This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.
1 Timothy 1:15[ |
According to
@Hoping, Paul, chief of sinners, was not yet a Christian when he wrote his first epistle to Timothy.
All that means is that he does not know anything about the Scriptures! May I say the following in an effort to support you and your conclusions. Paul and NO one else would write a Christian document to a church unless that person was a saved man.
ALL of Romans was written after his conversion, and there is no indication whatsoever that Paul was speaking in the past tense.
Therefore, following the
basic rules of interpretation apply which prove that he is speaking about after he was saved.
Those eight rules are copied from the Apologetics Research page below and are:
1. The rule of DEFINITION: What does the passage mean?
2. The rule of USAGE: It must be remembered that the Old Testament was written originally by, to and for Jews.
3. CONTEXT. Every word you read must be understood in the light of the words that come before and after it.
4. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND. We must have some awareness of the life and society of the times in which the Scripture was written.
5. LOGIC. Does the interpretation make sense?
6. PRECEDENT. We must not violate the known usage of a word and invent another for which there is no precedent.
7. UNITY. Scripture being interpreted must be construed with reference to the significance of the whole.
8. INFERENCE: An inference is a fact reasonably implied from another fact. It is a logical consequence.