1 Timothy 1:5
The goal of this command is love, which comes from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith.
Observe that the motive of all effective ministry is love. Like Paul, let every follower, worshipper and minister of Christ ensure that his or her motivation is agape-love. Lest jealousy, envy, fear, pride and other ulterior motives should hold sway!
Note also that Paul the qualifies his love-based ministry by means of three ingredients. Firstly, love driven ministry springs from a pure heart. It is quite possible, beloved, for our hearts to be polluted by all sorts of weights and sins (see Hebrews 12:1; 1 John 1:9). Yet it is our responsibility to regularly throw off these weights and sins. Will you by faith be cleansed today from all unrighteous thoughts, attitudes and motives? Let the blood of Jesus purify your heart through and through.
Secondly, our love-based ministry must spring from a good conscience. Note that it’s not just any conscience that is required–but a good one. That means it is quite possible for you and I to have a bad conscience. Your conscience is bad when it is unreliable or contradicts the Word of God. A bad conscience is like a faulty watch or an inaccurate scale–it misleads its user! My dear friend in Christ, how good is your conscience these days?
Thirdly, our love-based ministry must spring from sincere faith. The word translated “sincere” here literally means un-hypocritical, unfeigned or pure. Thus, it’s not enough to talk about having faith, beloved. Rather, we must frequently check the quality or purity of our faith. We must not fake faith. We must not pretend to believe, brethren! Let us truly trust in God and His Word.
That is exactly why many believers faith is ineffective. Oh, how much we would achieve if we consistently walked by faith unfeigned! God would be pleased and His rewards would be flowing continuously in and through our lives (Hebrews 11:6). Will you love and serve the Lord from a pure heart, a good conscience and faith unfeigned?
Pastor Josh