Ver. 1. In contrast to the false teachers mentioned in the preceding verses, and the pernicious results of their teaching, the apostle now urges, and with reference to all ranks and classes in the church, the sound practical teaching of the gospel. But speak thou the things which become the sound instruction of the gospel: sound, or wholesome, because it does not run out upon fables and frivolous prescriptions of human invention, but bears throughout with practical energy upon the duties of everyday life. Christianity is primarily, indeed, a doctrine, but only that it may be in the true sense a life; and the two can never be kept apart from each other in the public teaching of the church without imminent peril to both.
