Daily Devotional For Wednesday, August 20, 2025
We sing a song in church about how good God is. We sing in church about how awesome our God is. We sing in church about how faithful our God is. This is the point of 2 Timothy 2:13, “If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself” (NASB). This is the last line from the hymn in 2 Timothy 2:11-13: “For if we died with Him, we will also live with Him; (12) If we endure, we will also reign with Him; If we deny Him, He also will deny us; (13) If we are faithless, He remains faithful, for He cannot deny Himself” (NASB).
This last line applies to faithless unbelievers as well as to believers who fail the Lord. If you are observant, you will see that people in general are prone to failure. We may be born again, but we are prone again when it comes to sin and failure. Paul’s point to Timothy is that even though we are prone to fail God, God will never fail us. Even when believers intentionally sin and fail God, God will never fail the believer. As His children we are protected and secured in God’s promises to us.
Now to those who might think this is a license to go do what we want, it is not. The Apostle Paul writes this in Romans 6:1, “Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of His wonderful grace?”? (NLT). God’s grace is not a blank check to go do what we want. It is not a license to sin more and more so that we receive more and more of God’s grace. While God will forgive you, He will not remove the consequences of our sin. He makes us face those and go through those.
Christian author F. B. Meyer said this: “Three things are impossible with God—to die, to lie, and to fail the soul that trusts him. Even when we cannot muster faith enough, His word of promise cannot be frustrated” (Source: quoted by Bruce B. Barton, The Life Application Bible Commentary, 1 & 2 Timothy,” p. 189). Our Lord has promised to be faithful to us all the way to the end of the age (Matthew 28:20).
We see God’s faithfulness from the beginning. When Adam and Eve decided to be unfaithful to God in the Garden of Eden, God did send Adam and Eve out of the garden but not naked. He was faithful to them by providing clothes for them (Genesis 3:21). When we go to the next chapter and Cain murders his brother Abel, God is faithful to Cain in Genesis 4:15. What does this tell us about God? That even when we sin and are unfaithful to Him, He is faithful to us. Let’s go back and look at this hymn in 2 Timothy 2:11-13.
When we read the first stanza of this hymn, it emphasizes the salvation of the believer. The Apostle Paul reminds us of this in Romans 6:8. When we read the second stanza of this hymn, it emphasizes the perseverance or endurance of the believer. But this is more than just about endurance, it is about reigning with Him. The reward for our endurance will be that we will get to co-reign with Christ. This means that we will get to hear from Jesus these words in Luke 19:17.
The third stanza of this hymn emphasizes the problem of apostasy. This reminds us of Jesus’ words in Matthew 10:32-33. To deny Jesus means He will deny the one who denied Him. The fourth stanza emphasizes faithlessness. When we are faithless like Peter was with Jesus in denying any connection to Jesus 3 times, Jesus is faithful to us (John 21:15-21). In the end, Peter was eventually restored when he was so unfaithful. In the end, this tells us more about God than anything else. We can be fickle, disobedient, and disloyal to Christ but He never is to us. He is dependable, reliable, trustworthy, ever-present, and ever-faithful.
Assignment: Think of a time you were unfaithful to Christ and how He remained faithful to you. Did you ever thank Him for that? If not, do it now. Look back over Genesis 1-4. God could have wiped out everyone, but He didn’t. What does this tell you about God’s faithfulness to you?
Scripture To Meditate On: Lamentations 3:22-23, “The Lord’s lovingkindnesses indeed never ceases, For His compassions never fail. (23) They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness” (NASB).
I love you Southside! – Pastor Kelly