Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.
– 1 Timothy 4:12
What a powerful expectation. And I want to speak this word particularly over those of you listening right now who would be considered youth. And I know that’s kind of relative as some of you know. Okay, I’m a child, I’m a teenager, I’m a college student. I think I count as young adult, well young. And then you start to think, well, at what point are you not youth anymore? And I’m not trying to get into that discussion. But just think. Are you in a position where you are younger from other people around you that you have an opportunity to influence?
1 Timothy 4:12 Calls Younger Believers to Set an Example
And I use that language intentionally. Here, according to 1 Timothy 4:12, God has caused you to influence those who are older than you are. To not despise youth but to set believers an example in your youth. And listen to these categories. In speech and how you talk, in what you say, in conduct, in what you do. In love, in the care and compassion, selfless, sacrificial love you show to others, in faith.
I just think about my children and the level of their faith when they hear something from God’s Word. They believe it and say, Okay, if that’s the case. Then they start asking all kinds of questions because they believe God’s Word. Set an example in faith and in purity amidst onslaught all around you from spiritual forces of evil who do not want you to be pure and all kinds of temptations in this world to not be pure.
To not just be pure, but set an example for other brothers and sisters in Christ who are older than you when it comes to purity. Oh, I just want to pray these things over you. But before I do, I want to encourage you to ask God for his help to set an example in your life in all these ways to not despise your youth, but to realize God has called you to be an example to other brothers and sisters in Christ who are much older than you.
1 Timothy 4:12 Encourages Older Believers to Follow the Example of Younger Believers
And then I would just say to those who are older… And again, that’s a relative term. But for those of you who are surrounded by people in any part of your life who are younger than you. It is good based on 1 Timothy 4:12 for you to look to those who are younger for an example in your faith, in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith and in purity. Do not be so filled with pride in your age or wisdom or experience that you are not learning from those who are younger than you are and looking to them as an example for you.
Oh God, we pray 1 Timothy 4:12 specifically right now over all who are youth and any way that they might be categorized as youth. God, please help them, we pray to set an example in your church through their speech. God help their speech to be seasoned with salt and pure and filled with truth and uplifting and encouraging to others, edifying in every way. Help them to set an example for us in the way they live, in the way they obey you, in the way they follow you, in their love.
Prayer for those Younger than Us
God, we pray for those who are younger than us to set an example for us in caring, compassionate, selfless, sacrificial love for other people, for those who are in the body of Christ and those who are without Christ. God, we pray for their faith that it would grow and deepen and abound in ways that set examples for all of us. We pray for their purity, for their holiness to be an example to us for their fleeing idolatry and immorality in their lives in ways that are good for them and glorifying to you and good for us to see. God, we pray for those who are youth and we pray for those who are older. God, we pray that they would humbly look to those who are younger for examples in these ways.
Prayer for the Halang People
Oh God, across multiple generations, as your children in your body, help us to build one another up. And we pray specifically this over those who are younger. And God is we pray for unreached people, we pray today for the Halang people of Laos and Vietnam, knowing that all throughout history you have raised up students in particular to take the gospel of those who’ve never heard it.
God, we pray that you would do that today. Raise up a movement of multitudes of students who are setting the example and making disciples of all the nations in their speech, proclaiming the gospel to the nations, in their conduct and going to those who’ve never heard, in love for them with faith in you, and in purity coming out from the world and all of its ways being separate and living for what’s going to matter for all of eternity.
God, we pray, raise up a student movement that is spreading the gospel to the nations in ways that serve as an example for the rest of the church and spur on the rest of the church to do the same. And we pray that you’d help the rest of the church to follow that example. My God, we pray all this according to your word in 1 Timothy 4:12, in Jesus’ name.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
