior statement: Christ cannot disown himself.

That is, the answer to the original question is that Christ will be faithful to himself—to his own character and promises, rather than to those who are faithless.

In this context, by the parallel, we can now also see that us being faithless (v. 13A) means disowning Christ (v. 12C). In other words, it's talking about the very particular sin of apostasy—the public and settled denial of Christ—rather than the general fact that Christians continue to struggle with sin and failure this side of heaven.

This fits the context of the letter where Paul is urging Timothy to “not be ashamed of the testimony about our Lord, nor of me [Paul] his prisoner”, even if it means suffering for the gospel (2 Tim 1:8). In contrast, we discover that “all who are in Asia turned away from [Paul], among whom are Phygelus and Hermogenes” (1:15; see also 4:10, 4:16). Denying the gospel of Jesus and betraying those who preach him is the big temptation.

This also matches up with the sobering warning of the Lord Jesus himself in Mark 8:38: “For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.”.

(By the way, I discovered my understanding of this verse was confirmed by an excellent book on how to understand the Bible: Dig Deeper: Tools for Understanding God's Word by Nigel Benyon and Andrew Sach. You can read the particular reference, courtesy of the publisher, Crossway. You can also browse information about the book and all 16 of its tools for good Bible reading here. I recommend it highly.)

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