Scot,__I like what you point out and I raise it a little?__You landed on one of the most intriguing glimpses into Paul?s gospel and method. I am struck by his imperative ?Imitate me.? He does not say ?Believe what I taught you.? He then says that he is sending Timothy to remind them of ?my way of life in Christ Jesus.? He is not sending Timothy to parrot Paul?s teaching. Then, the clincher and note the order???my way of life?that agrees with what I teach in every church everywhere.?____It is an incarnated Gospel visible in Paul?s life. He unpacks his teaching from his way of life in Christ. This was Paul?s habit. And it is absolutely brilliant!__

John #1-
You do bring up a interesting point in regards to the importance of lifestyle as a mode of teaching, but Paul also does encourage people to remember what was taught.
2 Thess 2:13-15
“But we ought always to thank God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because from the beginning God chose you[b] to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth. He called you to this through our gospel, that you might share in the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the teachings[c] we passed on to you, whether by word of mouth or by letter.”
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20Thessalonians%202:13-15;&version=31;

Rick,
Paul teaches – and he expects people to remember. But he also models the whole gospel and teaches the whole gospel.
I think one of the key points here is that “making disciples” and teaching them to obey everything I (Jesus) have commanded you (Mt. 28:20) requires (1) being a disciple and (2) obeying the commands of Jesus.

RICK,
It is not either/or but you know and I know that the “teachings” part is played way out of hand in the USAmerican information-driven church rather than in vibrant transformational communities. Truth is to be incarnated…and not only in Jesus.

RJS and John-
I think we all are in agreement.
John- I have seen enough of your comments and posts to know that you do value verbal and written teaching, so I should have qualified my earlier comment with that.
My motive for bringing this up is that I have seen Christians abandon the verbal and written (including Scripture), and focus just on the modelling. They have made it an “either/or”, and so I just wanted to mention the need for both (the whole).

These sorts of passages are why I love Paul; he sees what God is doing in him and encourages others to follow the path that he is on. Can you imagine if someone who talked like Paul walked into bible study at most churches today? LOL, I don’t think he’d be real well received. One of my big pet peeves is church leaders who insist, “I’m struggling just like everyone else.” I do understand the desire not to be seen as an exotic creature living on a pedestal. But if you haven’t been down the road closer to God, and don’t think you’ll ever get much further than me, where exactly were you planning to lead me? We seem to have decided that as believers we can talk about ourselves as sinners(but not too bad, because we have to keep up appearances) saved by grace (not that we’re special or better than anyone else or anything). But it’s almost verboten to say, “I’m really a mess” or “I’ve been transformed by God and you should imitate me so God can transform you as well.” We seem to want people to stay in the comfortable mushy middle.

I think Paul’s encouragment to imitate him has to do with the struggles of the Corinthian Church. It is not the reception of the Gospel, that is their understanding of it, that is the problem, but how they are living it out (there are schisma’s among them). So Paul here lifts up his own life of denial of authoritative rights (see chp 9) as an example of how the gospel should be lived out in community. That is, living out the gospel should be about the upbuilding of the community. In other letters the issue is one of theology so he instructs in a way as to correct the theological problem (e.g. Galatians). But in 1 Cor. it really is an ekklesia problem not a specifically doctrinal problem. How the gospel should be lived out calls for powerful example rather than fancy rhetoric.