From the time you and I were infants we passed through various types of training, things like potty training and learning to eat with a fork. After conquering those mountains, I learned to swim (pretty well) and play the piano (not so good), to catch a baseball and read a book. All skills we must practice in order to get better. As an adult I trained as a communicator and I worked to develop as a gardener.

If you want to get good at anything, you have to practice, to hone your technique, to train.

So should it surprise us when Paul tells Timothy, the young church-planter, to train yourself to be godly?

How to set about such training? Paul encourages Timothy to focus on the Lord. Command and teach the truth. Set an example in speech, conduct, love, faith and purity. Read the Scriptures publicly. Listen to the Holy Spirit and lean into his gift in your life. Watch your life and doctrine closely. Stay diligent. Persevere.

Just like athletic training or intense study or gaining new expertise, we train ourselves to be godly.

Notice we don’t gain godliness through a mysterious force or a bolt of lightning. You won’t find your personal regimen toward godliness on social media or even in the many good books on the Christian life.

Instead, open the scriptures and focus on the Lord and ask the Holy Spirit to guide you. Don’t merely nod to the concepts you discover—give yourself wholly to them.

Then do the same thing tomorrow and the next day.

And never stop.

1 Timothy 4 in reading the Bible cover to cover in 2022

Photo by Bruno Nascimento