For Everyone
1 Timothy 2:1–6 (NIV)
1 I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people — 2 for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. 3 This is good, and pleases God our Savior, 4 who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. 5 For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave himself as a ransom for all people. This has now been witnessed to at the proper time.
First of All
Yesterday we saw Paul remember who he used to be. He called himself the worst of sinners, and he praised God for the patience that saved him anyway.
Now he turns back to Timothy and the church in Ephesus. It is a church with problems. There are false teachers. There are arguments. There are people who have, in Paul’s words, “shipwrecked their faith.”
So what is the first thing Paul tells Timothy to fix? Not the teaching program. Not the leadership structure. Not the troublemakers.
“I urge, then, first of all…”
First of all, pray.
That order says something. When a church is in trouble, and when our own lives are in trouble, we usually reach for a plan. Paul reaches for prayer first. Not as the last resort when the plans fail, but as the starting point before anything else.
Four Kinds of Prayer
“Petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving.”
Paul uses four different words here. Bible scholars have tried to draw sharp lines between them, but the simple point is that prayer has more than one shape.
Petitions are asking for a specific need. Prayers is the general word, coming to God at all. Intercession is standing in for someone else, bringing their name to God when they may not bring it themselves. Thanksgiving is gratitude.
I notice that thanksgiving is on the list. Paul is not only telling Timothy to ask God for things for other people. He is telling him to thank God for them too.
That is harder than it sounds. It is easy to pray for a difficult person to change. It is a different thing to thank God for them.
Even for Kings
“For all people — for kings and all those in authority.”
Here Paul gets specific. Pray for the people in charge.
We should remember who was in charge when this letter was written. The emperor in Rome at the time was most likely Nero. He was not a friend of the church. Within a few years he would blame Christians for the great fire of Rome and have many of them killed.
Paul does not say pray for good rulers. He does not say pray for rulers who agree with you. He says pray for “kings and all those in authority.” All of them.
And notice the reason he gives.
“That we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness.”
Paul is not asking for power or influence for the church. He is asking for quiet. Room to live a faithful life, to work, to raise a family, to worship without fear. A peaceful, ordinary life is something worth praying for, and Paul says it is worth praying for the people whose decisions shape it, whoever they are.
God Wants All People
“This is good, and pleases God our Savior, who wants all people to be saved.”
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Now we come to the heart of the passage. Why should we pray for all people, even rulers who are against us?
Because of what God is like. He “wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.”
This is the reason behind the prayer. We pray for everyone because God cares about everyone. Our prayers are meant to have the same reach as his heart.
It is worth being careful here. Paul does not say that all people will be saved. The rest of Scripture is honest that people can turn away. What Paul says is what God desires. God is not reluctant. He is not looking for reasons to leave people out. His wish is for every person to come home.
That changes how I look at the people around me. The colleague I find difficult. The neighbour who has never been to church. The leader on the news whose decisions I disagree with. God wants every one of them to be saved. If that is what he wants, then I should be praying for them, not just complaining about them.
One Mediator
“For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus.”
Paul now explains how this salvation is possible.
There is one God. Not a different god for each nation, or each kind of person. One God over everyone. That is why the prayer is for everyone.
And there is one mediator. A mediator is someone who stands between two sides and brings them together. To do that, a mediator has to belong to both sides.
That is why Paul says “the man Christ Jesus.” He chooses the word man on purpose. Jesus is fully God, but he also became fully human. He knows our side. He was tired, hungry, tempted, grieved. He stands between God and us as one of us.
There is real comfort in the word one. We do not need a list of go-betweens. We do not need to earn a better position before we can come. There is one way back to God, and it is a person who has already made the way open.
A Ransom for All
“Who gave himself as a ransom for all people.”
A ransom is the price paid to set a captive free. Jesus did not pay with money. He paid with himself.
And again Paul says it: “for all people.” It is the third time in six verses that phrase, or something close to it, appears. Pray for all people. God wants all people to be saved. Christ gave himself as a ransom for all people.
Paul keeps repeating it because he does not want Timothy, or us, to miss it. The gospel is not for a small inner circle. It is not only for the people who already look like us, believe like us, or vote like us.
“This has now been witnessed to at the proper time.”
God did this at the right moment in history, and now the news of it is being carried out to the world. Paul himself, the former persecutor, was one of the people carrying it.
Walk On
It is easy to read a passage like this and agree with it. Of course God loves everyone. Of course we should pray.
But the test comes when we think of real names.
Most of us pray for our family, our friends, and the people we like. Paul asks for more. He asks us to pray for the people in authority, including the ones we would not have chosen. He asks us to give thanks for people, not just ask God to fix them. And he asks us to pray with the same reach as God’s own heart, which is everyone.
So two questions to carry today.
Who is the one person you find hardest to pray for, and what would it look like to pray for them today, maybe even to thank God for them?
And if God truly wants all people to be saved, who in your life might he want you to carry to him in prayer this week?
All glory to God — forever and ever. Amen. 🤍
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