A Disciple is a People Person

Once upon a time there was a church that was looking for a pastor. They set up a pastoral search committee, and began to look at resumés. One day they received a letter from a man who was applying for the position. The letter went like this:

Dear Committee Members,

I understand that your pulpit is vacant and so I would like to submit my application. I am generally considered to be a good preacher, although I have been known to put people to sleep occasionally, and I don’t always end on time. I have been a leader in most of the places I have served. I have also found the time to do some writing on the side.

I am well over 50 years of age, and while my health is not the best, I have still done a great deal of traveling as an itinerant preacher.

I am afraid that I am somewhat lacking when it comes to references. I have never stayed in any church for more than 3 years. The churches I have preached in have generally been quite small, even though they were located in rather large cities. In one or two of them, I was forced to leave, because my ministry created some major disturbances.

Even in those places where I stayed, I didn’t get along very well with the other clergy in town. I have actually been threatened and physically attacked by some of them, and have been put in jail three or four times because of these disturbances.

In spite of all this, I feel that I can bring a solid ministry to your church. I must add, however, that I am not particularly good at administration and record-keeping. However, if you can use me, I’d be honored to be considered for your position.

When the chairman read this letter aloud to the search committee, they were flabbergasted. How could anyone think that their church would even consider hiring a man who seemed to be nothing but a trouble-making, absent-minded, ex-jailbird - and an old one at that? “Who was this guy?” they wanted to know.

“Well,” said the chairman of the committee, “the letter is simply signed… the Apostle Paul”.

What do you think of when you think of the apostle Paul? Most of us tend to think of a man whose life was so touched and used by God that he was just—well, different from us. We put him up on a pedestal. He was a super-apostle, a super-missionary, and a super-saint. He was so far out in front of the rest of us, spiritually speaking, that he essentially was a loner.

We see him in our mind’s eye alone. Alone on Mars Hill debating theology with the Athenians. Alone on trial before Felix and Festus and Herod. Alone in a jail cell in Rome.

But this view we have of Paul—the view of Paul as a loner—is not really biblical. For when we turn to the pages of Scripture, we do not find a loner. We find, instead, a Christian leader who was surrounded by people. Paul had a group of men and women who were his friends, his traveling companions, and his fellow-workers in the ministry.

Sometime you should flip through the pages of his letters in the NT. Look especially at the salutations and the closings of those letters. Count how many different names are mentioned as being close associates of this man. I think you’ll conclude that Paul modeled something in his life that we want to talk about today. Paul was a people person.

To be a follower of Jesus Christ is to be a people person. Because when all is said and done, all that matters is people.

Our world places a very high premium on accomplishment. We applaud the people who can get things done. They’re the ones who become the managers, the directors, the chairmen, the presidents. They are the doers. They are on the fast-track to success.

And it’s easy to get caught up in that mentality—the mentality of doing. You look at your Daytimer and you realize that you’ve got a full day ahead of you. Your To-Do list rules your life with an iron hand. And somewhere, in the midst of all that frantic activity, people begin to get squeezed out.

Doug Wambold related to me an experience he had recently on a business trip in California. He and his team had spent a long, exhausting day on a project at an oil refinery. Finally, late at night, Doug was returning to his hotel, when he happened upon a family of cats—a mother and a couple of kittens—in an alleyway next to the hotel.

Well, being a tenderhearted man who actually likes cats, Doug was immediately filled with concern for these animals. In spite of his own fatigue, he turned around, went back to his car, drove to the nearest convenience store, bought some cat food, and brought dinner back to those cats. (You know, I have a sneaking suspicion that those cats probably scam all the business travelers who stay at that hotel like that!)

But then the next day, on their way to a restaurant where dinner was going to cost $50 apiece, Doug and his team were approached by a homeless person looking for a hand-out. And nobody gave him a dime. And Doug thought later, “Wait a minute. What have I just done?”

People matter. And yet, we find ourselves almost unconsciously beginning to resent the inconvenience that people bring into our lives. Because people bring relationships and relationships are almost always messy.

People are time-consuming. People are unpredictable. People are emotionally draining. People can give you the most incredible hassles.

Don’t you just hate it when you are busy working on some project and then some person—maybe a work associate, or maybe your four-year-old son or daughter—barges into your life, interrupts your work, and demands your attention?

A long-time professor at Notre Dame University once said, “I used to always complain that my work was constantly being interrupted, until it slowly began to dawn on me that my interruptions were my work.”

I can really relate to that. Because I tend to be a very task-oriented person. I confess it. I struggle with that at times, because the essence of my job as a pastor is people. And if I become so consumed with getting my work done that I have no time for people, then what am I really accomplishing?

The Apostle Paul was a people person. The last few verses of 2 Timothy 4 prove it. He mentions 17 people in those few verses—18 if you count Timothy himself. These were people he worked with, people he was friends with, people he ministered to, and people who ministered to him. Let’s look at them and see who they were.

1. Demas

Demas was a disciple who became a deserter. We read about Demas in two other places in the Bible—Colossians 4 and Philemon 24. In both of those places, Demas is mentioned as being part of Paul’s ministry team.

But now, with Paul in prison awaiting execution, and things looking pretty grim for Christians in Rome, look at what Demas did:

2 Timothy 4:10 for Demas, because he loved this world, has deserted me and has gone to Thessalonica.

Can you feel the pain in that verse? Can you feel the pain in Paul’s heart? Demas had been part of the team, and now he had quit. He had turned his back on Paul, and on the Lord.

When Demas counted the cost of being a disciple of Jesus Christ, and weighed that against what the world had to offer, he decided to go for the short-term gain. His love for temporal things transcended his love for eternal things. Paul was looking at his heavenly reward in v.8, but Demas was looking for an earthly reward.

And his desertion really hurt Paul. You know, if you’re going to make a place for people in your life, you’re probably going to get hurt. Because people can let you down.

Have you ever put your trust in someone only to have that person betray that trust, or desert you? Have you ever had someone you thought was a friend turn his back on you? Doesn’t feel very good, does it?

There is a very great danger, when you get hurt like that, of building a wall around your life so that it can’t happen again. You think to yourself “From now on, I’m going to be a little more guarded in my relationships. I’ll try to keep people a little more at arm’s length. I’ll try not to let them into my life to such an extent so that nobody can hurt me like that again.

So you become a little more reserved, a little more distant, a little more cool and aloof. And a little bit less of a people person. And a little bit less like Jesus. Jesus was betrayed. Jesus was denied. Jesus knew what it felt like to lose friends and followers. But he never stopped being a people person.

2. Crescens

It says in verse 10 that he went to Galatia, and that’s all we know about him. There’s nothing else mentioned in Scripture about this guy. He’s basically a nobody.

There are a lot of people who will pass in and out of your life without making any waves. And you may be tempted to conclude that, because they aren’t important to you, they aren’t important to anybody. But every one of those people matters to God. How you treat the “nobodies” reveals how much of a people-person you are.

3. Titus

Titus was a neat guy. He was a tremendous helper to Paul. When Paul needed someone to solve a problem, he usually called on Titus. Titus was his trouble-shooter.

Paul was always sending Titus off to particularly tough assignments, like at Corinth and Crete, where the churches were struggling with severe problems. And when Paul went to that special church conference in Jerusalem where the apostles had to figure out how much of the Jewish Law the Gentiles were supposed to observe when they became Christians, he took Titus with him.

So Titus was a valuable, trusted colleague. But at the end of Paul’s life, when he could have used some company, Titus was off on another trouble-shooting mission in Dalmatia, which is right next to Bosnia where, it seems, there’s always trouble going on!

4. Luke

Luke was the only friend Paul had with him at this point. Luke was a medical doctor. He was a Greek, probably from the city of Philippi.

What you may not know is that Luke was a very brilliant man in his own right. He actually wrote more of the New Testament than Paul did, if you count the words. His two books—Luke and Acts—are written in some of the most elegant language in the Bible. Luke was a highly educated man, and he and Paul must have been close friends.

What a blessing for Paul to have a companion like Luke who stuck with him to the end. God often graces our lives with friends like that.

5. Mark

With Demas, a disciple became a deserter. But with Mark, a deserter became a disciple. There once was a time when Paul had very little use for Mark. Mark had deserted Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey. When it came time to go again, Barnabas wanted to give Mark another shot, but Paul wasn’t having any of it.

They argued so sharply about it that Paul and Barnabas split up; Barnabas took Mark with him to Cyprus, while Paul took Silas on his second missionary journey to Asia Minor.

We don’t know what happened to Mark in the interval. Maybe he had matured. Maybe Paul had mellowed. Maybe both. Whatever, Paul was now able to say about Mark that he was a real help in his ministry. That’s a beautiful statement of reconciliation. There had been forgiveness on both sides of that relationship, and the two men were now united in the cause of Christ.

A real people person will always rely on the power of forgiveness and reconciliation to heal relationships. If you give up on that, then you are saying that there are some relationships that God just cannot heal. And that’s not true.

6. Tychicus

Tychicus must have been a very trustworthy man. He was the man Paul put in charge of sending from Rome to Asia Minor, carrying not one, not two, but three important letters to the churches there.

And two of those letters eventually became part of the New Testament—the books of Colossians and Ephesians. What’s more, on the same journey, Paul put Tychicus in charge of seeing that a runaway slave named Onesimus was returned to his master.

So Tychicus was one of those quiet, trustworthy servants who brought great blessing to many simply because he did was what was asked of him. He carried out his mission.

7. Carpus

Carpus was a man who had given hospitality to Paul at Troas.

Paul wanted Timothy to come from Ephesus to Rome by way of Troas so that he could pick up his cloak that he had left there.

This cloak would have been something like a poncho—a circle of cloth with a head-hole in it. Paul must have been very cold in that dungeon in Rome, so he urged Timothy in v.21 to do his best to come with the cloak before winter.

8. Alexander

Alexander was a metalworker who “did Paul a great deal of harm” as he says in v. 14. He strongly opposed Paul’s message, and may, in fact have been instrumental in Paul’s arrest and imprisonment.

He is mentioned in Paul’s first letter to Timothy, in chapter 1 verse 20. Evidently Alexander had been at one time a member of the church, but he had abandoned the Gospel and had “shipwrecked his faith”.

And because of that, Paul and the elders had had to put him out of the church. They had had to exercise church discipline on Alexander. And no doubt because of that, Alexander became a bitter enemy of Paul.

But notice what Paul says about him in verse 14: “The Lord will repay him for what he has done.” Paul didn’t have a personal vendetta against Alexander. He was willing to leave Alexander in the Lord’s hands.

If you are going to be a people person, then you’d better get ready for the times when an Alexander comes storming into your life. You’ll be attacked, you may be slandered, you’ll be opposed. How are you going to react when that happens?

Well, the natural tendency is to defend yourself. To fight fire with fire. To protect your reputation and to show everybody what a liar that Alexander is.

But the best strategy is to let God be your defender. We are at our worst when we are defending ourselves. It’s better to leave the matter of your reputation in God’s hands.

9.&10. Priscilla and Aquilla

We meet up with this couple several times in the NT. First they are in Rome, then in Corinth, then back in Rome, finally in Ephesus. They were faithful friends of Paul.

11. Onesiphorus

Paul says to greet the household of Onesiphorus, which may mean that Onesiphorus had died. Onesiphorus was mentioned earlier, in chapter one, where Paul said:

2 Timothy 1:16 May the Lord show mercy to the household of Onesiphorus, because he often refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chains. On the contrary, when he was in Rome, he searched hard for me until he found me. May the Lord grant that he will find mercy from the Lord on that day! You know very well in how many ways he helped me in Ephesus.

Another faithful friend of Paul’s.

12. Erastus

In the ruins of the city of Corinth, archaeologists have found a paving stone with the name “Erastus” inscribed on it. The inscription goes on to say that Erastus is the commissioner of public works.

That’s rather interesting because in Romans 16:23, Paul mentions that Erastus is the Director of Public Works for the city of Corinth, where he was staying when he wrote the book of Romans. So Paul had some friends in government.

13. Trophimus

Trophimus ended up getting sick as he accompanied Paul on one of his missionary travels, and so he had to be left in the city of Miletus, which is about 50 miles south of Ephesus.

Now Trophimus was a Gentile from Ephesus. He spoke Greek. He was not a Jew. But several years earlier, he had accompanied Paul to Jerusalem. While they were there, they went to the Temple to worship. Now, being a Gentile, Trophimus could only go as far into the Temple as the Court of the Gentiles.

But Paul’s enemies in Jerusalem accused Paul of defiling the Temple by bringing Trophimus into the Court of the Jews. And that led to Paul getting arrested and to a whole mess of trouble which you can read about in Acts 21.

And it all happened because Paul dared to befriend a Gentile. If you are going to be a people person, God may lead you into a relationship which other people may frown upon. This person you are befriending may not be from the right background, or the right culture. Their skin may not be the approved color. But to a people person, that doesn’t matter, does it?

Jesus talked to the Samaritan woman. Jesus hung around with sinners and tax collectors. And it drove the Pharisees nuts. Because to a people person, there are no barriers of race or color or culture.

14. Eubulus - don’t know anything about him.

15. Pudens - don’t know anything about him either, although his name is Latin and there is an ancient tradition that says that he was a Roman Senator.

16. Linus - don’t know anything about him either, although the Roman Catholics claim that he was the second Pope after Peter.

17. Claudia - obviously a woman. Some scholars think that Pudens and Claudia were married and that Linus was their son. We just don’t know.

18. Timothy himself.

So Paul was surrounded with people. He was pouring his life into people. Even at the end of his life, when he was facing his own execution, he was thinking of others, not himself.

In fact, if you’ll look at verse 22, you’ll see the very last sentence that Paul officially wrote. Not long after he wrote this, he was executed. What did he say?

The Lord be with your spirit. Grace be with you.

The word “amen” that appears at the end of that verse in the KJV is not in the earliest manuscripts. So the last word that Paul wrote was “you”. That’s pretty typical of a people person.

Because when all is said and done, people are what really matter most. So what are you going to do with the people God has placed in your life? Is there someone you need to sit down and spend time with this afternoon?

Is there somebody who is hurting and needs your help and encouragement today? Is there someone you need to forgive, or maybe ask forgiveness of?

Then do it. Because people matter most.