2nd Timothy 3 | Guard & Guide: Courage in a Collapsing Culture

It's been two weeks since I've been able to teach on a Sunday morning.

I've offered two weeks, but it was so good

to have Michael and Sean fill in for us about two weeks.

Yeah. Yeah, that was good.

Okay, listen.

Now just stop.

Listen, I gotta say this.

The Bible says a double minded person is unstable in all they do.

So either freaking commit to clapping or don't clap.

But we can't be like, thank you.

Right? Like.

Yeah.

So, like, if you're going to clap, like,

act like a mean, it it don't be double minded.

You're unstable.

It's like I don't it's that.

Okay, so let me start over.

It's been two weeks since I've been able to preach

on a Sunday morning, and I've missed you, but it's been so good.

For God to provide people like Michael and Sean to preach.

When I'm gone. Yeah.

Yeah.

Well done, well done. Much better.

Much better.

No double mindedness there.

But we're in second Timothy, chapter

three, and next week we're going to be in chapter four,

which will be the wrap up of our series through first and second Timothy,

and then after second Timothy four next week.

The following week, we're going to get into a, chapter by chapter

through the book of Ruth and I really excited to get into the book of Ruth.

Right after that will be our our birthday party.

And I'm excited to look at the book of Ruth leading

into our birthday party and what God has done over the past

20 years through our church, the Kingdom work that he's accomplished.

And so we're going to get there.

And I'm excited

about going through the Book of Ruth, but we're going to wrap up strong.

The book of Second Timothy. Now,

the occasion of the

writing of first and second Timothy was this.

It's part of what we call the pastoral epistles.

There's one other one called Titus, and these two were

letters written not to a church, but to an individual.

Timothy written to Timothy.

Titus written to Titus.

This is at the end of Paul's life.

He's in his 60s.

He's in the teen prison in Rome.

He knows he's going to be beheaded at any moment.

And he's passing on these final instructions to these young men

who are going to take over leadership and who are leading in churches,

that he helped establish.

Timothy is leading the church in Ephesus.

And this is Paul's final words to Timothy.

Timothy is to his his young protege that he's been mentoring and disciple

in for for years now.

And, and and Paul is saying, Tim, as you

continue to step into this leadership and as I'm getting ready

for the final command of God to be in heaven, as I'm finishing out

my earthly work, I want to impress upon you

both the time in which you are living

and the call of God on your life and, and, and, and,

and Paul says, Timothy, you've got to do two things really well.

You have to guard good doctrine.

You gotta guard the dark, the clear doctrine of Scripture,

and you have to guide people into it.

And that's why I titled this series when I created it, called Guard and Guide.

We're looking at, guarding good doctrine

and guiding people into it because the times and seasons will come

when the Bible says, Paul will say, people are not willing to endure

sound doctrine anymore.

And so

he's saying, Timothy, as you step into what God has called you,

and as I step out of this world, let me one more time

impress upon you the need

to guard good doctrine and guide people into it.

So the big idea for chapter three,

the one big idea for chapter three is this.

That the collapse of culture

is the disciples call to courage.

The culture in Paul, in Timothy's

day, was in a rapid decline.

It was in a rapid decline spiritually,

morally, ethically, politically.

This sound familiar to anybody?

And Paul is is going to tell Timothy, listen,

just because the culture is collapsing

all around you and all those ways is doesn't

it isn't the time for you

to bemoan it, to protest, to revolt, to post about it?

It's your clarion call to

courage in the midst of it.

And so similarly,

I don't care where you stand as far as your politics are concerned,

I think it's apparent to everybody that it feels as though

the culture in which we're living is on a steady

decline and collapse.

And for the Christ follower, it's a clarion call.

In the midst of that collapse to courage.

Now we're going to look at what that means.

Paul is going to outline first

the culture

and the signs of the times, if you will,

and then he's going to say, because this is what is happening.

This is who you are to become and what you are to do.

And so in verse one,

second Timothy three, verse one,

but understand this, that

in the last days there will come times of difficulty.

That sentence is pregnant with meaning and implication.

And so let me unpack it for you.

It says, understand this. Be aware, Timothy.

Keep your eyes wide open. Don't get duped

and into slumber about the times that we're in.

In the last days of the last days.

Well, the last day started.

The day Jesus ascended to heaven.

Now we're in more of the last days than they were then.

And we got some more last days to come.

But we are in the last days.

They will come.

Times of difficulty in the Greek

in Scripture there's two words used for time,

and those two words are chronos and kairos.

Chronos is chronological time, seconds to minutes, minutes

to hours, hours to days, days to weeks, weeks to months, months to years.

You understand chronology, correct?

The second word is kairos, which means seasons or epics.

When people talk about we're in a season of

these are the times up.

That's the Greek word kairos.

And what Paul is saying here in the last

days, there will be kairos, there will be seasons,

there will be epics, there will be seasons of difficulty.

And when he says the word difficulties using

the Greek word, that means there will be seasons,

epics that are hard to bear and that are trouble.

Some.

Embody.

So these are.

This is what the times, the season of the last times are going to be like.

And then in verses two, three, 4 or 5, I'm going to read them.

He talks about the character, the character of the parable

and the character of the parable is not in the times.

The character of the parable is in the people

of the times.

In chapter four, he's

going to tell us that in these last times

people will not endure sound doctrine anymore.

They will not endure biblical teaching, biblical doctrine.

They won't put up with it anymore.

There will be this epic,

this epic season where people will reject sound doctrine

and what they will desire are things that tickle their ears, he says

that they want to hear.

They'll change the truth and the doctrine of this

to fit what they want to hear, to fit their own narrative.

Do you realize this, that most people live in their own echo chambers,

and the only voices they hear are the ones that they speak?

And so what will happen in the last days?

He says people will reject this, and they'll just live in their own echo

chambers, where the voices they listen to are what they already believe.

That will be contrary to the solid doctrine of this.

And so what he's going to show us here

and we'll talk about this, is this truth that bad people make bad times.

Bad times don't make bad people.

He's going to say in these last days, they'll be coming season,

these epic seasons.

But these seasons are the result of bad hearts.

Bad hearts aren't the result of bad seasons.

And this is something we have to understand,

especially in our culture, in our day.

And I understand there are legitimately evil systems in institutions.

That is true.

But the thing we have to get clear,

according to sound doctrine

is that the problem is with hearts,

not with systems.

And the current culture wants to fix systems

without fixing hearts.

The problem is not

is that bad times make bad people.

The problem is that bad people make bad times.

Sinful hearts make sinful systems.

And we don't.

We don't, fix systems without first fixing individual hearts.

We don't fix systemic until we fix sin.

You follow.

But the current culture says it's the system that's wrong.

It's the systemic system.

It's the institution that's bad.

Let's come up with a new system.

Let's come up with an with all these things

that address the system because it's bad, it's evil, systemic.

That's not the solution.

It will only be fixed when the hearts

are healed.

That's biblical.

And so when we focus on the system and don't address

the individual heart, the system stays broken.

You understand?

Because how can a broken heart fix a broken system?

This is the difficulty just

this is the difficulty with socialism.

It's a difficulty with progressivism.

It's a difficulty with communism.

Because all those things say suggest.

If you think about it, the perfect system

will create goodness for the person.

The system is the solution.

And the Bible says no, no, no.

The person has to be redeemed

before the system

can be healed.

Does that make sense?

And so right off the bat,

Paul is really pushing against even the culture we live in now.

That is not the times that make people bad.

It's bad people that make bad times.

And he's going to say, okay, this is what it looks like,

this is what it looks like.

And the first thing, let me just read verses two through five for people.

He doesn't talk about the system.

He doesn't talk about the times.

He said there are bad seasons.

And then he talks about people.

For people will be lovers of self,

lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents,

ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unapproachable, slanderous,

without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless,

swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.

Having the appearance of godliness but denying its power.

Avoid such people.

The primary condition of the perilous times

is the sinfulness of man.

And the sinfulness of man starts

with the characteristic of being a lover of self.

And after the love of self.

He lists 20 evil characteristics that are the result of the love of self

and all of them can be seen in a bad culture, a declining culture,

because of the discrepancy and sinfulness

of the heart.

Love of self

culture is curated to help me, love me,

and I want to be careful

as I teach scripture that I don't.

Divert into my opinion,

but I want to discern the times

and discern Scripture and rightly divide it.

Understanding the times.

And comments about times according to Scripture.

And so.

So let me just let me just I want to be careful, but I want

but I wanted to serve our times really, really, really well

because in the last days, people be lovers of themselves.

Our culture is curated

for me to love me.

Our culture is curated for me

to celebrate the self, myself.

And so just I love you, but please hear what I'm saying.

And no, it's coming from from from a heart that cares about you

and cares about your kids and cares about our culture.

Who cares about our church

because our culture is curated

to help me, love me.

This is what drives most social media.

Social media is curated

so that I can tell you how much I love me,

and I can convince you to love me as much as I love me.

That's at the heart of social media.

I love me so much.

I want to give you the opportunity to love me as much as I love me.

And I love me so much, and I love what I get to do so much.

I want to give you the opportunity

to give me thumbs up and like to tell me how much you love me to.

Feel right.

It's designed to celebrate the self

because I love myself and my life so much.

I want to give you the opportunity

to love me and my life as much.

There's

a lot of good, and so there can be a lot of good social media,

but we have to be very careful

about how we use it and how we model it,

especially for our children.

The love of self, the celebration of self.

It's a very dangerous place to be.

I read a study this past week when I was gone

and I want to share it with you.

The study I read says this that world wide.

Regarding the

the our educational system, math sciences,

and and the like

The nations that rank in the top eight.

Can you get some

China, Japan, Singapore?

India. Top eight.

The United States

ranks 35th.

But there's one area

the United States in students ranked number one

in self esteem.

So what we've done is we created a culture that loves self

so much we might not be very bright, but we sure

feel good about ourselves.

Right.

And so what I'm saying is

we got to be very careful.

My concern is that we have, as Christians

who have bought in into the same system

of love, of self,

and we plaster it all over the

our social media, just like.

And we've allowed our kids

to we've caused our kids to buy into the same system.

And it's the first sign of the end times

of a decaying and decrepit, sinful culture.

Got to be very careful. Yeah.

You okay?

Christian,

change the way you use social media.

Do I need to say any more about that?

Is the doctrine clear?

Yes. And out of that,

he list 20 evil results.

And so as we look at these, let's understand the times aren't evil.

Hearts are.

And the evil hearts start with self-love.

Yeah.

And that's why it doesn't look so evil.

Oh, that's why it doesn't look so evil.

Because it's not like.

It's like, you know, demonic.

It doesn't look that way.

That's the first sign of an evil, declining culture.

And that leads to this.

The ones who love themselves,

then it this lovers of money.

Let me just stop right there.

See, when I love myself, I'm going to love money.

Because money allows myself

all the things my self desires.

You follow.

And the interesting thing about loving money is you don't have to be rich,

love money.

Poor people can love money, which is really dangerous

because some people who are poor love money.

They get more poor.

Because we've created this thing called credit.

But it's equally as bad when rich people love money.

Because when rich people love money, they become even more materialistic

unless their hearts have been redeemed.

See, money is interesting.

Money is amoral.

Money has no morals.

Money is neither good nor bad.

Money is money.

Money is amoral.

Money doesn't have a moral good or a moral bad.

Money just reveals morals and reveals priorities.

Money is an amplifier of what's already there. God

sometimes

money is a sign of God's blessing.

Not all the time, but for the heart that has been redeemed.

God sometimes allows that person

to have a lot of money, because God knows that that redeemed heart

is going to use that money to further the kingdom of God.

And sometimes God blesses

some of his kids with the ability to make money

better than some others can,

because he trust them to leverage that money

to kingdom building, not for their own enjoyment

and those whose hearts have been redeemed will leverage their finances

towards Kingdom.

Because he love Kingdom more than self.

The Bible doesn't say the love of money, like money is the root of evil.

You know what the root of evil is? Satan.

The root of evil is the devil.

What the Bible says is the love of money

is a root of all kinds of evil.

And so it comes with some dangers, certainly,

but it's only dangerous for those who love themselves.

Because when I love myself, my money is my money that will spend

on my desires rather than leverage it for kingdom advancement.

You follow.

Okay, so that's the first thing.

Lovers of money.

Then it says proud, arrogant, abusive,

disobedient to their parents.

Pride and arrogance are the natural result.

When I think more highly of me than I think of you, when I love me

more than I love you, I will be very proud and I will be very arrogant. Why?

Because I like me more than I like you.

They will be abusive and disobedient.

Well, that makes sense.

Because if I love me more than I love you, I will abuse you.

Because I don't love you.

And when I love me more than I love you,

I will disrespect authority that's been given over me.

Because when I love me more than I love the authority

that God has placed over me, I will tell that authority.

No, you got no right to tell me whatever right.

Do you see how all of this flows

out of love of self?

And it's a sign of deteriorating.

And it came times.

Do you see that?

There will be ungrateful.

Unholy.

You don't want us to be ungrateful, right?

Not to be grateful.

That's what it means.

Okay, you know what it is to be unholy, right?

Not to be holy.

Some of this stuff is really easy to understand.

Heartless and peaceable.

Heartless means lacking love.

Just seasons where people don't.

They lack love anymore.

Like they certainly don't love God.

And so he talks about.

And a peaceable,

unforgiving.

That's what that means.

These last times will be characterized by people

because they love themself, cannot and will not forgive you

because you love yourself so much, you cannot and will not forgive them.

You'll carry the grudge, will carry the hurt because you love you so much.

They don't deserve.

You understand?

Slanderous.

You're not slanders.

Slander is telling untruths.

Show that my opponent is destroyed.

That's what slander is.

Doing are you?

Be old enough to remember when politicians in our country could be.

You could disagree without being disagreeable.

Are you old enough to remember those times?

Yeah. There used to be some civility.

Now you look at the world stage,

it's nothing but slanderous on both sides.

Both sides.

The right and left Republican do are all equally evil, equally at fault in this.

All they want to do is slander, even use untruth to discredit their opponent.

That's all they care about, right?

It's a slanderous soundbite.

It's a slanderous headline.

Now, it's easy to see on the political roll.

But how about me and you?

When I'm

willing to pass on truths that I'm not sure of,

untruths, even truths I have no business

passing on to discredit somebody else.

Slanderous.

It's a sign of the, of the decline

in culture.

Without self-control.

When Paul uses without self-control,

it means that what controls me is stimuli that's outside of me.

It means that I am no longer in control

of my actions, my desires, what I do, who I am.

I'm controlled by things outside of me,

and I have no control on the inside of me.

Here it is in a nutshell, is the inability

to hear no.

It's the inability to hear no,

you will not.

Doesn't that sound like our culture?

Who tells kids no anymore,

with any semblance of authority without their parents pushback?

Will parents tell their kids no, I don't have to give you a reason.

The answer is no, and I'm not.

Count to three and giving you three chances to disobey me like that.

Do you know one of the fruit of the spirit?

Part of that is self-control?

You have to be very careful.

Brutal.

Not loving. Good.

Treacherous. Reckless.

Swollen with conceit.

Lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.

All of this, he wraps up.

He says this.

Having the appearance of godliness but denying its power.

They look like good people.

They look like good church folk.

They're.

They look like religious people.

And they appear like they're godly.

But they deny the power of godliness,

the power of God to rebuke their error,

to correct their way of life, and to live in a godly way.

They deny that right in that power of God to do that in their lives.

They look good.

But their hearts are far from God.

And to all these people,

Paul's instructions is what?

To avoid them.

To avoid them.

We've got to be very careful

about the people we let closest to us,

because the ones we like, closest to us

will have a shaping, determining impact on who we become.

Charles Tremendous Jones, you years ago, one of my favorite quote

says this the difference between who you and I are, the person now

and who will be in five years comes in two things.

The books we read

and the people we most closely associate with.

That's the determining factor in

who we between who we are now and who will be in five years.

He said it years, decades ago.

It still rings true today.

Be very careful about the people you like closest into your world,

who let talk in your ears.

Paul will say to the church in Corinth, bad company corrupts good character.

This is the Christian parent's

greatest fear and send their kids to college.

Because college professors do not have

your children's best interests at heart, most of the time,

at least doctrinally.

Verse six.

For among them are those who creep in the house schools.

This is just kind of bear with me in this.

I'll I'll explain what it means.

They creep into households

and capture weak women burdened with sins and led them astray by various passions,

always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth.

When Paul was writing this to Timothy, the culture was

such as men would be out doing jobs, women would stay home.

That was the culture back then. Okay?

And so he said, what's happening in that culture

is that when these women would stay home

and they would gather together, these nefarious evil men

would infiltrate them and their lives

and do one of two things

either lead them away,

into, romance

and passion, away from their husbands and families,

or would lead them into self-indulgence.

And the love of self is basically what he's saying here is be very careful,

because there are nefarious, evil people out there

who will lead you away into passions.

And this and self-indulgence

and loving yourself more than loving God.

Be very careful.

And that was happening back then

in the context of this community to which Paul was writing.

And he says they they, they seem to be always learning,

but they're unable to come to a knowledge of the truth

because they diverted from this.

And when we divert from this, it's easy

to be convinced of other things.

And then he references verse eight, just as Janice and John as opposed Moses.

So these men also oppose the truth.

Men corrupted in mind, disqualified.

Regarding the faith, but they will not get very far,

for their folly will be plain to all, as was that of those two men.

He references. Janice and Jabra's.

This is the only place in Scripture where these two names are listed.

History and tradition tells us

that these two, Janice and Jabra's, opposed Moses.

These were the two magicians that mimicked

the miracles of Moses and Aaron before Pharaoh.

When Moses and Aaron were trying to convince Pharaoh

by the spear and power of God to let his people go.

And if you remember the story at all in Exodus seven and eight,

when Moses and Aaron first approached Pharaoh,

Moses has the staff frozen on the ground and becomes a snake,

picks it up and it becomes a staff.

And Pharaoh says, big deal.

My magicians can do the same.

They're magicians.

Come out, jettison chambers, take sticks, throw it on the ground.

They become snakes.

And so they replicated God's work.

It looked just like God's work.

But in the end, God said, okay, do it again.

Moses. And then Moses, a snake.

They're snakes.

It's like, ha! God! Gotcha.

And then in the first plague, when Moses

struck the wall of the Nile and turned the water, it turned into blood.

Pharaoh called his magicians Jonathan Chambers.

And they did the same thing.

And so they mimic the work of God.

But here's what I want you to understand.

Evil mimicked the work of God.

Here's what we have to get, though Janice Chambers

had some authority and had some power, they could only work.

Works of destruction and peril.

They couldn't make that destruction and peril relent and stop.

They couldn't solve anything. They could just create problems.

They couldn't

turn the water back, the the blood back into water.

They couldn't make the frogs leave.

They couldn't do any of that.

They mimicked the power, but it only worked for their destruction.

Here's what sin will do.

Sin will have an effect on your life,

but it will only have an effect

of destruction, not of betterment.

We have to understand that

it'll take you places you want to go.

It'll make you stay longer and stay in.

It'll cost you more than you want to spend and it will never relent.

It will always at peril.

Janice and Jabra's

sin will promise better and deliver worse.

And after the second miracle, these magicians

could not replicate the work of God anymore.

They were powerless

because

God started to create things that turn the dust into gnats,

created life out of nothing, and evil, does not have the power to create life.

It only has the power to destroy.

And so we have to be very careful.

And the warning is this

unchecked sin,

what you allow today will dominate your tomorrow.

If it's unchecked and unrepentant, what you allow today

will dominate your tomorrow with no hope of rescue.

Apart from Christ.

Let me go on verse ten.

You however.

And so he said, Timothy, this is the season that you're living in.

Does that season sound familiar to us?

As far as hearts of people are concerned,

so is that though that's the season you're living in.

You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life,

my faith, my patience,

my love, my steadfastness, my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me

at Antioch, Iconium and Lystra, which persecutions I endured.

Yet from them all the Lord rescued me his way, saying,

he said, that might be the culture, and it may be on the decline,

and it may be decaying.

That may be the case, but you

you must be different.

This is follow.

What's the first thing says, follow my teaching.

That's the word doctrine.

Follow my doctrine.

You're going to hear all these other voices, say all these other things

and speak into yours.

All this other stuff don't deferred from this.

This is the doctrine that you have to follow.

Timothy, in order for you to be courageous in a corrupt, decaying culture,

you have to remember this, follow this.

And then he says, follow my conduct, literally my discipline.

Paul was an exceptionally disciplined individual,

and part of the problem in our lives

is that we lack discipline right?

We all know things we should do,

shouldn't do, want to do, don't want to do different.

And we don't.

Not because we like the power of God by his grace to do it,

because we don't lack discipline to make ourselves.

You understand?

So Paul is saying, follow my doctrine, follow my discipline.

Wouldn't it be great if you and I could say to those, watch us

look and just follow my discipline?

Right, right.

Follow my aim in life.

Literally follow my purpose.

My purpose is kingdom advancement.

That's my purpose.

And so we'll do whatever we gotta do

for the advancement of the kingdom of God.

Follow my teaching, follow my doctrine.

Follow my purpose.

Follow my faith. Follow my patience.

Follow my love. Follow my steadfast.

Follow me.

Here's a question I want to ask you.

Here's a question.

If someone followed you for the next 24 hours,

would they naturally find Jesus?

From now until 1130 tomorrow,

if they followed you for 24 hours, would they automatically

find Christ?

That's what Paul saying.

In a culture that's declining and decaying.

But look at what he says in

and follow my persecutions and sufferings.

Welcome to Christianity. You know.

That happened to me at Antioch, Iconium, and I at Antioch.

He was kicked out of the synagogue for talking about Jesus.

He kicked him out of church because he talked about Jesus too much.

They rejected him.

He faced rejection at Iconium.

They want to Stoneham at last year they did stone him

to the point they thought he was dead, in a coma.

Do you know?

Do you know how they do?

You know what they use when they stone people?

Stones.

And they would target the head

and cause such internal damage that a dead person would die.

So they did this to Paul to the point where he was

they thought he was dead, in a coma.

So you can imagine what happened to, I imagine, Paul in my sanctified

imagination, as he's writing with these scars

and the eye that doesn't open all the way, and the nose that's still crooked,

and the ear that's kind of lower because it didn't heal right,

and the lip because it's all busted and missing some teeth.

That's what happened.

He says, I want you to follow me.

Am I suffering?

You know why?

Because out of all those,

out of all those, the Lord rescued me.

Here's what Paul knew that we forget.

As long as I have a command of God and fulfilling that command,

I am absolutely invincible. I am.

As long as I am fulfilling

the call of God on my life, I am invincible.

Until I have completed that call, I have run the race.

I finish the fight. You.

Do understand.

Understand.

And verse 12, indeed, all who desire to live

a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.

You. This is part and part.

Here's the thing.

In America we have trouble with this verse because we get to choose

the level of our suffering and the degree of our persecution.

And most of us, I understand, choose none rather than some.

But he says, the Christ follower

who is living a godly life will face

persecution, will suffer, or it will cost something.

And so the question for me

and you is to what degree am I choosing to suffer?

What degree am I choosing and allowing myself to be persecuted?

What Paul says is this is where there is no sacrifice.

There is no discipleship.

Instead of insulate ourselves from every difficulty

and every ill and every threat

and every peril, God has said, you must.

If you're going to follow my son, carry the cross, submit to me,

and you must put yourselves in positions

of sacrifice and suffer and persecution

for the sake of the name of Christ is what he says.

Amen, Amen.

And if you desire to live that way, you will choose

some persecution, some suffering.

Amen.

Jesus never said, follow me until it hurts.

He didn't say that.

The truth is this

that if it costs you nothing, it's not Christ like.

Physically.

Reputation, friends, money.

Comfort never produced a disciple.

Some of you need a screenshot that some in art that down.

Some of you put that on your your desk at work,

your desk or your car

mirror at home.

Well, evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse.

It's going to get bad.

It's going to get worse, he says, deceiving and B

indices are full in themselves.

Don't be fooled by them.

But as for you, continue and what you've learned

and firmly believe knowing from whom you learned it and how.

From childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings

which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus.

It's bad.

It's going to get worse.

Here's his word, Timothy.

Here's his word flip side.

Here's his word.

Oh, you Christ follower. Continue.

You don't back off, don't back up, don't give up.

Don't back down. Continue.

Continue. Continue.

Don't let off the throttle.

Don't take it easy.

Don't seek your comfort.

Continue. Continue.

And then he says, don't just continue.

He says continue in the sacred writings.

Continue in the word

because everybody else and everything else are going to divert from this, he says.

Timothy, the only way you're going to be courageous in a corrupt and decaying

culture is if you continue in the word,

continue in this, in the sacred writings.

Listen, we cannot love who we do not know.

And the only way we know God and the character of God

is through his revealed word.

It's not through your experience.

It's not through your desire.

It's through

the Word of God that we know God and we cannot love who we do not know.

And we cannot know God without knowing His Word.

We gotta get this.

Scripture has always been

of utmost importance for the disciple of Jesus.

It's this, and it's this.

Here, and it's this here.

And when this is here and this is here, it makes me courageous

in the face of a decaying, declining, evil culture that's going to hell.

And how about I'm not worried? Yeah.

I'm courageous.

The reason

this is so important is because this.

Listen to me right now, this is the God

breathed breath.

This is God's breath.

Let me prove it to you.

Look at the next verse.

All Scripture is breathed out by God.

This is God's breath.

And this right here, the breath of God,

this right here.

He says it's profitable for teaching.

That's doctrine.

It's good for you for doctrine,

for reproof, correction, and for training and righteousness.

So this right here, this is good for you.

For the first, the it has a four fold purpose.

The first is teaching. The first is doctrine.

This is good doctrine. This is solid doctrine.

And what this doctrine will do, the first word is rebuke.

That's what reproof.

It will rebuke, it will rebuke and call out error.

It will rebuke wrong, it will rebuke deceit,

it will rebuke that which is error in my life and in your life.

And when it calls out and rebukes that which is evil and wrong, then it correct.

It says that it was wrong

and this is the right way to live and to become a righteous person.

So this is profitable.

This doctrine is profitable to rebuke what is wrong and evil to me,

and then to give me correction in me so that I am trained for every good work.

This right here.

So Timothy, so church, don't back off of this.

This will teach you good doctrine.

And in that teaching it will rebuke what is wrong.

Listen, in last days people will not contend with good doctor

because they don't want to be rebuked. Don't be one of them.

Let this rebuke what is wrong.

So then it could correct and give you the right path so that you will be trained.

Why is it important for you to be trained? Thank you for asking that.

You may, verse 17, be complete and equipped for every good work.

When Paul says that this doctrine

will rebuke what's wrong, will correct,

living will train you, you will become complete.

That's the Greek word pathos, which means you will have

special aptitude for God specific uses.

So when you let the Bible, the doctrine, hear, rebuke,

what's wrong, correct, and give you a new good way, train you.

You then become endowed with a special aptitude for the specific use.

God wants you to live and you will be then

be equipped, which means thoroughly furnished.

It implies fully capable to do

all the work God has asked you to do in the face of it.

He came decrepit culture.

Do you understand? Understand.

So able to do.

Fully equipped for every good work.

Ephesians 210.

Don't you know, my friends, that you are God's workmanship, created in

Christ Jesus to do good works which he created for you to do in advance?

He's already created you to do good works, and you are fully equipped

and empowered and endowed with the special abilities of God

to be that in a decrepit, decaying, fallen culture.

As you allow the doctrine of God, the Scripture to rebuke the error,

to correct into new and right ways so that he trains us.

And when that happens.

Courageous living

and a decaying culture.

That's the clarion call for the disciple you

and every great thing that God wants to do.

He has tied to you and me.

Every great thing God wants to do in this culture, in this world,

is tied to people like you and me.

And that is why, dear Christian,

it is so important.

To follow this doctrine, the commands of God.

And that is why, oh dear friend,

who have not given yourself to Jesus.

There is no hope otherwise.

There's no solution otherwise.

Why don't you pray with me?

Father.

Thank you.

Thank thank you for your word.

Thank you

that it does

rebuke and correct and train us

if we allow it to.

And so, father, I thank you that in the midst of a

a culture, in a world that

is in just such peril.

Globally, politically, personally,

in every way.

Thank you that you've called us.

Not in

not in anger and opposition, but just in submission

to you and your word to to be courageous in the midst of it.

Father, we understand that that will only happen

as we allow your word to rebuke error in us,

to give us a correct way

so we can be trained in your way here.

And so, father, I pray you hear these hearts this morning.

And, friends, I want to give you the opportunity

to align yourself with the Word of God.

And maybe you need to ask

Holy Spirit or Spirit

what it mean needs to be rebuked

or call it out.

I don't want to be one of

those that rejects the doctrine.

I don't want to be one of those that just.

Here's what I want to hear.

So I give you permission to call out in me

what needs to be rebuked here.

And in response to that, correct me.

Correct.

Change my mind.

Tell them.

Say I want to be trained for every good work you've created for me to do.

I want to do it.

I want to be on mission with you, for you.

I want to be invincible.

And I've completed my last command.

And so this morning, father,

I submit to you and your word.

I submit to you and your word.

Jesus, we love you.

Father, help us to love you more.

We choose you.

You're the forgiver of our sin.

You're the lover of our soul, the sanctifier of our life.

And we choose you.

In your name I pray. Amen.

Amen. Listen, I love you.

You okay? You all right?

Now, listen.

Paul is going to lay it down one more time in chapter four.

So this week, read chapter three

and read chapter four to get ready for next week.

All right. You can do that. Okay.

Now we're going to have a baptism in a little while.

Over at my house there's 20 plus people getting baptized.

And so come and celebrate that man.

It's going to be a great celebration.

Allies who are saying, okay, here's my public profession.

It needs to be celebrated with each other.

I invite you all over.

He'll have a good time together.

We're good.

I told you, I've been off for two weeks. Ali. So as

as if this were anything abnormal.

Right?

So it's just what I do. So let's sing one more song. Ali.