Be Not Ashamed
Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner: but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God . . . For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day. . . . The Lord give mercy unto the house of Onesiphorus; for he oft refreshed me, and was not ashamed of my chain. 2 Tim. 1:8, 12, 16.
It struck me as I read this chapter recently that when he wrote this letter to Timothy, the apostle Paul was deeply aware of the fact that to be a Christian in the Roman world was something that exposed you to shame. You see the emphasis in the verses above: he encourages Timothy to be not ashamed of the gospel (8), he himself was not ashamed of the gospel (12), and he commends Onesiphorus who was not ashamed to publicly partner with an apostle of the gospel, almost certainly at great risk to himself.
The implication is that a lot of people were ashamed. In fact, in verse 15, the apostle writes, "This thou knowest, that all they which are in Asia be turned away from me; of whom are Phygellus and Hermogenes." Why did they turn away from Paul? Almost surely because they were ashamed of him. How painful that must have been for the apostle. It is almost as if he is saying to Timothy, as our Lord said to his disciples after many turned away from him, "Will you also go away?"
What is the cure to this sinful cowardice and shame? It is to remember that however weird and bad and out of touch Christians are made out to be by the world in this present day, there is coming a day when Christ will publicly own those who were faithful to him, as Pau reminds Timothy, as us: "I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day (12). . . . The Lord grant unto him that he may find mercy of the Lord in that day (16)." I can assure you, at that day when our Lord publicly welcomes and acknowledges and praises his own, it will be worth it all to have followed Jesus, no matter how much we had to suffer shame for his sake in this life.