Be an Iceberg Christian

Let’s start with something surprising: You are here, so many of you, in a breakout session titled “Setting an Example in Speech, Conduct, Love, Faith, and Purity.” I’m amazed; you should be too. I take it that this is a room of some unusual young men and women.

I assume you’re here because you want to lead, to shape, to be a catalyst for godly change. You want to set an example.

• You want to be an influence for Jesus.
• You have a holy discontent with the status quo on your campus, and online, and perhaps even in your church.
• You don’t want to be conditioned by algorithms and constant scrolling, and by others who are conditioned by algorithms and scrolling. You want to influence them, recondition them, help them swim against the current.
• You want to be shaped not by the world but by the word, by God and his Son, through Scripture, in the context of truth-telling, self-sacrificing, committed Christian relationships in the local church.
• Far above the whats and the wheres and the hows that dominate the attention of your generation, you have an all-encompassing who: Jesus Christ.
• You have a holy ambition to live for him, to influence others for him, and to lead a life worth emulating.

You have a hunger only Jesus can satisfy, and a holy discontent with this world, and godly ambition to make much of Jesus and not waste your life. Which means you want to set an example for others — whether younger or peers or older.

I take it that’s who I’m speaking to in these few minutes. And I thank God for you.

Iceberg Challenge

These days, I often find myself talking to fellow pastors and to young men who aspire to be pastors. One way I love to challenge them is to join me in seeking to be “iceberg pastors.”

You may know the fancy fact about icebergs: What you see above the water is only about 10 percent of the iceberg. Beneath the surface is 90 percent, which is why they are dangerous for ships like the Titanic. In open water, it’s not enough to steer clear of the 10 percent — 90 percent is unseen. So we have this expression, “tip of the iceberg,” for when some small part of an issue is visible, but the larger part, the main part of it, lies beneath the surface.

So, I’ve said before, “iceberg pastors” are those who learn far more than they teach. They ponder far more than they preach. Their soul feeds on God far more than they try to feed others. There’s a great danger in ministry when everything we take in goes right back out, when our inputs and outputs come close to corresponding. Pastors, I believe, need far more inputs than outputs. We need to be fed far more than we feed others.

Now, I want to tweak that for you. What’s new to me in coming to CROSS26 is that I want to issue this iceberg challenge to you. I know this is not a room of pastors or aspiring pastors. But it is a room of young men and women with a holy ambition to set an example. And one of the most important things I could say to you is this: Be an iceberg Christian.

That is, let your light shine. Set an example. Live a life worthy of emulation. Be a holy influencer for Jesus. And let that visible influence be just a glimpse of what’s beneath the surface. Be far bigger underwater than you are above the water.

In the few short minutes we have, we’re going to go to 1 Timothy 4:12, where Paul says to Timothy, who is about your age, “Set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.” We’re going there, and I want us to make one simple iceberg observation there. I want you to see the outputs above the waterline, and the private inputs beneath the surface.

So, I want you to see those two parts in 1 Timothy 4:

1. the 10 percent above the water
2. the 90 percent beneath the surface

Look for it as I read verses 11–16, and then I’ll call them out briefly:

Command and teach these things. Let no one despise you for your youth, but set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity. Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching. Do not neglect the gift you have, which was given you by prophecy when the council of elders laid their hands on you. Practice these things, immerse yourself in them, so that all may see your progress. Keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers. (1 Timothy 4:11–16)

10 Percent

So, first, the public, visible part. Note the outputs in this passage, Timothy’s public doing:

• Verse 11: “Command and teach.” As Paul’s delegate in Ephesus, Timothy is to teach what he’s learned from Paul and what Paul says to him in this letter, and to do so with appropriate forcefulness.
• Verse 12: “Set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.”
• Verse 13: He is to read Scripture in public and exhort and teach the church based on Scripture.
• This ministry of teaching is what I take Paul to be referring to in verse 14. (He ends verse 13 with teaching, and returns to teaching in verse 16.)
• Then, at the end of verse 15, Paul says he wants “all [to] see your progress.”

So, there is a public, visible part of young Timothy’s life — the visible 10 percent of the iceberg. Timothy is a teacher. He teaches in public. And more than just teaching, Paul wants him to show the church his progress, his growth, his maturation in Christ. And Paul mentions five areas for showing this example — the second half of verse 12: “Set the believers an example in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith, in purity.”

Now, if I had time, I’d take these five virtues in reverse order and talk about biblical youths who modeled them — five young adults for you to imitate to be the kind of Christians who influence others well for Jesus.

“There’s a great danger in ministry when everything we take in goes right back out.”

Purity: the young Daniel in Babylon, in Daniel 1. He refused to be contaminated by his unbelieving city. You don’t have to feed on what the world around you feeds on. Get a better (spiritual) diet than the world’s. Don’t scroll through life like everyone in Babylon. Fight like Daniel to be pure (which means at least sexual purity here, as in 1 Timothy 5:2).

Faith: the young Jeremiah in Jeremiah 1:7–8, where God says,

Do not say, “I am only a youth”;
for to all to whom I send you, you shall go,
and whatever I command you, you shall speak.
Do not be afraid of them,
for I am with you to deliver you,
     declares the Lord.”

Don’t undersell your own age. Rise above the world’s low expectations for this season of life. Take a risk in faith, like Jeremiah.

Love: the young David in 1 Samuel 17. Goliath issued a challenge, and neither Saul nor any other Israelite stepped forward. David heard the need and dared to volunteer. Listen for needs and seek to fill them, even if it’s dangerous. Die to your own safety and comfort and convenience and sense of productivity to help others, like David (or like Esther).

Conduct: We could look at Paul’s expectations for Titus to not only teach with integrity, dignity, and sound words, but to “show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works” (Titus 2:7). Let your vibrant inner life shine in your actions. Show the world, and the church, godly conduct, like Titus.

Speech: the young Elihu in Job 32–37, who knew God’s Spirit, not age, makes one truly wise. He says in Job 32:8–9,

It is the spirit in man,
     the breath of the Almighty, that makes him understand.
It is not the old who are wise,
     nor the aged who understand what is right.

Years don’t automatically make one wiser. Fools get worse with time. Trust that God’s Spirit, not age, gives true wisdom. In your youth, don’t undersell the power of the Holy Spirit in you. He’s never too young. Be patient, listen well, and be ready when your time comes to speak up, like Elihu.

90 Percent

But my main emphasis, and where I want to end, is the 90 percent — the quiet, the often unseen, the under-the-surface 90 percent.

I want you to see it in this passage. Not only has Paul talked earlier in the chapter about Timothy “being trained” (1 Timothy 4:6) and training himself (verse 7), but in our paragraph, he says:

• Verse 15: “Practice these things.” That is, cultivate; it’s quiet, hidden work. This word is used in Acts 4:25 for conspire or plot. It’s a word for something done in private that in time becomes visible to others.
• Verse 15, next phrase: “Immerse yourself in them.” Literally, “be in them,” exist in them, live in them — that is, not just in public but in your private life. Soak yourself in the Scriptures. Be saturated in them.
• Verse 16: “Keep a close watch on yourself.” Fix your attention on yourself and your teaching.

I count at least three iceberg charges for Timothy:

1. Cultivate in private what lies beneath good public teaching: habits of mind and heart.
2. Saturate yourself in (be in) the Scriptures privately; immerse your life in them that you may teach them well to the church.
3. Fix your attention (keep a close watch) on yourself and the teaching, through daily communion with Jesus and not drifting from the life in the vine.

Brothers and sisters, it’s a good, noble desire to influence others for Jesus. But how? That’s what’s so remarkable about 1 Timothy 4. Oh yes, Paul would have young Timothy set an example. Not on accident; on purpose. Aspire to it. Pray about it. Obey Paul’s command, Timothy, and do it. And all the while, do it like an iceberg.

Be the kind of person in private, the 90 percent, that will make your 10 percent above-the-surface example genuine and enduring. Devote yourself first to knowing and enjoying God and being a faithful member of your local church. Then let your visible example radiate from your invisible heart and habits of soul. Do let your light shine. And when people get closer, they’ll find you’re not shallow or thin or hollow; you’re even better up close than from a distance.

So, my younger brothers and sisters in Christ:

• Take in more than you put out.
• Hear more than you speak.
• Know yourself loved even more than you love.

Spend far more time cultivating your inner life, your devotional life, your knowing and enjoying Jesus, than you spend on your public example.

• Be bigger on the inside than on the outside.
• Be more impressive in person than online.
• Be more real up close than from far away.

And be an example. Be an influencer for Jesus. And let that be a humble, 10-percent-visible overflow of the quiet, massive, steady 90 percent beneath the surface.

Be an iceberg Christian.