“Exercise Discipline”
I Timothy 4:8

INTRODUCTION

• Exercise means… to put into practice, carry out in action.
• Example: Exercise bible study – to practice reading the bible. Doing it is action on your part.
• Example: Exercise for your body – To practice weight lifting, running, pushups and etc. Doing it takes action on your part.
• Discipline means… 1) strict training that corrects or strengthens a person. 2) control gained through obedience.
• In our text verse of I Timothy 4:8, Paul is teaching his brother in Christ (Timothy) that exercising his body is not as important as exercising godliness. 
• 1 Timothy 4:8a…For bodily exercise profiteth little: meaning that discipline (exercise) doesn’t profit you very much in Godly things.
• Exercising the body is good for you, yes.BUT, it doesn’t do anything your mind and soul or for others.
• Paul further instructs Timothy …8b) but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come. Meaning that exercising (putting into practice by action) as God wants us to exercise benefits our life on earth and our life in heaven when we arrive.
• Exercise of our body only benefits us in this life, not the life in heaven. WHY? Because when we get to heaven we will have a new body! Our body we had on this earth will be “changed.”
• 1 Corinthians 15:51…Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,

I. Bodily Exercise

A) Our muscles

• Things we do to benefit our body are not always healthy spiritually.
• Some cults or so called religions, believe that to obtain true spirituality you must lay on a bed of nails, or be able to walk on hot coals, or remain abstinent (no sex) for life and so on.
• Some athletes go through tremendous self -discipline by dieting, weight lifting and training, abstinence (no sex), running and etc.
• All these things are ok, as long as we do not let that be our main focus of life.
• When you become a Christian, your body becomes “a temple of the God.”
• I Corinthians 6:19…  What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?

• Your body no longer belongs to you, it belongs to God and you are to serve the Lord Jesus Christ as your Master and spiritual body builder!

B) Our mind

• The mind is an amazing thing that created in us.
• It can be used for God, or the world. The choice is yours.
• Which is more important to you? The world or God?
• Which is more profitable for you? The world or God?
• Isaiah 26:3…Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on thee: because he trusteth in thee.
• “whose mind is stayed” meaning…the person that has a mind that is set in the ways of God, focused on God, grounded in His word, and has memorized God’s word.

C) Our soul

• Exercising the body is of no profit or benefit to our soul.
• Mark 8:36… For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?
• Is it important for you to memorize who won every Super Bowl, or what movie was your favorite, or who murdered who, or how much money someone makes in a year?
• Mark asks the question in Mark 8:36… what does it profit you to gain the worlds wisdom and lose your own soul.    
  
  

II. Godliness is More Important

• Read your Bible more than worldly books.
• Volunteer to do something for the church rather than a worldly organization.
• Help a brother or sister in Christ rather than a worldly person that does not appreciate it.
• 1 Timothy 4:7…But refuse profane (worldly / false teachings) and old wives’ fables (myths that women of the world make up), and exercise thyself rather unto godliness.
• To “exercise godliness” means to put into practice a spiritual self discipline to live as God wants you to live.
• 2 Peter 1:3…According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of him that hath called us to glory and virtue:
• Trust in God that He promises to give us “all things that pertain to this life and godliness (the life God wants you to enjoy forever now and in eternity).