14 Remind them of these things, and solemnly charge them in the presence of God not to wrangle about words, which is useless and leads to the ruin of the hearers. 15 Be diligent to present yourself approved to God as a workman who does not need to be ashamed, accurately handling the word of truth. 2 Timothy 2:14-15 (NASB)
One of the lynchpins of whatever it is that God calls us to do to take up the slack in the battle for the truth is that we must be those who do indeed present ourselves to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the Word of Truth. What does it mean to “rightly handle the Word of Truth?”
I am a big fan of William Tyndale. Yes, I know he has been dead since the early 16th Century, but he worked and wrote in a time when Protestant Reformation was young and still being defined by Luther and his followers and others. Tyndale was in exile in the Antwerp area of modern day Belgium when he wrote his classic work, The Obedience of a Christian Man. Henry VIII was on the throne of England and had just broke from the Roman Catholic Church. All of Tyndale’s old Catholic enemies had either been imprisoned, killed, or were in exile themselves because King Henry had confiscated all of the property of the monasteries and Catholic churches. However, Tyndale had to stay on the continent because King Henry still did not approve of an English Bible and that was William’s primary passion. He had already published several editions of an English New Testament that had been smuggled into England where it sold rapidly to people starving for the truth of God’s Word.