Eunice's Victory

As wives and mothers, we like things to be just right.  Floors cleaned. Pantry stocked.  Clothes pressed.  Children obedient.

In our dreams!  In reality, there are spots on the floor, sometimes meals aren't gourmet, laundry piles up, and our children . . . well, raising children is an incredible challenge.  We can feed them right, dress them, even teach them right from wrong, but they still often choose to do wrong.

And then there is the challenge of teaching them the Scriptures.  The most fundamental thing our children need.  The most lasting contribution we can give them.  Sometimes it can feel as if we're spinning our wheels.  Are they really learning?  Will it stick?  And what about the influences of the world, some of which may even be rooted inside the family.  Family members and friends who oppose any efforts at practical godliness.

I want to tell you about a woman named Eunice.  She is referred to three times in the Scriptures (Acts 16:1; 2 Tim 1:5; 2 Tim 3:15).  She was the mother of Timothy, the Apostle Paul's "son" in the faith.

Then he[Paul] came to Derbe and Lystra.  And behold, a certain disciple was there, named Timothy, the son of a certain Jewish woman who believed, but his father was Greek.  Acts 16:1

Lystra was a town in modern-day Turkey.  Jews were living all over the Roman Empire, speaking the Greek language, and interacting with Greek culture.  But they maintained a separate identity and established synagogues for worship.  They had the Scriptures, too, written in Greek, which was what they spoke every day.  But in Lystra, the predominate religion was the worship of Greco-Roman demi-gods.  For devout Jews and later, Christians, there was a tension.  Sometimes even persecution.

This is where Eunice lived.  Her mother was devout and she learned the Scriptures.  But for some reason, she married a Greek.  Now some Greeks, hearing God's Word, became "proselytes."  They chose to identify with the Jews and obey the Law.  But this was not one of them.

We know this because their son Timothy was not circumcised as an infant.  A traditional Jew would be horrified at the thought of omitting this important ritual.  We don't know what Eunice thought about this.  We can guess that she was not pleased.  Or, perhaps, she may have wandered from her mother's instruction for a time.  It would explain the marriage.

Eunice may have understood that circumcision did not make a person right with God.  If not then, she must have learned it eventually, when she heard and embraced the gospel of grace.  Even Abraham was justified--made right with God--by faith even before he was circumcised, as Paul explains in Galatians.

Whatever Eunice's thoughts may have been, she did not give up.  She taught her son the Scriptures, assisted by her mother Lois.  It might have been tough at times.  It is quite possible that Timothy's father educated him in the traditional Greek way.  This would be like having your child attend a public school all day--then you get the "remnants" of your child's time and attention.  But despite these hardships, Paul remembers this mother and grandmother when writing to Timothy:

when I call to remembrance the genuine faith that is in you, which dwelt first in your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am persuaded is in you also . . .  2 Tim 1:5

It wasn't the "perfect" Christian family.  Such a thing does not exist.  Eunice faced unique trials.  But she was faithful and is now forever remembered in the annals of Scripture.  Her name, translated from the Greek, means, "good victory."